One of SA's most famous witches sent a Pick n Pay cashier running for the hills - without lifting a finger or casting a spell.
Donna "Darkwolf" Vos, who describes herself as the high priestess of the Circle of the African Moon, left the cashier in a tailspin recently when she wore a pentagram - a five-pointed star - around her neck on a shopping trip in Cape Town. Vos said that the cashier "muttered that the blood of Christ be upon her and went running from the till in tears".
The cashier's reaction has since led to the owner of the shop to issue a written apology to Vos.
In his letter, Graham Pateras said it was not policy to "discriminate against any person on the basis of colour, creed or religious beliefs".
He told the Sunday Times the incident was "regrettable and definitely out of character". He also said the pentagram had brought back a "trauma from the woman's past".
But the priestess said the cashier's behaviour smacked of ignorance and religious intolerance .
Vos came out as a witch 15 years ago and has become a full-time teacher of the belief system.
Speaking from her home in Cape Town, she said she wore the silver pentagram to symbolise her religion.
"I have come to realise that the intolerance to paganism exists mostly in white communities," she said. "Paganism was practised in Europe before Christianity. It's nature-based religions that Christianity has always sought to suppress, but pagans had such strong beliefs, they could not be suppressed ... there are witches everywhere."
Another witch, Amethyst Wolf, said she told only her closest friends about her religious beliefs, but a month ago a stranger threw "the blood of Jesus" at her .
"She threw some kind of red liquid in my face and eyes, which burnt like hell. While I was trying to get the stuff out of my eyes, she started yelling at me that the blood of Jesus would set me free and that I was Satan's whore."
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