By Gerrilyn Cadiz
This happened a couple of years back, when I was just a child of eight. My family and I had just moved an old House in Bulacan.
It was a bungalow-type of dwelling, with two bedrooms, a garage and a big backyard. The house was ample for our compact family, as it was only my six-year-old sister, our parents and I.
For a young girl who grew up in the congested metropolis, this new house was a haven.
The place was surrounded by trees -- mange, camachile, Star Apple, macopa, jackfruit, aratilis, chesa. There were also santan and gumamela plants planted all around the backyard. It reminded me of my maternal grandmother's house in Sta. Cruz, Laguna, only smaller.
It was, in a word, idyllic.
Our first few weeks there were great. We moved in the summer so we were on vacation. We immediately made new friends with other kids in the neighborhood. My sister and our new friends had a blast climbing the trees and "shooting" the ripe Star apples with our rubber slippers. We would spend the day hanging out in the bahay-kubo my parents installed in the backyard, beneath the giant Star Apple Tree.
One day, I overheard my mother and her friends talking about the house. From what I overheard, I learned that no family had been able to stay in the house for more than a few months because of the strange things reportedly happening in that house.
One of my mom's friends related the story that happened to a friend of a friend's friend. According to her, the friend had been passing by the house when she saw a white lady standing in front of the gate, as if trying to get in.
Another related that weird noises could be heard in the backyard at night.
Oh great, I thought, of all the houses in this subdivision, trust my dad to buy the haunted one!
I suddenly remembered how I kept losing, or as my mother would say "misplacing," my things. How one minute my box of colored pencils would be there and the next minute, it would disappear, only to be found, after hours of frantic searching, right where it was originally.
At the time, I thought my sister was playing a prank on me. But then I remembered she was only six years old, and pretty scared of her big sister. So, I easily ruled her out as a suspect.
Then something my mother's friend said totally creeped me out.
One of them said that a kapre was living in the huge star apple tree at the back of the house!
The star apple tree! The tree which stood over our favorite hangout!
I had a pretty good idea what a kapre was. My cousins from the province had already told me stories of a huge, hairy man who is usually seen smoking a cigar.
They said the kapre would snatch sleeping children and eat them and that a kapre could enchant you and lead you astray.
I felt a chill run down my spine. Not only was our beloved bahay-kubo directly under that star apple tree, but its massive trunk was totally visible from the window of the bedroom my sister and I shared.
One day, I overheard my mother and her friends talking about the house. From what I overheard, I learned that no family had been able to stay in the house for more than a few months because of the strange things reportedly happening in that house.
One of my mom's friends related the story that happened to a friend of a friend's friend. According to her, the friend had been passing by the house when she saw a white lady standing in front of the gate, as if trying to get in.
Another related that weird noises could be heard in the backyard at night.
Oh great, I thought, of all the houses in this subdivision, trust my dad to buy the haunted one!
I suddenly remembered how I kept losing, or as my mother would say "misplacing," my things. How one minute my box of colored pencils would be there and the next minute, it would disappear, only to be found, after hours of frantic searching, right where it was originally.
At the time, I thought my sister was playing a prank on me. But then I remembered she was only six years old, and pretty scared of her big sister. So, I easily ruled her out as a suspect.
Then something my mother's friend said totally creeped me out.
One of them said that a kapre was living in the huge star apple tree at the back of the house!
The star apple tree! The tree which stood over our favorite hangout!
I had a pretty good idea what a kapre was. My cousins from the province had already told me stories of a huge, hairy man who is usually seen smoking a cigar.
They said the kapre would snatch sleeping children and eat them and that a kapre could enchant you and lead you astray.
I felt a chill run down my spine. Not only was our beloved bahay-kubo directly under that star apple tree, but its massive trunk was totally visible from the window of the bedroom my sister and I shared.
