Encounters with Ghosts: My Personal Experience

This article is dedicated to Ms. QF Cheong. 

On Monday, August 12, 2024, I wrote an article explaining:

Do Animals have a Soul? here:

https://scientificlogic.blogspot.com/2024/08/do-animals-have-soul.html

Ms. QF Cheong then wrote to me about a dog she had that died. Let me quote what she wrote in pink: 

2:22 AM (0 minutes ago)

"Dear Dr. Lim , well said !

l believe that too. I privately cremated my late beloved great Dane . I kept Duchess’s ashes in my storeroom for years 

Finally realized l got to set him free , l sprinkled his ashes in my garden under my big pine tree . I trust now she souls can continue to protect our home and also enjoy the companionship of my others furry babies" 

Following that, let me follow up my belief that animals too have a soul. They can turn up as animal ghosts after their death. I have also written several accounts about the soul, spirits and ghosts here in this blog

However, yesterday I saw an account from Google about animals and pets becoming animal ghosts on their death. Here’s the independent question and answer others asked in parentheses below:

“Some of our most powerful bonds are not with other humans but with our pets. Could those ties survive even death? Could you be sharing your home with the ghosts of previous pets? Mediums, psychics, and parapsychologists—researchers who investigate haunted sites—say, “Yes.”

Why Do Animals Haunt?

Most hauntings canter around a trauma—a tragedy or sudden death creates an emotional “bruise” that traps spirits in time and space. That’s why battlefields and historically violent places, such as the Tower of London, are frequently the sites of paranormal activity. Animal ghosts, on the other hand, are less likely to be the result of agony or hurt in life.

The majority of household animal ghosts stick around for more benevolent reasons. Their attachment isn’t about past trauma, but a vibrant emotional connection with their owners or their homes. The connection between master and pet can be so powerful in life that it borders on telepathy. After death, that spiritual attachment does not fade. That’s why the ghost of a pet may act as a guardian angel, a divine protector. For example, animals that are loyal and defensive in life, like Rottweilers, might not see death as a sufficient reason to leave their post. There are stories in the psychic community of phantom barks scaring away would-be home intruders; most likely these cries are the defenses of an old pet.

Of course, animal guardian angels don’t always wait to spring into action until the danger is near. Much as in life, they can ease the burden of an emotional struggle with kisses and cuddles. The question is whether an animal ghost’s owner can consciously perceive its affection. Not everyone is well-attuned to psychic phenomenon, so not everyone can experience the presence of an animal ghost.

There’s no limit on what kind of animal can haunt. Dogs and cats are the obvious choices, but horse, sheep, cow, fish, and rodent spirits have all been reported. In rural areas, there may be reporting of horses in antiquated saddles riding along roadsides, only to disappear suddenly. Likewise, owners of historical farms may hear disembodied bleats, barks, moos, whinnies, and meows. They also asked how long animal hauntings last?

Some animal ghosts stick around just until they feel their owners are ready to go it alone. Some pet owners experience a warm spot in the place where their recently deceased dog or cat used to sleep, and this will occur for only a few days or weeks. Animal mediums generally interpret this as an assurance from the pet’s spirit that it has found the afterlife.
Other animals stay longer—they may feel their owners still need them, or they may be quite comfortable and happy in their old homes. When a family moves houses, sometimes the ghost of the family pet will accompany it. Undoubtedly, the animal ghost’s attachment to the old house will wane without the master’s presence, and the intensity of such hauntings will typically dwindle. This is not a bad thing—it means the animal ghost has advanced in its spiritual journey. Hauntings that are relatively low energy may appear only as apparitions in the same place, like a video set on replay. If you’re consistently sensing a phantom tabby cat run through your living room, that might be the full extent of the haunting.

If you’ve recently moved into a new home, you could encounter a host of mysterious noises and warm spots if the previous owner kept a small zoo. Unless the activity escalates to bothersome levels, these spirits usually offer positive energy. Most homeowners who inherit a benevolent haunting find it unnerving at first, but eventually, they acclimate to the presence of spirits and even embrace the situation”

I then sent this story about animal ghosts to others in a WhatsApp chat.

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Here are two more replies in pink to my earlier article if animals have a soul. Here are what they wrote to me. 

1.  Professor Dr Lim

I read several articles you wrote about the soul, spirits and about ghosts, your logical explanation about them and even the article if animals have souls. Let me tell you a true story about my aunt and her husband who used to keep two dogs in their bungalow house. One of their dogs one day died and they buried it just behind their house which was an extension of the garden in front and at the side of their bungalow. It seemed the other dog knew where its companion was buried, and she (female dog) used to go behind the house to the spot where the other male dog was buried. She would try to dig the space where the other dog was buried making a lot of whining noises. On several nights she would go behind the house and howled and howled. Initially my aunt and uncle and two of their children would ignore it. Then one night my aunt went behind the house to try to pacify the dog that was howling for some time, and to her fright she saw the ghost of her dead dog that was buried there. The other dog was howling at the ghost of her companion that seemed to be floating about 1.5 metre in the air. She called out to her husband and two sons to have a look, but by the time they came the ghost of her dog had already disappeared. Then it happened again a few nights later after they heard the other dog howling. They all went out to have a look, and they all clearly saw the ghost of the dead dog hovering above for about two minutes below the spot it was buried. This always occurred behind the house. Then a few weeks later they saw it again, this time it was seen inside the house. This went on for a few weeks. Then they offered it its pet food and conducted some prayers to rest its soul, after which they never saw its ghost again. But the other dog continued to howl at night behind the house.

One of my college mates too told us about the ghost of one of her relatives who always appeared through the walls of her house on the eve of the date she was found dead, presumably murdered elsewhere. Before her appearance through the walls of the house, the house would suddenly become very chilly though there was no wind inside or outside the house. But the ghost did not harm anyone except stared at those in the house before disappearing inside the wall. It was very chilling for my college mate who was then a medical student. There is lots of truth in whatever you wrote there.

Dr Jasmine Keys 

2. Uncle Lim please re-share all your articles on these topics on souls, spirits and ghosts as you had them in the other groups which I had lost them.

Shantini Charavanamutt

Luton, Bedfordshire, England

I would like to reply to Ms. QF Cheong that she is not alone in believing her dog Dane has a soul to safeguard her house. I have a brother-in-law, the younger brother of my wife who once kept a very fierce dog in his house that would bark and attack any stranger including my wife and me trying to enter his house. My brother-in-law would have to restrain his dog with a very strong steel chain to allow us to enter the house each Chinese New Year when we visit him.

In 2022 we noticed his dog was very quiet. It did not bark anymore or tried to attack us. My brother-in-law told me his dog was very old and sick already. Then year in 2023 I visited him again on Chinese New Year and was told his dog had died. He then cremated and i brought back its to the house to be buried under a tree in front of the house so that its spirit can protect his family from intruders.

 There you are Ms. QF Cheong, you are not the only one who believes your great Dane has a soul. I too think so, not only for dogs, but for all living creatures as I have explained in my article if animals have a soul.

Today, I am not going to write about animal spirits, their souls and their ghosts. What I am going to write about now is to tell you about my own experiences with (human) ghosts here. Please read on as they can be interesting.

I think different people have different perspectives about the existence of ghosts.

From a scientific viewpoint, there isn't conclusive evidence that ghosts exist. Most claims of ghost sightings or hauntings can often be explained by psychological factors, environmental influences, or misinterpretations of natural phenomena. For example, in pareidolia non-believers claim there is a human tendency to see patterns, like faces or figures, in random objects or shadows. There is also this sleep paralysis which is a state where a person is conscious but unable to move, often accompanied by hallucinations that can be interpreted as ghostly encounters. Other think it is electromagnetic fields where high levels of electromagnetic fields can sometimes cause feelings of unease or even hallucinations. Another person explains ghosts is the result of infrasound in which low-frequency sound waves, which are below the range of human hearing, can cause feelings of discomfort or fear, sometimes leading people to believe they're experiencing something supernatural.

But what about the existence of ghosts from those who believe?  Many people believe in ghosts based on personal experiences, cultural traditions, or religious beliefs. These experiences often involve seeing apparitions, hearing unexplained noises, or feeling the presence of a spirit. For those who believe, ghosts might be thought of as the souls of deceased people who haven't moved on to an afterlife, or as echoes of past events that somehow linger in a particular place.

There are a couple of well-known ghost stories such as the ghost of Anne Boleyn. This is one of the most famous ghost stories in England. It is said that Anne Boleyn, the second wife of King Henry VIII after being executed at the Tower of London in 1536, her ghost is said to haunt several locations, including the Tower itself, where she's been seen walking the corridors, sometimes carrying her head under her arm. All of them were dressed in ancient clothes as if their spirits were frozen in time. 

Then we may have heard of the Amityville horror.  In the 1970s, the Lutz family moved into a house in Amityville, New York, where a gruesome mass murder had taken place the year before. They claimed to experience a series of terrifying paranormal events, including strange noises, foul smells, and ghostly apparitions. The story became famous through a book and several movies, though many sceptics believe it was a hoax.

Some may have also heard about the haunting of the Stanley Hotel. Briefly, the Stanley Hotel in Estes Park, Colorado, is said to be one of the most haunted places in America. Guests and staff have reported hearing piano music coming from an empty ballroom, seeing apparitions of the hotel's former owners, and witnessing objects moving on their own. The hotel's eerie reputation even inspired Stephen King's novel The Shining.

These stories, whether one believes in ghosts or not, have become part of cultural folklore, reflecting the human fascination with the unknown and the afterlife.

 These were some of the foreign stories some of us may have heard. But let me now tell you what I have heard and have personally experienced. 

I have heard many, many ghost stories since I was a boy in school, especially occurring in my school. I was born and brought up in a small town called Batu Pahat in the State of Johore, Malaya, now called Malaysia. I studied in a school in Batu Pahat just after the Japanese occupation after the British took over. The school’s name was Batu Pahat Government English School then, then later renamed as Batu Pahat High School. During the Japanese occupation of Malaya then in the 1930’s the Japanese used my school to torture and killed a lot of Chinese in my school. I was not born yet. I was born before the Japanese surrendered on September 2, 1945 after which the British took over again after World War II (WW II). 

After the WWII, my school became very haunted. I heard of so many, many reports of ghosts roaming there at night when it was dark and isolated. Some students, including my classmate who went there, saw ghosts lurking around the compound. For instance, they could hear someone running round and round on the veranda of the rectangular rows of classrooms. In the middle of this rectangular row of classrooms there is a badminton court. Then sometimes some of the students could hear “someone” playing badminton there. The shuttlecocks could be seen flying to and fro  between the net that was not there. It always happened in the very late evenings when it was almost getting dark. But there was no one there. 

Then there were also some very brave classmates of mine who went back to school at night to study there on their own in the sports room just below the staircase leading to the hall upstairs. They went there to study because it was so quiet and isolated there unlike in their own homes that were very noisy with people coming and going that disturbed their concentration.  Then when they went to the school at night, they heard someone playing the piano in the hall upstairs in the dark. When they went upstairs to investigate and switched on the hall light, the piano stopped playing abruptly. Then when they came down, the piano started to play again in the dark. That has been going on for many years, and everyone in the school knew about this.

 Even in the daytime when school was dismissed in the afternoon or on weekends some workers who went to my school to do some repairs, they could feel someone else was also there. They could hear some noises and voices in the other classrooms as if there were someone there. But when they went there to investigate there was no one there. The school was very isolated from town and extremely quiet in a small town when all the students had gone home in the afternoon. It was a morning school. There were also many other stories of haunting in my school, including in the school laboratories and bookshop where we bought stationeries. They saw figures without their heads, I supposed their heads were chopped off by the Japanese soldiers after torturing them – the innocent civilians.  

What I write here are just a few stories. Even in the two storied shop house where I used to stay as a boy, I heard it was haunted as told to me by my sister-in-law who saw my deceased father floating down from his room upstairs down the staircase into the kitchen below before disappearing. She also saw ghosts there upstairs when she was alone at night. She told me on one or two occasions she was alone upstairs when her husband, who was my brother, was out in town. The shop downstairs was closed for the day, and her husband had locked it from outside. My sister-in-law was upstairs in the hall in front with three rooms behind. She was looking through the window upstairs when she heard noises coming from the second room. At first she thought it was her eldest but very young daughter who was almost a baby, barley a few years old. But she was fast asleep in the front room just besides the hall. But the noises came from the second room behind where my father used to stay before he died. She heard rustling noises in that room, and through the frosted windowpanes separating the first and second room she saw a face and a mouth pressed on the frosted window glass. She shouted who was there, but there was no answer except the rustling noises of some paper or plastic bags. The whole house became very cold. She was alone in the house, except with her very young daughter hardly a few years old who was fast asleep in the first room, but she was very brave to go to the second room to investigate. But before she could, she saw a figure floating out from the room which she believed was my deceased father. She chased after it, and saw the figure floated down the staircase and just disappeared midway through. I wouldn't dare chase after it myself.  Such a sight and encounter would scare the wits out of me. My sister-in-law wasn't well educated, but she is very truthful. She experienced this event many times whenever she was alone in the house. Her father also told me he experienced strange events occurring in his village house, being surrounded by noises and "fires" at night when alone.  

Even my wife told me our youngest daughter have experienced ghosts in Genting Highland resort, and also in her office when she worked alone at night where she heard noises and things falling down in the next room. My daughter did not tell me this, she told it only to her mother.  

Personally, I think I may have seen a ghost twice. It was in another very old hotel my father owned in Batu Pahat. It only had 8 rooms. This hotel building is still there today in Batu Pahat, but is now abandoned and in a very  dilapidated and derelict condition at the corner between Jalan Ismail and Jalan Sultanah (the word 'Jalan' means road or street in Malay language). 

One night my eldest brother, now deceased and myself were in the third room in front when my brother saw something that looked like a violin floating in the ceiling, and was coming down to the room. I think I too saw it very vaguely before we both ran away. There was another time when my second brother bed in the first hotel room where he was sleeping began to shake on its own. There are many of such stories I heard too many to remember to tell. 

Then when I was working at the Institute for Medical Research from 1968 – 1994 I had a private office room for myself which the staff told me was haunted. I used to stay back after office at 4:15 pm. I had a quick dinner after office and went back to work analyzing my research data and also to work towards my PhD degree. I was alone in my room normally from 5 pm till 9 or 10 pm, sometime till midnight. I was there working alone for 3 years, isolated from other rooms except the one adjacent to the research laboratory. It was so lonely, quiet and isolated in that room when all the other staff had gone home after work. Except for the low hum of the air-conditioner, I have not visually encountered any ghost or any uncanny figures in my room except on a few occasions when objects dropped mysteriously from the bench to the floor. But there was no one there. I am unable to explain how objects could move by themselves to drop on the floor.

However, after I have already retired, I was admitted to the Kuala Lumpur Hospital (KLH) from 13 August 2017 till I was discharged from KLH on 15 Dec 2017. I was admitted for an almost intractable left leg venous stasis ulcer. It was a 4 months and 4 days stay in KLH which they told me was a record for the hospital as they have never kept a patient there for so long. I was in a single room in a first-class ward which was my eligibility as a pensioner in the management and professional group. So, I did not mind staying in KLH that long as my single room was quite comfortable with a bathroom attached, two air-conditioners one of which was not working, a fan, a table, a wash basin, cupboard, small bench where I could bring my own kettle and oven, and two chairs for visitors and nice curtains.  It was quite comfortable like an average hotel room to allow me to stay comfortably for 4 months and 4 days.

I hardly get any visitors in that ward, except from my family members and some of my former doctor colleagues and close friends. During my stay in that ward, that was a medical ward, Ward 28 at KLH, our present Prime Minister (who was then imprisoned in Sungai Buloh Prison) was admitted there twice in the same ward. His room was naturally in the VIP room next to mine. There were police all over the place outside his and my room, and even outside the ward, and no visitors were allowed to enter that ward when Anwar, the Prime Minister, was admitted twice there.   

One night, well past midnight around 1 or 2 am I was still not asleep, but just lying down with eyes closed. Then out of the blues I opened my eyes, I saw someone draped in long clothing standing at in front of my bed. I did not see or hear anyone coming inside my room minutes earlier.  I asked who he was, but he or it did not answer. He, or it just stood there for about 1 – 2 minutes, then guided to the window, stood there for several seconds before vanishing. I pressed the button to call the night duty nurses who came, and I asked her if there was any stranger or person who entered my room. 

She said no, because they have no business to enter the ward at that eerie hour of the night unless there was an emergency case that needed to be warded immediately. Moreover, if there was any stranger or visitor at that hour, they would have noticed it, and would have stopped him immediately. The first class ward was unlike the third-class wards where it is very crowded with all types of people from outside walking in and out all day long, with light switched on and off all night long, compared to the first-class medical ward 28 on the firth floor of KLH I was in. It is very quiet there, hardly any visitors even the day, let alone well past midnight. The nurse told me there was no visitor they saw at that time, dead into the night, and all the other patients were in their separate rooms all fast asleep. I told her what I saw. She got a chill and told me this was not the only time it has happened. There were also the same “sightings” by other patients previously. 

Besides that, I have also heard of a story of an obsessed nurse in another hospital who always weighs herself on a weighing machine placed beside the nurse’s desk. The nurse died one day. Subsequently other night duty nurses at their desk where the weighing machine was placed often saw and heard someone stepping on the weighing machine to weigh himself / herself / itself. But the machine did not register any weight, just the sound of someone stepping on it and the machine moving a little bit. Thereafter, the nurses moved the machine away from their desk out of fright.

My youngest brother, a former Professor of Surgery at the University Hospital, University of Malaya and a Senior Consultant Cardiothoracic Surgeon also told me he has heard many stories of ghosts haunting the hospital he once worked, but he did not tell me the details.   

Then I also heard of the maternity hospital attached to KLH that was haunted especially at night when nurses and staff used the lift. At night when there was no crowd, one of them would enter the lift alone, and halfway through they suddenly saw another “person” inside the lift. Then it disappeared before the lift got to the next floor. There were also occasions when another lone nurse, doctor or staff entered the lift together with another “person” but before the lift door could open in the next floor that “person” just vanished. This occurred at the maternity wing of KLH told to me by other doctors who were my colleagues.

I don't think hospitals are a very clean place. You not only get hospital-acquired infections (nosocomial infections) but also the spirits of patients lurking there who died from all types of diseases in that place.   

Then there were a few other ghost stories I have heard from an Anglo-Indian family living in Calcutta, India where the mother told me she heard loud sounds of soldiers marching in a field nearby, and the marching sounds came right into their house and stopped right in front of their bed. But they did not see any soldier, just the loud marching sounds and someone in command shouting orders at an unseen "battalion". That happened many times on certain nights. I was then in India as a student. I knew the family very well through their only daughter called Penny who was very pretty. She introduced me to her parents. I accidentally met Penny again a few years later in England at a railway station in the UK after their family migrated there. Penny was quite in love with me then...  ahmm! I have since lost touch with her.   

Maybe my encounters can be considered rich with cultural and historical context like others which adds a unique depth to the haunting phenomena. 

The experiences I had, and those shared by others, are not uncommon in places with a tumultuous past like my school in Batu Pahat or the hospital I stayed in. Many people believe that strong emotional events, such as those involving pain, suffering, or death, can leave an imprint on a location, resulting in the kind of paranormal activity. But I did not have those emotional traumas. My personal encounters, such as seeing the violin-like object floating and the figure in the hospital room, could be interpreted by others in various ways depending on their beliefs. From a paranormal interpretation, these encounters could be seen as manifestations of spirits or residual energy. The fact that multiple people, including my own classmates and hospital staff, reported similar experiences could suggest a shared paranormal phenomenon. Some might argue that the power of suggestion or heightened emotions in certain environments can lead to these experiences. For example, knowing that a place has a history of hauntings might make someone more likely to perceive unusual events as supernatural.

Ghost stories often serve as a way for communities to process collective trauma or reinforce cultural values. In the case of my school in Batu Pahat, the hauntings could be seen as a way of remembering and acknowledging the suffering that occurred there during the Japanese occupation. Similarly, stories from hospitals often reflect the fears and uncertainties surrounding illness and death. Some can appreciate the role that ghost stories play in human culture. They connect us to the past, provide a way to cope with the unknown, and sometimes, they remind us of the presence of something beyond our understanding.

My experiences and the stories I have heard are a testament to the rich tapestry of human perception and belief. Whether one views these events through a paranormal, psychological, or cultural lens, they certainly contribute to the mystery and wonder of life. 

Maybe? I leave this question opened to readers