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Ever been to Siberia?
It's where difficult people are sent, and it's not necessarily on the Russian cold front. But first, that depends on whether you're a believer.
Whether or not you agree there is such a phenomenon as a haunted hotel room, you are likely to have heard enough stories about them to scare, worry or put you off a Christmas weekend away.
So we won't be sharing more hair-raising travel tales here. Rather, a few tried-but-can't-swear-it-works tips on what to do in a haunted room.
Superstitions, antidotes, lucky charms, remedies - call it what you will, just remember to swallow with several grains of salt.
Top on the list is of course: How do you know if a room is haunted?
Simple. Do not look in the mirror.
After an especially long flight, say 13hours from Singapore to a European city, you will feel like 103 upon checking into the room and look like 126, so avoid a mirror image or you'll shock yourself silly. Eeeee, mummeee, hantu kwee!
And if you don't want to worry about ghost-hunting upon arrival, then don't be a pain at the front desk.
Difficult travellers who demand rooms - 'high floor, don't face sun, don't want end of corridor, don't want near lift, better if can upgrade' - are asking to be sent to 'Siberia'.
That's the code name hotels have for a 'dirty room'. A dirty room is one in which someone has died of natural or unnatural causes.
One indication a room is sullied - I have it on the word of tour guides - is the deathly cold you feel upon entering. It's so cold that even the hair on your chest - especially the ladies - stand on end.
Commonly, most scaredy-cats sleep with a light on, say the bathroom light. But that won't make any difference to a day ghost, right?
The more enlightened tackle the devil by the horns, as one long-in-the-tooth tour manager confided.
'Excuse me, I've had a long hard day, I'm dead tired, can please leave me in peace.'
He told me he slept undisturbed the rest of the night.
GRIN AND BARE IT
Sleeping in the nude is apparently another 'trick' that will frighten anything and everyone away.
Single check-ins with twin beds in the room will place their main luggage on the unoccupied one, so as to 'occupy' it in case 'uninvited visitors' take the empty bed as 'welcome to join me'.
Shoes and slippers are never placed left and right side by side. Instead one side is deliberately reversed to face head to toe. This supposedly 'confuses' the one from the netherworld.
Channelling, dismission, meditation and prayer are among other practices.
But when in doubt, why not stay home and contemplate the escalating cost of living.
That's the very devil already.
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