hey

> La Balen is just a praise name for La Sirene, they are one in the
> same.
I have actually heard something different about this - La Sirene is
the one who will get up on her tippy toes and talk, and La Balene is
the one who lies down and "swims" and speaks like Freda does most of
the time - gestures and stuff.

Somewhere a few posts back someone mentioned a Petwo La Sirene? I
personally dont know her to have that. - she is one of the "White"
(not ethnically) Lwa who walks with Agwe and is one of the sisters
who came from the Mami Wata spirits in Benin (Ezili Freda Daome,
Ezili Mapyan, Ezili Kita (i think thats her name) Ezili Boumba, Ezili
Dantor (who is also Ezili Je Wouj, much like her Husband is Ogou Je
Wouj), Maitres Dayila, La Sirene being the more well known). Even
Gwan-n Ezili Freda is thought to be the mother of all the sister,
The only Lwa i know of (and i sure as hell dont know all of them)
that there is some ambiguity over where they sit is Bosou. Some
people say hes one, some the other. But he is African - he is a
Tohousou. In Africa there are little shrines in villiages where
people give stuff to spirits of twins (marassa) and near it willbe a
Tohousou shrine - a place for spirits of deformed children.

As a side note, it seems no coincidance that there is a river in (if
geography serves me) called Aziri, much like there is a river running
through Yorubaland simply known as the Ochun river. Thats just kind
of a neat factoid.