About this picture: Saut-d'Eau Vodou practitioners
Saut-d'Eau is a municipality in the Mirebalais Arrondissement, in the Centre Department of Haiti.
It has 34, 885 inhabitants.
Saut-d'Eau is French for 'waterfall', named after a large waterfall called 'Le Saut'.
The area of Saut-d'Eau holds cultural significance in Haiti, to both Catholic and Vodou practitioners.
In the 19th century, it is believed that the Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel (or the closely associated Vodou Lwa, Erzulie Dantor) appeared on a palm tree there.
A French priest, afraid of the superstition this would inspire, cut the tree down, but it nonetheless became an important religious destination for Haitians, akin to the Virgin of Guadalupe in Mexico.
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