Urban Legends: Hong Kong Ghost Takeout

Ghost Takeout (Traditional Chinese: 鬼叫餐) is one of the most well-known Ghost stories from Hong Kong. The origins of the story began sometime after the Second World War. Although there are variants, the basic structure of the story is as follows...

In the early post-war era, there was a young lad who worked in a restaurant located in the Yau Ma Tei 油麻地area of Hong Kong. One day,  he received a call to deliver food to a nearby condo. When the lad got to the suite, the door slide opens a small gap. From it, a hand come out and give the lad some money. The lad checked the money and returned to the restaurant. That night, when the owner counted the daily earnings, he found out the lad have given him joss paper, commonly known as ghost money, which are sheets of paper made into burnt offerings to the dead in tradition Chinese religious practice. The owner was furious. He thought the boy either took the money or was not careful with the task he gave him. Nonetheless, he forgave him after reprimanded him.  

Next day, the same call were made from the apartment. The owner again sent the lad. This time, the same happened, a hand also show up from the door gap to give him the money. This time, he took extra time to check the money before he returned to the restaurant. Nonetheless, that night, when the boss counted the daily earnings, he found that the lad has given him joss paper. The lad professed his innocent. The owner was sceptical but decided to let the incident slide due to his past performance. 

On the third day, the same again made by the same apartment. This time, the lad thought the incident to be to too eerie and refused the request to go. Hence, the owner went himself. It occurred just like what happened to the boy. A hand slide through the door crack and give him the money. He checked whether the money is real before leaving. Yet, like the lad, the notes become ghost money the moment he returned to the restaurant. The owner was furious. He thought the people from the apartment must be professional scammers. Hence, he called the police on them. When the police arrived, they knocked on the door. When they received no replies, they crush it to get inside. And boy were they shocked they found. Inside were four decomposing bodies laying around a Mahjong table with emptied food containers from the restaurant.

What made the tale freaky was that when the coroner examined their body. He found out that they had died for some time from carbon monoxide poisoning. There is no way that they could answer the doors during the incident with the restaurant owner and the lad. However, even more, freaky was that they indeed ingested the food they called from the restaurant, however, all signs showed they were ingested post mortem.

According to the folklorist Henry Chan, there was a basis of truth to the story. Supposedly, a supernatural incident was reported in the 1950s Yau Ma Tei. However, the story goes by very differently. According to the newspaper clip shown above, on March 6th, 1953, four people was playing mahjong in an apartment suite in Yau Ma Tei. During the game, however, they saw four extra hands joining in that do not belong to anyone in the group. They got very frightened and flee the suite. Eventually, the neighbours heard about the incident and the tale spread so much that more than a thousand people flooded around the purported haunted area to see whether there is a ghostly incident. This crowd was big enough to catch to catch both the police and the local newspaper attention. Eventually, the police were called to dispered the crowd and launched an investigation. 

After a thorough investigation, however, the police claimed the incident is a hoax. Apparently, there was a dispute between the landlord of the apartment and one of his tenant. Eventually, the tenant was forcibly evicted. In an act of spite, he took revenge on the landlord by spreading the rumours that the apartment is haunted. Over time, the rumour got out of hands and the neighbours thought his tall tale is true....This is the official version of the tale.