Disclaimer: These are personal stories shared by readers and as such are anecdotal.
We got a little inspired after the recent Hungry Ghost Festival and asked some readers to share their stories with us. This is what we got. Good luck!
1. The floating sleep-watcher – Mint, 28
I was a chemist at a paint factory in Klang. This incident happened in 2016 when two other colleagues and I attended training at a hotel in Johor Bahru. We checked in around 6pm in the evening after the training, and then had dinner and a chit chat session before going to bed. The three of us decided to combine the two single beds, and slept together. I slept facing the sliding glass. Sometime after midnight, I wanted to switch sides and that was when I noticed a tall, slender female figure with shoulder-length hair and greyish skin staring at my friend who was asleep on the other end of the bed, near the toilet. What shook me the most was the fact that the figure was floating above my friend! I tried to ignore what I saw before my eyes, but it was too late when I realized the figure was now looking back at me!
I knew I was in trouble when she started to roam mid-air towards me and that was when I quickly shut my eyes. I tried hard to turn to the other side but to no avail as I could barely move. As I was struggling, I felt a slight pain on my forehead and I could tell that the figure was trying to turn my head towards her so that I could see her face. I attempted to recite some prayers but under the pressure, I couldn’t remember them. I decided to just open my eyes and I saw a long greyish arm right before my eyes. Oddly, it disappeared immediately. I turned to look at my two other colleagues, and they were sleeping so soundly. It was around 3 am in the morning. I knew I couldn’t bear to stay in the room anymore, so I quickly changed, grabbed my phone, and headed down to the lobby where I had a nap until 6.30 am. I returned to my room as if nothing had happened, and got ready for the second day of my training. I don’t think I’ll ever stay in that hotel again.
2. A couple even in death – V. Raj, 29
This happened to my uncle and his family back in the ’90s. They were travelling to Batang Berjuntai (now known as Bestari Jaya) using the trunk road. It was around midnight and my uncle was driving while his wife and kids slept in the car. He stopped the car at the roadside for a while to rest. There were hardly any vehicles around, just a few lorries that passed by. At a distance, he could see two figures walking at the roadside but he could hardly make out anything. After a few minutes, he started to drive again. He realized he was coming nearer towards the figures. As he approached them he realized what they were. It was a couple dressed in traditional Chinese clothing. Their faces were ashen white and they looked down as they hopped! My uncle quickly woke his wife up to witness what he had seen. She was shocked and in fear. My uncle proceeded to drive faster after checking on the kids. He checked his rearview mirror and saw the couple hopping away slowly. A few meters later he realized he had just passed a cemetery nearby. Till today, my uncle and aunty never forgot what they saw that night.
3. The highway worker – Arvind, 58
I have always had the ‘gift’ to see supernatural beings. This incident happened in January 2019, a few days after the New Year celebrations. My wife, kids and I were travelling back from KLIA to Ipoh. I was driving and it was close to midnight, everyone was asleep in the car. A couple of kilometres before the Ladang Bikam R&R, I felt as if I drove over a barrel. But when I checked my side and rearview mirrors, there was nothing. A few minutes later, my wife woke up and said she needed to use the restroom and so I stopped at the R&R. While I waited for her in the car, someone knocked on my window. It looked like a foreign worker and he was wearing the highway construction worker uniform. He was bloody and he just looked at me. I knew what it was. At that moment my wife came out of the restroom and I quickly urged her to get in. She couldn’t see anything that I saw even though the worker kept knocking on my window. I quickly drove off. When I got back on the highway, I realized there were police cars and ambulances on the other side of the road.
4. I shouldn’t have seen between my legs – Anne, 26
This actually happened about 10 years ago, but I will never forget the experience. It was around 9pm and I was outside my house feeding the dogs. I would usually wait for them to finish and wash their bowls immediately. As I bent down to grab one of the bowls, I unconsciously looked through my legs and saw my neighbour’s house. But something caught my attention. The best way I can describe it is, I saw this huge, oval white thing floating across the sidewalk of my neighbour’s house. The thing roamed towards the back of the house. Out of confusion, I quickly stood up to observe further but the figure had disappeared. I am always full of curiosity and what I saw definitely raised my desire to find out what it was. Before I could do so, my dogs that were chained fiercely barked non-stop towards the directions to which I last saw the figure headed. I started to sense something was off and that was when I remembered that it was the Hungry Ghost month, and what I saw through my legs was definitely one of “them”! I felt so stupid for looking through my legs.
*Anne explained that in Asian beliefs, it is taboo to see between legs as what we see are “things” that are not among us as they’re from different realms.
5. It grazed me in while I was asleep – Azri, 28
I knew it was the Hungry Ghost month, and while I acknowledge the existence of evil spirits and ghosts, I used to believe that they won’t do us harm as long as we stay out of their way. But I was proven wrong.
One night in 2018, my parents were overseas and I was at home with my elder sister. I was preparing to go to bed and I can never sleep with the lights on. That night, however, I felt like something was watching me in the dark. I ignored the feeling but it was hard for me to fall asleep that night, despite it being 12.30 am. Frustrated, I switched on the lights, and minutes later, I was sound asleep. I thought that solved the problem but then, “something” woke me up a couple of hours later. I jumped up immediately when I felt something was creeping on my left leg. Initially, I thought it was a cockroach or a lizard because I am terrified of them. I even shoved my blanket away to check if there’s anything underneath, but I couldn’t see anything at all. I tried looking for them because I knew I could never sleep peacefully knowing there were pests around. But fear immediately struck me when I realized that whatever I felt wasn’t a pest at all. This time, I was certain that it was the feeling of a long and sharp fingernail grazing the skin on my leg! I looked around the room as the feeling of being watched grew stronger. I checked the time, hoping it was near dawn or sunlight but the fear became immensely deeper when the clock showed 2.59am! I forced myself into sleep but to no avail. I can’t remember how long it took me to fall back asleep but the next morning, I woke up with a high fever.
6. Pregnant and seeing ghosts – Yvonne, 55
This feels like it just happened last year when it was in fact during the late ’80s. These 3 separate incidents took place in the same month when I was pregnant. All the times I encountered “them”, my husband was out for duty. He was a policeman back then, so it was common for me to spend the nights alone. I first experienced it when I was sleeping. I wanted to switch sides and when I did, there was this little girl standing right beside me and stared into my eyes. She looked completely humanoid, except her staring eyes were full of curiosity and her neck was bent. The second incident also happened when I was sleeping. I woke up from my sleep when I heard chatters right behind me. The thing is, my husband was away. It was the chatters of a man and a woman. I couldn’t remember what they were talking about, but the conversation got louder. Frustrated and afraid, I immediately called my husband and asked him to get home right away, to which, fortunately, he did. Last but not least, I was in the passenger seat in the car and I remember passing by a Chinese cemetery. Something caught my attention when I spotted an old lady sitting on the tombstone! It was near dusk, and when I looked back again immediately, the old lady was nowhere to be seen.
7. Self-care, hair-loving spirit – Natasha, 24
People who are close to me know that I can see “things.” It happened since I was a kid so I don’t need to wait until the Hungry Ghost Festival to actually see them. In my experience, they usually take the form of a kid standing outside my house, or some weird creatures that I can’t even explain with words, which will usually sit at the stairs. But there was this one particular incident that took place during the Hungry Ghost Month. It happened 4 years ago and I had to burn the midnight oil as my assignments were nearing their deadlines. My bedroom is downstairs after the kitchen and there is a mirror on the wall of my kitchen which I sometimes use, until today. It was 2am and it was rather quiet. I was focusing on my assignments until something distracted me. I could hear a sound coming from the kitchen. I thought it was my cats as they sometimes play around there. But as the sound continuously distracted me, I realized that it wasn’t my cats, at all. What I heard was the sound of someone combing her hair in the kitchen, and from the way it sounded, the hair was way too rough. It was like “she” was struggling to comb through her hair, but she didn’t stop. My family members were asleep, and who would comb their hair in front of a mirror in the kitchen at 2 am in the morning? Fortunately, the sound disappeared as I ignored it. Only God knows how terrified I was!
Do you have any encounters of your own? Let us know in the comments below!
Also read: Watch: ‘Pocong’ in Alor Setar Hitches A Ride On Motorcyclist’s Head, Freaks Out Netizens
