The Aswang: The Terror of The Philippines

[00:00:20] Hello everybody and welcome to Enter The Rift Podcast Season 1 Episode 7.

[00:00:25] I'm your host Kenny and joining me is mi hermano Garrett.

[00:00:29] Donde esta la mota?

[00:00:30] And on this episode, we're going to be talking about the Aswan of the Philippines.

[00:00:36] So the Aswan is actually not a singular monster, but a collection of monsters from the Philippines, of which there are several types.

[00:00:47] And there's a version that's more like a western vampire.

[00:00:51] There's a version that's like a ghoul.

[00:00:54] There's a version that's pretty unique to the Southeast Asian region of the world, and those are viscera suckers.

[00:01:02] Then there's a shapeshifter that's more like a werewolf, but it'd be more like a were-dog or a were-boar.

[00:01:10] And then there's a version that's just, it's more like a sorcerer or a witch.

[00:01:16] But there is a huge variety of different monsters that are all classified as an Aswan.

[00:01:25] And it seems like every like island or province or region of the Philippines has almost like their own version or unique one.

[00:01:34] But there is a lot of overlap, and like the big types would be the most popular ones are what we're going to be speaking about here today.

[00:01:43] So one of the first ones is the Mandorogo, which appears more as like a normal, like just a beautiful woman in the daytime.

[00:01:53] They're even able to marry and have children.

[00:01:57] But at night, what happens is that he has a very long tongue.

[00:02:03] And at night, when she kisses her husband goodnight or when he's asleep, she'll slip that very long tongue down his throat and start draining his blood.

[00:02:14] Eventually, the husband will start losing weight.

[00:02:17] He'll be fatigued and feel sick, and he'll just start growing weaker and weaker.

[00:02:22] And then from some of the different things I've seen, if the husband suspects that his wife is actually an Aswan, it's recommended that he keep a knife under his pillow so that he can stab the Aswan in the heart during the act.

[00:02:38] Yeah, and could you just, okay, paint the situation here.

[00:02:42] You suspect your wife is an Aswan, and you're going to put the knife under the pillow, but you're sharing the bed with the bitch.

[00:02:54] So she's probably going to find it too and be like, uh-oh, uh-oh.

[00:02:59] Just immediately.

[00:03:00] And if she actually is not an Aswan, she's going to be like, I think he's going to kill me.

[00:03:06] This dude's a psychopath.

[00:03:11] Or, okay, you're out there with your homies.

[00:03:14] You're out there at the karaoke night.

[00:03:16] Somebody done messed up.

[00:03:17] They were singing Frank Sinatra My Way.

[00:03:19] If you know what I'm saying about the Philippines, not good.

[00:03:21] But later on, y'all go home.

[00:03:25] And after telling the homies, I think this bitch is poisoning.

[00:03:29] I think she's putting Drano in my food.

[00:03:31] I'm feeling weak.

[00:03:31] I'm feeling like lethargic all the time.

[00:03:33] I'm feeling like I got low iron.

[00:03:35] Hmm.

[00:03:35] Hmm.

[00:03:36] Meanwhile, it turns out, you know, you got underlying medical conditions.

[00:03:40] But you stabbed the bitch at night.

[00:03:46] Explain that to the freaking, you know, to the cops.

[00:03:48] I don't know, man.

[00:03:50] She was getting real freaky.

[00:03:51] She started, like, kissing me with tongue.

[00:03:53] And I stabbed her in the chest.

[00:03:55] Oh, my God.

[00:03:56] The bad thing is there have been murder cases in the Philippines where people thought someone

[00:04:02] they knew or even their children were an aswan or become one, and then they killed them.

[00:04:08] So it's not unheard of for someone to be murdered because they were believed to be an aswan.

[00:04:15] Just a common oopsie-daisy, you know.

[00:04:18] You know.

[00:04:19] My wife, you know, she was just trying to try something new in the bedroom, and I stabbed her in the chest.

[00:04:24] I mean, it happens to the best of us.

[00:04:30] Another version of the aswan is the Tewanak, which is formed when either a child dies before they're baptized.

[00:04:41] Or stillborn.

[00:04:41] Or it comes to life from an aborted fetus.

[00:04:45] Or it's a crossbreed between a demon and a human.

[00:04:47] But in all versions, it's the body of a young child.

[00:04:52] And it usually has very ugly, like, red, mottled skin and glowing eyes.

[00:04:59] And it will yell and wail like a baby to try to lure in passersby.

[00:05:05] And when they get close, it springs and tries to attack them with its sharp teeth and claws.

[00:05:11] And sometimes what happens is, if it's one of the cases where it's an aborted fetus or a child who dies before it's baptized, it tries to kill its mother first.

[00:05:20] And if it's successful at killing its mother, afterwards it gains the ability to make itself look cute.

[00:05:26] And then it can lure more people in.

[00:05:30] And sometimes if a family takes it in, when it's still looking cute, at night it transforms and attacks them as well.

[00:05:36] And then you gotta punt that shit.

[00:05:38] You gotta yeet us the fetus.

[00:05:40] You throw it into a pot of holy water and watch it go.

[00:05:43] Make some good soup.

[00:05:47] Oh, God.

[00:05:49] Bubble, bubble, boil it, trouble.

[00:05:50] It's in there.

[00:05:56] It turns out my baby, it tried to pull off a reverse abortion.

[00:06:01] It tried to kill my wife.

[00:06:02] So I put it in a pot of soup.

[00:06:06] Oh, my God.

[00:06:08] So of the Aswang, there's two that are more ghoul-like in that they're grave robbers.

[00:06:15] There's the busaw, which appears more human.

[00:06:20] But they'll dwell in cemeteries.

[00:06:24] And they'll try to steal fresh corpses from the funeral.

[00:06:28] Or if there's a car crash, they'll try to steal the body to eat them.

[00:06:31] And that one is pretty similar to the Balbal.

[00:06:35] Yeah, the Mr. Banana Man.

[00:06:38] Yeah, the Banana Man.

[00:06:40] Because what it does is after it steals the corpse and eats it, it leaves the trunk of a banana tree in the coffin to try to make the illusion that the body was never stolen because there's so weight in the coffin.

[00:06:55] Meanwhile, this thing's already pulled Grandma out of the coffin and ate her.

[00:06:59] Yeah, it's like, go to the viewing.

[00:07:00] It's like, damn, Grandma needs to use some lotion.

[00:07:03] She's looking a little barky.

[00:07:07] Come, Mr. Tally Man, Tally Me Banana.

[00:07:10] That bitch dead and she not coming home.

[00:07:14] Oh, my God.

[00:07:17] Damn.

[00:07:18] Got dark.

[00:07:19] Yes, it did.

[00:07:20] It's kind of funny, though.

[00:07:21] Yeah, a little bit.

[00:07:23] Yeah, so they're not going to notice, right?

[00:07:27] Like, you know, just go pop the lid open and be like, oh, sorry, Grandma.

[00:07:31] I just want to see you one last time.

[00:07:32] Oh, shit.

[00:07:32] That's a banana.

[00:07:37] That'd be so, so bad.

[00:07:40] Grandma's a shinobi.

[00:07:41] She did the old freaking switcheroo with the log like on Naruto.

[00:07:48] Oh, my God.

[00:07:49] So another type is known as the tick-tick or the whack-quack.

[00:07:54] And that's because that's the sound it makes of its wings.

[00:07:59] And this one is described either as a really big bird or sometimes bat-like creature.

[00:08:05] But the weird thing about this is that the sound, it tricks you with it because it's actually the volume of the wing beats is inversely related to how close it is to you.

[00:08:18] So if the wing beats are really, really loud, it's actually far away.

[00:08:22] But if the wing beats get really, really quiet, then that's actually when it's getting really close to you.

[00:08:31] And it does that to lure its victims into a state of, like, security because you think it's getting farther away.

[00:08:39] Man, how is that?

[00:08:40] Man, that frey-for-loop.

[00:08:42] Hey, guys, I hear a noise.

[00:08:45] It's pretty.

[00:08:45] Yeah, I hear it too.

[00:08:46] It's getting quieter.

[00:08:47] It's fine.

[00:08:48] Oh, shit.

[00:08:50] Or you hear it.

[00:08:52] Yeah.

[00:08:52] Tick, tick, wock, wock, tick, wock, tick, wock, tick, wock, wock.

[00:08:55] And it swoops down and it snatches your ass up.

[00:08:57] Yep.

[00:08:58] And eats your face off.

[00:09:01] But of all the types of Aswang, I would say the one that's probably the most famous, at least outside of the Philippines, is the Manamangal.

[00:09:13] And that means to remove in Tagalog.

[00:09:16] And the reason it's called that is it's usually depicted as a woman in the daytime.

[00:09:25] This is another case where it disguises itself as human in the daytime.

[00:09:30] But at night, it detaches its torso from its pelvis and legs.

[00:09:35] And it sprouts bat wings.

[00:09:37] And then it flies through the air.

[00:09:40] And it usually looks for pregnant women because it wants to eat the unborn child while it's still in the room.

[00:09:47] Now, some stories I've said it's not actually trying to eat the baby, but to steal its life essence, causing a miscarriage.

[00:09:55] But other versions I've seen, no, it's actually just trying to eat the baby.

[00:10:00] Oh, shit.

[00:10:00] And normally, it has a very long needle-like tongue.

[00:10:06] Like a proboscis-like tongue that can go in and eat the unborn child out of the pregnant mother's womb.

[00:10:14] Well, that's messed up.

[00:10:16] Yeah.

[00:10:16] So, it just detaches.

[00:10:18] And according to some of the folklore, too, you can either kill it by hiding the lower half until daylight, which then it will die from the sunlight like the traditional Western vampire.

[00:10:29] And also, like the traditional Western vampire, you can kill it with garlic or salt.

[00:10:33] Yeah.

[00:10:34] So, like Garrett was saying, you can either hide the corpse if you find—well, not the corpse, but the lower half.

[00:10:40] Half the corpse.

[00:10:42] If you suspect that you're hunting on Asawong and you find the legs, you can hide it and remove that so that the being, the monster, can't reattach and it will die at sunrise.

[00:10:53] Or you can rub it the lower half of garlic, salt.

[00:10:57] I've seen wine or spices even.

[00:10:59] And if you do that, it will kill the monster.

[00:11:04] Yeah.

[00:11:04] So, if you get those 11 herbs and spices and you go to season the bitch, it'll die.

[00:11:09] Yeah.

[00:11:10] Just need some good old KFC.

[00:11:12] And you're just rolling up.

[00:11:13] You're just like, oh, shit, this bitch got hit by a train.

[00:11:15] Nah, man.

[00:11:15] Nah.

[00:11:16] I'm telling you, that's an Asawong.

[00:11:17] And you're like, hey, let's grab the legs.

[00:11:20] We're going to take it home.

[00:11:21] We're going to hide it.

[00:11:22] Or in this case, you don't need KFC.

[00:11:24] You need Jollibee.

[00:11:25] Yeah.

[00:11:25] Yeah.

[00:11:26] Just, hey, so somebody who has no idea of what this shit's going on.

[00:11:29] But let's say it's real.

[00:11:31] You're walking.

[00:11:32] You're leaving the village.

[00:11:33] You're going down to, like, somewhere out of town.

[00:11:37] On the way there, you just see a set of legs sticking out of a bush.

[00:11:41] You pull the shits.

[00:11:42] And out pops just an ass and legs and nothing else.

[00:11:46] And you're just like, uh-oh.

[00:11:48] Damn.

[00:11:50] Yeah, I'm going to hide this.

[00:11:51] I'm taking this home.

[00:11:53] He's like, oh, shit.

[00:11:57] Wait, officer.

[00:11:58] Police officer.

[00:11:59] I was just doing everyone a service.

[00:12:00] This was a monster I'm trying to kill.

[00:12:02] I swear I'm not a necrophile.

[00:12:03] I'm not taking this severed ass home for other reasons.

[00:12:06] I'm trying to hide it from the monster that's flying around.

[00:12:09] I'm telling you.

[00:12:10] I didn't kill her.

[00:12:10] I didn't pull up on a train accident.

[00:12:13] Uh, uh, uh, I swear.

[00:12:18] Hopefully they believe you if that's actually the case.

[00:12:20] It's like, nah, this takes a whole new meaning to eat an ass.

[00:12:23] It's like, dude, you cut that bitch in half.

[00:12:25] Now you're going home to do some freak shit with it.

[00:12:27] And it's like, no, no, no, no, no.

[00:12:28] I'm trying to hide it.

[00:12:29] I'm trying to.

[00:12:30] So the monster, hear me out.

[00:12:32] The monster will die when it's looking for its ass.

[00:12:37] And because it has to reattach.

[00:12:39] But if it can't find its ass, the sunlight will kill it.

[00:12:45] God.

[00:12:47] That's one of a hell of a story.

[00:12:48] Yeah.

[00:12:48] He's just out, you know, trying to hide some ass and, uh, the, the bitch swoops him up.

[00:12:57] So that, see now that's probably the origin story of the Fresno nightcrawlers.

[00:13:02] It's just them legs running away, trying to hide somewhere.

[00:13:05] It's from Filipino immigrants that are actually aswongs.

[00:13:08] My gosh.

[00:13:10] Another version of the aswong is like the witch or the sorcerer.

[00:13:15] So in this version, they sometimes seduce men, lure them home, and then drink their blood and eat their innards.

[00:13:21] Some of the witches prefer to drink the blood of children.

[00:13:25] And in some versions, they don't eat people, but they are a witch that will curse people for whatever reason.

[00:13:32] If you like, you were rude or you did something to slight the witch, they won't kill and drink, kill you, drink your blood, but they will curse you.

[00:13:40] Just walk up thinner.

[00:13:51] And so another thing from the witch will do is they will try not to ever look you in the eyes because.

[00:13:58] Oh no, it's autistic.

[00:14:01] If you look them in the eyes and you see that your reflection is upside down, that's a giveaway that the person you're looking at is an aswong.

[00:14:09] Another tell is sometimes they'll have eyes that look like a cat or a lizard's eyes.

[00:14:15] Sometimes it just, their eyes are just extremely bloodshot.

[00:14:19] And another giveaway.

[00:14:21] Oh no, it's stoned.

[00:14:23] Another giveaway that someone is an aswong is that they have no philtrum, which is like the little indent between your nose and upper lip.

[00:14:29] So if you see all the above, you might be looking at an evil witch.

[00:14:33] What really happens is some chick is just walking down and she happens to be like, have a clept palate and she's autistic.

[00:14:41] And they're just like, kill it.

[00:14:44] Oh my God.

[00:14:45] It's a witch.

[00:14:45] But yeah, those are just some of like the really big types of the aswong.

[00:14:53] So let's get into some stories of some encounters with the aswong.

[00:15:00] And all stories will be linked down in the show notes so you can go and read them yourself.

[00:15:08] My younger sisters and I were sitting on the floor in front of our bathroom, which is located between our dining and living rooms, around 7pm on January the 3rd.

[00:15:18] While my aunts were in their bed, my father was watching the news on TV patrol.

[00:15:22] It was a silent night and all you could hear were the insects making their sounds, apart from the noise from the television.

[00:15:30] This is normal for me because I live in a province.

[00:15:32] So more rural.

[00:15:34] My mother works as an English teacher at an English academy in the city, where the majority of Koreans, Japanese, Taiwanese, and Chinese go to learn English.

[00:15:43] The pay isn't big and it's not fixed.

[00:15:46] It's often dependent on the number of students and the number of hours employed.

[00:15:50] We would wait for her every night until we could eat our dinner.

[00:15:54] My sisters and I used to play while we were waiting for our mom.

[00:15:57] They had finished their homework earlier, so it's time for us to play.

[00:16:01] We normally eat dinner at 8pm, which is the usual time that mom arrives home, so I invited them to participate in a drawing competition between the three of us.

[00:16:09] And whoever loses will have to yell,

[00:16:11] I'm ugly in English from the outside.

[00:16:14] They undoubtedly said yes, knowing full well that my sketches are always a disaster.

[00:16:19] Anyways, I still don't want to lose.

[00:16:20] The competition began, and each of us took a pencil, a piece of paper, and an eraser.

[00:16:26] I was about 9 years old at the time, and all I knew how to do was draw a house.

[00:16:30] I can feel the pressure even though it was just a competition between the three of us.

[00:16:33] I felt like I was in a real competition, with the crowd waiting to laugh at my dreadful artwork.

[00:16:39] At the very least, I sensed it in the aura of my sister, who is overconfident in her abilities.

[00:16:45] At this point, I believe 10 minutes have gone by, and we have just half an hour before mom gets home from work.

[00:16:51] While my sisters were busy doing their best, I felt like I wanted to pee.

[00:16:55] The bathroom was just a few steps away, and right in front of us.

[00:16:59] I jumped up to my feet and dashed through the toilet.

[00:17:02] When I opened the door, I was greeted by a chilly wind, which made me feel nervous.

[00:17:06] I felt like someone was staring at me with hostility the moment I walked into the bathroom.

[00:17:12] I hesitated before closing the door, but I needed to because I don't want my sisters to see me peeing.

[00:17:18] I slammed the door slightly shut, and then another blast of cold air hit me.

[00:17:22] I was really jittery, but I don't mind the sensation because it's possible I'm hallucinating or overreacting.

[00:17:28] I tried to persuade myself that I should start peeing right away, and I did after a brief pause.

[00:17:34] I was halfway through my pee when I heard a particular voice coming from behind me.

[00:17:39] ROAR

[00:17:41] My hair stood on end all over my body, and my peace stopped.

[00:17:44] I froze for a split second before another cold wind struck me, followed by another odd voice on my back.

[00:17:51] ROAR

[00:17:53] Hearing that again gave me a shither, and I sensed a killing intent around me.

[00:17:58] I trembled in fear.

[00:18:28] ROAR

[00:18:29] I shifted my gaze to the source of the noise.

[00:18:32] There, I realized that we have an open ventilation window in our bathroom.

[00:18:36] I saw a well-dressed white woman clutching on our bamboo tree leaning against the hole in our bathroom.

[00:18:42] Her other arm attempting to reach out to me from where I was standing.

[00:18:46] Her lips were bright red.

[00:18:48] She had white skin, unkept hair, and a terrifying appearance.

[00:18:53] After that horrifying moment, a sudden thought came to my mind when I remembered from my grandmother's advice.

[00:19:00] ROAR

[00:19:00] Do not be alarmed if you come across an Aswang.

[00:19:03] Try looking them in the eyes to see if you can get them to blink first when your eyes meet.

[00:19:07] That is their weakness.

[00:19:08] If you can do so, the Aswang will run out of energy.

[00:19:11] You will be able to defeat them with whatever you have.

[00:19:14] However, if you blink before they do, your only option is to run.

[00:19:20] Despite the fact that I am terrified and don't know if I still have the strength to stand,

[00:19:25] I took the courage to keep my eyes fixed on her vampiric appearance.

[00:19:29] I have faith in my grandmother and I hope this works out.

[00:19:33] My heart was pounding furiously while doing that.

[00:19:37] My world stopped for a moment and I felt as though it only began to move again after I blinked my eyes before she did.

[00:19:44] After that terrifying moment, I screamed at the top of my lungs,

[00:19:48] Aswang! Aswang! Father, help me!

[00:19:50] And exited the bathroom.

[00:19:52] I was already in the room of aunts, hugging them and trembling in terror in a fraction of a second.

[00:19:58] I just kept shutting my eyes because I didn't want to see something.

[00:20:02] But then I sensed my father's presence behind me calmly asking,

[00:20:05] What is it?

[00:20:06] I was in a panic at the time, so I simply said,

[00:20:09] Aswang! Aswang! Aswang! Aswang! It's in the bathroom!

[00:20:13] My father dashed to the bathroom and tried to search for it,

[00:20:15] But he didn't see anything and there was no one outside.

[00:20:19] My father returned to me and asked,

[00:20:21] Where did you see it? Is it possible that you're having a hallucination?

[00:20:25] I didn't have the energy to respond to him because I fell unconscious.

[00:20:30] Mom was already home when I woke up and had fully regained consciousness.

[00:20:35] She sat next to me and informed me that I had a high fever and my nose was bleeding.

[00:20:39] My mother, who was exhausted from work, was taking excellent care of me.

[00:20:43] My parents ignored what happened, claiming I was hallucinating.

[00:20:47] But I knew what I saw was true, and I couldn't prove it to them.

[00:20:52] The Aswang keeps on appearing in my dreams every night.

[00:20:56] It was relentless in its pursuit of me.

[00:20:58] And after a month it ended, and I was able to get some rest.

[00:21:01] But after a year on the same day, which was January 3rd,

[00:21:05] I dreamed about the Aswang's vampiric appearance once more.

[00:21:08] I had this dream every third day of January for the past three years,

[00:21:13] and she has appeared in my dreams.

[00:21:16] So, you're just a nine-year-old little kid,

[00:21:19] having a little drawing competition with your sisters.

[00:21:22] You go to the bathroom, and you hear this awful voice,

[00:21:26] and you look up in the open ventilation window.

[00:21:29] There's this thing trying to, like, half-crawl into your house to grab you.

[00:21:34] And I just, ah, puto blanco!

[00:21:39] Grande puto blanco!

[00:21:42] Oh my god.

[00:21:43] Oh my god, she's like, my pee stream stopped immediately when I heard the noise.

[00:21:47] It's just like, okay, I need a detail, yeah.

[00:21:50] My pee stream will probably stop too.

[00:21:52] But you don't need to tell everybody that detail.

[00:21:54] It's a little weird.

[00:21:56] That or everything gets evacuated real quick.

[00:21:59] Yeah, it's like, all right, I want the piss.

[00:22:01] I shit myself.

[00:22:01] Not gonna lie.

[00:22:04] I thought, you know, maybe it's freaking crackhead Pedro down the street,

[00:22:09] you know, just out there, you know, moaning and shit.

[00:22:12] Nah, puto blanco, Aswang.

[00:22:16] I think I was just like, hey, if you stare at it, and it blinks first,

[00:22:19] you kill whatever you got.

[00:22:20] Like, thanks grandma.

[00:22:22] I'm gonna stare at this shit down.

[00:22:24] All you gotta do is win a staring contest.

[00:22:26] And then hit it with a chancla.

[00:22:27] I mean, I guess that's what you got.

[00:22:29] Maybe hit it with a shitty piece of toilet paper.

[00:22:34] First, what you gotta do is you gotta have a standoff and stare it down.

[00:22:38] And then you hit it with a chancla.

[00:22:41] Oh my god.

[00:22:42] And then it's gone.

[00:22:42] It's good.

[00:22:44] I couldn't still imagine, though, being a little kid and seeing, even if it was just a crackhead.

[00:22:48] Yeah, yeah.

[00:22:48] Just a crackhead.

[00:22:49] Seeing a crackhead trying to break into your house.

[00:22:51] That would be terrifying.

[00:22:51] Yeah, no, it's just a junkie perving on a nine-year-old girl.

[00:22:55] That's all it was.

[00:22:56] Oh god.

[00:22:56] Yeah.

[00:22:57] Just some crazy white lady who's just over there moaning.

[00:23:01] She's like, hurry up.

[00:23:02] Hurry up.

[00:23:03] I gotta use it.

[00:23:05] I'm about to crawl in his window and take a shit.

[00:23:07] Oh my god.

[00:23:09] Okay, so here is another story from somebody else.

[00:23:12] And this happened in Metro Manila at around 2011.

[00:23:17] My cousin told me, the old man with the new neighbors asked me if he were pregnant.

[00:23:22] I was shocked.

[00:23:23] I had never even told my family yet.

[00:23:26] I was 21 and I worked nights in a call center.

[00:23:29] I never go outside when I'm home, and I was only a few weeks along, so I wasn't even

[00:23:34] showing yet.

[00:23:35] How did this nosy old man know?

[00:23:37] The neighbors were new in town, coming from one of the more popular provinces in the Philippines

[00:23:42] where witchcraft and aswangs are still in the norm.

[00:23:45] They were friendly enough, though, so no one really had anything bad to say about them

[00:23:49] other than the nasty rumor that they know about Aswang.

[00:23:52] When I was about eight months along, I was watching TV with my brother at around 2 a.m.

[00:23:59] Something big landed on our tin roof, strong enough to rattle the windows.

[00:24:04] My brother and I looked at each other with wide eyes as we listened to the footsteps.

[00:24:08] Yes, footsteps stopped right on top of me.

[00:24:12] I was not a prayerful person, but at that moment, I called on God and saints and angels to protect

[00:24:18] my baby.

[00:24:19] Then I remembered my grandmother's story about how she escaped an Aswang attack by placing

[00:24:23] a pillow between her legs to mask the baby's scent, so I did just that.

[00:24:28] We had no idea how long we waited, seconds, minutes maybe, but we heard another jump and

[00:24:33] then silence.

[00:24:36] Until this day, I was glad that my brother was with me to vouch for me.

[00:24:40] I couldn't believe it happened and that it happened to me.

[00:24:43] Then I remembered the nosy old man.

[00:24:45] Could it have been him?

[00:24:46] So there's another story where it involves pregnancy and maybe the old man actually wasn't

[00:24:57] as long and he used his evil witchcraft powers to know she was pregnant.

[00:25:02] And that's when you heard the thing on the roof.

[00:25:05] One.

[00:25:05] Okay.

[00:25:06] Pause real quick.

[00:25:07] So your grandmama said, if you're pregnant and there's a creepy dude sniffing around, make

[00:25:14] sure you put a pillow on the coochie so he can't smell your baby.

[00:25:17] I mean, I guess so.

[00:25:18] I mean, it must have worked.

[00:25:20] They said the thing went away then.

[00:25:21] Yeah.

[00:25:21] It's just like, yeah.

[00:25:22] It turns out the old man's just a pervert and he's just been like hanging out the window

[00:25:26] and he just overheard, you know, some stuff and he's like, yep, she pregnant.

[00:25:32] Oh my gosh.

[00:25:33] But still, could you imagine hearing something on your tin roof?

[00:25:38] It was like something big and heavy.

[00:25:40] Well, yeah, especially if it's like a tin roof, you know, that shit was probably loud

[00:25:43] as hell too.

[00:25:44] Oh yeah, for sure.

[00:25:46] So for another story, this is also from the perspective of the witness.

[00:25:52] I think I was seven at the time and while everyone else in the family was asleep, I somehow

[00:25:57] couldn't bring myself to follow suit.

[00:25:59] I was restless with nothing in particular in my head keeping me awake.

[00:26:03] I just remember lying there in bed, staring at the ceiling when suddenly I hear a noise.

[00:26:09] Confused, I sat up on my bed and looked around.

[00:26:12] Nothing but darkness.

[00:26:13] I listened again.

[00:26:15] Tick.

[00:26:16] Tick.

[00:26:16] Tick.

[00:26:18] Tick.

[00:26:18] My eyes went wide open.

[00:26:20] If I knew how to swear at this time of my life, the F's would be flying.

[00:26:25] I slammed my head back into my pillow and as kids would normally do, I covered myself up

[00:26:30] in my magic blanket, trembling in fear.

[00:26:34] The noise kept on ticking.

[00:26:37] My heart was beating out of my chest and I was on the verge of tears.

[00:26:40] I was wearing the options between screaming for my mom or not.

[00:26:44] Because screaming might alert something that might eat me up, that I'm a wide awake.

[00:26:49] I can't let that happen.

[00:26:51] Yes, I know the Manamangal went for pregnant ladies, but at that age, I thought everything

[00:26:56] would just eat me up.

[00:26:58] The ticking noise went away slowly, as if the one making it was fleeing away.

[00:27:03] I sighed relief and I calmed down a bit and made the biggest mistake of my life, forgetting

[00:27:09] that when the tick-tick goes far, it means the Manamangal was near.

[00:27:13] After I removed my cover, bricks were shat.

[00:27:16] The bitch's grinning face was on my window, her bloodthirsty eyes looking to my frozen,

[00:27:21] wide eyes.

[00:27:23] Mother of Jesus, I screamed, and nope, the fuck out of my room.

[00:27:26] I ran into my mother's room, where she welcomed me into an embrace.

[00:27:30] By then, I think I may have just passed out of fear.

[00:27:34] The next morning, my mother asked me what happened and I told her what happened.

[00:27:38] She laughed at me and told me how imaginative kids are and how cute it was.

[00:27:42] This is why I still have my doubts even after her face was scarred into my memory.

[00:27:47] The thing is though, at the moment when my pregnant ya-ya, or maid, served us our food

[00:27:53] and overheard our conversation, I saw her freeze and her eyes went,

[00:27:57] she looked at me and said, you saw her too?

[00:28:00] And then I started to cry.

[00:28:04] So, in that case, what was probably there is that the thing was probably trying to go

[00:28:10] after the pregnant maid.

[00:28:12] Oh, yeah, definitely.

[00:28:13] But the child saw it too.

[00:28:16] And could you imagine seeing that thing in your window as a kid?

[00:28:21] Yeah.

[00:28:21] Seven years old?

[00:28:22] Bullshit.

[00:28:23] Not good.

[00:28:24] That would be just crazy.

[00:28:27] And that's a case where it really exemplifies how when you hear the noise go quiet, it's

[00:28:34] how it lures people into a false sense of security.

[00:28:37] Because they think, oh, it's far away now.

[00:28:39] I'm good.

[00:28:40] No, you're not.

[00:28:40] It's right on your ass.

[00:28:41] Yeah, far from good.

[00:28:43] And I got a mom's just like, oh, that's so cute.

[00:28:46] Meanwhile, the maid's over there about to piss herself.

[00:28:50] Yep.

[00:28:51] Because it's going to be going after her.

[00:28:53] Oh, that's so cute.

[00:28:54] Your maid's just like, you saw that shit too, man?

[00:28:56] And the mom's just like, so imaginative.

[00:28:59] Meanwhile, her and the maid are just like looking at each other about the ship breaks.

[00:29:02] Just going like, oh, no.

[00:29:03] Oh, no.

[00:29:04] Oh, no.

[00:29:05] I'm just like imagining this situation as like a total sitcom where it's just the moms

[00:29:10] are just like total ditz, just does not know what's going on.

[00:29:13] She's like so imaginative, goes back to doing the dishes and her and the maid just like make

[00:29:17] eye contact, look, oh, shit.

[00:29:20] Yeah, some of those stories were pretty good.

[00:29:24] When I was doing the research for this episode, it was hard for me to find more stories because

[00:29:30] the majority of what was there was in Tagalog and I couldn't really, I don't know how to

[00:29:35] read that.

[00:29:36] And two, like I tried to use like Google Translate and stuff and it didn't really work out well

[00:29:41] for me.

[00:29:42] The grammar was probably just all over the place and words were probably like incoherent.

[00:29:47] Well, I put it on the settings that you required from Filipino to English, but it's still,

[00:29:52] I don't know, might have been a problem on my end.

[00:29:54] I couldn't get it to work.

[00:29:55] But I imagine there's some very good stories out there that are in Tagalog are even better

[00:30:02] than the ones that we discussed tonight on this episode.

[00:30:06] So if anyone is listening and you have a personal, you can either translate or have a personal

[00:30:12] experience with an Aswang and would like to share, please let us know.

[00:30:15] We would love to actually hear a personal story of an encounter with an Aswang.

[00:30:21] Aswang.

[00:30:22] So on different subjects, so of how to stop and kill an Aswang, we already mentioned a little

[00:30:29] bit with the Manamangal of how you can kill it by smearing garlic or salt on its lower half

[00:30:35] or hiding the body to keep it awake till sunrise.

[00:30:38] And the little chocolate leg baby, you can just make some soup out of it.

[00:30:43] Another surefire way to kill some of these Aswang is decapitation.

[00:30:49] They are also repelled by garlic and salt.

[00:30:54] Some stories I've saw, you can repel it with a picture of an old woman.

[00:31:00] It's like, ah, wrinkles.

[00:31:04] No.

[00:31:05] If you have a crucifix or a silver, that also is a way to ward off a Aswang.

[00:31:14] It's just like, oh, no silver, no garlic.

[00:31:18] I know the picture on the mantle of my abuela.

[00:31:20] No.

[00:31:24] That's just funny.

[00:31:25] It's just like, well, I guess, you know, they like to eat unborn babies.

[00:31:30] So you show them a picture of an old woman who's like, ah.

[00:31:32] Yeah.

[00:31:33] One way to determine if an Aswang is close, there's actually an oil that can be made on Good Friday from like a certain type of coconut oil.

[00:31:43] And what happens is you put it in a vial.

[00:31:46] And what happens is when an Aswang gets close, the oil starts to heat up or boil.

[00:31:51] So you know you're getting close to one if you feel the oil starting to get hot.

[00:31:56] So you're just walking around with some coconut oil, like Frodo with Sting waiting for it to turn blue.

[00:32:02] Yeah.

[00:32:03] Except it just, it boils when an Aswang is near.

[00:32:06] And that's when you know the whole ass.

[00:32:08] Yeah.

[00:32:09] Like, oh, shit.

[00:32:11] You smell that?

[00:32:12] Oh, let me pull out my bag real quick.

[00:32:15] Oh, yep.

[00:32:16] That coconut oil is boiling.

[00:32:17] Time to beat feet.

[00:32:21] So of all these types of Aswang that we spoke about more in the show, what would be the one, if you had to run into one,

[00:32:31] what would you, what would it be?

[00:32:34] I don't know, man.

[00:32:35] They're all pretty messed up.

[00:32:37] One, Banana Man, Bobal is fugly and really creepy.

[00:32:46] Um, I guess if I had to pick, can I just roll up on the, uh, the, the one that's just like either the little baby,

[00:32:53] because I feel like I could punt it or, or stomp it out with some Doc Martens, uh, make it bite the curb.

[00:33:01] Um, or I'll, I'll, I'll have to pick the severed ass just cause, uh, it's not going to kill me unless it like rips a mean ghost fart or something.

[00:33:09] So I would, I would pick the, uh, the severed ass just so I could, uh, just throw, throw some salt or some garlic on it and just run away.

[00:33:17] So you would choose the lower half of the Mana Mangal.

[00:33:20] Yeah, the lower half, because I, uh, one, it's probably going to give me nightmares and scar me seeing a, a, a, a severed pair of legs.

[00:33:27] Uh, yeah, I, I, I rather not, uh, deal with the upper half.

[00:33:33] I mean, fair enough, but I feel like if, I wonder if they can like, uh, if they sense that like something's moving their legs and they start like homing back in on where they were, you know?

[00:33:45] Hmm. Yeah. So if I just take a garlic clove and shove it up its ass, it should die, right?

[00:33:52] I think you got to smear garlic on top of where the wound set like on the top half where like where it's separated from its torso, not shove it up its ass.

[00:34:03] Okay. So I'll, I'll take some nice garlic paste.

[00:34:07] Like I'm about to, uh, like, you know, prepare a nice cut of meat and instead I'll just go down there with like a, uh, a butter knife and I'll just start smearing it.

[00:34:15] I'll just start smearing some garlic brother or like on, on the cut.

[00:34:19] And then hopefully nobody comes by and thinks I'm eating them.

[00:34:22] Oh my God.

[00:34:24] I think I would have to go with the first one we talked about.

[00:34:28] Maybe the one that's just that tries to drain their husband at night.

[00:34:32] Cause then all you got to do is shank them and you're good.

[00:34:35] Yeah. True.

[00:34:36] But, uh, because the money I'm in golf, man, it's like, it's real scary.

[00:34:41] It can fly and like, we'll try to like claw you or do all kinds of crazy shit.

[00:34:46] Well, I've already dealt with some women who have drained the life out of me.

[00:34:49] So I guess, yeah, the first one.

[00:34:50] Oh my God.

[00:34:52] But when you kill it, does it like turn?

[00:34:56] Like, does the body look different?

[00:34:58] Does it turn to ash or are you just left there with a dead hoe and you're just like, ah, shit.

[00:35:03] Well, roll her up in the carpet.

[00:35:05] I don't know.

[00:35:06] I don't know if it's kind of like in the movies for like vampires where they like turn

[00:35:11] the ash or explode into goo or do whatever, anything like that.

[00:35:15] Or if I just, you just have, it looks like a woman with a knife in her chest.

[00:35:19] Yeah.

[00:35:19] You're just like, ah, shit.

[00:35:21] Um, yeah, we're not going to talk about this.

[00:35:23] We're just, we're just put her in a dumpster and just, just roll her up in the carpet,

[00:35:28] take her out to the karaoke bar and throw her in a dumpster.

[00:35:32] You're good.

[00:35:33] That would be just crazy.

[00:35:35] I think my second choice definitely would be the, the Etianak.

[00:35:39] Little baby.

[00:35:40] Because yeah, the little baby one, because even if it's like a four V one, like four

[00:35:45] of them versus me.

[00:35:46] But if I have a super circle for a holy water, I think I'm coming out on top.

[00:35:50] Yeah.

[00:35:50] Or like a couple of like a couple of balloons, you know, with some water, maybe just like

[00:35:55] a, a big, uh, like a big bag of kosher salt and you can just like pocket salt, like,

[00:36:01] you know, like, and just like whipping in our eyes.

[00:36:03] Yeah.

[00:36:04] I mean, or like a slingshot or cloves of garlic.

[00:36:08] Potato gun with a, with a whole, uh, you know, like rack of garlic just stuffed down in

[00:36:14] it.

[00:36:14] Let's blast them.

[00:36:15] Yeah.

[00:36:15] There we go.

[00:36:16] We got, we got a holy water, garlic and a squirt guns.

[00:36:19] We're going to be like that scene in lost boys where we're just going to roll up and just,

[00:36:24] you know, get them in your eyes, pepper spray style.

[00:36:27] Oh, hell yeah.

[00:36:28] Well, they did say certain seasonings can kill them.

[00:36:30] Can I just walk around with a can of mace?

[00:36:35] Just be like, ha ha.

[00:36:37] Just hit them right in your eyes.

[00:36:40] I don't think that's the kind of mace they mean.

[00:36:42] No.

[00:36:44] I don't know.

[00:36:44] Can I just carry like a tube sock full of herbs, spices, and garlic?

[00:36:48] You could.

[00:36:49] You could.

[00:36:50] It's all fun and games until you whip out the tube sock.

[00:36:55] Or then you, you could just get into the staring contest and hit it with a chancla.

[00:37:00] Yeah.

[00:37:01] You make it blink first.

[00:37:02] Yeah.

[00:37:02] And I'd be like, ah.

[00:37:02] You win.

[00:37:03] Gotcha, bitch.

[00:37:05] Poop.

[00:37:05] Like a roach in the corner.

[00:37:10] All right, everybody.

[00:37:11] If you enjoyed listening to this episode of Into the Rift Podcast, I hope that you will

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[00:37:27] Thank you so much for listening to this episode.

[00:37:29] And I hope you have a good night.

[00:37:31] Peace.

[00:37:32] Peace.

[00:37:32] Peace.

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