Eerie tales

"Once upon a time"... Most fairy tales starts with those 4 words..as a child I was a voracious reader.. enid blyton, famous 5 , secret 7, nancy drew , hardy boys and any fairy tale books including volumes upon volumes of encyclopedia that my parents invested for me. I will pour through the pages and loose myself in its contents. When I stayed over at my Gran's I will normally sleep with my one of my aunts if they are in the country or my great grandma. The best part about that is I always get her to tell me stories before I sleep or have a story telling session when we are just lounging around after lunch or dinner in the weekends. The story the Fantastic 4 (click on the link for Fantastic 4 reference) keep asking her to repeat over and over again are her accounts of Cerita Hantu (Ghost stories) . We had a blast listening and later on would not be able to sleep on account of being freaked out beyond believe. Amazingly we still ask for more hehe it must have been the adrenalin rush of being scared out of the our skulls!?

One story that is etched on my memory is that of my great granma's relative in olden Singapore. The story goes that my Great Granma has an uncle or was it cousin? who loves going to town with his buddies. Well if you could call it town in the olden days.. being a young man they would definitely go to weddings and functions where there will be some sort of "joget lambak" (Dance) session . Whenever he goes .. he would always be warned not to stay out too late. At the time they don't have street lights and distances are some. The only method of transportation are you own two feet or bicycles, cars are commodities that not many can afford. He owned a trusted bicycle.

One night after those joget lambak sessions he set out home quite late. He was cycling while whistling..I would guess bahagia as he had had a good time wooing girls at the joget lambak, as he was cycling he saw a young lady standing at the road side as if waiting for someone. She was a beauty red lips fair skin and all. He stopped thinking she must have been from the same function . He asked her why she was waiting alone in the dark .She told him that she was waiting for someone to bring her home and that the person promised to fetch her. He had an eye for pretty ladies and thinking of mengurat (wooing) and being a good Samaritan and all thought perhaps since its late why not send her. She accepted his offer.

She had a realllly lovely heady perfume on and he almost drowned in that scent as soon as she got on his bicycle.. but he also had to break some sweat as she was extra extra heavy despite being tiny and svelte and curvaceous ..read sexy in a nice kebaya and sarong. As he cycled he had a whiff of something ..the smell of rotting flesh..the bicycle suddenly felt light ..when he turned he saw something in white on the air as if the person he had behind him was lifted up to the air..thinking initially she has been pulled up it later dawned upon him that she was actually that thing on the air..one word came to his mind.. Pontianak! That thing starting making screechy wailing sounds ..it was hideous..with long hair , long nails and all.

He cycled fast and later on ditched the bicycle and ran like there is no tomorrow. He pounded on doors to let him in and finally reached his house and pound some more . He screamed and shout for his family to let him in. When he was finally in the house . He got a scolding and his mom told the whole family who was by then awake.. they were told to keep quiet and just read the surah's in particular Al Qursy. The "being" terrorised them for quite sometime..living at the kampong they lived in a typical malay kampong stilt wooden house. The thing was apparently scratching on walls under the floorboards on the roof in between bursts of what the malays call "mengilai" or screeching wailing laughter not unlike the cry of a banshee. The thing went away after a while and the story goes that it will make itself scarce before dawn breaks. Suffice to say that the incident taught him a huge lesson after that. The villagers were all told of the story and was asked to be vigilant and not to stay out too long.

Apparently they were told that the "thing" likes to prey on young men as she died on child birth and was jilted by her lover when she found out she was pregnant or something like that..as i grew up there was so many variants of the reason why the pontianak came to being but the common denominator is that she is gorgeous ,hate men and wants to avenge her death.

Whether this is fact or fiction we enjoyed the stories tremendously. I miss my great granma.. she was a brilliant cook and was ever so happy to indulge us with her stories. I think perhaps I should document what I remember of her stories and preserve it for posterity. I hope you enjoyed this story too.