7/2/05 Life according to... Where have all the ghosts gone?
Life according to... Where have all the ghosts gone?
By Gerry Anderson
featureseditor@belfasttelegraph.co.uk
02 July 2005
AS a rule, I have never been much impressed by talk of the paranormal. Whenever folk raise the subject of ghosts, I usually reply that the nearest I've ever been to communing with them was once having a drink with Alex Higgins and Charlie Landsborough.
But then I am, of course, no stranger to the unacceptable side of life. After all, I did spend a period of time playing in a show band. Life and death hold no mystery or fear when a man has been to that particular Hell and back.
But I am not completely desensitised. There was a time when I was exposed to the Ways of the Old Folk. On a dark night while ruminating over the remnants of an expiring turf fire, my old uncle in Donegal would often hesitate in mid-sentence, cock a practised ear and inform me, a timorous, fearful child, that the noise outside the window was indeed the wail of the Banshee. Nowadays such a howl would go unnoticed. One would merely assume that the people next door were watching Pop Idol.
There was also an anonymous spirit known as the Woman in White whom my uncle would occasionally point out when he and I were strolling home in the dark after attending some infernal fiddle-infested country gathering. The Woman in White would be seen wending her way across the bog with a lantern in her hand and, I would imagine, necessarily clad in the sturdiest of footwear. My uncle always claimed he'd spotted her and would grab my arm in the process of wheeling me round to a position from which I could spot her too. I never did see her.
Of course, this may have had something to do with the fact that, unlike my uncle, I didn't have half a bottle of poteen in me at the time. As my aunt used to say, "The crattur can make many things seem what they are not."
People should be employed to shout those words at students writhing on the ground in Belfast's Bradbury Place on a Saturday night. It may curb anti-social tendencies.
And am I not on first name terms with a certain white witch who lives in the shadow of Mount Errigal in Donegal and who once introduced me to a number of varieties of Little People, one species of which are 10 feet tall, wear clothing that resembles the white man's long johns and don't like rock 'n' roll or people who smoke?
To these particular Little People I say: "Come back to Donegal. All is forgiven. The conditions in the pubs are perfect for you now. All the characters and the old men have disappeared. Come and drink in an antiseptic smoke-free atmosphere swarming with sullen traditional musicians and pink-sweatered golfers who laugh very loudly at nothing at all."
But I started out talking about the paranormal. I often wonder what ghosts will do in the future when there won't be any more old houses to haunt. According to the evidence in my own city of Derry, it seems that every building over 100 years old is being demolished by developers while elected officials stand impotently by. We'll soon have to place armed guards round the city's walls. They're too old and get in the way of traffic, you see.
Ghosts will have nowhere to go. Can you imagine telling your son in future years that your local KFC or Pizza Hut is haunted? It doesn't work.
It's confession time. I am here to tell you that, despite cynicism in the past, I now believe firmly in ghosts.
During the course of these past few weeks, I, a BBC Radio Ulster team and members of the Northern Ireland Paranormal Research Association have spent sleepless nights staking out locations where spirits are said to lurk.
We went to Richill Castle just outside Armagh, the Grand Opera House in Belfast, the Old Workhouse in Stroke City and to Crumlin Gaol.
What we found there I cannot divulge here. Keep your eye out for the programmes. What I can say for certain is this: we are not alone.
Back | Return to top | Printable Story
By Gerry Anderson
featureseditor@belfasttelegraph.co.uk
02 July 2005
AS a rule, I have never been much impressed by talk of the paranormal. Whenever folk raise the subject of ghosts, I usually reply that the nearest I've ever been to communing with them was once having a drink with Alex Higgins and Charlie Landsborough.
But then I am, of course, no stranger to the unacceptable side of life. After all, I did spend a period of time playing in a show band. Life and death hold no mystery or fear when a man has been to that particular Hell and back.
But I am not completely desensitised. There was a time when I was exposed to the Ways of the Old Folk. On a dark night while ruminating over the remnants of an expiring turf fire, my old uncle in Donegal would often hesitate in mid-sentence, cock a practised ear and inform me, a timorous, fearful child, that the noise outside the window was indeed the wail of the Banshee. Nowadays such a howl would go unnoticed. One would merely assume that the people next door were watching Pop Idol.
There was also an anonymous spirit known as the Woman in White whom my uncle would occasionally point out when he and I were strolling home in the dark after attending some infernal fiddle-infested country gathering. The Woman in White would be seen wending her way across the bog with a lantern in her hand and, I would imagine, necessarily clad in the sturdiest of footwear. My uncle always claimed he'd spotted her and would grab my arm in the process of wheeling me round to a position from which I could spot her too. I never did see her.
Of course, this may have had something to do with the fact that, unlike my uncle, I didn't have half a bottle of poteen in me at the time. As my aunt used to say, "The crattur can make many things seem what they are not."
People should be employed to shout those words at students writhing on the ground in Belfast's Bradbury Place on a Saturday night. It may curb anti-social tendencies.
And am I not on first name terms with a certain white witch who lives in the shadow of Mount Errigal in Donegal and who once introduced me to a number of varieties of Little People, one species of which are 10 feet tall, wear clothing that resembles the white man's long johns and don't like rock 'n' roll or people who smoke?
To these particular Little People I say: "Come back to Donegal. All is forgiven. The conditions in the pubs are perfect for you now. All the characters and the old men have disappeared. Come and drink in an antiseptic smoke-free atmosphere swarming with sullen traditional musicians and pink-sweatered golfers who laugh very loudly at nothing at all."
But I started out talking about the paranormal. I often wonder what ghosts will do in the future when there won't be any more old houses to haunt. According to the evidence in my own city of Derry, it seems that every building over 100 years old is being demolished by developers while elected officials stand impotently by. We'll soon have to place armed guards round the city's walls. They're too old and get in the way of traffic, you see.
Ghosts will have nowhere to go. Can you imagine telling your son in future years that your local KFC or Pizza Hut is haunted? It doesn't work.
It's confession time. I am here to tell you that, despite cynicism in the past, I now believe firmly in ghosts.
During the course of these past few weeks, I, a BBC Radio Ulster team and members of the Northern Ireland Paranormal Research Association have spent sleepless nights staking out locations where spirits are said to lurk.
We went to Richill Castle just outside Armagh, the Grand Opera House in Belfast, the Old Workhouse in Stroke City and to Crumlin Gaol.
What we found there I cannot divulge here. Keep your eye out for the programmes. What I can say for certain is this: we are not alone.
Back | Return to top | Printable Story
posted by Aestrea Raven at Saturday, July 02, 2005
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home