How many of you dreamers believe in ghosts?

Have you visited a place that's been purported to have been haunted?

Have you seen an apparition, or at least you think you have? Do you believe?

I'm forever a skeptic. I've been to places that are supposedly haunted.

I've had dreams that I've been jolted awake thinking something otherworldly caused me to wake up,

but I snap out of it.

I watch TV shows about haunted places. I've read stories and I've seen pictures of

mysterious images appearing in photographs. Spirits of the dead, haunting the places their lives ended.

My mom thinks she's being haunted by the ghost of my dad, but I remain cynical about it all.

I do find it absolutely fascinating however the stories

and all the history that accompany a good ghost tale. Recent surveys have indicated that a large portion of us believes in ghosts, a staggering

43% of us in the United States believe. In the United Kingdom, the numbers are even larger, 52%, more than half. In much of Asia, the belief in ghosts is even more widespread than the rest of the world, where ghosts are characterized. The

in ghosts are even more widespread than the rest of the world, where ghosts are characterized as neutral entities

and may be appeased through rituals or angered if provoked.

Ghosts in Asia can be asked for help in healing humans, winning the lottery, and protecting

one while traveling or while pregnant. As with some American ghosts, they have an attachment to the human realm, which keeps them

hunting and wanting to help.

So this would explain my mom, who is Vietnamese and her ongoing assertions that when she has a vision of my dad and it happens

to be raining when he comes a haunting, but she needs to go to the casino because this is a sign of good luck.

I bet you can see me rolling my

eyes every time she tells me this. The paranormal tourism industry is enormous, but it's hard to determine which sites are actually supposedly

haunted and which ones are dramatically staged haunted places.

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