Presenting: Otherworld | Zaza

0:00Hey fashion lovers, now that Halloween is over, we've got a different kind of costume for you. one that reality wears when it gets weird. The podcast Otherworld explores stories of the strange, the unexplainable, and the downright uncanny. Think glitch-in-the-matrix moments and encounters that make you question what's real, as told by the people who experienced the unexplainable. So trade your couture for curiosity and listen to this preview of Otherworld, because dark drama never goes out of season.

0:46Welcome to Otherworld. I'm your host, Jack Wagner. This episode comes from a woman named Kendra, who grew up in a small town in Wyoming, which is where this whole thing takes place. and it happened around 1996, which I think adds a lot to this story. All of this starts when Kendra is going into her freshman year of high school. At this time, her and her friends start playing with a Ouija board. At first, they attempted to contact John Lennon, which, if you ask me, is pretty ambitious. But then again, these are high school freshmen. they were not able to contact John Lennon however something did seem to come through on the board and start communicating with them this is a very classic spooky story in so many ways I'm going to let Kendra tell it for herself and I'll save the rest of my thoughts for after the episode this episode is called Zaza and you're listening to Otherworld

2:17We'll see you next week.

2:40I'm Kendra. I've been living in Idaho for about 11 years, 12 years. I'm in the banking industry. Love the outdoors, love living in Idaho and, you know, fly fishing. I'm also a musician, play the mandolin and piano and a little bit of percussion, just all the things, just for fun. And yeah, like just loving life here. So I lived my whole childhood and grew up in a small central Wyoming town, kind of the base of the Wind River Mountains. Very, very small town, you know, about 9 ,000 people, right on the edge of the Wind River Reservation. So a lot of Native American history there, a lot of mountain men, you know, there's like a rendezvous site nearby.

3:40So a lot of history. It's a really cool area to grow up in. so this all took place uh leading into my freshman year of high school so I think I was around 15 um going into 16 uh years old and I had a few really close friends um that we'd been you know hanging out um you know just doing normal high school stuff going into high school this is like 1996, I would say, 95, 96. So, you know, a lot of the like grunge music was really in, that's kind of what we were listening to, you know, like Bush and Weezer and, you know, Stone Temple Pilots and that kind of stuff. So we were really into like, you know, we had guitars and a drum kit and we were just, you know, playing music for fun.

4:41was really into the Beatles at the time, too, and just, like, old-school rock and roll, Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, that kind of stuff. So, you know, we were just kids in the 90s, and, you know, we would get bored, you know. We didn't have a lot to do. We didn't have the Internet, you know, so we were always just looking for things to get into, you know, prank-calling people, driving around town, just meeting up at the local parking lot where everybody hung out. It was a pretty fun time, I think. Like, I loved growing up in my small little town. Like I said, I was really into the Beatles at the time.

5:25And I was kind of obsessed with them, actually. And, you know, my friends were mildly interested in the Beatles as well. But, you know, this is the summer leading into high school. and we were really bored and looking for things to do. And so I decided, hey, what if we got a Ouija board and tried to contact John Lennon? So all kind of in good fun in the beginning. We really just, you know, we're trying to go into it kind of in a lighthearted way. Like, how cool would it be if John Lennon came through to talk to us? so we decided we'd go down to the local kmart and pick up a ouija board out of the game section you know i just took it back to my my bedroom i had like a ton of like beetles memorabilia and things in there and we were like okay we're really gonna try and concentrate and try and contact John Lennon.

6:30At first, you know, we're sitting in my bedroom on my bed, and there were, I think, maybe two or three of my friends with me at the time. My best friend, Lisa, and my friend, Brooke, and another friend. And so we just kind of started, and a couple of us, you know, put our hands on the the planchette and we didn't know you know it was our first time like are we really moving it is it really working and of course it started moving and it really did feel like you know none of us was really intentionally moving it and it did start spelling some things and it was slow moving at the beginning. We were asking, you know, is this John?

7:26We were trying to contact John and it would go to yes. And, you know, just pretty basic things. And I feel like, you know, as silly as we were back then, we did have like serious intentions of like an unopened mind of having this work. And so, of course, it said yes. And, you know, we were going back and forth asking it questions to kind of, you know, is this really John? If it's John, can you give us some kind of proof that it's you? And at that moment, I had a John Lennon photo hanging on my wall across the room and it fell off the wall. at that moment. And we all just looked at each other and we were like, oh my gosh, like, I can't believe that just happened.

8:27Maybe it was just a coincidence. I don't know. But I mean, I had all four Beatles photos hanging on my wall. And for that to happen just seemed to be like such it couldn't be a coincidence. You know, at first that just kind of intrigued us to keep playing. You know, we kept wanting to come back for more because we got evidence that this thing was really happening. And so, you know, in the beginning it was, it was very lighthearted and fun and we kind of were just really open. And I think because we were so open-minded and intentional, with what we were doing. Unintentionally, I think that's where things maybe kind of took advantage of us going forward.

9:21To listen to the full episode of Zaza and for more stories, search Otherworld wherever you get your podcasts.