Nepal has a 10-year-old living goddess -- the "incarnation of the powerful Hindu deity Taleju." The post rotates among young girls. Selected at a very young age from among the children of a specific village of goldsmiths, the goddess is taken off to live in seclusion until the onset of menses, at which time she returns to normal life, and a new goddess is selected.
I learned all this from an article in a local paper on the current goddess, in which the following fascinating information was included:
"At the age of four, a panel of judges examined her in a series of ancient ceremonies -- checking her horoscope, searching for physical imperfections, and, as a final test, seeing if she would be frightened after a night spent in a room filled with 108 freshly decapitated animal heads. She was not."
--The Asian Reporter, January 1, 2008, p. 5.
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