The Man in the Padi

This story was told to me by my mother, years after it happened. I wasn’t born yet, and my father was off in the military, leaving my mother to raise my two older brothers, Daniel and Samuel, mostly alone. It was the late seventies, and my mother would often take us to visit her parents in their village, tucked away at the edge of the forest in Kedah, not far from the Gunung Jerai.

The house was a wooden dwelling, raised on stilts, surrounded by thick vegetation, and the nearest neighbor was a good fifteen minutes’ walk away. Behind the house, dense jungle swallowed the land, and in front, a vast padi field stretched out, merging with the hazy silhouette of the mountain. The only sound at night was the chorus of insects and the occasional cry of a night bird. It was a place where the world felt both vast and claustrophobic, and the sense of isolation was palpable.

One evening, as dusk painted the sky in deep oranges and purples, my grandmother prepared dinner while my mother nursed Samuel. Daniel, then about four, was playing near the window that faced the padi field. He was a quiet child, but that evening he seemed restless. He kept looking out, pointing at something unseen. When my mother asked what he was looking at, he said, ‘The tall man in the padi.’ My mother assumed he meant a scarecrow. The farmers sometimes placed them. But when she looked out, she saw nothing but the swaying green stalks and the distant mountain. She dismissed it as a child’s imagination.

The next evening, as the sun dipped lower, Daniel became more agitated. He tugged at my mother’s sleeve and whispered, ‘He’s closer now. He’s waving.’ My mother felt a chill crawl up her spine. She peered into the growing darkness, her eyes straining to pick out any shape among the padi. But again, she saw nothing. That night, Samuel, who was usually a sound sleeper, woke up crying inconsolably, and my mother found it hard to soothe him. He kept looking towards the window, his tiny fingers pointing at the darkness.

The following morning, my mother decided to walk into the padi field to see if there was indeed a scarecrow. She walked along the narrow paths between the flooded plots, the water cool against her bare feet. She walked for perhaps twenty minutes, a cool breeze rustling the plants. She found a few scarecrows, but they were simple constructions of bamboo and old clothes. None of them could be mistaken for a tall man. She shrugged it off and returned home, chalking it up to a child’s imagination, but she couldn’t ignore the unease that had settled in her chest like a stone.

That night, the atmosphere in the house felt heavy, as if the very air had thickened. The oil lamp flickered, casting dancing shadows on the wooden walls. Daniel, sitting at the dinner table, suddenly went rigid. His eyes widened, and he pointed towards the front door, his voice trembling, ‘He’s at the door now.’ My mother’s heart pounded. She didn’t want to look, but her eyes were drawn involuntarily. The door was ajar, leading to the small porch. In the dim light, she saw the silhouette of a tall figure, its features obscured, but it was unmistakably there. It was impossibly tall, with long, thin limbs. It stood motionless, and yet it seemed to radiate menace.

Terror seized my mother. She grabbed both children and retreated to the back room, locking the door. She prayed as she had never prayed before. The figure outside began to move, slowly circling the house, its steps heavy and deliberate. The wooden walls creaked as it leaned against them, and my mother could hear a low, guttural hum emanating from it. It continued for what felt like hours, the sound of its footsteps and the hum never fading. Then, as the first light of dawn began to break through the cracks, the sounds ceased.

Cautiously, my mother unlocked the door and peered out. The house was as it had been, no signs of disturbance. The door was closed, though she had left it ajar. The padi field was peaceful in the soft morning light. She checked on the children; they were asleep, exhausted. She never saw the figure again, but that experience changed her. She became overly protective, and we never visited the grandparents at night again, always leaving well before sunset.

Years later, when I asked her about it, she would only say, ‘There are things in this world that we don’t understand. That thing was real, and it wasn’t a scarecrow. It was something else, something that feeds on fear.’ The story stuck with me, a chilling reminder that even in the calmest of rural settings, the unseen can be all too close. And now, whenever I go back to the village, I avoid the padi field at dusk, because I never know if the tall man is still there, waiting.