Manila Film Centre

The Manila Film Centre is a national building located in Pasay City, in the Philippines. From 18^th to the 29^th of January 1982 the building was the main theatre for the 1^st Manila International Festival. A great deal of consultation went into the building and over 4,000 workers working in shifts across 24 hours. Unisco’s input was considered invaluable in parts of the design.

In 1981 about 3am on the 17^th November an awful accident occurred. The buildings scaffolding collapsed and at least 168 workers fell and were buried in the quick drying cement. Marcos administration immediately imposed security there and they would not allow rescuers or ambulances to the site. This was because they would not allow them on the site until an official statement had been prepared. They were finally allowed there nine hours later.

In 2005 GMA Network’s i-witness produced a documentary that stated all 168 workers were traced, a dozen died and the bodies were recovered for a proper burial. However there are stories that this was a cover up and that workers were willingly buried alive in the concrete.

The building had been leased on various occasions and is currently in use. In 2013, it had a three-hour fire that had costly damages but fortunately no casualties.

The events of 1981 have led to an urban legend that before rescuers made it in the workers there were entombed alive. The bodies were left in hardened concrete slabs and “spirit questors” confirmed that the spirits are crying out for their recovery and a proper burial.

I could find no particular experiences listed that could give me more about the paranormal side but probably because this is an urban legend that has sprang up around a tragedy.

Here is a little video about the history of the place.

The Black Knight Satellite

Well this one has been on the radar a while (yeah shoot me bad puns etc) but I thought it might be interesting to add to the list. I have had a search around the internet and found a few interesting facts about it. So here goes…

The story is that The Black Knight is a satellite that orbits the earth, and it is around 13,000 years old too! The story seems to have originated in 1954 when newspapers ran a report of two satellites orbiting earth had been detected, at this stage there was not meant to be the technology for our planet to do this so speculation began.

A photograph in 1988 was claimed to show the ‘alien artefact’, or perhaps what might be space debris from a previous attempt at sending machinery into space. However my thoughts on the latter contradict the idea we could not send that type of technology out… the first launch we know of was Sputnik in 1957.

Nikola Tesla was said to have intercepted a signal from the thing back in 1899. A HAM radio operator was said to have decoded a series of radio signals from TBK and interpreted it has a star-chart centred on the Epsilon Bootes star system. It is also where the information about it being 13,000 years ago seems to have originated too. It’s said that the radio signals had been picked up for around 50 years as well.

Whatever it was in the 1960’s has been located in Polar Orbit and was calculated to be over 10 tons of weight, making it one very heavy object and if man/alien made one of the largest ever created. NASA have also released images and this has spurred more interest in it, no one (or thing) has claimed to own it.

What makes it harder to wade through information like this is that so many projects use the name, for instance as Skeptoid points out, 22 UK launches between 1958-1965 gives you an idea. Tesla also did get radio signals but they were not from the satellite they were from space, Pulsars… giant deep space sources of pulsing radio signals. Duncan Lunan did not get a message from the satellite about the Epsilon Bootes star system either, it was collected from LDE radio reflections that allows him to build the map.

It seems that the Black Knight satellite is really more of an amalgamation of already quite interesting facts.

The magic of Constantine

Alan Moore created the comic book character of John Constantine, later adapted into a film that starred Keanu Reeves playing the character, but Alan Moore may well have come face to face with his ceration before then. In his words:

“One interesting anecdote that I should point out is that one day, I was in Westminster in London – this was after we had introduced the character – and I was sitting in a sandwich bar. All of a sudden, up the stairs came John Constantine. He was wearing the trenchcoat, a short cut – he looked – no, he didn’t even look exactly like Sting. He looked exactly like John Constantine. He looked at me, stared me straight in the eyes, and then just walked off around the corner to the other part of the snack bar. I sat there and thought, should I go around that corner and see if he really is there, or should I just eat my sandwich and leave? I opted for the latter; I thought it was the safest. I’m not making any claims to anything. I’m just saying that it happened. Strange little story.”

In the snakes & ladders book a fictionalised version added he once came up to say “I will tell you the ultimate secret of magic. Any c*** could do it.”

Now either Alan Moore was telling another good tale, delusional, had subconsciously made him and had seen the guy before or possibly he had brought Constantine into existence. This has been discussed before as something called the Tulpa effect, essentially this is a Buddhist belief that a thing or being can be willed into existence with the right spiritual and mental discipline. The concentration and the power of the mind is what creates it but with enough vitality the creation can free itself from its maker. Perhaps we shouldn’t be so quick to dismiss Alan Moore’s story, or come to think of it, a child with an imaginary friend….

“DC Comics’ Constantine No. 1 cover” by Source (WP:NFCC#4). Licensed under Fair use via Wikipedia.