I’m a photographer and the darkroom I use belongs to a friend. He lets me use the darkroom he has in his old, dirty, decrepit print shop near Changi Village. The shophouses are very old, at least 100 years old, probably older. A little more than a year ago I went into the place to clean it up and lightproof it to make it suitably usable. I had to clean up all manner of rodent shit, cobwebs, dust, leaves, and trash to even move around the place. At least it had functioning sinks, trays, enlargers, and a really nice safe-light.

Well, fast-forward to the recently, about two months ago I started getting the heebie-jeebies while working there. In the dim red light I’d see things out of the corner of my eye while the photo paper was in the developer. I’d turn to focus of “it” but it’d disappear. Sometimes I’d feel things brush behind me while I’d be at the sink. Once I turned from the enlarger toward the sink and there was this presence bearing down on me, like what a gangster does when you’re about to get into a fight. It was quite threatening, but it dissipated. On another occasion I was developing a print in the sink and I saw something approaching to my right. As I turned to see it, it rushed at me and vanished. That place creeps me out and I have since quit using that darkroom in favor of a newer, cleaner place that another friend of mine runs.