Megan Singleton: BloggerAtLarge.com writer on Eastern State Penitentiary's Halloween fundraiser

It's Halloween this week - and to mark the occasion, Megan Singleton recapped her experience at Philadelphia's spookiest fundraiser.

Eastern State Penitentiary's 'Halloween Nights event runs from September 20 to November 9 and it's designed to scare the life out of visitors while raising money for a good cause.

BloggerAtLarge's Megan Singleton shared the memorable moments from her experience - including the cocktail bar for 'scaredy cats' who want to contribute without being frightened.

Read more about Megan's experience here.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the Sunday Session podcast with Francesca Rudgin
from News Talks EDB Travel with Wendy Woo Tours unique
fully inclusive tours around the world.

Speaker 2 (00:20):
Megan Singleton joins us now to talk travel.

Speaker 3 (00:23):
Good morning, Good morning.

Speaker 2 (00:25):
Now, there are some interesting experiences you can have in
order to celebrate Halloween there. I mean, you can just
go do your trick or treating, or if you're in Auckland,
you might want to go along and be terrified at spookers.
But you had a very interesting experience in Philadelphia.

Speaker 3 (00:41):
Yes. Well, so firstly, disclaimer, I hate spooky stuff and
I hate Halloween because it's all about the celebration of
evil spirits who have supposedly run them up the night
before or Hello's Day. So we really meant to be
celebrating All Saints Day on November the first, but now
we just celebrate Halloween. But in the name of looking

(01:03):
for a good story for my blog, I found myself
at accepting an invitation in Philadelphia to go to Halloween Nights,
which is a six week annual fundraiser for the historic
Eastern State Penitentiary. So this infamous prison is spooky enough
without this event. It once housed al capone. I mean

(01:25):
they let him pimp his cell, by the way, and
you can still go and see it today with carpets
and rugs and lamps and writing desk and a nice
bed and everything. So anyway, my husband and I rock
up at this prison, which is huge and imposing, towering
brick walls. It's aerily lit inside. There are one hundred
and fifty actors and the whole place has been turned

(01:47):
into five different haunted houses. There are zombies and monsters,
and we can hear screaming and doors clanging and chainsaws
and dentist drills. So we go in. We sign the
waiver first, obviously in case we die, and there are
ambulances parked outside. I'm not even Joe, I'm scared just

(02:07):
telling you this. So we put on a neon neckband,
and that means if you put one of these on,
it means you're allowing the actors to touch you. They
can whisk you away, that sort of thing. So we
start going and I'm crouched so low behind my husband.
I'm holding onto the tail of his puffer jacket, and
but we keep in our little group of probably ten,

(02:29):
we keep being in the front because we're going so
slow that the group have gone ahead of us, and
now we're the first people to be jumped out at
Oh my word. So we squeeze through like they've got
these inflatable buffers in the hallways to make the hallways
really narrow, so you can barely squeeze through. And someone
grabbed my ankles. I mean, for a noise came out

(02:49):
of my mouth that I've never heard before. A girl
in front of me was grabbed. She disappeared through an
opening and we never saw her again. And we did
come past sort of a dentist area and a man
was fighting being dragged into a dentist's chair, and all
the drill sounds and stuff, and so on we go,
and you come out, you take a breath, and you
have a nervous giggle, and then you go into the

(03:10):
next sort of phase of this. And over the years
they've got more and more spooky. But but they do
for scaredy cats, just have a cocktail bar area where
you can just go and have a drink, contribute to
and recover, and contribute to the fundraising, which is what
this prison needs.

Speaker 2 (03:30):
Is that the most terrifying thing you've ever.

Speaker 3 (03:32):
Done, ever done ever in my life.

Speaker 2 (03:37):
Did you see anyone require assistance from the ambulances?

Speaker 3 (03:41):
I don't know. I don't know. I don't think I did.
People were in various stages of repose when we got out,
you know, sitting, some leaning over, but some having a
fairbulous time. Thought it was hilarious. They go through again,
I mean, all up to what your constitution can cope with.

Speaker 2 (03:59):
I think I love it. Thank you so much, Meghan.
If you'd like to find out more about it, Meghan's
got to blog up on her website, Blogger at Large.
And actually, if you are thinking about a novel way
of celebrating Halloween, try and find a copy of Spookers.
I'm not sure where you can screen it. Actually, I'll
have a Google and see if I can find it.
It's a film from twenty seventeen, a documentary that Florie

(04:21):
and Hubitch made here in New Zealand on the scare.
I call it the scare Attraction, I suppose, which is
all the horror attraction. It's in South Auckland, adjoining what
was once King Seat Psychiatric Hospital. You may have been there,
you may have had the experience of Spookers. Everybody is

(04:41):
just terrified, but it is a wonderful watch. It's about
It's really a film about community and the people at
work there and things, but you also get to experience
it a little bit. So if you are looking for
a little bit of a Haroween horror, see if you
can track down a copy of Spookers and enjoy that documentary.

Speaker 1 (04:57):
For more from the Sunday Session with Francesca Rudkin, listen
live to News Talks it'd be from nine am Sunday,
or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.