'Like you're in The Twilight Zone': Ex-MTV VJ Utt, who hosted paranormal show Incredible Tales, discusses his own spooky encounters

Utt Panichkul hosted the local paranormal anthology show Incredible Tales from 2004 to 2017, but his own experiences of spooky encounters come from elsewhere.

On a recent episode of the podcast Tales from Incredible Tales uploaded yesterday (Feb 15) to YouTube, the 50-year-old Thai host-actor was shown snippets of some episodes of the show that featured paranormal encounters on a road and in the workplace.

The podcast host, Ria897 DJ Raihan Yacob, also asked Utt if he had experienced anything scary while on location for the show.

Utt responded that situations in the office and on the roads were relatable and more "tame" for him.

"At a scale of one to 10, it's probably like a three or four for me," he said.

However, he had his own unnerving encounter in Phuket where he was shooting a travel show.

"I have had that situation personally where I was on a road and it felt like it was never-ending. It felt like a deja vu, like I kept on driving on the same road over and over," Utt shared.

He recalled he had agreed to meet the crew at a restaurant that evening and had rented a moped to ride there with his cousin.

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"I remember we saw an uncle, not exactly the same as what we watched (on Incredible Tales), but we passed him twice, we had passed him already," he said.

He felt that he was "in The Twilight Zone" and his cousin was also rendered speechless by the encounter. While it felt that they had been on the same road for over an hour, Utt and his cousin actually reached their destination in "15 or 20 minutes".

The area was dark and forested, and the road was on an uneven terrain with curves. There were also offerings left on the side of the road, which Utt said indicated that "there had been a lot of accidents at that particular spot".

Utt felt that the encounter could have been because he was "playing around a lot during the day" and said that he has since become "more conscious" about paying his respects while working in different places "because you're working with energies".

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'Right when I was about to fall asleep, the lights went on-off, on-off'

Utt shared a second paranormal encounter from Phuket, where he was covering the city's nightlife for another show.

There had been "some complication in booking the accommodation" so Utt, the cameraman and the producer ended up staying in this "one or two-star" old shophouse that looked right out of a Wong Kar Wai movie scene.

This time he wasn't "playing around" and knew to "pay his respects", but experienced something scary nevertheless.

"Right when I was about to fall asleep, the lights went on-off, on-off," he shared, adding that he had been alone in the room.

"I just felt that it was not the right place to be, because when you can feel energies, I knew it was not a positive energy because the energy was too strong."

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He called the cameraman, who had managed to fall asleep, and then the producer, telling her he was coming over. When Utt hung up the phone, he said that the lights started flickering again.

"I walked through the hallway and I knocked on her door and, right when she opened it, the lights in the hallway went on-off again," he added.

His producer had never had paranormal experiences prior to that incident and wasn't "a believer", but she knew something was wrong and the pair hugged it out.

The two of them went down to the reception afterwards because Utt was "very matter-of-fact". Instead of wanting to change rooms, Utt told the receptionist: "I have a third eye, I know what's going on. What's up with my room, what do I need to do, where is the altar?"

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Utt was directed to an altar on the roof to pay his respects to the resident spirits and shared that there might have been a suicide in the room he was given.

Despite everything turning out okay, Utt added that his producer doesn't "let up on that story" to this day.

"She goes, 'I spent my whole life never having any experience and then you have to give me one'," he said, to laughter from the host and other guests.

[embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29uNguUaxBQ&ab_channel=Entertainment-Mediacorp[/embed]

Tales from Incredible Tales airs on mewatch and YouTube Thursdays at 8pm, and is also available on melisten, Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

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drimac@asiaone.com

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