Haunting Insights: Balancing Paranormal Research with Thrilling Entertainment

In today's episode, I take you into the captivating realm of a local ghost investigation event that I am currently crafting. This unique experience blends thorough research gathering with engaging and enjoyable activities for participants. I also delve into my personal reflections on the ethical considerations surrounding ghost investigations and the quest for paranormal evidence, juxtaposed with the more entertainment-focused approach of hosting a spooky scare event. Join me as we navigate the fascinating interplay between serious inquiry and playful thrills in the world of the supernatural.

Transcript

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Hey everyone, welcome back to my channel. If you are new here, my name is Barb. You're listening to Spirits, Witches, and Times. Hey, how are you? I hope you guys really enjoyed last week's episode because it was super, super fun, and I cannot wait to get those girls back in studio to have another discussion. Maybe tell some ghost stories of both our adventures, whether they are together, because I am sure I am going to go out with them at some point. Anyway, it was super exciting, and I'm still coming down off that high. I hope you guys are too. And this week I am just jumping on. I am kind of spitballing here. I don't have a script. I know. Scary. Calm down. It will be okay. Guys, I'm not talking to you. I'm talking to myself. Oh my god, I'm scared. Anyway, I don't have a script today. I actually only have a few minutes to get this out, at least record it, and that's because I have to go for a massage. I know. Uh, self-care, very important, right? And this week I am interviewing another guest for the podcast, which will be out, but I don't believe it'll be ready for this Sunday coming. So that's why I'm recording this episode. So I decided I wasn't going to just pop onto Reddit or write a script and really focus down on a subject. I kind of want to just talk to you guys and figure out what exactly is going on in my life. Because let me tell you, there's a fuck shit ton going on in my life right now. And I really wanted to share it with you. So give me a second to get comfy. Hold on. Oh, I was a little low in my chair. Okay. So right now, going on in my life is a huge project. It will run for seven nights. So about 14 weeks because it's every two weeks. It'll start on August 8th and go all the way finale on Halloween. Uh, and it is a paranormal research project. So this is running in Sydney, Nova Scotia. So if you're local to the area, hi, nice to meet you. Uh, you may join, or if you're visiting Sydney from elsewhere and you're going to be around during the uh period of August 8th through to the end of October, you may be here during one of those uh nights when this is on. So what it is, is a ghost investigation of one of the historic properties here. The historic property has been around, it's the oldest still-standing home in downtown Sydney. And so I've named the project the 1786 project, because that's when the home was built. And it is an ongoing paranormal research project over the seven nights. And what I'll be doing, pardon me, that came out of nowhere, uh, as it usually does when I'm chatting with you guys. Um, yeah, so what I'm doing is I'm hosting a an event at this historic property every two weeks, and it's only open to eight people per night, so it's very limited. The house is very small, uh, very limited. Um, and the people that come, I will teach them how to use ghost hunting equipment. We will go around, we will ghost hunt in the specific areas of the house that have more or less, you know, the known activity. And we will we will, you know, check out the other areas as well, but we'll focus on the ones that have known activity. And the known activity is per, you know, me doing my own investigations there and hearing the stories from the building uh owners. So uh all that being said, what we will do is I will um teach the people who come to you know how to ghost hunt, have them gather their own evidence, have them really conduct the investigation itself. I'll lead it, of course, and um we have a team. So in one area we'll have one person helping lead, and I'll be in another area helping people lead, and then we'll compile the information. And I am writing everything down so that at the end of the seven nights, I can gather all the information that has come through or come forward. We've discovered any uh voice phenomena we've had, any pictures that have come through, any videos that have come through, anything. Everything we've actually gathered over the seven nights will be compiled and given to the heritage property so that they can have it in their records as part of their historical information through the paranormal research. So it's a pretty huge project, and I'm really excited about it. Um, so how did this happen? You're wondering, right? Like what the fuck? How did this happen? Well, I think I mentioned to you guys before that I was invited to go back and ghost hunt at the Joast House. I had done a ghost hunt there last year, last October, and it went really well. And so I talked to them and they said, yeah, come on back this year, anytime you want. So I thought about it, I'm like, well, anytime I'd love to be there all the time, but that's just not going to not that it'll get boring, but I wanted to give it purpose. Does that make sense? When you're ghost hunting, when you're going out and you're having fun and you're just having a fun night, and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, that's great on the, you know, one-off kind of thing. Like, oh, let's go do this one time and have the experience and have a laugh or whatever. Um, but I wanted to make it more of a lasting experience, especially because we've never had anything like that around here. We've had ghost hunting events around here. Uh, the Fortress of Lewisburg, uh, so the Fortress of Loisburg Association in conjunction with Haunts from the Cape. That was a great event, and that has happened over and over, and they do a wonderful job out there. It is entertaining, it is spooky, uh, there's all kinds of elements they hit and they tell the stories well, all of those things, right? Um, and they teach you how to use the equipment. All of that happens. It it is very similar, but it's like um once or maybe twice a year, and it is for the fun of it, it is for the entertainment, it is for the knowledge, it is for the spook factor, it is for all of those entertainment sides of things. I don't know how much evidence is being collected and then categorized and delivered to the to the property. Maybe it's happening behind the scenes. I have no idea. But uh because it's not a well-known fact that maybe it's not happening. And then I heard, I heard, uh, well, I don't know if it's true, guys. I don't know if it's true, and I don't like saying shit, I don't know for sure, but I did hear a rumor, and I'm going to call it that. It's not substantiated, so I'm not putting out a claim here. But I heard a rumor that um other properties in the Sydney area will be doing like uh not ghost hunts, but like scare nights. So almost framed like a ghost hunt, but it's like a scare room or a scare uh haunted house kind of feature, right? That's cool too, because that's for entertainment and people like that. People like to be scared. So I I give them, you know, props for doing it. That that's wonderful. And anything to get people more interested in the historic properties, I am all for. What I'm not all for is pretending or um acting as if there's a a scare when potentially there's not. Um, if you want to do that, in my own humble opinion, okay, it's just my humble opinion, guys. Take it for what it is. But in my own opinion, I think if you're going to do like a scare feature, like um a haunted scare room or something like that, do it in a warehouse, do it in a cornfield, do it in a barn, do it somewhere that's not a historic property that has spirits that you want to document and then you want to tell their story. Because they're two separate things. We're we're playing with two separate, um, we're we're playing with two, what am I trying to say? Like two different realms of what is happening, and you can't say that one is equal to the other. It's like an apple and an orange, or even an apple versus a lemon, you know, in this circumstance, because they're it not at all similar. Although in the public eye, where maybe people are more novice to ghost hunting, the paranormal, and that kind of thing, they look like the same thing. So I'm a little nervous about that, and I'm trying to really set the narrative that what we're doing is an ongoing research project. It is not a scare night, it is not simply uh let's go out there and um make sure everybody has a spooky fun night. I hope people have fun. I mean, uh I'm aiming to have fun with people, but I'm not aiming to make fun of the paranormal. I am there as more of a serious investigator. Does that make sense to anybody out there? Like, if I'm hitting any sense out there, please let me know because I this is listen. Listen, Linda, listen, Linda. I love scary things. I don't like to be scared. I don't go into the scare features and the scare rooms and whatever. I don't like scary movies, but I do like the idea of them. I do think they're fun. I do, I have a sense of humor. I love when people get scared. Like I can watch the video and I love people screaming and getting scared. Would I scream and get scared? I don't know. I don't know because I don't go into those things. But in the real situation, when I'm ghost hunting, do I get scared? No, I don't. I don't scream. I actually am very much how would I react? I'm like, I don't even know who would be a really good example of like a ghost hunter out there, like on YouTube, like the known ones. Um, and probably like the um Pythian priestess. I don't know if you know who she is, but her name is Ashley. She's on Instagram, TikTok. She she's the uh priestess that has traveled with Sam and Colby, and she's fun and she has a sense of humor, but she takes what she does very seriously. And that's more my style, because when I go into, say, the Joast Heritage House and I'm speaking with spirit, I'm having fun with them, I'm laughing, and you know, we're we're setting the energy, but if something comes through and it's like creepy, or we hear a knock, or you see a shadow, I'm not like, you know, I'm doing the dramatic scream, oh my god, oh my god, maybe I should. Maybe that would ramp up the energy. But if that's not part of my nature, would I love if somebody with the group was like that? Sure, because it would totally amp up the energy, and I know why people do it. I know why those YouTubers on those shows, that's why they do it. I don't know if it's part of their natural like demeanor to scream at everything. Some of them are like, can you set the REM pod off if you're here and it goes beep and they go, ah you just asked it to do it, and you're screaming? What the fuck? What the fuck? Anyway, so that's not my style. I digress. This is why I need a script. So moral of the story, guys, is I am super, super, super, super duper excited about hosting this event. Again, if you're in the Sydney area, feel free to like DM me, email me, what have you, and I can give you more details on it. But most of you aren't here, so you can just hear about it through uh what uh this way, like hello, I'm talking about it for the last 15 minutes. Um, or I did the hunt at the Joast House last October that is on my YouTube channel, or you can come to Sydney and see for yourself. It's kind of cool, it's really cool. Anyhow, that's not uh I mean that is partly what I wanted to talk to you guys about. I wanted to talk about mainly the fake side of these ghost hunting um events, right? Because we've all seen them. I've participated in a few of these events thus far in my career, and they're fun. Okay, that when I purchased the biggest one I did was the Lunenberg, again on my YouTube channel, the Lunenberg Academy. I paid $250 plus my gas to get there. It's a six hour drive from where I live, plus the overnight in the hotel, plus my food and beverage. So this wasn't a cheap investigation out of pocket. Did I have fun? Sure. Did I meet some new friends? Not long lasting, but yes, some very nice people. Would I do that event again? I don't think so. I don't think so. And there are reasons why. Biggest reason to me, the biggest one is you pack them in like sardines, and sure it's a big building, 60 people, looks like nothing, okay. But when you're actually investigating, um like doing an active investigation, if you have I don't I can't remember how many investigators there were, let's say six to eight investigators, plus the production team, plus the guests that purchased tickets. So we have maybe 70 people in there. How much actual non-contaminated evidence do you think was captured? Probably not much. And what was captured was probably fucking amazing because it would it surpassed any of the contamination noise that was happening. Lots of footsteps, lots of uh voice phenomena, lots of you know, shuffling and movement, uh breathing, all of these things from living human beings that were contributing to the noise around you. That's what I don't like about it. Could these people have been faking anything? I don't think they were, honestly. I don't think they were. Um, any of the investigations I've been on that I've paid to go on, I don't think they were faking it. And that's that's lovely. I love that. Um, because you get to experience it. Now, would I prefer a smaller group when we can like actually go and talk and investigate and you know learn more, like, especially for those of us who do know a little bit about the industry and do know a little bit about the products, like the the equipment and things like that. I would prefer to say um to an event host out there, whoever's putting one on, if you could have a night where it's like for general public, novices who know nothing and just want to have a a spook and a laugh, this night's for you. But on this night, it's only 10 people allowed, limited 10 tickets. The the price goes from $50 per person to $100 per person, but you're limited in the number. We will gather the evidence, and this is for actual investigation. That would be more up my alley. I would spend the extra money for it. That would be a premium experience for me. So that's how I look at what I'm doing. So my ongoing paranormal research project is priced at the a reasonable price. So there is a general emission. I'm not gonna go into the actual details. That's coming out. If you want to follow it, go to the TikTok, Paganori, uh, Instagram, Facebook. I'll link it in the show notes if you want to. No need if you don't. I mean, there's some pretty cool content over there you might just want to check out. You might not really care about the pricing or whatever. So that's cool too. Uh, and I do put out bloopers where I'm actually laughing at myself because I I say some pretty fucked up shit sometimes. Anyway, as you know, as you all know. Um what was I gonna say? Oh, I gotta get to my massage. Okay, so there's a general admission ticket, but then there's uh add-on. So you can add-on to a VIP uh service. So that gets you like a dedicated EMF reader, that gets you a souvenir at the end of the night, which I haven't quite figured out exactly what I'm gonna do there, whether it be a bag or a t-shirt or something like that. It'll be something to substantiate the additional price, of course. Give somebody something for the value of what they're paying for, you know. They're giving me my research, and I want to give them something in return, you know? And then, of course, there's the private booking. So if they buy all eight tickets, right, they can add on for private, and that gets them the private uh booking. Now, if there's only five of them and they have private, they have to buy all eight. That's all I I don't even know how to work that actually. But I don't think many people are gonna be buying private, except for my grand finale on Halloween, which is more expensive. I mean, I gotta do it that way. I have seven events total leading up to Halloween. Halloween is number seven. So we have the first three are uh pre-Spooky season, the next three are in spooky season, and then the last one, the seventh one, is Halloween night. The ground finale. So that one I'm actually gonna have prizes and some food and that kind of thing, and that will be like, you know, merchandise, everything available, the the hoop de la, all that. So anyway, guys, that is all for this week. I know I just talked all all all about my event and all the details, but I gave you a little bit about um, you know, ghost hunting events in general and what to kind of like, in my opinion, what I like about them versus what I don't. And I alluded to, I didn't dive deep into because I kind of like I said, I only heard rumors, so I don't want to like splash anybody or shade anybody out there. Splash anybody, where the fuck that come from? Anyway, I don't want to shade anybody if it's not true, but I did hear rumors that there will be some events happening come this fall in my area that will be using actors to scare people. So I'm just gonna leave that out there in the universe. I don't unless that's specifically their purpose and that's what they're advertising, that they are purposefully scaring people. Man, do you do you? But that's not what I'm doing. Uh my 1786 project is a research project on the paranormal at the Joast Heritage House, and I'm super, super excited and super proud of it. I can't stop thinking about it, actually. I'm so super proud of it. Anyway, it's the one of the biggest projects I've worked on ever, besides opening my two companies and raising my dogs. Biggest thing I've ever done. So scared. Anyway, okay, I will post pictures of the logo and everything so you guys can see what's going on there and you know some of the merchandise. But until next week, guys, you know what you should do? You should take care.