Scary Stuff: Part 9

 

This year, a few paranormal things happened in my presence but not necessarily involved me—except for my last story which happened a few days ago. This year was a little more interesting than last as I have new material to share.

Playful Elemental

The event happened this year on my mom's 75th birthday. It was supposed to be a surprise for our mom, but we decided not to after she started planning the event, hence the start of the venue-hunting. She found the place online as a sponsored ad that popped up on her feed, and she showed it to me out of interest. I made the arrangements for an ocular visit after seeing the photos online. We went there a week after and were immediately enamored with the view and the place as it was still new; all guests unfamiliar with the place. My parents loved it so much that I booked the reservation immediately after the tour.

It's an exclusive resort with Balinese-themed detail located in a high-altitude area with a view of rolling sugarcane plantations. It sits on the foot of a mountain and was a private plantation until they decided to build their vacation home along with an events place where they allow one party to rent out at a time. The vibe felt relaxing at the same time secluded as it was a chunk of land in the middle of their farm with no neighboring residents, so you will feel that sense of exclusivity. 

On the day of my mom's birthday celebration, our family went in two cars, my elder brother and his wife went ahead to the venue to welcome guests who might arrive early, while we followed about 20 minutes later after we finished preparing the food to be served. When we got to the venue, we were the second party to arrive, as my brother and sister-in-law were already enjoying lounging in the pool area by then. The party was at 12 noon, we arrived before 11:30 while they arrived a little past 11am. It was enough time for the caterers to set up the buffet area before guests slowly arrived at noon.

The guests were all amazed at the venue we chose and they had a lovely time taking photos at every Instagrammable corner they could pose at. As I was winding down after all the eating and games a cousin came up to me and asked, "Have you seen the pictures on Maricel's phone?" referring to my sister-in-law. I shook my head before she added, "She captured an anomaly on her phone and we've been trying to figure it out but couldn't. It's so creepy that it's cool." That of course made me want to see the said photo. I made my way to Maricel where a couple of my cousins huddled around her phone, bemused and engrossed at what they were seeing.

I took the phone and scrolled through the photos and got goosebumps at what I saw. It didn't take much for me to see that an entity the shape of a tall man with an elongated head and a tail was playfully posing with Maricel by the pool. There were a lot of shots taken, and we could see the figure move from the pool and stand right next to her as the shots progressed. As she changed her position, so did the humanoid figure. My initial thought was that it could be a filter or an app, but then I knew my sister-in-law was oblivious to such things especially since she is not the pranking type that it ruled out the possibility of a hoax. The thing that stood out was how defined the shape of the entity was as it clearly had a head, shoulders, arms, a torso, and a tail (the leg part wasn't as clear as the other parts)...but 80% who saw the photos could make out the outline. It's the old folks who could not tell the clear from the blurred, but the younger ones with a sharp eyesight all saw it. It wasn't a shadow, it was a shape that blurred out everything, including Maricel's face. That was the first time I had encountered this type of captured image wherein it isn't a shadow or a blurred mist...it was the only clear figure and blurred those that its body did not touch. 

I asked Maricel how was this possible? She explained since they were the first to arrive at the venue at around 11am, it gave them time to take pictures of the place. The spot they chose was by the pool. At first a staff took their photo as a couple, then my brother proceeded to take her photo after a few shots. It was so uneventful that they didn't even bother to review the photos immediately after, only in the afternoon when the excitement had subsided that she checked and saw the bizarreness that it was. 

With this, we asked the staff of the place for any shared experiences they have with the paranormal within the premises. At first, they were hesitant to say anything, but then one revealed that one of the carpenters saw an old man with a long beard smoking one evening. "They say he's a guardian of the place," the staff added, "Even the owners don't stay here because they're scared." They say it's a kapre since it looks like 7-feet tall based on the image alone, but something tells me it's more of a white duwende based on its playful nature.

This was later confirmed by a Balinese friend who had an extremely open third eye because we forwarded the image without saying anything. He simply replied "That's an old man". 

Below are a few of the actual photos that we took. You be the judge of what you see:

Haunted Road in Samar

It was June of this year when we decided to have the ultimate road trip. The trip started in Taguig and ended in Bacolod, and the route we took was via Laguna-Bicol-Samar-Leyte-Cebu-Negros. We traveled around 12 hours a day for 5 days, mostly traveling first thing in the morning and finding a destination where we could hang out and stay for the night. It was on the third day when darkness caught up with us on the road. We had just crossed the San Bernardino Strait after waiting for 4 hours to ride the roro and another two hours at sea that it was fairly late in the afternoon when we reached Allen port.

There were three of us in the party, driving a new Toyota Avanza to bring home. I was seated in front as the main driver's reliever, my friend and I would switch taking the wheel while my brother was seated at the back as a passenger princess since he doesn't know how to drive. The car was chuck-full of random stuff at the back, and the second 3-seater row was also full of bags that only one person could fit at the back, hence my brother. 

It was around 5pm when we docked, and we were supposed to sleep at Tacloban that day but didn't realize how long it would take to get there. That was the first time my brother and I stepped foot on Samar soil. I cannot express how much I hated Samar's Maharlika Highway, especially when I was using a brand-new car on a road that had potholes the size of bathtubs. The distance from one pothole to the next was less than 20 meters which was a nightmare, especially when it was over a hundred kilometers of road we had to cover. 

With the stress from nonstop travel setting in, we would fall asleep every now and then, drowsing in and out of consciousness as we passed through the mountain with a horrible asphalt road. It was probably 9:30pm when I woke up from an hour-long nap and my friend who was driving then blurted when he noticed I opened my eyes, "You know sometimes there are certain areas when you can just feel your hair stand up?" Groggy, I looked outside the window and it was pitch black; not a living soul in sight. We were passing by a mountain road at that time, with a lush treeline on one side and a cliff edge on the other, it would be no surprise if a white lady would cross the street at any given time. The only light source we had was our car's, not even the moonlight could save us from seeing anything beyond eight meters in front of us. 

"Why do you say that? Did you see anything?" I asked my friend after gaining composure.

He honked the car before he vigorously rubbed down his arms with the intention of removing the goosebumps he had. "Whenever I feel like I'm passing by a creepy place I would honk just to show respect. It's a way of letting the non-human residents of the site know that I recognise their presence and I'm asking permission to pass through their territory."

"I hope we caught one on the dashcam. That'll be amazing!" I quipped.

He changed the topic right after because he was scared at that moment. And that was that. 

A day after we arrived in Bacolod, he confessed, "Remember when we were in Samar and I mentioned having goosebumps? I didn't want to tell you that time because it might freak you out, but I saw in the rearview mirror that there was someone seated right beside your brother at the back of the car at that time. I saw a shadow figure, head, shoulders, and all...it took several long blinks before it disappeared. It was gone by the time you woke up, that's why I honked to shake off the feeling of fear."  

The photo below is what the road and landscape feature generally looks like. This moment was taken during a quick stopover because my friend had to pee and there was nothing to stop at for many kilometers. The sun was going down and we had a long way to go before we could reach the next town.    

 

Haunted Item from Japan Surplus...AGAIN

I told a story a few years ago about our haunted condo in Taguig. The unit is not specifically haunted like other properties, but we've had our fair share of experiences every now and then. It has settled down for a while now after a friend stayed for two months to cleanse our unit. One of the reasons why a shadow man would appear in one part was due to an old clothes rack my brother bought from a Japan Surplus shop, and once we got rid of it the shadow man disappeared.

This October my brother told me that he bought another second-hand cabinet from Japan Surplus. Incidentally, when the cabinet arrived in the condo his housemates started having nightmares every night, particularly of a green goblin-looking creature. One evening when they had to leave his housemate's mom at 3am to bring a friend to the airport the mom who was left behind had a paranormal disturbance. 

The mom I'm referring to is an old woman from Uzbekistan who came to visit her son who happened to be my brother's roommate. My brother would describe her as someone who is imbued with a lot of wisdom about nature as she is an Earth warrior, actively defending trees and animals in her hometown. She could not speak English, but her son explained what transpired that morning a few minutes after they had left. She went in her room and heard loud clapping in our living room, where the cabinet was. The clapping was so distinct and did not stop for a long time that she could not sleep from the sound. She was afraid to take a peek, she instead covered her head to muffle the clapping sound but ended up unable to sleep until the sun rose. 

That morning the mother made an offering of sweets by placing candies on a bowl and lit an incense in front of the cabinet. After she made the offering, all nightmares and activities stopped. I still wish my brother would just get rid of the cabinet altogether. 

Below is the photo of the cabinet:

Getting Caught in the Act

Connecting to the cabinet incident, the day after he sent the photo of the cabinet and told me the story I ended up with a nightmare that evening. However, the nightmare could possibly be the result of another event that same night. In last year's story, I mentioned a friend who had been haunted by this elemental spirit when she was younger due to a guy who was courting her had this said spirit attached. Out of spite from the attention my friend was getting from the guy the spirit ended up scaring her to the point that she had to dump the guy in order for the hauntings to stop.

I never met the guy, I only saw him in photos. This year, on this particular night a friend managed to recognize him while we were casually walking during a festival. With the street full of people, he spotted the guy coming toward our direction about 10 meters away. Curious, I made it a point to look at him from head to toe, following him with my stare, observing every detail I could absorb at that moment. Excited to tease our friend that we had found her past fling amongst the crowd, I told the guy I was with to go chase down the man who had just passed and take his photo so that we could forward the pic to our friend.

My friend disappeared for a while, taking longer than I had expected. When he reunited with me he was huffing, a bit exhausted from his escapade. 

"Mission accomplished?" I asked.

He exhaled a big sigh, "It was a struggle to take his photo because my phone had several errors and kept shutting off as I was trying to take his pics! It took many attempts and I had to chase him down much farther because of it."

This links back to what we assumed was the elemental trying to protect him. It is a common occurrence for gadgets to fail when spirits are involved due to their nature of being able to pass through electrical fields. 

That evening I thought nothing of the incident until I ended up with a horrible nightmare that was too real to brush off. The thing is, the scene happened in my room. Right before I slept I was on the toilet when I saw a quick white streak flash across the bathroom briefly covering the light as it passed for half a second. It confused me for a bit because if the light was coming from the outside-in, it wouldn't cause the entire room to darken...but whatever. The next thing that happened was me walking out of the bathroom and it was pitch black because of a blackout. I approached my emergency lamp in the hopes of turning it on since I knew I had it fully charged that afternoon, but then the light turned dim until it started to flicker. And as I panicked I felt a huge shadow overwhelming me from the back. It enveloped the entire room that as I stared at the mirror before me the whole scene turned pitch black. I then found myself waking up but unable to move. Thankfully, the bathroom light was on, and with some delay, I managed to slowly get up to calm myself. It freaked me out since it was the first time I had that dream, and the setup was in my room, one that felt too real that I was unable to go back to sleep with the light off.

I told my friends the next morning, we all agreed the spirit was very much still with him to bother every person who is a potential threat for his attention.