Tag Archives: spirits

Festival – Chinese

Nationality: Chinese-Australian
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Australia
Performance Date: March 2007
Primary Language: English
Language: Chinese

My informant is actually a Chinese-Australian. She was born in China and lived there until she was in junior high. She then moved to Australia, where she lived until college. Although she had moved a couple of times, she still remains true to her heritage. Thus, she told me about a festival called the Ghost Festival that many Chinese people celebrate. This is actually a festival and a holiday in Asia that is quite like what Halloween was in the beginning. The Ghost Festival is held the fourteenth night in the seventh lunar month.

This festival started as a day when ghosts and spirits would leave their underworld to come visit those that they have left behind. However, this is not a day to be afraid of the dead. Rather, it is a day where the living and the dead can coexist for a few hours. It is a day for ancestors to visit their loved ones. My informant tells me that she and her family will often visit her family tomb and leave offerings for her ancestors. They also burn money so that the spirits of their ancestors can still live a fruitful life. Another tradition that is not as common anymore that her family used to take part in is the releasing of paper boats. Her family would hand make miniature boats and set them on fire. The glowing boats would be “lanterns” for the ghosts to find their way back home at the end of the night.

My informant told me that in her family and especially in Chinese culture, the idea of a family is very important. Her family believes that her ancestors are very much in control of their future. If they respect their ancestors, their ancestors will bless them in return. This is why during festivals such as these, her family makes sure to work extra hard to please her ancestors.

Annotation: Yih, Jung-tzung. “Ghost Festival.” Calendar of Holidays and Festivals. Government             Information Office, Republic of China. 26 Apr 2007             <http://www.gio.gov.tw/info/festival_c/ghost_e/ghost.htm>.

Superstition – Chinese

Nationality: Taiwanese
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles, CA
Performance Date: April 17, 2008
Primary Language: English
Language: Mandarin, Thai, Taiwanese

After a funeral you have to go to somewhere else before you go home so the spirits don’t follow you home. I think it’s like a Chinese thing – like a superstition.

Wilson explained that he has had to stop by another location before heading home after every funeral he has ever attended with his parents. He believes that Chinese people generally believe this. His interpretation of the belief is that the purpose of the extra stop is to “throw off the spirits.” This idea can be considered more of a folk belief rather than a superstition because it is a belief that has not been scientifically proven to be true but it is not tied to magic and does not involve either looking for signs in the universe or reversing something that has been broken. His deeming it a superstition shows how closely related these terms are and how people generally use the terms superstition, belief, and magic interchangeably.

This belief reveals that regardless of the ties that the people have to the deceased, they do not want the spirit to follow them or stay with them. This goes along with the concept that people are supposed to move on in the afterlife rather than linger among and shadow the living. There is also a fear of the spirits that drives people to continue this practice. Wilson mentioned that any place will suffice. For example, his parents and he have stopped by a supermarket before, a Starbucks, and simply anything convenient at the time. In Sunnyvale, CA where he was raised, there are plenty of convenient places to visit instead of leading the spirit home with them.

Ghost Story – Hispanic/Native-American

Nationality: Italian
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Ventura, CA
Performance Date: April 02, 2008
Primary Language: English

The San Buena Ventura Mission in Ventura County, CA was built on an Indian Burial ground.  Next to the mission a school was built called Holy Cross for grades kindergarten through eight. One of the buildings was really old, it was first building of the school. The school used to be a small one-building school. The building had a bell tower and the bell tower was said haunted by the spirits from the burial site. Friends of Charly claim to have heard funny noises and seen shadows when no one was there. The bell tower was torn down 4 years ago. On the night the tower was torn down people nearby claimed that there were strange noises and lights around the construction site. A new, really large school building was built in its place. Now it is said that if you are at the new building at night time lights will flash on and off and that you will hear sounds. These are supposed to be signs from the angry spirits in the burial ground. They were angry that they were built on top of in the first place and remain angry that buildings still stand over the burial ground.

Charly went to Holy Cross School in the 6th grade. She said that she heard the story when she became a student at the school. She said that the new students were always told this story when they first got to the school to scare them. This ghost story could be seen as a type of initiation for the new students. Charly said the kids would tell the new kids this story and then also embellish different parts of the story. She said that the kids would pick normal, modern objects and claim that they were haunted too just to scare the new kids and make them feel uncomfortable. This would go on only for a few weeks in the beginning of the year according to Charly, after that liminal period the students would get tired of scaring and just accept the new kids.

The setting of angry Indian spirits is a common beginning to many ghost stories. The Indian polytheistic belief system is directly juxtaposed with the Christian monotheism in this story because a Christian mission is built on top of the burial ground. This may symbolize the stomping out of Naive American beliefs by monotheism and the oppression the Indians went through during the colonization and Christianization of southern California. The angry spirits are a means of retaliation by the Indian people and also bring recognition of their presence.

The active bearers of the story are middle school aged children, ages 12-13. At this age kids are beginning to want to impress others, boys impressing girls and vice versa, and therefore scaring a new kid may be a way to impress these groups. Also, if a new kid says he or she’s not scared he will probably impress the new kids more than if he bought into the story and revealed his fear.

Kids telling ghost stories or daring each other is a commonplace in middle schools, especially when it involves welcoming a new person into social groups. At this age social groups and standards are becoming more important and cliques are established. The ghost story of the Indian burial ground at Holy Cross appears to serve more as a hazing ritual for the new students at the school versus a story actually investigated by the students.

Ghost Story – Singapore

Nationality: Singaporean
Age: 22
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles, CA
Performance Date: April 12, 2008
Primary Language: Chinese
Language: English

“I feel that there are a lot more ghosts and scary stuff in Asia, then there is in the states. It’s because most of the buildings here in LA are newer, and don’t have so much history. Whereas in South East Asia, just walking around the streets at night I really can really fear it. You just sense that fear a lot more, whereas here I simply just don’t get the chills. Like in my boarding school in Singapore. I woke up once in the middle of the night and our room for some reason it looked like a lab, like a science lab. And then this fat guy walked in, he was a soldier. And he was walking around our room. When I saw him I thought SHIT don’t come to me. Next thing I knew I felt very cold and I saw that he was standing at my bed. I pretended to sleep and was lying on my stomach. He kept leaning over trying to see my face and called “Alex!” and wave. I just ignored him. Suddenly I could feel his hands pressing down on my shoulders, it was SO COLD. I was trying to call out to my friend “Sam! Sam!” but I couldn’t scream loud I felt paralysed, it was a strange feeling. Suddenly I was able to break free and I said “SAM!” and I woke her up. She said she heard me the first time I called her but said she thought I was dreaming. That proves exactly that I was not asleep. To make matters worse, all along I knew that my school was and old Hospital during World War 2”.

As far as my informant is concerned, this story is 100% true. Having grown up in Singapore myself, I know that the idea of ghosts, especially wandering Spirits is a belief that is not questioned at all. This informant is an example of a Singaporean that despite being very exposed to contemporary western culture, where most of the people are sceptical, this story to her greatly affects her belief system on what she believes regarding human life, the afterlife, and whatever comes in between. I would further like to include in this analysis the following quotes from my informant:

“When I’m in LA I don’t sense the wandering spirits, but in places like London where all the buildings are old, I already sense that chill. It gives me a feeling of fear and I am automatically reminded that there are spirits here”

“There is definitely a war going on between angels and demons going on here on earth. Only those who have a third eye can see it”.

I would also like to add that in Singapore, although many people have adopted Christianity, they still do not denounce the idea of wandering spirits but instead incorporate this into their Christian beliefs, that is they would say that sin is all around us and that they often come in the form of spirits. This story and stories like these are not told on any particular occasion, but instead count as normal life experience, not necessarily everyday, as paranormal encounters are not frequent. Another quote I would like to add from my informant:

“My friend sees them all the time and is completely used to it. Sometimes we are sitting in the living room and she looks and my grandfather clock and says she sees an old man in there dressed in an old-fashioned suit. We told my mother, she thinks its just the clock maker”.

Although I grew up in Singapore, it is only my mother that is Singaporean whilst my father is actually German and thus I integrated a lot with the western community when I was growing up. However when I entered the Singapore military, the basic military training camp was said to be extremely haunted. There were countless stories of spirits walking around the soldiers’ bunks at night. What I found interesting was that our superiors never denied any of the stories. For an example, many instances where someone brought in a snack that was barbecued pork, a popular dish in Singapore, a ghost would always appear at night to the person who possessed it. Our superiors simply said “Do not bring pork in, just don’t do it”. I explain to you this story because I found it very peculiar that military superiors, who need to ensure that you get your 7 hours sleep between full days of rigorous training, would want to put thoughts like that in your head. What I did not understand was that denying something like that is an abstract idea to them. Therefore they simply insisted that you follow certain abstract practices or rules to ensure that you get your 7 hours sleep and pass through your basic military training time as soon as possible.

To refer back to my informant’s story, I have heard many similar stories to this, and particularly in Singapore they often involve themes of the Second World War, the Japanese Occupation, and the torturing of the prisoners of war.