Ghost Stories - My Encounters

Do you believe in ghosts ? Decide for yourself after reading these two incidents which happened to me, one 4 years back and one recently.

Also, next time I'll post some other stories I've heard / read so do come back later on.

Incident 1 :

This was 4 years back when I was finishing my internship @ Veritas. One night I was returning home and got a bit late. In those days there were no direct buses to Chinchwad ( where I live ) so late in the night. Also there used to be almost nobody on the roads you could hitch lifts from. So the usual practice used to be to get off on the highway and walk the rest of the way.

This highway is separated from Chinchwad by a railway track that runs parallel to it. There is a bridge over this track that connects the highway and Chinchwad. The bridge has steep walls on either side upto the point where it joins the highway.

Now, on this particular night, it so happened that the some of the street lights on the bridge were defunct. Thus, there was a stretch of darkness on the bridge starting some way from the highway and extending upto the point where the bridge crossed the tracks.

I noticed this, but thought nothing of it and started walking along the bridge. As I entered the dark stretch I heard footsteps close behind me. I looked back to see that a young man my age was also walking down the bridge. He was about 10-15 paces behind me. Seeing all was ok, I turned around and resumed my walk. I kept hearing his footsteps for some time. Then as I was about to reach the end of the dark stretch, all of a sudden everything went eerily quite. The crunch of his footsteps had stopped abruptly. Naturally, I turned back to look and got the fright of my life.

The bridge was completely empty right upto the highway ! There was nobody there ! I was stunned; there was no way that man could have gone anywhere in the split second that I took to turn around after his footsteps stopped and yet the bridge was empty and its sides too steep for someone to jump over. He had just vanished ! I was totally scared and took off @ top speed and stopped only when I'd crossed the bridge. I hurried home and could not sleep that night !

Incident 2 :

This happened around 6 months ago. I'd been to California for a short onsite stint. I was staying @ the apartment my company had arranged for us. It was a nice big 3 bhk house and a colleague and I were the sole occupants for the first week or so.

The first night there was uneventful and I slept like a log. I was glad that I'd not felt any effects of jet lag and seemed to be able to sleep soundly every night. A few nights later though, I'd a frightening experience.

As was my usual practice there, I slept early. It was about 2 in the morning when I was startled and felt that 'someone'/'something' was sitting near my shoulder ! I tried to look and realised I couldn't move. My arms, legs all were just paralysed. I just couldn't move. As I started to panic, I tried shouting. But no sound issued from my mouth. It seemed I was totally subdued by that presence whatever it was. And suddenly, it just went away and with it the paralysis was gone too. I got up completely shaken and could not sleep for the rest of the night.

I felt that it must have been my imagination and decided not to talk about this with my roommate lest he get unduly frightened. So the next night I slept without any worries.
Again around the same time as before, I was awakened from my slumber, this time to feel a presence sitting on my chest ! And now it was worse as I could not even open my eyes try as I might ! Like before, I tried hollering, kicking, jabbing but none of my appendages seemed to obey me as before. Again, like the previous night it just went away. By now I was hysterical and called up my folks. They managed to calm me by telling me this would have been just a dream and not to worry about such silly things.

Nevertheless, I started sleeping with the lights on in my room just in case. Luckily, for me, it stopped @ that.

These are the 2 incidents I've experienced. Haven't turned me into a believer yet.

The second one I researched and found that its a common occurrence, particularly if there are sudden changes to your environment. Its aptly called Sleep Paralysis.

The first one I can't explain at all but I doubt it was a ghost I experienced that day.