A curious mind is a terrible curse.

A curious mind is a terrible curse.
That’s the way it’s always been for me. Some of my earliest memories are of secretly listening to my dad swapping ghost stories with his buddies while I sat rapt in the room next door.
I can't help it - I have a yearning to know the Great Unknown. In some macabre way, I've always wanted to experience something paranormal for myself, just so I can know the Truth.
Over time I never did encounter anything that reason and logic could not explain. The adult world was ultimately very rational; the childhood wonder and possibilities dissolves quickly into the reality of serious jobs and mortgages.
But all that changed recently.
The house I grew up in was a small wooden building in the middle of suburbia. It was without question the oldest house in the street, which was how we could afford to live in it.
I'd always wondered if it was haunted - anything that old must have had some dark history to it. But it was always uneventful. There was some constant the scratching noises above my bedroom at night, but it turned out to be just pigeons roosting in the ceiling.
Once when I was 10, I was playing alone on the floor of my bedroom. My heart suddenly froze when I could distinctly hear the sound of snoring coming from my bed. I could hear the sound growing louder and louder. I stared at my bed, but saw nothing there. Mustering what little courage I had, I yelled out “Hello? Who is there?”.
All I got back was a loud, horrible, snore.
I grabbed an umbrella – and gingerly walked towards my bed, heart pounding furiously. There wasn't anything moving as I poked my blanket and pillow. It was then I noticed the window above the bed was slightly open. The moment I closed it, the snoring stopped.
It was nothing more than the wind whispering through the cracks.
Another experience was the nightly terrors that would strike me in my sleep. I would often awake to the sensation of my blanket being ripped away and my body held down, while a dark angry entity strangled my throat so hard that the bed would rattle.
The first time, I thought it was just a vivid – but terrible nightmare. But when it happened again and again, night after night, I started to panic. Whatever it was, it was relentless.
As I seemed to always survive each attack though, I though I was just going crazy. Thankfully, I learned about Sleep Paralysis a few months later. Changing my sleeping patterns stopped it from happening again.
So everything paranormal that I’ve ever experienced was ultimately very rational. Like the famous poster in Fox Mulder’s office, “I Want To Believe”, but ultimately found the evidence lacking.
But I can found no explanation for what's happened to me recently.
I had decided to take a break, and spent a few weeks backpacking in Vietnam. Starting from Ho Chi Minh City, we took a winding journey northwards through the muddy roads along the coast.
It was miles and miles of mostly untouched wilderness broken by the occasional village, and some of the best pristine beaches in the world. It was in one particular stretch that we spent a full day soaking in the sun and surf, the worries of the world a thousand miles away.
As day made way to twilight, we feasted on some amazing seafood we had caught earlier. Sleeping under an open sky is an amazing experience, especially far away from the polluting lights of civilization.
It was to this glorious view of the heavens that I awoke around 3am, feeling the less glorious call of nature urging me to the nearest toilet. It was a humid night with the sound of insects chirping their nightly symphony.
I groggily made my way through the path to the basic facilities set up for campers. It was in a clearing with male toilets lined along one side of a 30 foot wide crude concrete floor, facing another row of female toilets.
Between the rows in the center was a waiting area, with a makeshift lamp hanging above to light the yard.
As I approached, I saw an old man standing under the lamp with his back towards me. All I could see was his scraggy long white hair that reached past his shoulders, and a thin old boney body jutting up from his thin clothing rags.
Slightly freaked out – I wasn’t expecting anyone to be around at this time of night – I coughed politely to make him aware of my approach. I didn't want an old man’s heart attack from fright weighing on my conscience.
He was probably a local villager waiting on his wife, since electricity and running water was scarce in the scattered collection of homes in the area.
He didn’t seem to notice me, so I let him be and made my way to the nearest male stall. As I closed the door, I could still see him in my line of sight. Though I was now 90 degrees from where I first saw him, he still had his back to me again.
It was definitely odd, but certainly far from threatening. Besides, I had more urgent pressing matters, particularly against my bowels.
The toilet was barely more than a hole in the floor, with a flimsy undersized door that was all that stood between you and your dignity. The overwhelming stench of human waste filled my senses as I dropped my pants and squatted to make my own deposit. After a few moments, my thoughts lazily drifted back to the old man in the yard.
There was something definitely odd, and my subconscious was screaming that something was very out of place. With rapidly rising horror, my mind clicked the pieces into place.
Though the old man was standing near a bright light, he didn't cast a shadow.
The possibility it could have been an optical illusion vanished when I suddenly saw his shadowless feet inches away through the gaps under the toilet door.
I was almost thankful I was squatting with my pants down, since I emptied my bowels simultaneously with my lungs emptying a scream through the other end.
I jumped up and pulled my pants up as I backed up to the back wall.
From my now standing position, I had lost sight of what was under the door. With no shadow, I could not tell if… it?… was still waiting there.
My mind furiously ran through what scarce options I had. I realized I didn't have much of a choice but to escape this stall. This flimsy door would provide no protection for me, and there was certainly nothing left of my dignity. If I was to die, I decided it wouldn’t be in this literal shit hole.
I peeked under the door, but couldn't see anything on the other side. Deciding it was now or never, I kicked open the door… to nothing but an empty courtyard.
I rushed out but could see no sign of the old man. Nothing but the incessant sound of crickets.
It was then I made the fatal mistake of looking at the stall I had just escaped from. He was there - that dreaded white haired and bony body, standing where I was mere seconds ago.
For the second time that night I was thankful, as I had nothing left to brown my pants as I let out another scream.
Now running on pure instinct, I sprinted back to the beach like I was being chased by demons – for all I knew, I actually was.
Making it back to the camp, I spent the next few hours wide awake. Crouching and staring at the trail, I was ready to wake everyone at the merest sign of the old man. When morning finally broke, my camp mates lazily woke and wondering why I looked like death itself. I was too afraid to tell them what I saw, and simply explained that I was struck with insomnia that night.
Nothing as eventful happened for the remainder of the trip, but I had to share my experience with our local tour guide on the last day. I had to know the truth.
When I finished my story, he only looked gravely at me gravely and asked just one question – “did you see it’s face?”
He explained that in Vietnam, lonely ghosts often haunt sites where travelers can be found. Those who see their face are doomed to a grisly, gruesome death in the near future.
It's been almost two months since that fateful encounter. To this day, I still don’t know if I really saw its face. It’s a blur that still haunts me, and I'm not sure I want to know.
Maybe there are some things in life that are better left unknown… I think I am already cursed enough.