Every year, Kochi draws aspiring young people to the city in search of jobs and better opportunities. Every year, the rents go higher, and house hunting becomes a difficult and costly affair.
But every once in a while, you luck out and find that perfect place with all the amenities — even a housemate. But is there a catch?
This question is being explored as a viral trend on Instagram featuring houses available at surprisingly cheap rents. And the answer is — “because they were haunted”.
The houses in these videos are not old, eerie or ghostly. They look like usual spaces that are ‘lived-in’ and occupied by common people.
Some featured the song ‘Aatmave po… ’ from ‘Romancham’, others ‘Oru murai’ from the classic ‘Manichitrathazhu’. One such content creator, Ajeesh Ashokan’s reel, which garnered four million views, shows him scared and slowly waking up to the sound of the song from ‘Manichitrathazhu’ playing in the distance.
The Malayalam text on the reel reads ‘When you get a 3bhk in Ernakulam Town for `10,000’. The video is playful; it cuts the tension with dry humour. The room is dark, but the tenant Ajeesh carries on.
“I had experienced really spooky incidents when living with a few friends in Kakkanad and Palarivattom. We would hear the sound of furniture moving. This happened around three years ago.”
What pushed him to turn it into content, however, was a more recent experience at his current home in Vypeen, where he lives with four others.
“I was once alone in the house when I heard someone knocking on the window and also felt that someone was climbing down the stairs outside the house,” he says.
Once posted, the reel struck a chord almost immediately. Ajeesh noticed that many were connecting with it. Viewers flooded the comment section with their own versions of similar incidents, strange occurrences, and stories that were scary and yet humorous. “A lot of people shared their experiences. It is turning out to be a relatable experience,” he laughs.
Ajeesh, in fact, says he has made new friends through the trend. In a way, the unseen ‘housemate’ has become a unique point of connection.
While Ajeesh’s video found the funny side in the unease, Sriraaj Saran, another content creator, took things further. He now has a three-part series of reels that depict his life living in a rented flat, which is allegedly haunted. His ghost housemate, though, seems friendly.
His first video also garnered four million views. It shows him leaving the house for work as usual one morning, informing the other ‘occupant’ not to play with the light or fan.
It is in the last frame that you realise there is no one in the flat, but a ghost, when a glass kept in the room randomly falls.
Continuing the story, Sriraaj made two more videos, one of him talking to KSEB officials, arguing with them about his unpaid current bill and connection being cut, with a special appearance by his housemate, whom he now calls ‘Prethu’.
The third one features him discussing his plans with ‘Prethu’, the video ending in a funny twist.
“I got the idea when my wife and I went out one day. When we returned, the light outside was turned on. We did not have any memory of doing it; maybe we forgot about it. Then we thought, this might be a good idea for a reel. We know people who had spooky experiences like this, and took inspiration from them to develop the concept comically,” says Sriraj.
While the origin of this trend may be tough to discover, it seems as though ghosts in Kochi are not scaring people away. They are instead bringing them together. The rents may not go down anytime soon, but at least we can find comfort in humour.