If you grew up in Singapore, the hungry ghost festival – a time where spirits are released from hell to wander the earth for a month – should be a familiar phenomenon.

Even if you're not the superstitious sort, these four spooky anecdotes from a Singaporean Reddit thread titled "Chit Guay Stories" ("chit guay" literally translates to "seventh month", which is synonymous with the hungry ghost festival) might just have you re-evaluating your beliefs - especially when the date (Aug. 22) is fast approaching.

1) This unresolved episode was contributed by original poster /u/Cubyface:

Chinese seventh month starts 22 August this year. For people not in the know, that's when Taoists and Buddhists believe that the gates of hell open for a month for spirits to wander the earth. In a multicultural country like Singapore, this is observed widely and even people from other faiths generally tend to err on the side of caution and observe certain customs during this period.

This period is also when stranger things tend to happen, and I thought I'd share something which happened to a friend of mine.

He and his girlfriend went to a certain ktv in the central part of Singapore during seventh month a few years ago. Now this is a big no no for various reasons, it's believed that spirits are attracted to dark spaces (ktv rooms are generally really dark) and music and singing (as entertainment).

They spent a few hrs in the room singing, had fun and then left to make payment. But then at the front desk the cashiers tried to charge them for three people, and kept insisting that when they arrived they had another lady with them. My friend argued with them, and finally they decided to check the footage from security cams in the room.

To his horror, the footage showed three people in the room! An additional lady crouched on the sofa just beside his gf, looking at the floor throughout the session. And when my friend and his gf left the room together, she stood up and left with them, all the while still gazing at the same spot on the floor. As the cashiers watched the video, it dawned on them what was happening, and they waived off the charges for the 'third person'

What other seventh month stories have you guys heard and want to share?

So the "lady" followed followed them out of the KTV room and...? D:

2) National Service is a common setting for paranormal encounters, but this one stands out not only for being exceptionally hair-raising, but also for the narrator's cool-headedness:

I have quite a few stories to tell, given that I did my NS in Lim Chu Kang. Once, I was on sentry duty and had just swapped places with my fellow NS colleague- I went down to the hut at the jetty because he wanted to take a dump. As the aircon in there was spoilt (as always) and blowing warm air, I shut it off and opened the windows to get a breeze before settling in under the desk for a nap.

I recall waking up with a start, feeling something was amiss but I couldn't place my finger on what was wrong exactly. The air was unusually still and silent. After around 30 seconds or so, there was a cold draft and there was a sound like someone (or something..) was climbing in through the window. Mickey, the old stray dog that was everyone's favourite, was sleeping outside and from under my table, I could hear her whimpering. I heard a soft thud like a person landing with both feet, and footsteps heading to the desk but I couldn't see anything.

The footsteps came closer and closer and they stopped right in front of me. There was silence for a split second and then the table rocked as someone (or something...) sat on it. Here's the scary bit: a pair of skinny legs materialised and started swinging as droplets of water landed on me. Then, they stopped and water kept on dripping onto the floor beside my head where I laid.

Now, I'm not a superstitious person nor afraid of supernatural stuff and the best thing to do in these scenarios is often not to engage with them. So, I basically shut my eyes, breathed slowly and forced myself to go back to sleep until my alarm rang.

3) Imagine... a disembodied sound that imitated your mother: 

Once I was at home in the living room, just sitting there using my phone. From behind me at where the main door is, I heard a whistling. "Oh, mom's back" cos usually she would whistle when she comes home. But after a while, no one appeared into the living room. I got up to see if mom was at the door and maybe needed help with the groceries or something, but there was nobody there. I was puzzled but I just sat back down and try not to be scared. Perhaps it was my imagination, perhaps the whistling came from the neighbour or from downstairs...

And then, I heard the whistling again, from my behind-left in the direction of the main door, go past me, in front of me through the whole living room and into one of the bedrooms at the other end of the house.

It took me quite a while to realize that this wasn't the first time I heard the disembodied whistler. A few weeks before that, I was sleeping until afternoon as usual because holidays, and mom would buy back lunch for me. Again, she likes to whistle when she comes home. So I was sleeping that day and I was awoken by a whistling right beside my ear. Like literally whistling into my ear but I don't feel the tickling air blowing into it. I woke up thinking it's my mom calling me to wake for lunch, but when I got out of my room, I found myself all alone. The time was early, not the usual time that mom comes home with lunch. I called her on the phone and true enough, she's still out and nobody's home...

I wonder if I will meet the whistler again this year...

4) When you're "alone" and a second dog face comes on your snapchat filter - AND IT STARTS MOVING:

TL;DR Haunted by a tall, black mass that could be tracked by Snapchat's dog filter.

Last year, a friend who could see ghost took a double take as I came to work. Then he kept glancing behind me with a very scared look on his face and then pretty much avoided making any eye contact with me. I was like wtf is up with him, but we were rushing to open up the store so I just went on with our duties.

After the store opened, we were waiting by the counter for any customers to come in and he was still avoiding talking to me or looking at me. Which was odd bc he was very talkative. It went on for the next hour and I was slowly getting annoyed with him. So I just demanded him to tell me.

He refused quite a few times only I told him "Then don't talk to me anymore la!" Only then did he mumble "Someone following you." I was like "What? Who? Where?" cos I knew I came to work alone. He said "I don't want to say bc I don't want you to be scared. If I tell you, will you be scared?" I very bravely said "No la!"

According to him, there was a tall, very black mass in the shape of a person behind me, following me everywhere. Like a shadow. Every single day. From the first day to the last day of the 7th month, the black shape was there. My friend was scared bc every time he looked at it behind me, he would feel the black mass getting very angry and "glaring" at him.

Back in those days, I used Snapchat a lot. And every single time I used that dog filter, it would register in thin air. Like I could be taking a selfie with the dog filter, and then behind me the 2nd dog face would appear. It would move from further away, to by my right shoulder, to above my head. I could track it with the Snapchat filter lol I still have a video of it, I think.

After 7th month was over, it disappeared and everything went back to normal. Except when that same friend came over to my house, he said "This place very dirty." Goldie was barking out my 3rd floor bedroom window at one point and when that friend looked out the window, his face went pale. Later on, he revealed that there was something looking back inside.

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