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Speaker 1: Our world is full of the unexplainable, and if history

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Speaker 1: is an open book, all of these amazing tales right

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Speaker 1: there on display, just waiting for us to explore. Welcome

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Speaker 1: to the Cabinet of Curiosities. Fairies as we know them

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Speaker 1: today are a composite of centuries of influence from all

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Speaker 1: over the world. The Scandinavian fairies were portrayed as elves.

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Speaker 1: In Irish folklore, they were described as little folk. Some

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Speaker 1: regions painted them as demons or fallen angels. Although there

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Speaker 1: isn't one definitive origin of fairy folklore, certain characteristics are

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Speaker 1: shared among several cultures. For example, fairies are often depicted

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Speaker 1: as magical beings, curious of their surroundings and wary of humans.

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Speaker 1: They can be mischievous, too, often tangling people's hair as

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Speaker 1: they sleep or stealing small items. More serious conditions used

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Speaker 1: to be blamed on fairies as well, such as tuberculosis.

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Speaker 1: It was once thought that the impish creatures had forced

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Speaker 1: young people to party the night away until they were

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Speaker 1: weak from exhaustion, causing the disease, and they were protective too,

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Speaker 1: of their homes, of the environment, and of themselves. Interloping

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Speaker 1: humans who threatened their way of life, tended to find

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Speaker 1: themselves the victims of a fairi's ill will. In the

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Speaker 1: mountain town of Slavonia, Croatia, there is a castle, well

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Speaker 1: what's left of it, anyway. First mentions of a date

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Speaker 1: back to the mid thirteenth century, more of a walled

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Speaker 1: city than a pure castle. The ruins today spread out

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Speaker 1: across eighties six thousand square feet. When viewed from above,

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Speaker 1: the surrounding forest looks to be swallowing the stone structure,

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Speaker 1: perhaps retribution for what occurred here centuries earlier. According to

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Speaker 1: the stories, a nobleman from the area had chosen this

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Speaker 1: on Papook Mountain as a place to construct his castle.

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Speaker 1: High up and far from the town below, he would

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Speaker 1: be able to see invaders approaching in the distance and

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Speaker 1: protect himself. However, the nobleman ran into a problem. A

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Speaker 1: site on which he had chosen to build his fortress

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Speaker 1: didn't belong to him, at least not in the eyes

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Speaker 1: of the fairies who had already been living there. They've

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Speaker 1: been using the spot as a gathering place to make

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Speaker 1: potions and hated the idea of seeing destroyed by such

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Speaker 1: a massive intrusion, so they did what fairies do best,

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Speaker 1: they started to mess things up. As construction got underway.

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Speaker 1: Builders noticed that their handiwork that they had completed the

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Speaker 1: day before would be completely destroyed by the following morning.

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Speaker 1: No matter how far they got, the fairies managed to

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Speaker 1: undo all of it, setting construction back for weeks. The nobleman, however,

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Speaker 1: refused to budge. He would not find another spot for

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Speaker 1: his castle, nor would he cease construction. Instead, he put

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Speaker 1: up a net. It surrounded the perimeter of the build

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Speaker 1: site and protected the workers from the fairies meddling. One fairy, however,

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Speaker 1: trying to break through the net. Her name was Ruzka,

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Speaker 1: and she had gotten her long beautiful hair tangled up

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Speaker 1: in it, trapping her there. The nobleman caught Ruzka the

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Speaker 1: next day, but rather than letting her go, he decided

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Speaker 1: to make an example of her. He buried the faery

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Speaker 1: deep in the ground as part of the castle's foundation.

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Speaker 1: From that point on, there was no going back. The

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Speaker 1: nobleman and the fairies were at war. They cursed him

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Speaker 1: and his construction site, which the nobleman didn't think too

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Speaker 1: much about. After all, he'd caught and killed one of

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Speaker 1: them already, and he'd taken their homeland. There wasn't much

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Speaker 1: else they could do. The builders continued uninterrupted, returning each

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Speaker 1: morning to see their work exactly as they'd left it

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Speaker 1: the day before. The castle was eventually completed and it

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Speaker 1: was clear that the nobleman had won. He called his

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Speaker 1: new home Ruzicka Grad, a lasting testament to his brilliant

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Speaker 1: scheme to outsmart the fairies that had tormented him early

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Speaker 1: on during construction. As far as he was concerned, their

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Speaker 1: curse had been nothing but hot air, the desperate attempts

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Speaker 1: of wild creatures to hold onto what never belonged to

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Speaker 1: them in the first place. But the Nobleman's joy was

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Speaker 1: short lived. Trumpets blared, celebrating the completion of the fortress

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Speaker 1: to all of Slavonia. Then a stone came loose from above.

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Speaker 1: It fell and struck the nobleman dead. He'd had no children,

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Speaker 1: and the royal bloodline had ended with him. Perhaps the

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Speaker 1: fairies curse had been present all along. Since then, Razka

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Speaker 1: Grad has slowly rotted away to a hollow stone husk,

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Speaker 1: almost entirely consumed by trees. Eventually it will be reclaimed

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Speaker 1: by the mountain, and the land will one day return

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Speaker 1: to its former Glory, just like the fairies had wanted

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Speaker 1: all along. Read any comic book or watch any superhero movie,

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Speaker 1: and you're likely to see a familiar story play out

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Speaker 1: each time a regular person like you or me is

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Speaker 1: suddenly endowed with special powers after experiencing some kind of trauma.

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Speaker 1: Perhaps they've been bitten by a radioactive spider or injected

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Speaker 1: with the super serum, and suddenly they're able to climb

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Speaker 1: walls and lift hundreds of pounds without a struggle. But

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Speaker 1: those are just make believe stories meant to entertain, and

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Speaker 1: on more than one occasion, inspire. After all, it's not

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Speaker 1: the powers that make these characters heroic, but what's inside them.

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Speaker 1: In Orthopedic surgeon Anthony Sikoria was an average family man

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Speaker 1: from upstate New York when he was struck by lightning.

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Speaker 1: He just walked away from a public phone booth after

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Speaker 1: hanging up a call. A woman who had been waiting

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Speaker 1: to use the phone happened to be an intensive care

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Speaker 1: unit nurse and helped him as they waited for paramedics

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Speaker 1: to arrive. The bolt of lightning had struck him in

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Speaker 1: the face and exited through his left foot, both of

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Speaker 1: which were burned badly for Tony. The incident was an

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Speaker 1: out of body experience. According to the statement he gave

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Speaker 1: the press, he watched himself from above and saw his

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Speaker 1: body surrounded by bluish white light. A wave of peace

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Speaker 1: came over him before he was brought back to the

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Speaker 1: world of the living. As he recovered, he could tell

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Speaker 1: his memory wasn't what it used to be. He consulted

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Speaker 1: a neurologist who performed a series of scans on his brain,

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Speaker 1: but they didn't see anything out of the ordinary. Several

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Speaker 1: weeks passed by, and the memory problems seemed to resolve

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Speaker 1: itself on its own. But something else had awakened inside him.

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Speaker 1: When he was younger, his musical tastes had extended to

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Speaker 1: rocket roll and not much else. Now, however, he found

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Speaker 1: himself addicted to classical piano music, though listening wasn't enough

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Speaker 1: for him. Secoria, who had never touched an instrument before

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Speaker 1: in his life, was suddenly compelled to play the piano.

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Speaker 1: He ordered sheet music for pieces by Chopin, his favorite composer,

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Speaker 1: and brought a piano into the house to teach himself

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Speaker 1: how to play. The lessons started out difficult, and his

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Speaker 1: fingers didn't move the way he wanted them to. But

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Speaker 1: as he played, he discovered his obsession went even deeper

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Speaker 1: than he'd thought. He'd wake up in the middle of

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Speaker 1: the night with melodies he just had to get down

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Speaker 1: on paper, even though he really didn't know how to

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Speaker 1: write them down yet. He'd play for hours before he

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Speaker 1: had to leave for work, then come home and plunk

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Speaker 1: out his songs until bedtime. His progress moved at an

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Speaker 1: incredible pace. The term that the doctors had for Tony

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Speaker 1: was acquired savant, and his skills earned him performances in

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Speaker 1: theaters all over the United States, on television, and interviews

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Speaker 1: in countless books and magazines. He even released a CD

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Speaker 1: in two thousand eight entitled Notes from an Accidental Pianist.

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Speaker 1: But Tony's accomplishments were only the tip of the iceberg.

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Speaker 1: Sudden jolts of electricity have affected people all over the

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Speaker 1: world in different ways. A great example is Julia Vorobieva,

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Speaker 1: who was working in a Ukrainian mine in June of

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Speaker 1: nine seven when she was zapped by three volts from

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Speaker 1: her mining equipment. She was pronounced dead and brought to

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Speaker 1: the mortuary, where her body remained on the table for

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Speaker 1: two days awaiting a medical examiner. When the emmy finally

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Speaker 1: arrived to perform her autopsy, he made a single incision.

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Speaker 1: Blood poured from the wound, and that shouldn't have happened

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Speaker 1: with a dead person, And then the body started to shake.

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Speaker 1: Julia wasn't dead after all. It took her six months

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Speaker 1: to fully recover, but she found that she was unable

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Speaker 1: to sleep at night. No matter what she tried, her

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Speaker 1: body could not calm itself. Then one night, she finally

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Speaker 1: slept for hours without interruption. She woke up the next

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Speaker 1: day a new woman, as though the electricity that had

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Speaker 1: been bouncing around inside her had finally settled down. What

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Speaker 1: Julia didn't realize, however, was that the electric shock she

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Speaker 1: had endured had changed her her way to buy bread.

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Speaker 1: That day, she looked over at a woman waiting for

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Speaker 1: the bus and witnessed a horrifying site. Her intestines were

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Speaker 1: completely visible. There was still inside her body, but Julia

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Speaker 1: could see them clearly, even though no one else could.

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Speaker 1: A reporter followed her for the local paper, and she

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Speaker 1: was able to see what he'd eaten for lunch, working

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Speaker 1: its way through his stomach. Her new talent earned her

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Speaker 1: a position at the Ukrainian hospital where she could look

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Speaker 1: into a person's body and see what was ailing them.

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Speaker 1: According to one doctor, Julia never made a single mistake

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Speaker 1: when using her X ray vision, which might be the

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Speaker 1: most shocking thing of all. I hope you've enjoyed today's

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Speaker 1: guided tour of the Cabinet of Curiosities. Subscribe for free

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Speaker 1: on Apple Podcasts, or learn more about the show by

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Speaker 1: visiting Curiosities podcast dot com. The show was created by

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Speaker 1: me Aaron Manky in partnership with how Stuff Works. I

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Speaker 1: make another award when show called Lore, which is a podcast,

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Speaker 1: book series, and television show and you can learn all

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Speaker 1: about it over at the World of Lore dot com.

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Speaker 1: And until next time, stay curious. Yeah,