Aluxes

This is a Mexican folk tale I heard while taking a tour through the Mayan Riviera. Lucky enough I got to experience a couple incidents that made me believe in them.

Aluxes are a sort of goblin or spirit that live among the human. It is said they are invisible unless they need to take the shape of a human for a purpose. If they do take a human shape, it is said they are quite short, about knee high. They protect corn fields. If you travel to the Mayan region, you will notice they are respected by the locals. There are a lot of stories that involve Aluxes. There is one in particular that called my attention while traveling through the Mayan Riviera. 

It is said that a few years ago, a firm or Architects was hired to build a bridge in Cancun. the project was approved and so they started building. After a few weeks of progress, one morning they found the bridge had fallen apart, there was no explanation for this, as it had never happened to any of their projects before. Besides, it was not a major construction. They searched for possible failure on the field, but found nothing to blame. They started over again. The bridge fell another 3 times, and this only happened during the night, so the next day the workers would find the destroyed bridge. 

One of the workers suggested that maybe it was the Aluxes that were protecting the field, as it use to be a corn field. The engineers accepted with skepticism, but after a long conversation with the Governor, the Mayan priest was brought to the construction site. The Priest confirmed what some locals suspected. Aluxes were not happy, they didn't mean to harm anyone, but they were guarding their land.  so in order to continue with the construction they built a small house in the typical style of the region. Many believe this is a tourist attraction, but it is actually the agreement they set in order to finish the bridge, which as inaugurated in 1991. You can visit this bridge, and who knows maybe you'll be able to meet an Aluxe.