'The Alkimos' and 'WA Skin Divers' - Haunted History
By John Ramses 16 June, 2006
Barry Sue, co-author of Ghost of the Alkimos,
and son of legendary Jack Wong Sue, mentioned to us one day that his shop in Midland (Western Australia) may be haunted. Barry and Jack own WA Skin Divers,'the oldest skin diving shop in the southern hemisphere'. Their shop is located in an old historic building built just after the turn of the 20th century with a history of being a brothel, then tea house and a few other businesses before the building was purchased by the Sue's.
Adjacent to WA Skin Divers is an adult shop. The girls at the Adult Entertainment business have complained for years to Barry that “screams and thumps” are quite often heard from his building at night. It unnerves the girls who work late at night as they are not sure if it is one of their own calling in distress. This happened frequently enough for them to mention it to Barry and ask him if he had been working late or up to any strange antics. Barry of course had locked the premises and gone home for the night – as he always does. Barry himself has experienced strange events in the shop at different times and various small artifacts from the infamous haunted shipwreck, Alkimos, are also on display in the shop.
During a recent interview with Barry Sue for Lia Ramses' Underworld program Barry invited me to take advantage of my visit and explore the upper level of the shop with a video camera equipped with night vision (olux). I had my two daughters with me (5 and 12) who are both fascinated with orbs. I tell my youngest that the orbs are lights from the faerie's magic wand and she often takes the camera herself around our home searching for them. Our eldest daughter seems to be an orb magnet. Wherever she goes orbs are soon to follow. Since around age 6-7 she has talked about seeing people who are not visible to anyone else. Only in recent years has she come to realize that what she is seeing may be what we adults call 'ghosts'. Since moving to a our current home a few years ago she has often talked of a little blue boy who sits huddled in her closet. Upon investigating the history of our home we discovered that the previous owner had 3 children and who unfortunately experienced a lot of violence and abuse by thier mother's over-bearing boyfriend. All the children's bedrooms had dead-bolt locks on them when we moved in and they were installed to be locked from the inside.
One can imagine then that during periods of violence between the mother and her boyfriend, the children would lock themselves inside their rooms. One can also imagine a frightened child huddled in his closet. We know the boy didn't die in the house - not physically, but he likely died a thousand emotional deaths during this period of his life. What our daughter sees in her closet is a 'memory', a true ghost whose living counterpart has permanently impressed his more dire emotional moments into the closet where he often hid. Needless to say, our eldest daughter is not frightened of nor intimidated by apparitions. Indeed, she embraces the study of this phenomena to understand more those whom only she can see...and sometimes hear! But WA Skin Divers' old historic building was something different again and we could all sense it.
While Lia conducted the interview I and my daughters climbed the steep staircase into the upper lever of the old building where the neighbors claim the ruckus often occurs. Barry had turned on all the lights for us but even so there were deep shadows and an eerie feeling of being watched. My daughters, who are usually un-effected by haunted locations and have a healthy, un-afraid view of paranormal research, clung tightly to me as we walked down the creaking hallway and into each rooms. The rooms were bare and empty with the exception of half-dressed mannequins posed near the windows. The peeling wallpaper was from another time in history and the unusually high ceilings didn't help to quell a feeling of oppression and claustrophobia as if we stood in a thick crowd of people.
The camera was on and recording, but only to record the general layout of the rooms as they were. It was now time to switch off the lights and put the camera in night vision mode.
The first room, the size of an average bedroom, was our first target. I explained to my youngest that fairies love old buildings and, of course, they only come out at night when it's quiet and most people have gone to sleep because they are shy. She feels special when she sees an orb in the LCD monitor. I've told her that they appear because they know she won't hurt them or frighten them. But as I closed the door to the room and switched the lights off both my daughter's fingers dug deep into my skin. They couldn't get close enough to me. Neither had ever acted this way when investigating a haunted location - even in pitch black and after midnight. But none of us had ever investigated WA Skin Diver's building - a building with an active history and a resting place for some of the remains of the ill-fated ghost ship, Alkmos.
We sat in silence huddled in a corner with the camera pointed out into the room. The dim glow of the camera's LCD monitor did little to break through the dense darkness. Adding to the unsettling scene was the silhouettes of two mannequins against the window; they suddenly seemed too life-like against the soft glow of a street lamp somewhere on the otherwise dark street beyond and below. We didn't have to wait long before the first orb appeared. My youngest, normally excited by the prospect of seeing a 'faerie' never moved or commented. Instead, she just watched. My eldest daughter, who has experienced ghosts personally throughout her life and is normally indifferent to any appearances, sat equally motionless. We all sensed that something was present and more, it was aware of our presence.
Several more orbs appeared. They came in fast towards us then paused a moment and darted back out of view. One manifested directly center screen moved downward, blinked a few times and vanished again. After five minutes in this room I was ready to check out other areas. I stood up to turn on the light - with added weight of my two girls still clinging to me. I found the light switch and with a click the uncertain, foreboding world of darkness vanished with the speed of light. We all forced a light chuckle, opened the door and proceeded down the hall toward the old food preparation area.
During the era when the building was used as a tea house, or cafe, food was prepared and sent down a dumb waiter to the ground floor dining area. The room was larger - about the size of a master bedroom - although it had once been much larger before a wall was built to divide the space into two separate rooms. With some trepidation I reached out to the light switch to shroud the room in darkness.
"Here we go!" My girls braced themselves against me again and with a click the room went black. The camera was still running and as I brought it level and scanned the room I was amazed that right in front of us was was seemed to be a cyclone of orbs of all sizes. They moved quickly up, down and around as if acting as one mind and my first thought was that it must be dust, although there was no breeze that could cause even dust particles to move in such a fashion. I lowered the camera for the girls to see. "Look at all the fairies", I said in order to assure my youngest that there was no danger. The sound of daddy's voice in the uncertain darkness of a strange, spooky building helped to give them confidence and we began chatting about the orb-storm swirling before us. Brighter orbs seemed to blink as if showing off while lesser orbs flowed in streaks as if riding some invisible current.
We watched and filmed for several minutes when the eldest daughter made a startled comment about an icy cold area that had just formed around her left hand. She noted that her fingers also tingled. I told her I was going to move away from her and point the camera on her to see if we could capture something and asked if she would be ok. She said yes and I walked backwards until the majority of her showed in the monitor. Except for one stray orb that moved quickly in and out of view there was nothing to see. I was disappointed but at the same time relieved that the night vision had not revealed some disembodied spirit holding her hand.
Satisfied with what he had filmed and witnessed and anticipating Lia's interview with Barry to end shortly, I returned the lights and made our way down the hall to the stairs and down into the world of the living. WA Skin Divers old building is definately on my hit list for a serious and thorough investigation into possible paranormal activity. The old building also holds other secrets and curiosities that I'll talk about on another occassion. For now, this experience has confirmed that what the girls from the next door adult shop hear late at night is more than imagination!
Below are photos and video of the orbs captured at WA Skin DIvers building. One particularly bright orb was cropped and enhanced in Photoshop CS to reveal what appears to be a woman's bust and head. She appears to have the style of around the 1930's or 40's.
 Click here for video of orbs.
Click here for video of orb as seen in the images below.
Capture and enhancement of a single orb from WA Skin Divers building
Frame from video showing a particularly bright orb
Close-up of the orb. Appears to be the face and bust of
a woman looking downward or tilted.
The image of the orb enhanced for detail and rotated
clockwise several degrees.
Image of woman (orb) coloured for clarity.
 For a more complete history of Jack and Barry Sue's WA Skin Divers shop building visit Haunted Australia
 Hear Barry Sue Interview with Lia Ramses on Underworld : 7-1-2006
 Purchase Ghost of the Alkimos, an intriguing investigation and history of Australia's most haunted and possibly cursed ship (wrecked off Yanchep)
Purchase Jack Wong Sue's Blood on Borneo
| Audio Interview Archives - The Alkimos |
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