Balete Drive, and Lapses in Time

Balete Drive is a famous street. Its reputation is somewhat tricky, because there are many origins for its hauntings. For some, it was about women who were raped and left for dead. For others, it was about car accidents, with women looking for their body parts way after death – sometimes eyeballs, sometimes other parts of their faces. Some taxis supposedly picked up passengers who would disappear about a block or two. Still others would say it was all about spiritual geometry, that it was built over a line of energy that tended to do strange things. And of course, some people pointed to haunted houses.

Whatever the case may be, Balete Drive is near where I live. It is now well-lit, and urban gentrification (what a term!) has done its work on some parts of it.

Years ago, a friend and took Balete Drive on the way to an event we were supposed to go to – or, another plausible reason was that she was bringing me home after a party. Still another possible reason could have been we were going to have a late-night merienda in the Morato area. I don’t remember clearly anymore, so let’s keep it multiple choice.

As we turned into Balete Drive from Nicanor Domingo (yet another interesting place, with the reservoir behind these utterly horror-movie-esque gates, and that old ‘50s style apartment row right next to the waters), there wasn’t any traffic.

And on we went, waiting to pop out at the other end, which would be E. Rodriguez, which could be on the way to Morato, or my house. As was our wont, we were having a fun conversation.

But you see, Balete Drive can be traversed in a few minutes. It’s not that long a road, honestly. But we began noticing that we seemed to be stuck traveling the road section between 3^rd and 11^th street in New Manila, in some sort of endless time loop.

The moment we got worried, though, we seemed to have popped the bubble; and we saw the E. Rodriguez intersection, with Emery Apartelle on one corner. If I remember correctly, our watches had to be reset to conform to normal time all over – apparently, we lost 15 minutes, I think. I used to say 45, but somehow, I think that’s my mind trying to make a good story better.

At least, thinking about it now, we didn’t encounter a white lady. Not there.

As a related side story, I remember someone coming up with this one during a family dinner with guests. My mind normally attributes it to my mother, but again, my memory seems to be conveniently hazy. Supposedly, the person telling the story loved to go out to parties in the old days – think the 60s – and they would sometimes gatecrash one. They supposedly saw what seemed to be a very loud party in one of the large houses in Balete Drive. Since they were on the way to another party, they figured, they’d stop by later in the night. And so it was, they decided to drop by Balete Drive, to see if the party there was still going on. What they saw was that the old house was now dark and decrepit, and it looked like it hadn’t seen activity in an awfully long time. Maybe it was the alcohol, or maybe… well. You know.

Another story I heard in yet another family dinner with guests was that the storyteller was taking a shortcut through Balete Drive at night. The person knew of the road’s reputation, but he had to go home quick. As he was speeding down the road, he nearly got into an accident as a speeding car – what looked to be an old Mercedes Benz – nearly collided with the front of his car, as it sped through one of the intersections. But when he looked into the street where it went down, it supposedly had a wall.

That one, however, I now call bullshit on. Looking at Google Maps now (what a wonderful time we live in) there are no straight cross-intersections in Balete Drive. At this point, anyway.

So… Is it real? Is Balete Drive haunted? Seeing as I have personally only experienced some sort of time displacement, and that the only other story I heard of without going into the common lore seems to be yet another case of time displacement, I’d believe more in the idea that Balete Drive is built over some kind of energy line. But the lady or ladies of Balete Drive? I hope they’ve found their peace. Unless they also happen to be echoes from the past.  

Ashes

 

 My father died a year or so ago. And yet, I can still smell the smoke of his favorite cigarettes, every now and then. Usually, I smell it in the place in our house where six doors face each other. It stays there, a lingering memory, sometimes for the whole night.

At other times, I feel it: the weight of his slow shuffling gait - our floor is made in the old style; wooden floorboards over support beams. I can sense the shift in the floorboards, ever so slightly, as he walks across the room.

Strangely enough, here, where I sit and type this, there is no haunting, even though this is also where he died. It was very early in the morning, on the day he was supposed to have his first chemotherapy session.

He also hasn't visited my mother.

And so it happens every few weeks: the smell of airborne ash.