"Hoodoo broadcasts the beauty and power of black culture at its root." Practicing a mix of Hoodoo, Puerto Rican Spiritualism, and West African traditional religions, she incorporates different aspects of her heritage into her magic. "Hoodoo is the power of intention, confidence, and faith manifested," she explains. For her, Hoodoo means "making something out of nothing." She uses the magical practice for herself and her clients as a way to overcome obstacles and attempt to gain a desired outcome with the help of spirits. People come to her when they're in need of anything from love spells to healing and energy work to personal protection.
In "real life," Kongo is based in Illinois, and she offers candle work, spiritual baths, crystal consultations, and other services to her clients that seek her spiritual guidance. Where black imagery is rare on the typical "witchy" blog that curates pastel photos of crystals and moon cycles, on Kongo's blog it abounds. I found Kongo through her Tumblr, Kalunga Avenue, where she blogs about Hoodoo and the importance of its tradition and ancestry. "Without an African ancestral link, the practice becomes something other than Hoodoo," says Madame Omi Kongo, a rootworker who comes from a long line of female practitioners. Today, this manifests in reblogging sigils-a painted symbol said to have magical powers-like that which circulated on Tumblr among Hoodoo practitioners to protect the people of Ferguson during the unrest following police violence and the killing of Mike Brown in the summer of 2014.
Common rituals include carrying "a little bag of garlic and brimstone on the person to safeguard you" and walking backward into your house and then forward to ensure that no one will harm you, Hurston writes in Hoodoo in America. This is particularly apparent in the specific uses for Hoodoo spells, many of which are for security, stemming from the violence and disregard that enslaved blacks endured.
Though Hoodoo itself (not to be confused with Voodoo) stems from an appropriation of sorts, the southern folk magic is still intimately tied to its uniquely African American history. Watch Now: Meet the Vodou Priestess Summoning Healing Spirits in Post-Earthquake Haiti In New Orleans, for example, she writes, rootworkers incorporated altars, holy water, and blessed oils from the Catholic church. According to the iconic author and folklorist Zora Neale Hurston, who embedded herself in the Hoodoo culture of the South in the 1930s and wrote about its history, the practice itself evolved from a combination of African spirituality and Christian rituals that slaves newly encountered in the Americas.
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