The last time I had been to the house in which my father grew up was so long ago, my memories of the place are blurred and incomplete. The one aspect of this house, however, that I could not forget was the supposed rumor that it was inhabited by spirits. As a child, my relatives would often tell me stories about this house, always implying the presence of beings from another dimension. These stories left an impression so strong in my mind that it may have influenced one of my memories. On a night I could not sleep, I left the bedroom to use the bathroom, and when I looked to my right, through the doorway I saw a shadow move swiftly down the hall. The memory abruptly ends as I turn around to go back to bed, but admittedly, I wonder to myself whether this was truly a memory or a dream.

Two years ago, my family and I visited my grandparent’s home again, for the first time in over a decade. When I arrived at the house, it felt much smaller than I expected, as the building felt like a mansion to me as a child. The large living room, the kitchen, and the rest of the main floor triggered a nostalgic feeling inside me. The faint musk of the furniture and the familiar placement of the house brought me back in time for a moment, as if I was visiting again as a child, as if nothing had changed. This made the place seem aged and antique, and in a way, it added to the mysterious, almost creepy, aura of the house. Within the nostalgia, I also remember the stories of spirits in this house, and the fear I felt as a child.   

Later that night, while the parents slept in the bedrooms, my cousins and I decided to set down sheets in the living room, and then place mattresses over them for us to sleep altogether, We spent a lot of the night playing card games and reminiscing, but there was always time for ghost stories, and most were about the house we were sitting in. One story I recall was about the maids who once worked there. Most middle-class households in Indonesia hired maids to maintain the house and carry out daily chores, but when I noticed this large home was not being taken care of by any help, I asked the relatives living there about it. They shared stories of previous workers who suddenly began to act strange, and even about one who suddenly began throwing dishes at the wall in anger. These creative rumors did not stop there, and there were many creatively told instances of spiritual habitation in this house.

In addition to the strange behavior of these workers, some of my relatives claim to have seen my grandmother’s rocking chair move on its own, or heard short bursts of water come out of the faucet. They also claim that, in the basement floor, one can hear the sweeping broom of a spirit who was once a maid in the house years ago. Another area these spirits supposedly inhabited was the small warehouse built behind the house. They seemed to believe spirits were involved when the front of the building collapsed and the entrance became blocked.

While I am not sure whether these stories were real accounts of the past, this storytelling time became a fun bonding experience, and an enjoyable way to spend time with many of the relatives I rarely had the chance to meet. Moreover, these stories were good souvenirs to bring to friends and other family members when I returned home. More than anything, the memory of listening to these stories became a significant part of the relationship between my relatives. There was a slight fear in my heart, recalling the possibility of some presence looming in that residence, but with these frightening tales, I had begun to associate a warmth and happiness towards the familial love rooted in all those storytelling sessions.