Safe Spaces

In the Backyard

My siblings and I are now in our late thirties and early forties. My three sisters migrated to either California or Hawaii, while I stayed in Quezon City, Philippines. Whenever they would come home every five or so years, we would visit our old house in Ilocos Sur, now inhabited by our second cousin, and light candles in the backyard.

Often nicknamed as the "Little Women" of Sawat, Ilocos Sur, the four of us siblings—Anghelita, 12; Julieta, 13; I, Isabela, 15; and Manang Marites, 16—loved to hang around in the backyard. There, we cared for our small plant beds as an attempt to imitate our parents who harvested sugarcane and corn in the fields, and then we'd compete against one another who'd get the best harvest. After our classes, we would gather in the nipa hut to talk about boys and invite some of our friends to join us.

Unlike here in Manila, the houses in our barangay did not have fences. The most we had were short blocks of wood connected by barbed wires, which one could walk over. Nevertheless, each one respected others' territories. No one attempted to steal from our property, not even a single crop from our backyard; in fact, we actually gained something.

I still vividly remember December to March 1971. The first from the chain of events in our house happened in December when Mama, Papa, Anghelita, and Julieta stayed overnight at the house of Mama's cousin while Manang Marites and I stayed in the house.

We only used gas-fueled lights before, so it was very, very dark inside our house. I wasn't sure what time it was, maybe around dawn, when I awoke to Manang's consistent nudging. She said she heard a whimper, so we listened closely, but I did not hear it. I was braver than her, so I just asked her if she wanted to switch places, which we did. As a child, I was very fascinated with paranormal events, so I envied that she heard something, whereas I did not. But I woke up again—this time, alone. I heard it for a while, but when it suddenly stopped, I just went back to sleep.

The next day, after our class, the four of us went to the backyard and talked about school. While bringing our notebooks out, I noticed Anghelita looking at our plant beds. When I asked what she was looking at, she said—verbatim, "Adda napintas nga babai didyay." (There's a beautiful woman over there.) But when she blinked, she said she could no longer see it.

There was also a time when the three of us were preparing watermelon as a nighttime snack while Julieta presented to clean the nipa hut. Then, we heard her scream. She then claimed to have seen a beautiful woman, whimpering near our potato plant beds. It shocked our parents, as the house had been passed for two generations and nothing like this happened.

The apparition also appeared to Manang Marites while she was sprinkling her plant beds. She described the moments before she saw the ghost as "chilling, like someone was watching." Then when she looked back, the ghost of a crying woman was there, looking at her. I could remember her running toward the house, but because of her recklessness, she slipped and broke her arm.

These apparitions continued until March. Even visitors and passersby claimed to have seen a woman in our backyard.

I was envious of my sisters that they had seen the woman while I did not. I thought I wasn't special, or the ghost only appeared to the cowardly kids, not the adventurous ones like me. I even pretended to be afraid of ghosts as I visited the plant beds at night, but it never appeared. Manang Marites comforted me by saying, "Maybe she didn't like smart girls," as I was known to be the smartest among us four.

Because they were scared, they stopped going to the backyard. My parents even requested a priest—who had to travel far—to bless our home. But I didn't stop hoping that I'd see her, nor did I want my potato crops to die, so I continued going to the backyard.

One mid-March morning, the digging season, I noticed that the leaves in my bed were greener and larger. I was worried; my father told us that greener leaves did not mean larger tubers. It could have been that I placed too much fertilizer, although I was confident I did not.

So I tried harvesting one, and my theory was true—my potatoes were indeed smaller.

Frustrated, I pulled all the potatoes from my bed. But to my surprise, I saw an earring that did not belong to any of us. It looked expensive; ours were just the plastic ones.

Curious if I could find its pair, I dug deeper.

But instead of an earring, I saw a decomposing foot.

I screamed. My sisters thought I had finally seen the apparition, but they all became as horrified as me when they saw the foot. We did not dig the body further; we immediately called Papa—who was plowing fields at that time—to go to the police and report what we saw. He and Manang Marites traveled hours to go to the town proper, and they came back after another few hours with the police.

From inside the house, the four of us peeked through the door, trying to eavesdrop. We didn't see the body as it was further dug up; we tried, but Mama was insistent that we shouldn't.

The police interviewed us one by one. When it was my turn, I detailed everything to them—from the exact day we heard the whimper up to the foot—as these were the only things I could share. When they were about to leave with the body, the main officer thanked me personally. I wasn't sure why.

That evening, Manang Marites and Anghelita claimed that they saw the ghost again, but this time, she seemed to dance around our backyard, making them think she had grown to love it. In fact, they told us that they continued talking inside the nipa hut but the woman did not bother them and vanished soon after. Eventually, she stopped appearing.

A week after, we found through word of mouth that the body we found was the daughter of the mayor in our town and it was declared that she was dead for four months. She disappeared the exact date they went to the house of Mama's cousin, which I suspected was the reason the officer thanked me because the date I said matched their findings. Fortunately, a suspect was arrested and was found guilty, his reason being revenge for his now-dead daughter. He was heard implying that his daughter would still be alive if the mayor heard his plea.

When we saw the picture, we were all the more shocked—it was the face of the ghost we have seen.

I never saw her, not even after the incident. It was fine with me now, as being the first person to find a dead body was more beyond my belief than seeing a ghost. My only regret was I did not get up the night I heard a whimper after knowing that the criminal confessed to burying her alive.