What do you do when you drive along a lonely dark road in the middle of nowhere and you see a lady walking by the roadside?
Thought I’d share some of my childhood stories this round… just for fun…
Hello There...
So this happened to my Dad. He was young, in his twenties. One night, he and his buddy lets call him Q (like the James Bond series, why not), were out for dinner and drinks with their other colleagues till very late. Q didn’t have a car, so Dad had to send him home. And Q of course had to live like way out there in some small suburb at the other side of town. Back in the 60s, there was not much development outside Kuala Lumpur city (which is in Malaysia by the way, in case you didn’t know). There was a small population living in the city centre and others outside in the various housing estates. A lot of the housing areas outside Kuala Lumpur were not fully developed yet and they are scattered here and there linked by small roads and surrounded with rubber plantations etc.
Back to the story – Dad was taking Q home – it was super late. They passed by this lonely road cutting through the middle of a big plantation – trees all around, far from any housing estate. There were no streetlights – it was in the AM, so no cars either. They were talking about whatever is it that men talked about – when suddenly they saw a figure up front walking by the side of the road with his or her back facing them. Dad slowed down the car and as they got closer, they saw that it was a lady – or they guessed it was a lady from the long black hair. They drove up to the lady and Q rolled down his window and asked.
“Hello – are you lost? Why are you walking by yourself? Do you need help or a ride?” The lady didn’t answer and continued walking. Q couldn’t really see her face as it was covered by the long hair. She smelled so nice though but he didn’t have a good feeling. He quickly rolled up his window and told Dad to drive straight on.
None of them spoke a word after that. Dad drove on and they finally got to Q’s place about 15minutes later. Q asked whether Dad would like to just crash at his place. He looked concerned – he didn’t have a good feeling from their short encounter with the mysterious lady. Dad dismissed him and told him not to be silly.
Well this was my Dad telling his ‘not-so-little’ girl a story about his ‘adventure’, maybe he exaggerated the ‘macho’ part a bit. We will never know.
Here We Are Again..
Dad stayed in the City Centre, he didn’t have a choice and had to use the same road to go back home. It was very quiet this time – he was alone in the car and more conscious that it was past 3AM. He was really tired but he needed to keep it together and just focus on the drive.
He got to that part of the road again where they saw the lady when suddenly his engine just stopped. (In old horror movies, this is the part when you will hear some haunting music in the background)…
He started the car, the engine seemed fine, but when he tried to move forward, the engine died again. He started the car again, and this time he went into reverse mode, the car cooperated. Then he went into the drive gear again, and the engine died when he hit the same spot as before. He started the car again, reversed, which was fine – tried moving forward and the engine died again. This was going on several times and he was really getting frustrated.
After 5-6 attempts, he got really annoyed, opened the car door and stepped out. Ok, if this was a Hollywood movie, there can be a few scenarios of what happened next.
Scenario 1 – The whatever thing appeared – he got freaked out – and got back into the car and frantically tried to start the engine. The ‘thing’ started to scratch the car trying to get in – he managed to drive off – for a bit but then the car hit a tree or something. He got out, and he saw the ‘thing’ coming at him – and started running and it goes on and on… spooky
Scenario 2 – Nothing happened – he went back into his car, but as he started driving, he saw the lady sitting at the back in his rear view mirror. He freaked out and he crashed into a tree and passed out. (Nothing serious happened of course – he did get married and had me after all..)
Ok – nothing like Scenario 1 or 2, happened. But it was true – he did get super annoyed and angry. He got out of the car and called out loud to whatever that was stopping him from passing through. His exact words – translated to English of course – ‘If you dare, come out and show yourself!’
Dad suddenly realised that he was surrounded by total silence. He couldn’t even hear the sounds of crickets or anything. It was just pure silence – he could hear his breathing and that was about it. It was quite odd as he was surrounded by rubber trees etc. But really – nothing!
He called out again – repeating the same words – ‘If you dare, come out and show yourself!’. He was actually a bit freaked out deep down. But at the time, he was feeling more tired than scared, and really just wanted to crawl into bed.
Then, he went back into his car, started the engine and attempted to drive forward one more time – but of course, the car refused to co-operate. So in the end – he didn’t have any choice but turned the car around, and slept over at his friend’s place that night.
What Can We Learn From That Story?
Don’t call out to lonely figures walking by themselves in the middle of nowhere! Haven’t we seen enough horror movies to know NOT TO DO THAT! What was wrong with Dad?
Don’t get out of the car for goodness sake! What was he thinking – seriously what was wrong with him?
And of course – don’t go out at 3 am all by yourself passing through some lonely plantation roads… maybe there are no ghosts but there could be a few ‘crazies’ out there too…
Anyway – it’s a true story…I would have freaked out if that happened to me! Ok – signing off for the night.. gosh its 230am over here… feeling a bit freakish all of a sudden…