Ghost Stories & Paranormal Encounters

This incident happened ( more or less a year) after my first encounter with the paranormal. If you haven’t read my first encounter then feel free to search here under the title “In my room”. If somehow you cant find it or couldn’t be bothered then read on.

The year was 1994, I remember because when things like this happens to you it’s quite hard to forget. My friend Edwin’s (not his real name) parents was going on a vacation for a couple of days. This meant he would be alone at home, which means party! Word got around quick, the first night was awesome, the gang was all there. Unlike in the US and other western countries where alcohol can be purchased only if your at a certain age and requires a valid ID, in the Philippines that law doesn’t apply. So even though we were just teenagers we managed to buy large amounts of alcohol.

The following day we awoke with skull splitting head aches (the joy of hangovers).  We were sprawled all over the living room, all 7 of us. That’s where we all spent the night (or so we thought).  We couldn’t find one of our friends (Brian, not his real name). He must have left really early cause none of us noticed his departure. As we were talking we heard footsteps coming up the stairs, (Erwin’s house has an underground basement which they converted into a bedroom) it was Brian. We asked how or why he choose to sleep in the basement? We even teased him about missing his girlfriend.  His answer gave us all the goosebumps.

When everyone was fast asleep he suddenly woke up cause he thought he heard a knock on the door. Positive it was just a dream he tried to go back to sleep, that’s when he heard 3 taps on the door. He tried nudging me awake so I can hear it myself, and prove that he’s not hearing things. But try as he might I remained asleep, weird cause I’m a light sleeper, based on previous all nighter parties I can still wake up with just a slight nudge.  Having no triumph over arousing me from my slumber, he tried waking others, nothing. Then he heard the knock again, this time it was much more aggressive as if to say “let me in now!” His mind was firing on all cylinders at that moment, what was it? A friend playing a prank? But who? He counted the bodies sprawled all over the living room, everyone, the whole gang was there sleeping. So who then is doing this? He checked the clock, it was 3.30 am. He was wide awake now. Then he suddenly had this feeling of hatred envelope him!. So much anger, but it wasn’t his, it’s like something or someone wanted him to feel this Anger.  He then had this urge to go down to the basement, like it was his sanctuary.

Upon reaching the basement he instantly felt ridiculously tired! All he wanted to do was put his head down and sleep. He found the bed under the dimly lit basement and fell asleep. We were all in awe about this spooky event, so much so that we forgot our hangovers.  We were all oblivious to this event as it was happening, and even suggested to him that it could possibly have been just a dream. He reacted quite strongly, he says he can very well differentiate dream from reality and what transpired was not a dream. And how do we explain him being in the basement? It can’t be sleep walking, as far as I know when you sleep walk you don’t have any recollection of you doing it when you wake up. He was adamant that it wasn’t a dream.  And the hatred that he felt, never did he feel such strong negative emotions before.  Edwin and his family never experienced anything weird in their home, so we all agreed that what happened was a weird one time event and nothing more. We were far off from the truth.

The following night the gang was again complete, this time no alcohol was involved, instead we just hung out watching movies and having fun. Nothing spooky happened. We did the same on the third night. Again nothing. On the fourth night, (the last night Edwin would have the house alone) none of us wanted to stay overnight cause we where all getting crap from our parents, in my case my uncle for staying out at night for like three consecutive days. Edwin begged each of us to stay for the night but the thought of nagging parents was enough for us to pass on the offer.  At about 10.30 pm we decided to call it a night. For the last time Edwin tried again to convince any one to stay the night, again no luck. He then zeroed in on me, started to remind me the favor he did for me a couple of months ago and by staying that last night I would be free of that debt.  At this I gave in, albeit with much hesitation and a lot of grumbling.

As I lay on the couch watching TV I noticed Edwin dozing off to sleep. I tried to keep him from sleeping, (I didn’t want to be awake alone in someone else’s house) no luck. A few minutes later he was snoring. Great. It was only 11 pm and my friend who desperately begged me to stay the night was off to dreamworld. Bored and wide awake I surfed through channels after channels, not really interested in what’s on but just taking comfort in the voices on TV.  While I was flicking through channels the remote suddenly went dead. I cursed at it then went directly to the TV to change stations . It wouldn’t, even the volume buttons would not work. I thought oh great! I’m wide awake and the TV is stuck to this channel. I decided to turn the TV off and chose the radio as my next companion. I checked the time, around 1.30 am.

I went to the bathroom, as I was coming out I was startled with a loud and heavy thud and crashing sound . I was sure it came from the room of Edwin’s parents. I Walked quickly to the living room, and was sure Edwin would be awake and startled like me. Amazing, he was still snoring. I thought ok, he must be playing a trick on me. I said something like “funny Edwin, way to convince me to do this again”.  After about 20 minutes, Bang! There it was again, this time it was followed by three loud knocks! I was suddenly reminded of Brian’s experience, the three knocks! I was scared to death! I was desperately trying to wake Edwin up. For reasons I could not explain he would not wake up.

Then this smoke like mist passed by between me and the TV, and as soon as it came I felt instantly cold. The smoke just lingered there. Then it disappeared, just like that. A few minutes later I heard what seems like someone cooking, I can definitely smell food. The kitchen isn’t visible from the living room so I had no idea what was happening in the kitchen. I tried to rationalize, thinking it must be the neighbors doing the cooking, but then again why was the sound so clear, as if the cooking was being done just a few steps  from me and I can hear the sizzling of food on a pan. I was scared stiff. I experienced a ghost sighting before, and hoped against hope that it won’t happen again, but the mist? The sudden drop in temperature? I wanted to prove to myself that this is not a “ghost”, so with much hesitation and a gut full of  fear I went to the kitchen.  Nothing. The smell of  food was gone.  I was right! The neighbor must have been doing the cooking. Wrong! I started to feel the cold chill again then the smoke like mist! It was hovering above the kitchen table! It was so weird, I can’t describe it. The mist was in no human form or any. It was just swirling around and again it disappeared.

I rushed back to the living room, I cannot even begin to describe how scared I was. If you haven’t experienced the paranormal then you will never understand how I felt or how scared I was. Edwin was awake, finally. The words just came tumbling out of me, trying my best to tell him what just happened. He was in awe and scared at the same time. At around 3.30 a.m  we decided to have coffee. I showed him where the mist was and where I thought the loud thud and crash came from. I asked him if anything happened in their house in the past, like a family member passing away. Yes there was. His uncle died in their house when Edwin was about 10, died of tuberculosis. He was living with them, and was very helpful around the house, doing gardening and cooking!

The hairs on my neck stood up again. Cooking! The sound of someone cooking that I heard, the food that I smelled. I’m now pretty sure it’s him. I asked him where his uncle’s bedroom was and he pointed to the basement. Brian slept there when he had that spooky experience. He felt obligated to sleep there that night, why? And the hatred that Brian felt? Was it his hatred? Maybe his uncle was pissed at us for making all that noise. After countless mugs of coffee, and about 7 a.m we ended our chilling conversation.

I went home and tried to put  what just happened behind me. I tried getting some sleep but I remained awake. So many things for my mind to process. I kept asking myself if all of it just happened. I felt weird having witnessed such horrific event. My mind was on total confusion. No one tells you that these stuff are not fantasy but reality. You hear of it but have no idea how it really feels like to have the experience. You tell people of your eye opening experience but they just brush you off with an “over excited imagination”. I was like that before my first encounter with the unknown, laughing at such stories, making fun of the person who experienced it. Trust me it does exist! No matter how you deny their existence, ghosts are real. It’s not important to me if you believe my story or not, I’m not here to convince you, but to inform you through my experience of their existence. Let me put it like this, you haven’t seen a million dollars right? I mean like actually see it in front of you. I haven’t either, but just because you can’t see it doesn’t mean it does not exist. Same with the paranormal. Some of us will never see or experience the paranormal, but unfortunately some will. I have friends ( reliable friends) who have amazing personal experience of their own, much more horrific than my own which I plan to publish here in the near future.

Written by Zack Sawyer, Copyright 2009