Figments of the imagination?

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PEOPLE claiming to have had a ghostly encounter usually do not talk about it – for fear of being ridiculed.

Would anyone believe us if we told them we had seen a ghost?  Well, yes and no.

Generally, ghost believers are regarded as “plain nuts or screw loose” and often scolded for hallucinating or being “not quite right up there.”

But how can anyone be absolutely sure that contact with the other side is all in the mind? The dichotomy of real versus surreal is a head-cracking conundrum. The same is true of normal versus paranormal.

Here is a “believe it or not” account of an encounter of the spooky kind related by a friend Max (not his real name) who claimed he once gave a lift to a ghost – or something he thought was a ghost – in his old Ford Prefect sedan.

On the night of the Seventh Moon (in July) around 11 o’clock back in the 1950’s, while driving home along the old Kuching airport road after dropping a colleague off at the old Mile 7 bazaar, he was waved down by an old man, carrying a leather briefcase, just outside the 5th Mile area.

Max pulled up by the roadside and the smartly attired old-timer hopped (with both legs) towards the car and told Max he lived further down the road at Mile 4 1/2 and would appreciate a lift – before inviting himself in!

The old man also spun a hard-luck yarn of missing the bus and waiting a long time for the next one, which he said was driven by a brother of his, to come but it never did!

Max thought it rather strange for an apparently well-off senior citizen to be waiting to catch a bus in that part of the road this late at night, especially when there was no bus service to the Mile 41/2 area at the time even during the day, let alone near midnight.

But Max thought nothing of it until a while later. He was happy to be doing a good deed by giving a fellow citizen, stranded on a dark road at an ungodly hour, a free ride home.

Max feared if left alone by the roadside, the old timer could be kidnapped and would probably die trying to fight off his abductors. He did not want that on his conscience.

So with the old man secure in the back seat, Max drove off. He did not talk to his elderly passenger along the way. No point disturbing the old guy, he thought.

Approaching the 41/2 Mile area, he asked the old man where exactly was his house. Just down the road came the reply.

Soon, Max found himself stopping in front of a gravelled footpath, leading to a brightly-lit empty wooden double-storey building some distance from the main road. The old man’s home, he presumed.

Tall trees cast long shadows on the surrounding overgrown vegetation. Only the bright lights from the building betrayed the presence of a nearby graveyard.

The old man alighted, thanked Max for the lift and began taking short jerky hops towards the building. Then, a short way from an outhouse that looked like a worn-down garage, he paused, gave Max a haunting look, waved goodbye, turned around and hopped a few steps further down the footpath before vanishing in a dash of blurring imagery.

Surely this couldn’t be happening – a person, flesh and blood (at least, that was what the old bloke looked like) disappearing just like that, a goose-pimpled Max wondered aloud.

He was sure his eyes weren’t playing tricks. And he hadn’t been drinking!

Had the old man been obscured by the undergrowth encroaching onto the gravelled footpath or fallen into a nearby grass-covered drain, the lights from the building would have caught it. But inexplicably, he just evaporated into nothingness in plain sight. Max was convinced he had seen something “very unnatural” that night. How a wealthy old man had waited for transport at a secluded dark road (with no bus service) when a person of his standing had no business doing so. How the old man was hopping (the gait of ghosts) instead of walking (like you and I) and how he had disappeared into thin air – poof and gone without a trace.

Just then, Max’s thoughts flashed back to the bus the old man said he had been waiting to catch but which never showed up. What kind of bus was it? A ghost bus from purgatory? And the driver the old man said was his brother – who actually was he? A good brother to whom the old man, probably a good brother himself, had gone to join? Conspiracy theory or not, Max did not stick around to find out. Spooked by the spectral happening, he was off in a flash.

On his drive down to Kuching, he saw offerings of cooked meat and fruits placed beside some burning red candles on the side of the road. It was, after all, the night of the Seventh Moon when famished lost souls are let out from the underworld to partake of the offerings in what is known as the Festival of the Hungry Ghosts.

The next day, Max told me his hair-raising encounter and I asked: “Sure, you are not pulling my leg?”

He shot back: “You don’t joke about these things, lah. Maybe you like to check out the place tonight. I will take you there but you do the snooping around yourself. For all you know, you might bump into a good brother.”

Although I took Max’s story with a bucket of salt, I did not take up his dare. Thanks but no, thanks! No point poking your nose into the dark side.

Today, the area of the ghostly encounter has changed beyond recognition, having been opened up for housing estates and is served by a network of well-lit roads. I was told the old man’s house is no longer there. Perhaps, it never was!

Maybe the old guy is still hanging around the place, waiting to hitch another lift on the Seventh Moon from some motorist with a weakened aura. But who wants to know?

Scariest story

One of the scariest horror stories must be about the orang minyak (oily man or ewe kui kia).

During the 1950’s and 60’s, this disciple of black magic prowled several villages in peninsular Malaysia, molesting young women. Its oil-coated body made it extremely slippery and hard to catch. Besides, it is said to have the power of invisibility.

Although the orang minyak was definitely human, many stories have linked it to the supernatural.

The oily man is said to be a normal person but in pact with the dark forces, had to rape 21 virgins to possess the black arts. It sought out victims mostly at night.

According to one report, a student from a higher education institute in Shah Alam had a macabre brush with this greasy ghostly predator which she described as having “a very dark complexion, piercing deep eyes and oil all over.”

Throughout the ordeal, the student tried to scream but was strangely mute. She tried to push “the oily thing” away but it seemed all her strength had been drained from her body. She felt hypnotised and was subsequently raped!

Her room-mates did not heard or see anything – so they did not come to her aid. None of them saw the elusive orang minyak.

So the management of the institute decided to bring in a bomoh to perform an exorcism. Pity, there was no account of what actually followed.

The tall ghost

Max’s creepy tale got me recollecting the many ghost stories I (perhaps you too) heard as a kid.

I am sure most of us know about a spectre called hantu tinggi or the tall (bamboo pole) ghost. It is said this particular ghost grows taller and taller when someone approaches it … until it reaches into the sky.

The hantu tinggi usually appears during a passing drizzle on a hot day (hujan panas). The superstitious would place a stub of grass or a leaf on their ears as a camouflage when venturing outdoors during such times.

It is believed if your aura is low, you could also run into this tall ghost on a moon-lit night. Usually, the ghost would stand in the middle of a road with legs outstretched to form an arch.

In the event of an encounter, you’d do well not to look up at the face of the ghost but quickly pass under its arched legs –- and vamoose!

If you try to be funny by mocking the ghost or taking a swing at its long hairy legs while passing under them, the tall fellow will close its legs and crush you. Don’t say you have not been warned!

The chui kui (water ghost) is another member from the other side whose story most of us are familiar with. It is said to be the restive spirit of a drowning victim and will haunt the place of its demise such as a pool, a lake, a river or some seas.

This particular ghost can only be reincarnated after claiming a victim, so the story goes. Rain and snow are its nemesis as these elements will prick the ghost like a million needles!

Unlike most ghosts that haunt the night, the chui kui is most active at noon when the sun is directly overhead.

Ghost photo

According to a newspaper report, a photo showing what was supposed to be a ghost, caused panic among schoolchildren in the peninsula.

The image on the photo appeared to be a ghost-like figure floating behind a boy.

The schoolchildren were so scared that they refused to use the school toilets.

Copes of the photo had been circulated in schools in Kuala Kangsar, Pantai Remis and Taiping, according to the report.

A head teacher told the newspapers the students were advised not to believe such stories. The National Union of the Teaching Profession also urged parents and teachers to explain to the students that ghosts did not exist!

The Union suspected it was the work of irresponsible people who wanted to frighten the youngsters and called for action to be taken against the culprits.

The apparent prank eventually ceased but the practical jokers were never found or caught nor the true nature of the image properly explained.

It’s supposed to be like that with ghosts or so I am told!

Most times, you don’t get to fully grasp the reasons for ghostly sightings.

I guess that’s what makes us afraid of the unknown … of ghosts. Now you see them, now you don’t!  I am having goose bumps already.