It started during that time you woke up in the middle of night. The usual buzzing street was in dead silence. As you try to lull yourself back to sleep, you suddenly hear scratches on the window, then a few bumps reverberate from across the room. And before the eerie feeling sinks in, you went to the only place that could take your mind off of things—Facebook. But between scrolling through your feed, looking at your friends' latest food endeavors and stumbling on funny kitten videos, you find that the real scare is in Spookify.
Created by Eran Arvonio and Cris Joy De Pablo in 2014, Spookify is a Facebook page dedicated to Filipino horror and thriller reads. It was born at the height of Files FB pages and student confessions online among local universities.
Photo from Spookify Facebook page
"Back in 2014 to 2015, that was when Eran noticed the high volume for horror stories as we kept receiving a lot of them in our non-horror page," Cris Joy tells Manila Bulletin Lifestyle. "With that, he realized the need for a separate page for the genre."
Soon enough, the page garnered a huge following of both horror story fanatics and authors sharing their horrific experiences, real or not. The two admins of the page are tasked to read and edit all entries.
"Dati, mahirap mag-edit ng stories kasi yung ibang senders ay 'jejemon' at kulang punctuation marks. Pero ngayon, okay na since nag-set kami ng rules kung paano ma-feature ang story nila (Before, it was hard to edit stories since some were written in 'jejemon' style and lack punctuation marks. But now, it is easier because we have rules on how we feature stories)," Cris Joy says. "Ilang beses na kaming kinilabutan habang nagbabasa ng story na pinasa nila kasi mafe-feel mo talaga at magaling sila maglahad ng kwento (It's happened so many times that we get chills while reading their submissions. You could really feel them and these authors are great in telling the stories)."
Now with nearly three million likes, the pages still receive numerous submissions with 7,000 entries up for editing and 19,000 pending posts.
In case you need help on which to read, Cris Joy shared some of Spookify's top stories and chronicles to get you started on your Halloween binge-reading.
Eiko-chan's tomodachi no more by RavenOfDeath
Sometimes, imaginary friends aren't just fruits of our imagination. Let's leave it there.
UV Express by Alexis
With Manila's heavy traffic situation, it is pretty unlikely to encounter anything paranormal on the road, or so we think. A ride home from work becomes a spine-chilling trip for commuters and their unknown passengers.
Ligaya of Iloilo by Ligaya
Unlike most of the entries submitted to Spookify, Ligaya of Iloilo is a coming-of-age tale of a girl trying to find normalcy in her life as she juggles her studies, work, friends, and being a budding aswang.
Kalamansi and the babasaging baso chronicles by Hunter
It is a pretty common scene in Filipino culture to welcome guests, familiar or not, during fiestas. With all the delicious food, warm hospitality, and all sorts of merry-making, the last thing you would think of is people having a secret agenda on you. With this tale, you might want to rethink your next binge eat in and out of town.
To read more of the hair-raising submissions, visit Spookify Facebook page.