Do you believe in what you can’t see?
There are forces in the universe you cannot see but you can feel them.
This week on Florida’s Fourth Estate, hosts Ginger Gadsden and Matt Austin continue to explore the spirit world as we get closer to Halloween.
Austin and Gadsden’s guest, Ting Rappa, said we have to be open to the idea we are not alone.
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Talking to Rappa about the paranormal is eerily comforting. Perhaps that explains why for 18 years now the company she founded, American Ghost Adventures, has been so successful.
It is one of the longest-running ghost tours in Central Florida. She had no plans of ghosts being a part of her everyday life.
You can listen to every episode of Florida’s Fourth Estate in the media player below:
“If you told me that years ago I was going to be doing this, I would have thought you were crazy because the word ghost to me back then scared the heck out of me. I would not even talk to you. I would have backed out of there and run,” Rappa said. ”My entire life has been surrounded by it. The spirits find me whether I want to or not.”
So how do these spirits find her?
“They seek me out. They really, really do. Whether I want to or not, I will end up at the most haunted hotel. I will end up at a haunted location. I will have some sort of unexplainable occurrence that happens to me and people always look at me and go ‘Did that just really happen?’ and I am like ‘Yep, it sure did. It always happens to me.’”
Rappa said instead of running scared, she educated herself.
“So I just decided to research it a little bit more so that I could understand it and protect myself. I got so involved in it that I ended up loving it, so it’s part of my life now,” she said. “After doing tours I realized that spirits can follow you. They do not have to haunt the place where they died. They are not trapped in the building unless they are a certain kind of spirit. They can go anywhere they want and early in my career I didn’t know how to do a closing and spirits came home with me.”
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Rappa said she now uses her pets to clue her in on any hitch-hiking spirits.
“I use my dog and cat for security now. So I come home from a tour, I come in, I wait for the dog and cat to greet me and if they look behind me there’s something probably with me and I turn around and say ‘You can’t come into my house. You’re not welcome.’”
Rappa also said not all ghosts want to hurt or even scare you.
“Eighty percent of the time when you meet a ghost or see a ghost, it’s most likely going to be a relative. The other 20% of the time is being at the right place or in some cases the wrong place. The more haunted places you go, the more likely you’re going to see a spirit. So yes, if a dog or cat is looking in that corner, it’s most likely going to be a relative of yours that’s visiting and saying hello,” she said.
If you would like to book an American Ghost Adventures tour, click here.