Creepy Tunnel
12/2006
Near my university housing unit, there was a small garden with a twisty hedge/vine tunnel with benches inside, I loved sitting in there and reading and I HAD to walk through it every chance I got, which was at least once a day for 7 or 8 months. Because it was twisty, you couldn't see the whole interior at once, and even though I never actually saw anyone else in there I was worried about surprising someone so I would hum or whistle while walking through.
Around Christmas I was walking back from the club with a group of girlfriends and we took a few photos in the garden because it was decorated with lights. We previewed the pictures on the digital camera screen before heading to our rooms. One of the pictures we took in front of the tunnel had 5 faces squished together. There were 4 of us. I only saw the picture for a couple of seconds but there appeared to be a young smiling Korean guy standing behind me with his head close to mine. He wasn't familiar to any of us (the foreign student population was small enough that we knew or at least recognized everyone). Unfortunately, the friend with the camera freaked out and deleted the photo before we could get a good look at it. I figured there was something wrong with the camera because I hadn't felt anyone behind me. But, I also had second thoughts about the safety of walking through there alone at night in case someone was in there.
A few nights later my boss came to pick me up and I waited for him in the opening of the tunnel. He got upset and told me that I shouldn't hang out in places that had such bad energy. I tried to laugh it off but he told me that years earlier, after a night out, a foreign student had been robbed and assaulted on his way back to his rooms and died from his injuries in the tunnel. He thought the university was better off tearing it down.
I wish I could say that I was brave and kept walking through the tunnel, but I skirted it for months. Every time I got near it I wanted to hum or whistle and eventually I recognized how out of character that was for me. Before I returned to the States I walked through it one last time and just in case said an awkward goodbye, surprising a student reading on a bench.
Submitted by:
Jocawest