The Old Woman

This week journalist and professor Shaheen Pasha shares a lifetime of djinn hauntings with Rabia, from a doppelganger djinn in her mother's home to the old lady djinn that followed her and her family across the globe, and down through the family tree.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:04):
Welcome to The Hidden Gin, a production of I Heart
Radio and Grimm and Mild from Aaron Mankey. Hi, and

(00:30):
welcome to this very special bonus series of The Hidden Gin.
The interviews. In these episodes, you'll hear me talk to
people from all walks of life who have had GIN experiences,
are drawn to the stories of Gin, and draw lessons
from these stories. You'll hear from artists, scholars, writers, journalists,
and Gin exorcists, and even from me as I discuss

(00:53):
how and why this series came about in a very
personal conversation with my husband. Thanks for listening and enjoy
I hope you really enjoyed the episode. Last week our
conversation with Professor Ali Alumi, who is you know, scholar
expert but also a very cool guy. Uh. This week,

(01:13):
I wanted to pivot a little bit. I wanted to
move a little bit away from the scholar expert field
and kind of talk to somebody who has had some
crazy experiences, more like telling stories around the camp fire
type of vibe. So I have on this week somebody
who I love dearly, Shaheen Basha. She is just an amazing,
extraordinary woman in the work that she does and Also,

(01:33):
her stories are freaky. I mean like I first heard
of these stories a couple of years ago and I've
just remembered them ever since. And I said, Okay, sha Heen,
I got it. I needed to retell these stories. So
let me tell you a little bit about Shaheen Um
Shahen is an assistant teaching professor at Penn State University
and her focus is on mass incarceration and prison education.
She's a journalist. She's also the co founder and executive

(01:55):
director of the Prison Journalism Project, which is all about
providing incarcerated men and women the skills to tell their
own stories through journalism and also giving them a platform
to publish their stories on She is an award winning
veteran journalist with twenty years of experience as an international
reporter covering legal and business issues for Thompson Rooters, CNN,

(02:17):
DAL Jones Newswire. And she's also the co editor of
the anthology Mirror on the Veil, a collection of personal
essays on hit job and veiling, and a contributor to
Burn It Down, an anthology of essays exploring women and anger.
So let's talk to Shaheen Basha. This is a fun conversation.
Hope you enjoy it. Hi, and welcome to this week's episode. Shaheen,

(02:40):
how are you. I'm good, Thank you for having me.
Thank you so much for a green to come on.
You're incredibly busy person, and I told our listeners a
little bit about your background, but I want you to
tell our listeners about your work and your own words. Well,
I'm I've been a journalist for about twenty years, so
I always have that as part of my identity. So
I'm a journalist. I'm an assistant teaching professor Pence Date,

(03:00):
and I'm also the co founder and co executive director
of the Prison Journalism Project, which is basically my life work.
It's um it's my passion project. And what we do
is we teach incarcerated men and women around UM the
country how to do journalism, how to express themselves. Uh.
It's both educational in the sense that we know curriculum,

(03:21):
we do, you know, we work on textbooks advising all
of that. But we also have a publication and online
publication at Prison Journals and Project dot org, and we
receive submissions from all over the country and we get
to work with these amazing writers and people that you know,
the rest of society doesn't know yet, and we're training
them and like getting their words out. And I'm really

(03:43):
excited about it because I think, especially right now, when
it's so possible for people to be forgotten, I think that,
you know, the project is really giving them life. And
I'm really excited about that. Yeah, a lot of people
don't realize. COVID quarantine has been tough for a lot
of us. But for those who are incarcerated, they get
to see no buddy, so they can't even get outside
of their cells. They've lost visitation. It's been really, really

(04:05):
tremendously difficult. And you know, this work that you're doing
is so close to my heart. But here's my question,
and it's a huge I mean, honestly an incredible project
and a huge project. How do you train them? Isn't
like virtual or you have people go like how does
this work? Right now? At the moment. What they do
is they send us their work and you know, we
edit it and we post it. But from within that,

(04:25):
we also we reach out to our our men and women.
We send them. You know, there's definitely send of their
clips on our website. We basically all of our writers
have a profile page where all of their work gets
put up there and it encouraged. But how do they
hear about you? How do you even know you exist?
A determination? Yeah? Now, um, we we had started basically

(04:47):
last I mean, we've been doing the work. You know,
I've been a professor for a while and I was
going inside in person to to teach classes on an
individual basis. But you know, we've been doing the work
for a while. When I moved to Penn State, we
launched the Prison Journalism Project officially September two thousand nineteen.
Launched our website this year. Um, it was supposed to
be the work was supposed to be about, you know,
the training and the education and going inside and curriculated.

(05:08):
The pandemic changed all of that, you know, and we
realized we didn't want to just put the project on hold.
We wanted to evolve it, and we had this idea
to create this publication and with that, what we found is,
you know, we started with a really simple medium page
and that blew up. And it partly was word of
mouth with us, you know, basically talking to people that
we knew were partnered U with San Quentin News as well,

(05:30):
and you know, with do my sources and people that
I worked with before, and then we partnered with the
American Prison Writing Archive and they connected to the Prison
Legal News, who met who agreed to put our submissions.
Call for Free Fantastic was the nicest thing for them
to do, and it just went everywhere. And then Black
and Pink put us in there as well, because we
wanted all these different voices to get you know, to

(05:50):
get inside. So a lot of it started with that,
and then it just kind of word of mouth just
kept spreading around the country and now we're getting submissions
from everywhere, and you know, people are really reaching out
to us as well, um individually, like what are you
looking for? So we created um this journalism primer that's
on our website that you know, we have a section
in the Shared Story so we're writing prompts, so we
have a primer style guide all of this stuff. Um.

(06:13):
Sometimes family members will send inside, but oftentimes somebody will
write us and we'll just send it to them and
then they'll send us stuff back, and you know, we're
working with that and some people are just happy to
get you know, a piece out in our poem out
and be done. And I really want to work on
their craft, and so we do back and forth with them,
and through that we're seeing a few writers as set

(06:33):
group of writers are starting to rise above. So we're
gonna be launching a contributing writers section, which you know,
and we're trying to get our guys separately. We work
with the ones that are really showing promise and really interested,
where we go back and forth on pieces to get
them published. One of our guys just got published in
the Washington Post. That's amazing. Yeah, so we're really insulations.
Oh my god, what fulfilling work. As I hear you

(06:53):
talk as prompting all these questions in my mind because
I'm so interested in this work. But obviously this conversation
is not not about this work. But I do want
to mention there's two reasons I'm having this conversation though,
because the first is because I want folks to know
how we first, how we know each other, how we
first connected. Were you following like the advanced case or
undisclosed if I remember correctly what happened? Was I mean,

(07:15):
I was a huge fan of you know, following the serial,
you know, and um, I've been talking, you know, because
I just saw so many similarities. You know, I have
a I have a loved one of friends who's incarcerated.
I saw so many similarities that passion for it. And
it was interesting because my husband is the one that
reached out to you. He did reach out to me
and said, listen. He said, I have an incredible wife

(07:36):
who does incredible work, and I need you to read
her work. And I was like what, because I have
never people do reach out and solicit right like they
want you to like you don't read their work promote it.
But I've never had a spouse to that. I thought
it was so lovely and he was right, and I'm
so glad I did it, and I'm so glad we connected.
And yeah, there's also that the fact that this work
is very meaningful to you. But okay, but the real

(07:56):
reason I set folks up before we get into this
conversation is because no one I wanted listeners to get
an idea of, Like all of our guests has very
different backgrounds. Everybody having conversations with around this topic of
gin and the supernatural a very different backgrounds. But I
also like to like build up your credibility and then
like I'm not crazy and then bring it crashing down.
And I'm waiting for that to happen to be like oh,

(08:18):
She's like, oh right, so you are risking some measure
of your credibility. But look, it is what it is.
You know, you see what you see, your experience, which experience.
So let's like shift the conversation now, because clearly you
are a reasonable, rational, brilliant, intelligent, accomplished woman. Now let's
get into the gym stuff. First of all, were you
raised in like a cultural identity or religious culture that

(08:39):
had any connection to this phenomenon. Yeah, I mean I'm
I'm Pakistani American. I mean I was born in New York,
a New Yorker, but um, my family's Pakistani. We're from
Karachi and you know we're Muslims. So I think for me,
the whole concept of gin and supernatural is not something
that was outside of our wheel bearer. I mean, this
is something we grew up with as just you know,

(09:00):
you you believe in God, you believe in you know,
saying you believe in Gin, I mean, you believe in angels.
It wasn't something that was deemed as being crazy that way. Um,
So I remember, you know, my grandmother would be in
Pakistan and she'd be we'd be lying in bed and
she would tell stories about like you know, magic and
Gin and like India, you know, before partition, and that's

(09:21):
just what I kind of grew up with. And then
I think that level of wonder it was just it
was just so normal that that's life that duds us,
and that's other things out there because that's what our
religious beliefs and training, you know, said. I think as
you grow older, you kind of go, oh, I am
never going to mention this out loud, and you know,
I can't talk about it, and I don't you know,
share stories in public about it. But you know, my

(09:42):
cousins and I had this standing thing that anytime we
got together, you know, whether it was in Pakistan or
when they moved here. Even to this day, we tell
Gin stories. It's just part of like our way of connecting.
I think I was at your house and we started
telling Jin stories stories. It was great. That was like
that was a while ago, that was like and haw
or two years ago. Yeah, yeah, yeah, um, it is

(10:03):
very much a thing. And I knew growing up that
was like the best part of seeing friends other friends
who actually also shared this belief and I also felt
like we had this little secret where it's like all
this other phenomenon that the rest of the world doesn't understand.
We're like, oh, we totally know why it's happening. We
we can totally explain it to you. Um, but let
me ask you. So when you when you say like
your grandmother was telling these stories, were these stories that

(10:24):
frightened you? Like? Were these lessons? Were they like? How
how did you think about the gin? Honestly I was
a scaredy cat kid who was scared of everything, and um,
I was terrified also they were were they scary stories? They?
I don't think they were meant to me. They would
just sort of like you know, um, you know my grandmother,
you know, we're from our families from lucknow in India,

(10:45):
and you know, very kind of spiritual in you know,
it's an old place, whole place, very spiritual, very much
very Sufi, right. So I think also it's when you
when you're more into Sufism and souf you know, when
you have those beliefs, you sort of are much more
open to, you know, the things that are outside of
your long vision, you know, and the spiritual world is

(11:06):
just another world to you, because you know, that's what
suphism is. It's about, you know, spirituality. I think that's
those are the stories. It's just about like you know
how old houses that you know you don't go into
at certain times or were left vacant for too long.
My grandmother would tell stories about that. I grew up
um being told never to be outside um at magreve

(11:26):
at sunset with my hair loose, right, the same thing,
same thing. And I am now a mother of three
children and my eldest daughter is seventeen with long hair,
and I'm like, oh, yeah, that's not happening five right.
She's like Mom, I like no, no, no, there's a
tree right there. You're not. Oh my god, yes, you've
gotta bring home a gin in your hair. Basically, they're

(11:50):
going to be like infatuating because of the stories we
were told. You know, like everybody was under a tree
in in India. It's always right, so it's in the
tree in India, and like they had long hair, and
then a jin fell in love with her. The next thing,
you know, she became possessed or she became you know, connected,
and it would make and I'm stating they're going as
a very you know, rational human being going to the

(12:12):
probably other issues there too, but what if not and
what's not is enough to say get inside. It's like
do you want to test the theory? Right? Like do
you really want to push this envelope? I totally get it.
For for those of our listeners who might not be
familiar with what a Sufi or Sufism is, it's kind
of like a methodology of practicing the religion of Islam,
but it's like more of a mystical esoteric, right. I

(12:34):
guess like in in Judaism you have the Kabbalah. It's
I guess, may I don't know enough about it to
say it's similar, but it's it's basically like that. So
you have people who are like very very fundamentalist, very Orthodox,
and you have people who are like Sufis were like, oh,
it's all about the spirit of the religion and then
this that So, yeah, you're right, I do think that
like for families, for Sufi families, Now, my family was
not a super family. They were very kind of orthodox

(12:55):
traditional my mother, I would say, straight up like hobby type.
But so nobody told of these stories in our family,
and I was um starved for them. I heard about
it from all like the other uh Muslim families that
we grew up with, where they did talk about this
and then I would love to trade stories. Have you
experienced things that you believe are inexplicable or the supernatural

(13:15):
in your life? Absolutely? Absolutely? When is the first time
that happened? How young were you? Honestly? Um, One of
the first things I remember was back when I was
probably seven or eight. Yeah, I mean way back ago,
long ago, where um, you know, we were living this
little one bedroom apartments in Brooklyn, like little crapple in Brooklyn,

(13:36):
and we're very poor, and we had this five of
us lived in this one bedroom apartment and I remember,
um my brother coming in barging into my room, my
our room, our one bedroom. I was sitting there, I
was like seven or eight, and he's like, you know,
what's wrong with you? Like why you why do you
keep going to the bathroom? And I'm like, I haven't
left the room, I said, and he clearly so. And

(13:58):
I had very short hair. I was a tom very
short hair, you know tom boy bull cut salth Asian
look going back then. And I think we also that
at one heard that, but he uh yeah, he saw
this little what he thought was like me, but he
was like a like a little boy that just kept
going from the bedroom to the bathroom, right, And that

(14:19):
was the first time I was like kind of like, okay,
that's weird because it's just you know, we're latch key kids.
It was just me and him, So I was seven,
he was twelve, right, really strange and so of course
you know, that's started freaking me out. And then I
saw The Exorcists, which still gives me, um nightmares and
just ruined me for life. And that was sort of
the first and I was like, okay, that that's different.
And you know, when we go to focus on my family,

(14:39):
my grandmother would tell stories about you know, this house
where the light would come on and stuff. I remember
going to a wedding and my cousin was like, yeah,
that house and you know past the tendency that that's
that's the house that you know, and now I was
talking about was like a light was on. So of
course it freaked me out. Um, but yeah, I think
that's right then. But I think as I got older,
you know, um, you know, we were to like in

(15:00):
our family and stuff that like that. That kind of
weird stuff is very strong in the women. And so
like my mother, you know, used to have like dreams
and they would come true and stuff like that, and
you know, it was just something that was part of
our our life, like we knew, you know, none that
was a certain way. My mother was a certain way
and around for us, the girls around their team would start,
you know, like having experiences. So have you had like

(15:23):
premanitive like premonitions as well like a mother? Yea, no, definitely,
I I do. My daughter, does you know? Really? So? Yeah,
but it's straight it's straight through like it and it
was a Sufi shif once I told our family that
it's very strong through the line of the mother. Oh wow.
And then I've heard this over and over again, Um
that these kinds of abilities, however you want to understand them,

(15:45):
do seem to have a family connection. Oftentimes it's put
through women, but I have I have friends who are
male who also have said that they, like their elders,
had some somebody in their family, had some kind of
experience or had kind of ability, and they feel like
they've kind of inherited it. So that experience when you

(16:05):
were seven, did that scare you at the time, or
you were you just like, oh, yeah, I understand that
my not not told me about this kind of stuff.
Remember my nanny or whatever. Yeah, because I was saying,
they're going, okay, why why is there a little kid
in the house. Oh my god, there's a little kid
in the house. And I then the next year I
saw The Exorcist because I saw it by myself in

(16:26):
my house God, and watched but my sister told me
I could watch it, so as soon as everybody was
out of the house, I put it in. That was
terrible ideas an eight year old, terrible idea, and it
literally to this day, I'm in my forties, I hear
that theme song and I throw up. Oh really that
deeply internalized. Yeah, that was one. That's one of the
most terrifying, even though in many ways, if you go
back and watch it now, like kind of from a

(16:49):
like a detached perspective, it seems kind of hokey. Obviously
the effects are right. I never watched it again, You'll
never watch it again. It lives inside your head anyways.
So tell me a little bit about um as you're
growing up. So then after that, after experience, when your seven.
Do you think that was kind of like when the
doors opened for you, when the veils were lifted a bit.
I think so. I think it's when I kind of

(17:09):
understood that because remember, you know, kind of growing up
and more stories in the family and kind of you know, looking,
I already knew my mother, you know, could like predict
things she would see. For my mom, she always saw death,
like she always knew when something was going to die,
and so she would she would see it in the
dream and so she would always be upset and crying no,
and then it would happen within a day or two, right,
So like, okay, many of these things existed, and um,

(17:31):
so to that end, it was just kind of like, okay,
you know, I know it exists, so it's fine. When
I was about and like seventeen or so, like my
my brother was always into weird stuff, and so he
was like he decided to start looking at like tarot
cards and you know, things like that, and you know,
he taught me how to do them. And that was
I think, um, when things got very weird, because then
there was that point where like everybody in the family

(17:53):
started having weird experiences like where you know, like a
woman with long hair and stuff. And it was interesting
because multiple people, um that weren't related to us would come.
You know, we had a lot of family members that
you know, when they immigrated to the USK in our
house first, and so in the basement when you're in
New York, you're like the port of entry. And at
that point, we actually moved from New Jersey to New
Jersey and when I was seventeen, so we had a

(18:15):
house house, so we had a house at the base,
and so definitely people were staying with us, and uh,
we created this little area in the downstairs. And I
can't tell you how many times, like relatives told us
years later that you know, they thought I was down
because I was own. My family had long hair at
that point, I was short, and so how many of
my family members would wonder why I'd be standing in
the basement when they were in bed, you know, Oh

(18:36):
my god, I just got chills. And one of them
thought I was away and then I want to wait
to college. And one of my other cousins years later
said that he asked my mom, but when did Shining
come home? And She's like, no, shs await college. And
he didn't say anything, and then later on, you know,
later on years later he said, yeah, you know, and
my brother's friend, who's a white guy, refused to sleep

(18:57):
in the biggest hung out at our house. Once left,
and then he came back and he was again in
the couch. You know, that's that's crazy, okay. So um,
but I remember when we talked about this a couple
of years ago, whenever it was now, you told me
about what happened when you your family moved overseas, and
little me, I see this because you are married. Where's

(19:18):
your husband on the spect on the spectrum is he's
like I don't know about this stuff, or he's like
totally in oh no. He was really like whatever. When
we first got married, he's like I don't believe any
of it, like you're you know, because he thinks he actually,
you know, his family as his Canadian and his family
was like the bleak you know people, so they used
to get more orthodox Orthodox and stuff. So he knew that,

(19:39):
you know, he had spoken of people. He knew there
were things, but he was like whatever, right, and he
just thought, you know, it was nothing. I remember I
was pregnant with my daughter, my first kid, and we
had to move home for a little bit before we
join the place. I was living at my parents house
for a little bit while I was pregnant e sevent
eight months pregnant, couldn't sleep through the night, and he
comes in the room waking me up, and I'm piste off,
like okay, I can't sleep to the night and eight

(20:00):
it's pregnant already. And he's like, you need to come
downstairs with me, and I'm like why. He's just like,
just I need to get some water. Can you come
downstairs with me? And this is my husband is a
big man. He's a big, all thronged, you know, broad
man who doesn't look like he would need his five
for tall pregnant wife to come downstairs. Um, we go
down the stairs, he goes you know, I'm standing there
and he's like, I'll tell you tomorrow. And then the

(20:21):
next day he said that as he was Um, the
reason he did was because he never leaved anything. And
then he came was coming down the stairs at like
three o'clock in the morning to get water, and we
had a mirror that was like right opposite the stairs,
and he's like he's looking, you know, as he's coming
down he's looking in the mirror, but instead he's he's
seeing a woman with long hair, and yeah, and then
he's like me out and later he's I could never happened.

(20:43):
I'm like, yeah, but I never described what I what
the woman looked like. He described her to me, right,
because I never told him what you look like? He
described her. It was literally the same old woman that
I like, old and long hair that I I know
and like my family because I mentioned it to them, knew,
but no, and he described again. He's like a perspective.
He thought I was down. Apparently everyone thinks of an

(21:03):
old crazyman, right me, but he thought and then he
really think. He's like, I just left her in bed.
It can't be shy, right, And so that in that
minute where he his brain was processing, it was gone.
And that's when he came and got me. So let
me ask you. So, it sounds like a lot of
people have seen like this apparition, this woman, but other
than just kind of appearing, has she ever done anything,

(21:25):
spoken to anybody, moved anything, has anybody? Yeah, we had
this um prayer, just like a prayer somebody gotten us
from a Saudi or Saudi Arabia, right, that was hanging
on our It's like an engraving or something like that.
It was like an engraved piece that had a glass
on it, you know, but it was a good glass
and um, it was standing and we'd had it, you

(21:47):
know for years, and it was nothing. And then you know,
one day, like my brother was sleeping downstairs and the
living he was just sleeping on the couch and then
like it was this wow bang, right, this loud bang,
and this like this thing basically which was hanging just split,
you know, and it's just split like in two. It

(22:08):
split into like the glass was completely shut. And we're
like all coybe was pressure or something, but it wasn't.
And there there was one the time I never told
anybody about what I'd seen until I was There was
this one time where I was actually because I thought
me about sleep dreaming or whatever you're in that weird place.
I was, Um, I was awake and I was talking
to my best friend on the phone, and my parents,
you know, strict bucks and your parents were like, you know,

(22:29):
you have to be in bed by midnight, no talking
anybody because were talking to boys kind of a thing, right.
So I was on the phone with my best friend
at like one o'clock in the morning, and I look
up and I'm fully awake, right, like my lights are
off and the whole all the lights and out from
the house. But I look up and um, I see
this woman in the doorway, and I think it's my
mom because my mom is also you know, short whatever,

(22:49):
and I'm on, like a crap, I'm telling my friend.
I was like, oh man, I'm in al right, Like,
my my mom is here in the door and she's
yelling at She's gonna yell at me. And then that's
when this thing like rushed with his mouth open scream
like I didn't hear because see it. And then my
friend was like and I'm like, oh my god. My
friend is on the phone right and she also like
on the phone and like I'm like, I and what happened?

(23:10):
Did your Mom's your mom throw something at you? Would happen?
And I'm like, I'm going to get back to you
in a minute. And I was like, I just saw
something weird. And then I went to my mom. My
mom's knocked out. My mom and my dad like knocked
out sleeping, And that's the first time I told my
family and stuff and that's when, you know, like they
were like little things here and there. I think people
have picked up on stuff and you don't talk about
it because it's crazy and you know, and it's you know,

(23:31):
for me at this point, I'm like, you know, their
ghost stories and if you believe it, you believe it.
If you don't, you don't. You know. So this woman,
this woman came rushing at you with her mouth open
and then just what poof disappeared at the foot of
the bed. At the foot of the bed. Can you
describe what she looked like? Yeah, she was. She was short, right,
so probably like this short woman kind of um like
long hair, like long hair centered parted but like straggly,

(23:54):
like it wasn't straight. It was straight, but like you know,
like and her face. I can't remember the details of
the face other than it was very like the mouth
was just very wide and like, you know, her eyes
were kind of squinting because she was her mouth was
just really really open, you know. And I didn't luckily
see her again for many years until my dad was

(24:14):
in Bokistan when you know, he had gotten sick. He
had a heart attack in Pokistan. We had been in
Bokkistan for two weeks with him. Come back. Um, I'm
sleeping in my room. My brother is sleeping in the
other room in his room, and my parents were both
in Pokisan, and it was the first night we were back.
You know, I wake up and she was like literally
standing at the same foot at the bed, and I screamed.
And that's when my brother came running in and he's like,

(24:36):
what happened? As he came running in, she was She's gone.
But then he believed me because at that point he
told me that he had seen her as well. So
you know, he pulled his mattress to the hallway and
like slept in the doorways. Oh my god. Did you
guys ever do any research about like whether there was
somebody connected to the house and the description and you're
trying to figure out who she was, what she wanted. No,
you know, honestly, I think that what it was, because

(24:58):
my my mom got very upset when she found out
my brother had been doing tarot cards and and things
like that. She's like, you know, you opened doorways and portables,
and it's so weird because these are literal conversations that
we would have in our home right, like people talk
about buying cereal and my mom's telling at us about
like don't open mortals sale and you know, did you

(25:19):
guys do the Buiji board too? No, that is one
thing I avoided, like the plague, because I just I know,
I was like, I would never do that. That those
those things scared me. It's too much of an invitation.
That's way too much. And it was one of those
things that like even the tarot cards, like once that
stuff started, we were like, yeah, I know, my brother
put those away and like, but at that point, whatever
was happening was in the house already. We'll be right

(25:40):
back after the short break. So when you when you
got married, you moved out or you we went overseas.
I mean, it seems like this particular entity was kind
of it was at the house. It was connected the house.
It wasn't like some some they say, some gin will
attach to people, so wherever that person goes, they end
up just following that person. I know, somebody like that

(26:00):
who hasn't had that experience. Um, and so she sees
the same thing over and over, um, the same experiences
over and about where she moves and then others kind
of remain in there, but you moved overseas at some
point in your life, right as an adult or after
you had kids or I don't know when. Yeah, I
moved to Egypt um when after I had had my
second son, So when he was three months old. My

(26:21):
my like my kids, and I moved to each of
My husband stayed in the US for another year and
then he came with us. Yeah, and so's thirty by then.
I think, okay, And so I remember you telling me
about the experiences you had in this home over there, right,
so let's talk about that. Yeah, And just to be clear,
like honestly, you know, there's a lot of you know, discussion,
you know about things falling because you know, we've had experiences,

(26:44):
like all of us in different ways, you know, and
different things like moving and different things happening. You know
what people you know saying things. So I actually I
understand what your friend is talking about as well, because
these are conversations. So we've had so, yeah, that woman
stayed there. But you know, who knows, right, if people
are attached or not. When I is, we lived in Cairo,
was generally okay. In Cairo. There's a couple of times
you know, little things that happened here and there, but

(27:05):
um loge and my daughter. But then when we moved
to Dubai, that's when everything kind of like, you know,
that was the point where I'm just like, Okay, maybe
I'm not because there was still moments where I thought
I was crazy. I was just like I'm crazy, and
I'm like day dreaming or we're half asleep, or you're right,
you're tired, right, and you know, because I'm a rational
human being who well, and I'm the person that will

(27:26):
justify it in some rational means as much as possible.
Right before I get um, when we lived in Dubai,
we actually moved into this really beautiful villa that was
right next to a mosque. Right, I'm thinking, it's next
to a mosque. How much safer could you see? How
much spiritually safer could you be? Like it's perfect? And
then you know, um, a couple of weeks into it,
you know, I kept my husband had to go back

(27:48):
to the US for something for work, so I was
just me. It was really it was like a five
bedroom house. My kids are sleeping in their room, I'm
in my room and like we're and I'm just hearing
the cabinets in the kitchen going bang bang bang really
really loud, and you know, I'm thinking, okay, and we
you know, obviously you're in Dubai. You always have like
you have domestic help in Duvice. So I thought, okay,
it was our it was my kids nanny and she's

(28:08):
pissed or something and she's banging things. And I went
downstairs and all the lights are off, nobody's there, and
it wasn't happening. So I'm like, okay, that's weird. You know,
I'm come back. I'm telling my husband. He said, oh,
you know, it's probably how settling or something. Right, we're
sleeping and then the same thing my weeks us up,
boom boom boom. My husband's like, that's gotta be the nanny.

(28:29):
And I'm like, and your husband, you heard it too,
because we were broke away that at that point. And
then you know, it was just constant. Then a little
bit we go back to sleep. A little while later,
we're hearing footsteps going up because it was like marble
steps because you know, like when you want to buy
they have a lot of more ornate kind of think
these marble steps, and we're hearing like footsteps on the step, like,
and he's like's are the kids sleep walking? Because we're

(28:50):
thinking it's the kids, it's something, and you know, he
opens the doors. Nothing there, so we're like, all right,
this is weird. And then we go and my husband said,
you know what, just let's just put if somebody is
moving around the house, we'll put like there was this
kid's gate. There's this wooden kid's gate that we had
put it, and that was across the top of the stairs.
Because my younger son was about three, we moved there.

(29:11):
So we're like, you know, if he falls down the stairs,
it's marble, really hurt himself. So we had this kids
so you know, like if somebody they know, they would
bang into it because they wouldn't know that it was
up there, right, So we had it and you know,
a couple of nights nothing. A couple of nights later,
we're going hearing the banging downstairs. So we wakes both
of us up. You know, my husband grabs a bat, right,
he's like waiting now or he's got a bat. And
at that point and we were sitting up in bed

(29:32):
and we can hear it clearly footsteps going up the thing.
The footsteps are coming up the stairway towards your room.
Where's our room? The stairs go and then there's like
a landing and then right and directly in front was
my bedroom, and then the bedroom to the left was
my kid's bedroom, and then we had a guest bedroom
in office to the rights. It was a big house, right,
so we're like kind of a dead center. So it's

(29:53):
coming up the thing, and you know, I, I'm scared.
So we had like actually that night closed the door
because I was getting a little creep out. I thinking
maybe the somebody probably around the house. You know, there
were a lot of robberies in du buying that area.
So that's my husband at the bat. The doors closed
and the kids doors closed, our doors closed, and then
we hear the footstep. My husband's got the bat now
he's like piste off. He's ready to do whatever, right,

(30:14):
and then we hear the thing slide the gate, the gates.
We hear it. My husband jumps up and he opens
the door and there's no there's nobody there there and
like the gate is open. The gate was open and
we had closed it. So that was like the beginning,
and then it just accelerated after that, like I was,
you know, downstairs, my husband and I were watching Game

(30:35):
of Thrones downstairs. The kids are in like in bed,
you know, sleeping, and they had a bunk bed in
their room, and all of a sudden, my daughter starts
screaming bloody murder. So I remember jumping out of the couch,
like running up the stairs. My husband's following me, right,
And she had she would sleep on the top bunk
and we had when those kids tents that went over
the top bunk, you know, they have kids tents. So

(30:56):
she used to like sleeping in his kid's tent. And
she's screw dreaming inside this tent, right, And I run upstairs.
I opened the tent and she is just pale and screaming,
and I'm like, what's wrong? And she's like, you know,
I woke up and I I saw this you know,
shadow like outside of my tent, and I thought it
was you, right, And she opened the tent and she's like, mom,

(31:17):
it was not you, right, And then she's like and
then it disappeared, and that's when she started screaming. And
she was six or seven, right, and she saw did
she see a person? She described what she said she
saw a woman, and she said, like she saw the
wind shadow, and then when she opened the thing, she
saw like a woman for like a fraction of a
second and then she disappeared. But she's like I clearly,

(31:37):
She's like, I thought it was you, right, And I
was sitting up and I opened it. I just keep
getting chills. I just keep getting chills up and down
my body. Gary. It was really sCOD because it was
one of those things that I'm just like, this is crazy,
and I'm just a really respected journalist covering the Middle
Eastern and I'm going and I'm tired, Like I'm going
into work and I'm tired. And then it was funny.
I told my boss, who was um a small and

(31:57):
she's one of my best friend. She's a smaller Canadian woman,
so she's Muslim too, and I told her about this
stuff and she was like, Okay, that's really weird and scary.
So she's like, you know, read like something from the Koran,
and you know, this is the conversation having with my
boss in the newsroom about and so it's just sort
of crazy. And then we're just doing it. And then
it just started accelerating, accelerating with the banging and this,

(32:18):
and then then our housemaid or nanny told us the
same thing. She would she would do it too. So
she actually one day I come home and she was
she was Christian, and she apparently while we were awakey
at work, she went to the church and she got
all this holy water, so all over our house. But
these crosses, holy oil. Whatever works, man, whatever works. And
he's like, are you mad, And I'm like, nope, I'm good.

(32:41):
Something's gonna work. It's good. I'm sitting here playing like Karan,
you can have lumpthing's gonna work right right, And yeah,
I mean then it was just started accelerating more and more,
and then it came really really common, to the point
like we lived there. Maybe I had to be terrifying
for the kids to write, well, that's the thing. Eventually
we all wounded up sleeping in the same room. We
had a five rough house and the kids in their room,

(33:02):
and so we had a king size bed. My husband's like,
this stinks. I'm gonna go sleep in the guest room.
Why so me and my two kids are sleeping in
the room. He's sleeping in the guest room. Does it
a week and then comes back and he said nope,
pulls a mattress out and starts sleeping on the floor
in this room. And I'm like, what, what's wrong with you?
Wanted to sleep in the guest room And he's like, okay,
so I was sleeping right, and he's sitting when he's sleeping,

(33:26):
and clearly he's like somebody pulled his foot. He's like
he pulled his foot and filted him awake. He thought
it was me, And he's like what and he looks
and he's like, no, nobody there, and he he was
just so he's like, maybe it's a good gin because
it was like fund your time, and I was sleeping
through it, so maybe it was just waking me up
for prayers or something. Right, get up, get up and pray.
But he was just like, nope, I'm not going back

(33:46):
in there. So by the end, because it was happening
so much, we would all sleep in one room. And
I'll sell you the reason I forgot why. The reason
we started doing that was because my daughter was having
tough time sleeping in her She kept getting up the
middle of the night and coming to my room. And
you know, my son with something, he was pretty sleeper,
but you know she would always come down. And one
night by you know, I wake up and I looked

(34:06):
at the door and I see my daughter, you know,
I see him, like I see the same size my daughter,
short short South Asian short hair, right she's standing there,
and I'm like, okay, you know, baby, you can come in,
come in the bed, go ahead, and you know, and
then I like move move to make room for her
in the bed, and she's already lying there. So I look, Mike,
shack and stop it, you keep give me. I'm so
freaking out. It was really scary, and I'm she's already

(34:30):
lying there in between my husband and myself. And then
I'm like, I'm looking and I look back and then
not only at this point, I'm awake, now come sitting
up right, and I'm looking and I look back and think,
and I still see this little shadow of like this
little kid, but now I see a woman right behind
the kid, right like, and it looked like a woman
like niob like I look like a woman in a
work like right behind and that's where I'm like banging

(34:52):
on my husband's arm and I'm like waking him up.
And so I grabbed my son and I was like no,
I'm not gonna let to sleepy himself in his room, right, So,
like all of us started sleeping in one room that's
where my as we went to the other room asleep
and then came back. So it was like three of
us in the king's size bed and my husband on
a mattress on the floor. So at some point when
I mean, because I feel like, how can you even rest?
How can you emotionally and physically rest in a house
where you feel like you're certainly not alone, Like there's

(35:15):
something that like the psychic toll has to take over time,
it's gonna be really difficult. So what are you thinking, like, Okay,
we just have to get out of here, or we
have to find a fix, or what is the long
term plan? In response to this? Are you just in
their space and they want you out? What if you
think was happening? Well that I didn't know what was happening.
It was really scary. But the problem is when you
moved overseas, especially if you live in du Buy, you

(35:36):
have to pay rent for a year and that rent
gets taken out of your salary. So I could not
cut the lease for any reason. You know, it would
have been literally all everyone has still been taken out
of my salary and I wouldn't been able to afford
another place because you have to pay for the entire year,
and like it's not cheap the buy, it's very very
over priced. Right. So it was one of those things
that I was like, Okay, we're here, We're stuck here, right,

(35:59):
And um, was it an old home or what was
it was newly built? And this is the thing, right,
So it was it was a newly built home that
was next to it wasn't like maybe a couple of
years or something. Oh no, it was actually newly built.
There was another home that was like maybe a few
months early. So they had been building this development of
these really beautiful villas in that area. And I come
into work one day and there's this newspaper called There

(36:21):
was this newspaper called Emirates twenty seven in Dubai and
I come into work and there's a newspaper on my thing,
and my boss walks up to me. She's like, turn
to page whatever seven, right, And apparently somebody in Emirate
wrote an article about how the entire area of Jamara
three where we lived, was plaguing the British expats, because

(36:42):
British expats kept moving out because they kept saying it
was haunted flying it wasn't a freaking newspaper. And like
then my friend, my boss is like, isn't that your
neighborhood And I'm like, yes, that's my name. And it's
all these like people from like all over England and
Australia are being quoted and they're going, I'm sitting there
and like glasses are flying off and I see these
people and all the bang the bangings too much and

(37:05):
like the rattling in the bank. It was really crazy.
And then at the very bottom, because apparently they didn't
know how to write a story, so they put this
at the very bottom of the buried it was that
that Terentire neighborhood was built over a graveyard. The whole
neighborhood had been built over a graveyard. With the Dubai sprawl,
they just there's not enough space there. Yeah, so they
had to oh, my god, that built over a graveyard. Yeah,

(37:27):
that can really hurt property values right there, this is
the buy Okay, that's true. And we stayed there for
a while. I mean there was one point where I
remember um sitting up. My husband was like on the mattress,
and we started, you know, locking our door. At that point,
we closed our door and we were locking our door,
and you know, all five, all four of us are

(37:47):
in the bedroom. We're all sleeping, same banging bang banging
footsteps with steps. I wake up, you know, my husband
wakes up. We're like basically sitting there looking at each other,
and then the footsteps come up and then you stop
right outside of our door, and my husband was like,
are you sure maybe there's somebody in the house. Right.
He's like, because that's really that's right outside there. He
would whispering to each other and I was like, and
it just sounds too real. It sounds So he's like,

(38:08):
I think there's somebody in the house. He's like, I
think somebody because you know the robberies here. So he
goes to get the bat and then the door starts
like the door knobs are shaking, and he's like, holy crap.
He's like, there's somebody at the door. So he gets
the bat and he gets opens door over there. Wow.
And so at what point did your husband go from
I don't really believe in this stuff too. Oh, this
is definitely real. I think since he married me married me,

(38:33):
I think he kind of was just like you hear
things and then he was like, Okay, now I'm experiencing
them with you. And I think Dubai really clenched it
for him. I think that was he was just like,
all right, you know, these things happened. And we actually
went to the you know, the mom at the mosque
connect door um and then apparently everybody, all the Muslims
in the neighbor that were at the moscow, Oh yeah,

(38:54):
that happens in this house, and that happens. It's the
entire neighborhood in the neighborhood, very common. So the mom
started talents and you have to do like Suita Bucca
and you have to have it on play all night.
And you know, it was one of things that I
didn't want to tell my mom because I don't want
people do not come visit right because don't tell them
about the gin. Come, the beach is lovely, the what
is great, the shopping is good. Anything, And like my

(39:17):
sister came and she she actually lived with us when
she was waiting for her house to be ready. She
was living to buy. Then she came and lived with
us like two three months, and then later on she's like, yeah,
your house. Your sister experienced something too, so when you
came back to the United States. So how long ago
was that? That was? Um? We left that house two
thousand twelve Christmas? H did you um sense? Like I'm

(39:41):
just wondering, like, because you know, people have a sense, uh,
people have these experiences when sometimes got a sense of
some kind of overwriting feeling like some people will describe
like they're being an incredible kind of sadness around this
entity or or if they feel they can sense like
malevolence or or anger or something. Did you get any

(40:02):
get a sense from these apps? From these whatever this
entity was in the house? I think I think it
was just it was more like we were in their space,
in their space, the kid was playful, you know, and
the kid was playful and wanted somebody was what just
saying I think the mom I'm I'm projecting here, whoever
the longer woman was right. I think that she was
just kind of why why are you in the house

(40:22):
sort of. I don't think there was anything like malevolent,
but I just think it was it was scary because
I like to be in this reality, and I like
that reality to stay far away from me, you know, yeah,
which which takes me to another question. I mean, so
you've been told that you have a lineage of of
of having these abilities, right like, which means if you

(40:43):
wanted to, you could really cultivate them. Have you thought
about them? Sometimes? I'm thinking I should, But it's part
of my family, so I just kind of you know,
you know, it is what it is. But you know,
it's also something that like I don't talk about and
if you were not my friend, I would not be
talking about it on a podcast. I do appreciate it because, look,
I know you're putting yourself. I've asked other friends too,
They're like, do you understand I have a professional reputation

(41:05):
to protect? That's what my partner doing this, She's like, really, like,
you know, my work stands for itself. It does, it does,
it does, And like I said, like, we have a
whole spectrum of really like people from all kinds of
different background just not just professional backgrounds, but like religious
and cultural backgrounds who also are going to be having
conversations with me around this. So it's been great, Well,

(41:26):
when can I ask you this? Then? Just as a
kind of a closing question, when is the last time
you had an experience that you feel like was the
supernatural experience? Um, you know, honestly, it was probably like
a couple a few months ago, so you know what
I mean, Like this is like stuff that you know,
my husband basically like he he told me that I'm
married into a very annoying family. Right. It's just like

(41:50):
I don't know what to say to you guys, because
that's why I'm saying. He's like, you know, obviously there's
something attached to your family or you draw it or whatever, right,
but like, um yeah, it was was like kids voices,
like kid's voices. And I didn't say anything to anybody
about in your house in my end, like this this
house that we were renting and not this one with
the one before that, and like I never said anything

(42:12):
to anybody. And then um my son, he's like I mentioned,
He's like, yeah, I thought I heard kids playing downstairs
in the basement, right, And I was like, okay, it's okay, right,
Well look because I don't because he gets scared, I
wasn't gonna say anything to him. And then you know,
I was sleeping one night and then when I actually
wasn't sleeping, I was supposed to be sleeping, and then
my husband was snoring. So I left the room and

(42:33):
I went to my my daughter's room and I was
just like trying to settle down in my daughter's room
with her, and then I just heard a music box,
like really loudly, and we don't have music box, so,
oh my god, a really loud music box. And you know,
I got up and I walked to the different rooms
to try to find it, and I couldn't find it.
And then I went downstairs to the basement, you know,

(42:53):
the next day, putting like something away the laundry, and
then I was like, you know what, there's a kid's
section in the basement, you know, and it and then
there was a music box in there. Wow. I have
a feeling. You have so many, so many, so many stories,
but it sounds like you have kind of resigned yourself
to living with these experiences and none of them have
really felt threatening necessarily, but it's just like they're letting
you know, we're here. We're just here. It's culture, you know,

(43:16):
I think it's culture and its religion, and you know,
there's people are going to say, oh, you know, wow,
you're crazy or while you know there's this and that's fine.
That's what faith is, right. I mean, the people say
the same thing for believing in God. And if you believe,
they think you're crazy. And you know some people do, yeah,
some people do, and some people tell you. I mean,
I figure there are plenty of people who are like
agnostic or have you know, don't no really have a

(43:37):
faith tradition, but they might still believe in like something
a little that they can't explain UFOs or ferries or whatever.
Maybe something you never know, uh you know, Santa Claus,
I mean the inexplicable. But anyhow, thank you so much.
I mean, this has been a really it's been a
fun conversation, even though I've had lots of chills and
a little bit of a little bit of some scarce too,

(43:58):
But I really appreciate it, and I I would love
to continue to talk to you like as you have experience.
I mean, I don't know if you've ever thought about
like documenting this stuff or like doing your journalists you
could do a whole like project around it. I could,
and then I would like to maintain somewhat of my credibility.
Can you. Please put our listeners how they can find

(44:20):
your work, especially the Prison Journals and Project UM and
find you online and follow you. Okay, well, um, you
can look us up at Prison Journalism Project dot org.
That is our publication. We're super excited about it and
you know we're we focus on incarcerated men and women
formerly incarcerated and incarceration impacted because we understand that the

(44:40):
impact of people inside is so much wider and that
net is so huge that we want to hear the
stories of everyone that's been you know, involved in any way,
shape or form, whether it's a family member, loved one, friend,
or even if they worked with people and it's it's
touched them. So we're always looking for those stories. You
can find me on Twitter at profit Pasha prof Psha

(45:00):
p R O F p A s h A awesome,
Thank you so much. I hope you enjoyed that conversation
as much as I did. Now there are as many
people in the world with JIN stories as there are GIN,
so if you have one you'd like to share, make
sure to email it to me at the Hidden Gin

(45:20):
at gmail dot com. That's the Hidden Gin. Th H
E H I D D E N d j I
n N at gmail dot com and until next time,
remember we are not alone. The Hidden Gin is a

(45:48):
production of I Heart Radio and Grimm and Mild from
Aaron Mankey. The podcast is written and hosted by Robbiah
Chaudry and produced by Miranda Hawkins and Trevor Young, with
executive producer Who's Aaron Mankey, Alex Williams, and Matt Frederick.
Our theme song was created by Patrick Quartets. For more
podcasts from I Heart Radio, visit the I heart Radio app,

(46:11):
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. M