Nationality: American
Primary Language: English
Other Languages: Tagalog
Age: 19
Occupation: Full-Time Student
Residence: California
Performance Date: 11/26/2023

Context: This story occurred to MG when they were about fourteen years old and taking a shower in their house in the Philippines. They were in the Philippines for vacation just visiting relatives and stayed at their residence there, which was built over a church, and knew prior to visiting that it was haunted.

Text of Piece: When traveling to their house in the Philippines, they knew it was haunted already, so they came scared for vacation, and being there for a week already had frightened them enough. She ended up taking a shower near eight o’clock at night before going with friends, and her entire family was still home.

She started up the shower and was already showering when she heard the door open, saw feet on the floor, and a silhouette glided past the shower curtain. She thought it was her mom or sister going to go use the toilet or something, so she didn’t really care, but once she opened the curtain, there was nobody there. 

MG then screamed, causing her mother to rush to the bathroom. She then told her mom what had happened, to which her mom replied that everyone was in the bedroom. The entire family ended up getting more scared, and they still had to stay two more weeks. More ghost stories ended up occurring after that, but currently, they do not own the house anymore.

I have had similar experiences in my own house, so hearing this story was very relatable and believable. I do believe that places can be haunted, but I myself have not encountered a building that was said to be haunted. Some part of me does want to try adventuring to find one for fun, so maybe in the future I will be able to explore and confirm or falsify this belief for myself.

Nationality: American
Primary Language: English
Other Languages: Spanish
Age: 19
Occupation: Full-Time Student
Residence: Cale and Irani 
Performance Date: 11/26/2023

Context: This story occurred to JE when they were about eight years old and visiting relatives in the Philippines near Boracay. This story does come to their mind a lot as they still frequently visit the Philippines, and they make sure to never stray away from groups of people.

One time when JE went to the Philippines. he was visiting his grandpa and grandma in Boracay. His grandma would always tell him stories about the duendes, which are little ghost people that live in the ground, but he personally did not believe it at the time because he thought they were like moles. They told him that he should never be alone and watch his belongings as they were known for taking belongings and taking away little children who wander off by themselves.

He was greeting his relatives as usual and checking out the farm and livestock as he thought that it was very interesting that they were farmers. They were having dinner in his relatives’ backyard with a lot of Filipino dishes, music playing, and a lot of talking. He then heard a noise coming from a darker area of the house near the actual farmland and decided to check it out, just out of curiosity.

The further he got away from the dinner, the louder the noises got. He knew he was pretty far from the dinner in the dark and suddenly heard the noise coming from multiple directions which scared him. He ran away because he was really scared and ended up telling his parents and grandma about it, to which they confirmed that he encountered duendes.

From that point on, he has developed a fear of dark areas, being taken away, and making sure to stay with his parents. Throughout the rest of the trip, he kept a tight watch on his belongings and surroundings as he held a firm belief that the duendes would still try to take him away.

I personally grew up hearing about duendes, but although I have never been to the Philippines, after hearing many stories about them, they did seem very believable to me. As a kid, my parents always told me to behave and not wander off because of duendes, which did scare me as a kid, but now I don’t really believe in them.