Karina Machado is a journalist, host of the Spirit Sisters podcast and the author of Spirit Sisters, Where Spirits Dwell and Love Never Dies, a non-fiction series exploring the extraordinary experiences of ordinary people. Now, on The Ghost Files podcast, each week, Karina will introduce a guest who’ll share their personal encounter with the spirit world.
Hear a preview of The Ghost Files below:
What would you do if you saw a ghost?
Hollywood would have us believe we’d bolt for the door, screaming, before launching ourselves into the car and screeching away. And yet, after speaking to hundreds of people who have seen a ghost, I’ve learned that – in the grand majority of cases, at least – that’s not what actually happens.
Usually, when someone comes face to face with the dead, they simply go on with the business of living. One woman I interviewed for Spirit Sisters was woken by a man transfixed by a fancy watch on her bedside table. He was so lifelike that not for a moment did she think he was dead. Indeed, he stood close enough to make out his blue-grey eyes and the thick weave of his cable-knit jumper. Yes, her breath caught in her throat as the intruder calmly turned his head in her direction … before vanishing. The next day? Well, she went to work.
Something similar happened to Matt, who shared his chilling story on the first episode of The Ghost Files podcast. Matt’s visitor seemed connected to the house (located in a historic part of Sydney once infamous for its razor gangs) and, interestingly, this ghost too was drawn to a trinket from the 21st century. In the past, I’ve also spoken to a mother who opened her eyes to see a blonde girl, no older than four, at her bedside. She wasn’t afraid. It was, she told me, ‘like a call from a child in the middle of the night.’
My guest Danielle shares a moving encounter of this kind in this week’s episode of The Ghost Files podcast. She wasn’t scared, either, just heartbroken.
‘You see figures out the corner of your eye, and you think, what was that? Am I seeing something?’ Danielle recalls of the build up to her encounter. ‘And then one night I just woke up at 1 or 2 AM, and there she was standing outside by bedroom doorway, just staring at me in full view.’
Even after all these years hearing personal stories of ghostly visitors, this story floored me. You won’t want to miss it.
To hear the latest episode of The Ghost Files, see below.