Why horror stories and the djinn continue to thrill us

Rym Ghazal checks into the Haunted Hotel, and lives to tell the tale

The entrance to The Haunted Hotel at the IMG Worlds of Adventure amusement park in Dubai. Jon Gambrell / AP

In a world filled with man-made horrors, it is surprising that we still seek and enjoy thrills that frighten us.

In a country renowned for its luxury hotels, there is now a different kind of hotel in Dubai: the Haunted Hotel has just begun welcoming its victims – er, guests – into its rooms.

Dark, damp and filled with cobwebs, freaky props and scary performers set against a soundtrack of screams and eerie music, it is quite an adrenalin rush walking – or rather, running – through the corridors and rooms of this demon-damned building.

Going to haunted places is nothing new to me. Staying over at a haunted palace is the premise of my book for young readers, Maskoon. I also stayed in a purportedly haunted house in Jeddah as part of an investigation.

And this Haunted Hotel is pretty good at scaring its visitors. This ghostbuster – or, rather, djinn­buster – found herself ducking as a line of bodies dangled from the ceiling, and I even let out a scream as someone, or something suddenly crept out of a dark corner.

The Haunted Hotel is inside Dubai’s IMG Worlds of Adventure, said to be the world’s largest indoor themed entertainment destination. The queues were so long that it took a good hour for my friends and me to get our turn inside.

We have this odd fascination with horror. We fear and at the same time are fascinated by the unknown, unexpected and unexplained. The reaction is partly physiological but it is also mental: people are curious by nature about things they can’t properly define. It is the same with love.

Bedtime and folk stories around the world have elements of horror in them. There is always someone or something evil or bad, be it a witch, devil, wizard or some ugly monstrous creature. Usually, but not always, the good and pure win in the end.

Sitting around a campfire telling tales of horror and intrigue is also a tradition in this part of the world, with a djinn or two among the characters of the story. These mystical, mysterious creatures of fire are even mentioned in the Quran, in which a whole chapter is named after them.

We read about the djinn in school, and we talked – and continue to talk – about them at home and at social gatherings. As children, we were not allowed to go alone to abandoned places, and we were told not to walk near water at night. I also recall avoiding going near certain trees at night. Al Qurm or mangrove trees are said to harbour very vicious djinn that protect them.

There is always someone who has some story of how they encountered one – or someone close to them did. People in the construction industry who have worked in the desert or mountains often have the best stories. A retired engineer in Saudi Arabia once told me that several times when he was driving in the middle of nowhere, he would hear someone call his name.

He would stop the car and look around, but he admitted he was too scared to get out.

“I was told that if you heard someone call you from behind, don’t turn around, as something bad will happen,” he told me years ago. What would happen we never found out, as nobody dared to turn around.

Some people just don’t believe ind djinn, nor in ghosts or spirits or the devil. But that doesn’t stop them from watching horror films and reading scary stories.

We like to listen to djinn stories, which explains why some very famous djinn, such as the genie in the tale of Aladdin’s lamp, have been revived through the ages, in books and then in films. Alf Layla Wa Layla, known in English as One Thousand and One Nights, a collection of tales as told by the enchanting Shahrazad, never goes out of vogue.

The unknown and the freaky continue to intrigue us, and yet, we don’t really have to go anywhere to see horror, we just have to turn on the news. For me, the true horror stories are those of animal abuse, such as the series of cat poisonings by some monster – er, person – in Dubai.

Twitter: @arabianmau