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From the Emailbag: Strange Nights on Bedford
By The Changeling | February 20, 2008
This is one of the funniest emails I’ve gotten in awhile. It reminds you to be grateful that you live in Bed-Stuy, because where else would you experience craziness like this? Here’s the entire email:
This might come across as a little strange, but unless I mention it to someone else in the neighborhood, I’ll think it was a figment of my imagination! Perhaps you can post this also to see if anyone knows what the hell is up with this? Ok- Last night, around 4 or 5am, I woke up to what sounded like a woman singing outside in the neighborhood. We live on Greene at Bedford. Our window was open and our bedroom faces the backyard and noise really ricochets back there and what was strange was that it sounded far away but it was semi-loud, like the woman was really projecting her voice or something. And she wasn’t just humming a tune or singing a particular song, she was singing “ah” ’s and the notes were similar to that of a sitar, angular notes that were sounding particularly creepy through the echo-y mist of late night bed-stuy! The tune actually reminded me of that movie “Eyes Wide Shut,” when they are conducting the ceremonies, so of course it sounded like she was a ghost wandering the fire escapes doing a rite or a ritual. Have you or any of your readers heard this late at night in the neighborhood? Am I being visited by a ghost or whatever or is this an actual woman that does this? I’ve also heard similar music being played around 11 or 12 a few other nights… help!
I’ve walked along Bedford Avenue late at night more times than I’d like to admit, but I’ve never had an experience like this. Have any of you been visited by the ghosts of Bedford?
February 20th, 2008 at 2:01 pm
That is crazy. I also live on Greene Ave at Bedford and my bedroom faces the backyard. Although I have heard “strange noises” at night, I’ve always shrugged it off as the sound of stray cats in heat. They can be very loud! As far as sitar-like music, that I’ve never noticed…
February 20th, 2008 at 5:49 pm
I live on Quincy at Franklin and I’ve heard what I believe was cat yowling noises a couple weeks ago– that got loud and sustained, like it was in pain, almost like a moaning. But definitely not siging.
February 20th, 2008 at 6:51 pm
There’s a Mosque on Bedford and Madison, sometimes I hear them around 4am. They have quite a loudspeaker.
February 20th, 2008 at 9:48 pm
Yeah, I think that’s the call to prayer from the mosque.
February 21st, 2008 at 9:05 am
i think that is what they are hearing it does sound like a wailing but you are right jake that is the call to prayer at the mosque
February 21st, 2008 at 4:47 pm
whew i was afraid for a moment that bed stuy had better caterwauling cats than bushwick.
February 27th, 2008 at 11:41 pm
Yes, the mosque definitely sounds right. We hear it all the time (Gates and Bedford), and we thought it sounded like religious-like chanting and melancholy singing over a loudspeaker, especially very early in the morning on weekends.
April 24th, 2008 at 7:23 pm
Maybe it’s a little far from Greene and Bedford but I have heard the same thing described from my Decatur and Tompkin’s apartment window at around 5-5:30am. I have doubts that it’s the mosque because I live too far. It’s definitely a woman chanting from the back of the building. Quite eerie…