This is probably another haunted school story you are about to read. This happened to me when I was in Secondary 1 (1984). I was a student from St. Patrick`s School down at East Coast Road and I had joined the Scouts as an ECA then. There was an organized camp fire in the school field on Saturday night during the June school vacation and it was a joint one with the Girl Guides from St. Hilda`s Secondary (back then, St. Hilda`s was an all-girls school). There were lots of singing and dancing around the camp fire and the fire really lit up the sky and the surrounding area of the field.

It was around 11.30pm after we had cleared up all the mess and logs from the field and I told two of my other friends that we had better take our leave to catch the last bus home (the three of us apparently stay in the same area - just a Block apart from each other). So armed with our torchlights, we made our way to the back gate where the school hostel is located. Most unfortunately, the back gate was already locked. So we decided to walk along the corridor past the teacher`s room to the Art Centre of the school where another rear gate was located.

The walk past the teacher`s room made me feel spooked because of the darkness. Then we had to walk past the school office. At that point, all our torchlights simply went off by itself. I didn`t like the idea of walking along that corridor in the very first place. After walking past the office, our lights came on again.

As we took a few more steps away from the office, I heard a very faint “scream” coming from behind me. I turned around to have a look and realized that ther wasn`t anyone behind me. Thinking that my mind was playing tricks on me, I decided to move on. As we continued walking, I told one of my friends about the “scream”. He said that he didn`t hear a thing so I was confirmed that it was my imagination. Just after mentioning the “scream” issue to my friend, I heard the same thing again. This time, my friend asked me what the sound was. I told him that it was the exact thing I was talking to him about earlier. We started to get worried and increased our pace.

As we made the bend towards the Art Centre, the “scream” was heard again and this time it got louder. At this point, the other friend of mine heard it but told us not attempt any silly tricks on him. We tried to convince him that it wasn`t us who was making those noises but he just didn`t believe us. He simply told us that it wasn`t funny at all. Now, we have been quite upset with all the “screams” and got to become more upset when we found out that this other rear gate was also locked. How unlucky could we be?

The only solution to get out was to cross out of the fence by the big canal beside the school. The fence was installed in a way that an extra bit of it was sticking out of the canal guard rails to deter people from sneaking into or out of the school grounds. Friend number 1 began his cross. Left leg first, then his body and then the other leg. Now it was friend number 2`s turn to make his cross. All this time, I was standing by the guard rail and facing the canal with my back towards the Art Centre building. As he was crossing (he was facing the Art Centre building), he shouted out to me to look behind and up. What I saw is beyond description. I couldn`t make it out but it was a white figure and had made the same “scream” as it flew over us. The figure was about the size of an average male adult. I scrambled across and what made it worse was that my belt loop got stuck in the fence. I frantically tried to break free and after several hard thugs, I succeeded. I ran out and across Marine Parade Road, not even bothering to look out for oncoming cars, and sat at the bus-stop with my eyes all tearing.

Thereafter, we didn`t even dare to make our way up our respective blocks and had to “long-chiam-pass” to see who would be the unlucky one to go home alone. Till today, 20 years later, I still can picture the figure in my head but am unable to draw it out or even describe it to anyone. That goes for my other two friends too. I would not force you to believe my story but thinking of it still makes my hair stand on ends. With this, I`ll leave your imagination to run wild!