Which House is the Witch House? (by Cindy)

In honor of October and Halloween …

Our Spanish teacher gives us homework, and one exercise was to answer questions that would require us to use the Spanish word “hay”, meaning “there is” or “there are.”  There were several questions about our city or country, and mostly we took the easy way out by answering what we knew about Des Moines, Iowa, or the US, because we still have so much to learn about Costa Rica.

One of the questions (translated to English) was “Are there many museums in your city?”  And, of course, both John and I gave answers about Des Moines. Sometimes our teacher seizes a cultural learning opportunity and, in this case, decided to list museums in the San José area for our benefit. (You may remember he did something similar when he listed in Spanish the 10+ kinds of milk we could buy, including the ever popular, buffalo.) So, he proceeded to list museums:   Museo Nacional, Museo de Jade, Museo de Oro, Museo de Arte, and concluded with Museo de las Brujas (Witch Museum).

You may recall from a previous post that Escazú is the “The City of Witches” with a stereotypical witch flying on a broomstick wearing a pointed hat and cape, prominently displayed on the city emblem. Our teacher went on to explain that the Witch Museum was closed. It had been run by a former older student, who had carved a witch representation for each witch story associated with Escazú. He said that there were almost 100 of these small witch statues.

Our teacher then talked a little about how a long time ago, scary creatures like witches had been used by the church to help control the mostly uneducated population.  But, then, he said, “I believe in witches, because of an experience I had a few years ago.”  He then proceeded with his story…

Our teacher has a wife and one daughter (the daughter is now a young adult, going to school in the US). He and his wife currently live in Escazú, where they both teach English from their house. Prior to moving to Escazú about four years ago, they had been driving an hour each way to Escazú from their home to teach, and driving separately, because of schedules. It was a lot of time and driving, so they decided to find a place to rent in Escazú.

Our teacher found an ad for a house in a good location (not far from where we live in Escazú Village, we would later find out), so he called. The woman that owned the house said there were two stipulations for renting, that the renters liked animals and that they had children. Our teacher said that was true for his family, so he went to see the house. He was met by the woman’s niece, who lived next door. The niece had long hair that hung down her back and stopped just a few inches from the ground. There were also a few cats that were hanging around the house. The niece explained that she had 9 cats, and the cats liked to visit the rental house.  

Despite the niece and her cats, the two-story house looked good to our teacher. He called the owner and said he was interested and asked how much the monthly rent was. The owner said it was $2,000 per month.  Our teacher, who still had a house in the other town, said his budget was $1,000, so thought that was the end of it.

Later the owner called him back and asked him about his budget again. He said it was $1,000. The owner said she could rent it for that amount. Our teacher said he wanted a copy of the lease, so he could confirm that the rent was $1,000 and she wasn’t going to change the rent on him. The owner said she wouldn’t change the rental amount. Our teacher insisted that he would need a lease, but first wanted to show it to his wife and daughter, since this was a family decision. A few days later they went back to see the house.  Our teacher anticipated that they would rent the house, so he withdrew $1,000 for a deposit and had it in his pocket, ready to sign a lease.

Again, the niece met them to show them the house. Our teacher asked if they could meet the owner of the house. The niece said that wasn’t possible. The niece asked them what their zodiac signs were before they toured the house. Our teacher, his wife, and their daughter then walked around the house, touring it separately.

This time the house was … different. Our teacher noticed that there were strings of peppers hung by the door. He also noticed that there were horseshoes and upside-down crosses hung about the house. Later our teacher would find out that during the tour, the daughter heard the sound of people laughing. She saw the niece stroke the wall and say softly, “Quiet, we have guests. It is OK, she has a fire sign.”  

After they toured the house, the niece, our teacher, his wife and daughter, all sat at the kitchen table. Our teacher said that his wife, who normally takes forever (like months) to make big decisions, was ready to rent the house then and there. He was also ready to rent and told the niece. She said, no, they would have to come back at 3:00 p.m. Our teacher was perplexed, since he had the deposit money with him and was ready to sign. The niece insisted that the owner wanted them to come back at 3:00 to sign the lease. (At this point our teacher made a point of saying to us that the time of 3:00 was important. I wasn’t aware of the significance of that time, but upon doing some quick research, found that the number 3 is the first sacred number in the occultists worship numbers.)

While they were sitting at the table, they heard heavy footsteps coming rapidly, perhaps tumbling, down the steps and walk to right behind where their daughter was sitting. But, there was no one there. Our teacher asked what the noise was. His daughter opened her mouth and said that it was her sandal. But, according to our teacher, the voice that came out of her mouth didn’t sound like the voice of his daughter.  And yet with all of this, while they were in the house, the three of them still felt compelled to rent the house.

Because they couldn’t sign the lease then, they left the house and sat in the car. Once they were outside of the house, they felt strongly the other way about renting it. At that point they apparently had returned to their unpossessed senses, and they decided not to rent the house. Our teacher called the owner and told her. She asked if it was something the niece had done, and he said, no.

Our teacher added that he has heard that people who do rent that house end up moving out in just a few weeks.

And, that is why he believes in witches.

We were captivated by the story. There were three of us in class that day – John and me, and the other guy, who is new, and also named John. New John also lives in our Escazú Village apartment complex. We asked our teacher where this witch house was, so he drew a rough map on the whiteboard of where he remembered it was located. It turns out the house is in the neighborhood between Escazú Village and Avenida Escazú. We are familiar with the neighborhood as we walk around it all of the time.

This was so intriguing! John, John and I had walked to school together that day. We decided that we would try to find the house on our walk home, as we were going that way anyway. On our walk home, a torrential downpour started just before we got to Avenida Escazú. This is the kind of rain that will soak you through even with an umbrella. We made it to Avenida Escazú and grabbed a coffee at Starbucks, hoping the rain would stop enough we could continue walking home. It didn’t. We ended up taking an Uber back.

The following day the other John sent us a text message saying that he had walked the neighborhood and told us where he thought the house was located, although not in the location that our teacher had drawn on the white board. He thought it was a yellow house with a white fence across from a vacant lot.

John and I explored the neighborhood ourselves. We also didn’t see a house that could be located where our teacher thought he remembered it. We also saw the house the other John thought might be the witch house.  That house didn’t look like a witch house to me. It was a very pretty yellow with a white wrought iron fence that had beautiful climbing vines with purple flowers on it. It didn’t have a “For Sale” or “For Rent” sign on it. I assumed it would, if there were really people moving in and out as frequently as our teacher had said. One of the windows was open in the upstairs, and from afar, I saw someone enter the fence gate. (I didn’t get a good look, as my view was obstructed by a tree branch.) I had been taking pictures of other houses that might have been the witch house, but didn’t get one that day because there were a lot of security guards in that area of that neighborhood. (At the next class I showed those house pictures to our teacher, he said none of those were the house.)

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The other John had a class with our teacher the following evening. Since he is new, he is taking some private classes and also was invited to another group class to help him catch up. He told our teacher that we had looked for the witch house. The teacher was surprised. When John told him we couldn’t find it, our teacher said he would have to drive over and figure out the location for us. (The teacher ended up being ill over the weekend, so didn’t locate the house.)

A couple of times now, John and I have tacked on a walk to our normal morning walk/run, to get additional mileage in before the inevitable afternoon rains, and also to continue to scout for the house. We walk in the neighborhood between Escazú Village and Avenida Escazú. We got to one street where we saw a cat laying down in front of a parked car. It is extremely rare to see a cat outside on its own. I have seen only one other, in the park. Hmmm….

This morning during our walk I brought along a camera, and captured a few more pictures of potential witch houses, including another kind of creepy looking house, the pretty yellow house that the other John thought might be the witch house, and a house with a for sale/rent sign on it where the cat was still in the street under the car, in exactly the same position as the other time we saw it. At our next class I will check with our teacher to see if any of these houses are the witch house.

Costa Rica doesn’t celebrate Day of the Dead, like Mexico. Costa Rica also doesn’t celebrate Halloween, like the US, with costumed kids running through the neighborhood trick-or-treating for candy, although for some reason there is a small Halloween section at Walmart.

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But in Escazú, it’s like it is Halloween every day, since people here believe the witches are real … and maybe they are.