Spooky season: Haunting destinations around the world

La Casa Matusita, an unassuming building near Lima’s Museum of Art, carries a haunting past. During the Spanish colonial era, a Persian woman first bought the house. Facing accusations of witchcraft, she was dragged from her home by the Spanish Inquisition and accused of making a pact with the devil. Suffering a fate known all too well by witches of the era, she placed a curse upon anyone entering her house, ensuring a cruel destiny would befall them.
 

Over the years, the house has witnessed numerous violent incidents. In the 1970s, a renowned TV personality attempted to disprove the house’s haunting by staying for seven days and nights. Within four hours, he was forcibly removed due to psychiatric concerns and never spoke of the house again.
 

Visit La Casa Matusita on your way to the delicious restaurants nearby and raise your Pisco Sour to honor those who fell victim to the curse. Perhaps, if you offer a drink in tribute to the original homeowner, she may allow you to pass by peacefully.

Before my Simply Japan trip started, I stayed in Asakusa in Tokyo and ventured 20 minutes north to the old Kozukappara Execution Grounds. Every time this area is developed, they find human remains left by the >200,000 executions that took place in the Edo period until 1873. Skeletons literally pave the road to what is now two temples split by a JR Line. By the Enmei-ji temple you’ll find the Kubi-kiri Jizo (Beheading Buddha) - pictured here - that was erected to serve as the last thing the condemned would see before losing their head.

Fast forward to the Dutch and other westerners building relationships with Japan, and the Tokugawa Clan turned the site into a memorial for those harshly convicted as an effort to distance themselves from this bloodied past. However, history never forgets, and after the 2011 tsunami, the Beheading Buddha required renovation as its own head had broken off.