Haunted Places: Got any near you?

[Mwulf]

There's a Bed & Breakfast in the old part of town that's supposedly haunted. My old Highschool English teacher runs it, actually.

Of course, it's not really haunted. What with the whole concept being so irrational and illogical and all.

[Newtype87]

Well, I just moved to Davis, California about a month ago so I don't know any ghost stories from here. There're probably a few, but I don't exactly go out of my way to find any.

However, I was born in Redwood City (California) which is about two hours drive away from Davis. I do in fact have three little ghost stories.

Okay, first ghost story. My parents used to own this cafe in Redwood City, the Redwood Cafe and Spice Company. Every so often, we'd hear strange sounds in the kitchen and dining room area, but especially in the kitchen. Sometimes menus would be found scattered around, and occassionally kitchen utensils would wind up in funny places, but we never had "our" ghost destroy anything or get violent. We believe it was actually two ghosts, but we never really could tell. My grandma also believed that one of them liked to cook, since most of the activity happened in the kitchen. Again, nothing too exciting, but still.

Second story. When I was about six (First grade), my dad picked me up from school, and I told him we had to go see my great-great grandmother (her name was Caroline, but we called her Goma) TONIGHT. So, the two of us ended up going to talk to her, and she and I ended up talking for about an hour. She was about two or three weeks shy of her hundred and first birthday, and she told me to tell the relatives that she didn't want a party that year. Then she said that she was really tired, so my dad and I went home just before she fell asleep. She died a few hours later. Now, it's not really a ghost story, but it is one of those weird coincidences in life.

Finally, after Goma died, my family ended up getting her house and moving in. My parents set out to renovate the house (it was already about eighty years old at that point), and started to fix up some of the old parts of the place and clean everything up. And every so often, I'd wander off into the living room for an hour or so, and then just walk up to my parents and say "Goma likes what you're doing with the house." And when they'd ask me how I knew that, I'd just say "I've got a feeling about it, that's all."

According to my mom and grandma, my whole family has had this long history of ghost encounters. My little brother had an encounter of his own on an overnight trip with his Boy Scout group to an old WWII warship moored on the other side of San Francisco bay (the name slips my mind right now), while my sister's heard a few ghosts. Unfortunately, I haven't had any myself since I was about seven or so, so I stopped having them way before my siblings even started having encounters. My comment on the whole situation is that that's when I got sensible and stopped believing in ghosts.

PS: And for the record, I have been to the Winchester "Mystery House": dang, was that place interesting. It's the closest thing to a real life Escher painting I've ever seen. However, I did not see any ghosts - or hear any, for that matter.

[Renegade334]

Has anyone watched any of those videos? Some of them are particularly compelling, although I feel reserved towards some of them (such as the guy who got attacked in the attic and the ghost-in-the-window cases). The last link had me actually freezing in place when I realized that the girl's reflection in the mirror was no longer moving; I didn't spot it at first but when I noticed the discrepancy, well...whoa.

- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LsoPZoUV0VY
- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=up-F6Ztstgk
- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cQIEfi0H2co
- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=59GtP-Mfqjc

I also found vids about 'demon children' often involving a person taping his apartment, only to see some Sadako-like figure in a dark corner of a room before he makes a quick beeline for the door, but I'm not quite willing to give them some credence. Those kinds of vids are too easily faked.

Your thoughts about this? Hoaxes or 'real' paranormal occurrences? I'm a lot skeptical when it comes to so-called 'phenomena that cannot be explained by science alone' but at times I keep wondering about possible explanations. One buddy of mine once theorized about ghosts/poltergeists being some sort of 'electromagnetic imprint' dead people leave behind, acting like computer programs - with preset routines, objectives, activity parameters, etc, but I'm not sure if such a thing is possible in this realm of existence.

[Chimera]

Here in the Philippines, I'd surprised if there a town that doesn't have at least one popular ghost story/ haunted place.
In my hometown for example, Baguio, has at least twenty well known haunted houses that dot the various boroughs.
The reason why they're haunted range from broken families, mass-murders, murder-suicides, mysterious disappearances or such didn't realize they built their home over an old cemetery.
And mind you that's just the haunted houses.
We also have several haunted bridges. Almost every little used/ isolated road has at least one hitchhiking spirit. Hotels are also common spiritual stomping grounds. Camp John Hay, one of the city's major tourist attractions has a lot of story, especially the infamous ghost tree, which said to house an evil spirit and caused God knows how many car crashes fatalities. They cut the thing down in 2001 only then did the accidents started lowering in that area.
Heck my own home has a freaky secret, my grandparents are buried under the foundation.

[Leroy Landers]

I swear the place where I work feels like it's haunted (my local Shopko store) several people I've worked with swear there is an evil presence in the linens section of the stockroom upstairs. I refer to the place as "the dungeon" it has brick walls and is filthy like the set of Saw. My buddy was walking by that area alone and he heard laughter presumably from a toy that went off on by itself (linens is right next to toys) it scared the sh*t out of him and bolted right out of there! My experience is worse I was working near the area in question when I suddenly felt a presence in the aisle adjacent to me, I also felt an intense feeling of dread and fear, I dare not check to see what was standing in the aisle, I knew for a fact that no one was in the back room with me that night. To this day I hate going back there unless I'm with someone, I hate being back there alone all night, and especially when they decide to save a quick buck and shut half the lights off making it nice and dark!

[Albireo_818]

Apparrently my school is haunted.... according to my art teacher in the art corridor the ghost of a worker appears at night...

[Renegade334]

From what I heard, the White House is also rumored to have its own share of ghosts - the staff is known to have reported several times strange noises coming from nowhere as well as unexplained oddities such as doors left mysteriously open while they should have been closed, as the area is highly monitored and tidied at all times. There were also purported sightings of Abigail Adams doing her laundry in the East Room and Dolley Madison overlooking the Rose Garden. One of the most famous ghosts said to haunt the WH is that of Abraham Lincoln.

Whether this is an actual fact or an urban legend crafted by WH staff members for a small hoopla is left to anyone's judgment.

Other famous haunted places also include the London Tower (where Anne Boleyn apparently walks around with her severed head under arm; there was also a recent video showing an unidentified ghostly figure shown on a surveillance camera - all attempts to find a scientific explanation to the apparition on the video failed), 50 Berkeley Square (a well-known poltergeist area where two squatters and a nobleman died of unknown reason a long time ago - what caught everyone's attention, though, was the look of terror imprinted on each of the three victims' faces), Temple Newsam and even Windsor Castle, where ghosts were even witnessed by royals such as King George VI, William Ewart Gladstone and Andrew, Duke of York.

In the U.S. President Andrew Jackson confirmed having encountered and talked to the Bell Witch (the ghost seen in the An American Haunting movie, for those who don't know). The Bell Witch is also the only 'confirmed' case where a ghost was directly responsible for someone's death.

[teslashark]

There is a large park near my home, it holds bookfairs 3-4times a year.in 2001 I went there with my mom and bought a copy of <<Uncle Stories>> by J.P.Martin(a 2001 reprint of the 1&2book of this popular sieries in the 60's) .When I went there next fair, the corner where I bought it just disappered! But the book remains the same. I translated it into chinese in 2004, but it isnt published yet. I search for the corner every fair,but the park seemed to have TRANSFORMED!!!!!

[Nightwing03]

Errrmm....maybe because they just rearranged the park?

[teslashark]

Errrmm....maybe because they just rearranged the park?

There's no such events since the 80a.it's the temple of land and farming of ancient Beijing. If it's rearranged, the guy in charge willsurely be charged for destroying a historical site.