Today we talk about Mexico City’s haunted train stations, but before that we discuss inheriting memories from your organ donor, how not to steal a jeweled octopus, and the societal scourge of alcoholic raccoons.
The News:
TRANSCRIPT:
00:53 – 01:06 (Chris): Today’s episode we talk about ghosts of the Mexican Metro. But before that we discuss inheriting the memories of your organ donor, how not to steal a jeweled octopus, and the societal scourge of alcoholic raccoons. I’m your probably cursed host Chris.
01:07 (Sheryl): And I’m Sheryl.
01:08 – 01:30 (Chris): And as we do at the start of every episode, we calibrate our Lord Carnarvon Curse-O-Meter for the main topic. The Curse-O-Meter is our technological device that allows us to determine the cursedness of all things and we calibrate it by feeding it three news stories from recent articles in the past couple months. I will insert the first news story now. Titled: “Organ donors might pass on their personality traits, suggesting your cells have their own memory, scientists say.” This is from November 19, 2025, by Danielle Zickl for Popular Mechanics.
01:31 – 01:43 (Chris): Before Allison Conklin’s heart transplant, she didn’t shy away from eating meat. But after, the idea of it made her stomach churn and she became a vegetarian.
01:44 – 01:46 (Sheryl): I mean, that’s what happens when you get a heart transplant from a pig.
01:47 – 01:54 (Chris): I guess so. This is like about human stories, but if you did get a heart transplant from a pig, would you get the pig’s memories? It’s like “Man, I just want to eat truffles all the time.”
01:55 – 01:57 (Sheryl): That’s a good question.
01:58 – 02:11 (Chris): Conklin’s experience isn’t unique. Emerging research hints that organ recipients can sometimes take on the personality traits and memories of their donors long after their surgery is over. Studies indicate that heart transplant recipients may exhibit preferences, emotions, and memories resembling those of the donor, suggesting a form of memory storage within the transplanted organ, wrote the authors of a 2024 review in Curious.
02:12 – 02:22 (Sheryl): Yeah, I mean, I’ve never heard of that article or that publication before, so I’m not sure how legit it is, but continue.
02:23 – 02:45 (Chris): It’s kind of a good title and also a bad title in the same time because it’s like, oh, Curious, it’s about curiosity, but if you said “My article is in Curious,” it kind of means that it lacks curiosity. Anyway, further, the heart’s complex neural network, which the study authors call a “heart brain,” supports bidirectional communication with the brain and other organs. Experiences in which organ transplant recipients take on personality traits of the donor have been most commonly documented in heart transplants.
02:46 – 02:48 (Sheryl): Oh, the heart really is where the soul is.
02:49 – 02:52 (Chris): It’s true. That’s why the band’s called Heart. They knew. They knew before anyone.
02:53 – 03:07 (Chris): At first, Conklin wondered, “Is it just the drug side effects making my taste buds feel different?” But three years later, she is still a vegetarian. While she’s never met her donor to confirm whether or not they ate meat, she doesn’t think the timing was a coincidence.
03:08 – 03:22 (Chris): Additionally, Conklin experienced memories or moments of deja vu “that just weren’t mine,” she says. “Very early on within the first year, I would have these feelings on experiences that I knew I’d never done, like hearing songs I’ve absolutely never heard before, but feeling like it’s my favorite song.”
03:23 – 03:29 (Sheryl): How could she have never heard the song? For it to be someone’s favorite song… I don’t know, that says to me that it’s been around for a while.
03:30 – 03:31 (Chris): Yeah.
03:32 – 03:34 (Sheryl): Maybe she was like never… tuned into it?
03:35 – 03:45 (Chris): Or like a Swedish death metal fan, and then somebody just ended up playing it for her. She’s like, “Wait a second. I love this song, even though it’s the first time I heard it.” A vegetarian and a Swedish death metal fan.
03:46 (Sheryl): Yeah, yeah. I like it.
03:47 – 03:59 (Chris): Songs are stored in the heart. That’s why the band’s called Heart. They knew. They knew before anyone.
04:00 – 04:14 (Chris): Organ recipients aren’t told about their donors, but are sometimes given minimal details. Both the donor family and the recipient may write letters to each other that go through the hospital social network team or social work team, but Conklin’s letters have not been returned.
04:15 – 04:26 (Chris): This phenomenon can happen with other organs, too. A study looked at people who underwent heart, kidney, liver, and other organ transplants. 89% of the 47 transplant recipients in the study reported personality changes after transplant surgery.
04:27 – 04:30 (Sheryl): Idle hands… Wait, no. Idle hands… Mano: The Hands of Fate?
04:31 – 04:40 (Chris): Yeah, Mano: The Hands of Fate. Or no, wait, the other one, that old-timey movie we saw. The Hands of Orlac? Yes, there we go. Orlac. The Hands of Orlac. Yeah. The hands that want you to murder.
04:41 – 04:55 (Sheryl): I knew we’d get the movie title eventually. So many movies.
04:56 – 05:07 (Chris): It’s true. Music is stored in the heart and The Hands of Orlac proves that murder is stored in the hands. Right, that’s the first news story input into the Curse-O-Meter. Sheryl will read the second.
05:08 – 05:22 (Sheryl): This article is titled: “Man allegedly swallows jeweled octopus. Police fish it out.” This is by Charlotte Graham-McLay from The Sydney Morning Herald on December 5th.
05:23 – 05:25 (Chris): I thought you were going to say “Harlot.” That’s a terrible first name.
05:26 (Sheryl): It is a terrible first name.
05:27 – 05:41 (Sheryl): A 32-year-old man is accused of attempting one of the most unusual jewel heists imaginable. He swallowed a Fabergé octopus pendant worth 33,000 New Zealand dollars, approximately $19,000 Canadian, at Partridge Jewellers in Auckland on November 28th.
05:42 – 05:45 (Chris): They can frisk you, but they can’t frisk your tummy.
05:46 (Sheryl): That’s right.
05:47 – 06:14 (Sheryl): The missing treasure isn’t just any pendant. It’s a limited edition Fabergé egg inspired by the James Bond film Octopussy, a movie that itself revolves around jewel smuggling. Only 50 of these eggs are in existence, each crafted from gold, painted with green enamel, and sparkling with 183 diamonds and two sapphires. Inside the egg, you will find an 18-carat gold octopus with diamond-studded suckers and glittering black diamond eyes, a nod to the film’s villain.
06:15 – 06:16 (Chris): Cool.
06:17 – 06:23 (Chris): I think though if you’re selling Fabergé eggs, they should be sold by the dozen. In a Fabergé egg carton.
06:24 (Sheryl): That would be very, very expensive.
06:25 – 06:36 (Sheryl): The suspect was nabbed inside the store just minutes after the alleged gulp-and-go. He appeared in Auckland District Court the following day, facing a theft charge but offering no plea.
06:37 – 06:41 (Chris): That’s like really fast turnaround for a court appearance. We don’t get that in Canada.
06:42 – 06:44 (Sheryl): Maybe there’s not a whole lot of crime in New Zealand.
06:45 – 06:46 (Chris): We’ll have to ask your coworker.
06:47 – 06:50 (Sheryl): Inspector Gray Anderson notes that at the time of his arrest, the man underwent a medical assessment.
06:51 – 06:53 (Chris): Do you know what the results of his medical assessment were? It was egg-cellent.
06:54 – 06:57 (Sheryl): Well done. There’s probably a real answer that you’re going to say right there. No, actually, I was about to say no.
06:58 – 07:02 (Chris): I think the medical assessment was a psych eval. That he was egg-centric.
07:03 (Sheryl): Well done.
07:04 – 07:18 (Sheryl): New Zealand police announced that they recovered the James Bond-inspired Fabergé pendant six days after the man allegedly swallowed it. The pendant made its reappearance on Thursday night, exiting the suspect’s gastrointestinal tract naturally with no medical intervention required.
07:19 – 07:22 (Chris): Six days. He needs to eat more fiber.
07:23 (Sheryl): Yeah.
07:24 – 07:35 (Sheryl): Officers had been stationed around the clock to monitor the man, waiting for the evidence to resurface. I like the poop jokes. I do too. I think that’s… that’s lots of fun.
07:36 – 07:44 (Chris): Although, I can’t imagine going home and telling your partner what you did all day. “Well, I watched a guy to see if he pooped.”
07:45 – 07:48 (Chris): Important police stuff, you wouldn’t be interested.
07:49 (Sheryl): That’s right.
07:50 – 08:04 (Sheryl): A police photo released Friday shows the less-than-Hollywood ending: a gloved hand holding the pendant and its long chain with the price tag still attached.
08:05 – 08:14 (Chris): He ate the price tag, too? He just swallowed the whole thing. I’ve never learned about Fabergé eggs, but I never actually saw how big they are.
08:15 – 08:19 (Sheryl): Well, so this one’s a pendant, so it’s actually quite small.
08:20 – 08:23 (Chris): Oh, okay. I always pictured them as the size of like a chicken egg.
08:24 – 08:31 (Sheryl): No. I mean, there are some like that for sure, but not this one. This one is like a small little necklace that you would wear.
08:32 – 08:42 (Chris): All right, there goes my theory about a man swallowing a chicken egg-sized piece of jewelry somehow. Yeah, no, it would be like the movie we just watched where you would try swallowing it and then die.
08:43 – 08:44 (Sheryl): It’s true.
08:45 – 08:48 (Chris): Or flashback to our Tarrare Halloween special episode.
08:49 (Sheryl): That’s correct.
08:50 – 09:02 (Sheryl): The unnamed suspect is scheduled to return to Auckland District Court on December 8th to face consequences for the strangest jewel heist New Zealand has ever seen.
09:03 – 09:09 (Chris): I hope this gets turned into one of those short crime drama reenactments where it’s all done by comedians. Or a made-for-TV movie.
09:10 (Sheryl): Yep.
09:11 – 09:21 (Sheryl): Well, that’s the second article. Chris, ready for the third?
09:22 – 09:34 (Chris): Third article titled: “Drunk raccoon found on bathroom floor after liquor store rampage.” This is from December 3rd, authored by Rachel Goodman for Global News, our good old Canadian outlet.
09:35 (Sheryl): Yep.
09:36 – 10:00 (Chris): A masked intruder broke into a liquor store early Saturday, trashed the place, and raided the bottom shelf where the Scotch and whiskey were kept. Bottles shattered, a ceiling tile gave way, and booze pooled across the floor. Employees arriving at a local liquor store Saturday were greeted by a scene straight out of a slapstick comedy, and the culprit sprawled on its stomach in the bathroom: a very intoxicated raccoon, apparently sleeping off his wild night.
10:01 – 10:04 (Sheryl): I wonder if he vomited into the toilet.
10:05 – 10:08 (Chris): Hopefully had a friend there to hold his ears back.
10:09 (Sheryl): That’s right.
10:10 – 10:24 (Chris): “I personally like raccoons,” said Samantha Martin of local animal control. “They’re funny little critters.” He fell through one of the ceiling tiles and went on a full-blown rampage drinking everything. Martin transported the tipsy trespasser to the animal shelter, chuckling at the unusual call.
10:25 – 10:28 (Chris): “Another day in the life of an animal control officer, I guess,” she said.
10:29 – 10:48 (Chris): While this raccoon’s night of mischief may sound extraordinary, experts note that raccoons are well-adapted to urban life. A recent study even suggests they’re showing early signs of domestication, with physical changes such as shorter snouts, smaller teeth, curlier tails, smaller brains, and floppier ears.
10:49 – 10:52 (Sheryl): In other words, we’re making cute, dumb animals that we can take into our homes.
10:53 – 10:58 (Chris): They saw what happened to the wolves that got turned into dogs and they’re like, “Oh, me too.” It’d be dangerous having a raccoon in your house, though. They have opposable thumbs.
10:59 (Sheryl): It’s true.
11:01 – 11:24 (Chris): And they’re wild alcoholics. The Hanover County Animal Protection and Shelter later confirmed the raccoon had sobered up. After a few hours of sleep and zero signs of injury, other than maybe a hangover and poor life choices, he was safely released back to the wild. “Hopefully having learned that breaking and entering is not the answer,” the agency noted. I guess they didn’t mention the alcoholism.
11:25 – 11:28 (Sheryl): No. I mean, they’re not going to say anything about the alcoholism. This is the States.
11:29 (Chris): That’s true.
11:32 – 11:47 (Chris): The liquor store may need repairs, but the raccoon walked away with nothing more than a cautionary tale. And perhaps a headache, a newfound respect for liquor stores, and a lesson learned about binge drinking. I mean, you should go watch the video.
11:48 (Sheryl): Oh, right.
11:49 – 12:00 (Chris): I’ll post the video in the show notes for all of you to enjoy. So head on to our site, probablycursed.net, and then you should be able to see it on there. I don’t know if there’s an actual video of the raccoon doing it, but there is like a news story where they interview the people and whatnot.
12:01 – 12:06 (Chris): Okay. I’ll just link to that news story, I guess. Whatever I can find.
12:07 – 12:09 (Sheryl): Whatever you can find.
12:10 – 12:20 (Chris): I’ll get to the bottom of this. This is called investigative journalism. Well, we have the three stories input into our Curse-O-Meter, and we will get it to spit out the results now.
12:21 – 12:24: (Machine noise and bird chirp)
12:25 – 12:38 (Chris): In the Curse-O-Meter results for the memory transplant along with the organ transplants, the Curse-O-Meter says: Probably Blessed. It’s true. A part of you lives on in someone else, affecting their life in ways that they cannot predict.
12:39 – 12:51 (Sheryl): Yes. I would say, if you haven’t checked that box on your healthcare card or your driver’s license as an organ donor, you do that so you can continue to live on in the body of somebody else. And make them a vegetarian.
12:52 – 13:08 (Chris): And the results for the second news story about the octopus jewel egg heist of New Zealand, Curse-O-Meter says: The real curse is people. Yeah, I don’t know what that guy was thinking was going to happen after he swallowed it.
13:09 – 13:21 (Sheryl): I bet he didn’t figure he would be spending a week in jail while law enforcement watches and waits for him to poop.
13:22 – 13:35 (Chris): No, probably not. Would not recommend. Can you imagine if that was not the only thing he stole? He’s recovering like cell phones and like little diamonds and bracelets and rings.
13:36 – 13:43 (Sheryl): That would be one smelly evidence locker. I’m sure there’s a team they’ve got for cleaning that stuff off. That’s the rookie’s job.
13:44 – 13:58 (Chris): And the results for the drunken raccoon story, the Curse-O-Meter says: Probably Benign. Yeah, nothing happened. The raccoon hopefully learned a lesson and isn’t trying to break into other liquor stores to get drunk and pass out near a toilet.
13:59 – 14:15 (Chris): He didn’t get out and drive or whip out his phone and start texting exes. He just passed out. He drank a lot of alcohol, like some of us do on the weekend, and then he just passed out in the bathroom. Kept it classy. Who hasn’t done that in their lifetime?
14:16 – 14:19 (Sheryl): Everyone puts up their hands. Even Freddy.
14:20 – 14:38 (Chris): All right, that wraps up the calibration phase of our episode. Before we get to Sheryl’s main story here for the episode, we’re going to take a quick break over to the Probably Cursed Museum and Gift Shop to release today’s artifact.
14:39 – 14:42: (Tense music sting)
14:43 – 15:07 (Chris): Hey, I’m jumping in here with a quick message. I forgot to include this in the original recording, but this month we will be doing our usual Friday the 13th sale at our Etsy shop where everything that we have on our shop is 13% off. Head to probablycursed.etsy.com on Friday the 13th and you will be able to get a discount on all our spooky things.
15:08 – 15:11: (Tense music sting)
15:12 – 15:28 (Chris): Today’s addition to the Probably Cursed Museum and Gift Shop is the Porcelain Clown Music Box. The artifact is roughly nine inches tall and depicts a clown sitting and playing the flute. The base of this object is a round platform that spins while the music plays.
15:29 – 15:47 (Chris): The music, of course, is “Send in the Clowns.” Google dates this figure to the 1980s. The manufacturer’s unknown and there’s no writing or logos that I can find to determine its origin. I have seen that it does have a companion piece that’s playing the accordion.
15:48 – 15:49 (Sheryl): Oh, interesting.
15:50 – 16:08 (Chris): Now this item we picked up in a thrift store that gets a surprising amount of clown knick-knacks. Yeah, a lot. Most of our clowns have actually come from that store. There’s something going on there.
16:09 – 16:32 (Chris): I was going to add in that there must be a coulrophile in the neighborhood, because coulrophobia is the fear of clowns, so I figured the opposite, but apparently a coulrophile is the popular term for people sexually attracted to clowns. Now that the word has appeared in our podcast, I apologize if you got recommended our show for the one topic and not spooky things.
16:33 – 16:34 (Sheryl): Yes.
16:35 – 16:47 (Chris): Anyway, this clown is creepy. Not at all sexy, but I’m not particularly fond of clowns in the first place. The coloring is very pale, its eyes gaze at you with an unsettling intensity.
16:48 – 16:53 (Chris): Also it’s one of those music boxes that will randomly play tones way after the music ceases.
16:54 – 17:10 (Sheryl): We have never actually wound… well, Chris must have wound it up to check what song it was playing, but other than that we haven’t wound it up and I’ve definitely heard it make like a random noise occasionally.
17:11 – 17:34 (Chris): Yep, it did start picking up tones when I picked it up even before I wound it up. If you’d like to see this artifact or any of the other Probably Cursed artifacts we have up for sale, check out our Etsy shop at probablycursed.etsy.com. Sale of every item helps fund this podcast and gets us ever closer to our dream of opening a Probably Cursed museum.
17:35 – 17:40: (Spooky music)
17:41 – 17:51 (Sheryl): So for our haunted house update… I can’t really tell if it’s one of the ghosts trying to send us a message or not, but while Chris and I were looking for something near the TV stand, our wedding photo fell off the wall and broke a candle holder I made.
17:52 – 17:55 (Chris): Yep. Candle holder just exploded.
17:56 – 18:09 (Sheryl): It’s not the first time something has fallen off this wall and it probably won’t be the last time something has fallen off this wall. It’s true. One of our other lovey-dovey couple photos kept getting popped off the wall before I really fixed it on there with a frame.
18:10 – 18:24 (Sheryl): Yeah, and the… we’ve got one that’s a photograph of like our eyeballs and that one has fallen off the wall a couple times as well. Oh yeah, the eyeball photo fell. I forgot all about that.
18:25 – 18:39 (Sheryl): We’ve been lucky so far none of the frames have broken and hopefully that won’t change, but knock on wood. And that’s… yeah, that’s what’s been happening. But if you would like your photos to fall off the wall…
18:40 – 18:56 (Chris): You can check out our Probably Cursed shop and see if there’s anything on there that tickles your fancy. You might buy the actual thing that is causing slight poltergeist activity. Add a little excitement in your life. Or if you hate the photo frames that you chose but just can’t get rid of them for no good reason. Well now a ghost will give you a good reason.
18:57 – 19:15 (Sheryl): I was going to say you can also prank your family members. If they’ve got some photos that you don’t like, you can give them one of our cursed articles and see what happens. Just don’t mention us by name. Maybe don’t give them the certificate saying that it’s cursed.
19:16 – 19:20 (Chris): Just hide that in your file cabinet. That wraps up the spooky updates. We will now head over to the main topic.
19:21 – 19:24: (Tense music sting)
19:25 – 19:47 (Sheryl): So I wanted to do this episode because Chris and I are going on our first winter getaway together. And before we go, which ironically will be before this episode is released, but this episode is being released after we’ve already gone. So if you were thinking of breaking into our house, it’s not going to happen.
19:48 – 19:51 (Chris): You’re too late as you’re probably opening the front door right now and staring at us while we’re eating our dinner.
19:52 – 20:07 (Sheryl): I wanted to look up some supernatural stories from Mexico City. To start, I will apologize in advance. Unlike the States where it seems like Spanish is a very common language for a lot of people to learn, in Canada the language that’s mandatory for people to learn is French and so my French skills are way better than my Spanish skills.
20:08 – 20:25 (Chris): Even then, we don’t get many people from Mexico here. All the Spanish-speaking people I know in Canada seem to come from South America: Peru or Ecuador or Colombia. We just don’t see a lot of people from Mexico here.
20:26 – 20:28 (Chris): They exist, I’m sure they do, but like Chris said, we just don’t encounter it much.
20:29 – 20:30 (Chris): Yep. They’re hiding it.
20:31 – 20:47 (Sheryl): And I will also put the caveat that not all the names are Spanish, which then also makes it difficult because I do not speak Mayan. Few people do.
20:48 – 21:14 (Sheryl): So we’ll start with a bit of background. So the Mexico City Metro was first open to the public on September 4th, 1969. The current metro system has approximately 227 kilometers of track, 12 different lines, and 195 stations, making it the second-largest metro system in North America, with the largest being the New York City subway.
21:15 – 21:26 (Chris): Oh yeah, New York is huge. Yeah, well I was… I was surprised that Mexico City’s was that big. Yeah, you don’t even hear about it.
21:27 – 21:36 (Chris): I mean, you watch Hollywood movies and all you see about Mexican infrastructure is everybody is living in concrete houses that are shot up with bullet holes with rusty tin roofs. That turns out that’s not really the case.
21:37 – 22:01 (Sheryl): No, that is not… that is not correct. Of note, the Mexico City Metro survived the 1985 Mexico City earthquake, which led to between 5,000 and 45,000 deaths, 30,000 injured, and over 412 buildings having collapsed with over 3,000 structures having been seriously damaged.
22:02 – 22:15 (Chris): Wow, what a catastrophe. It was quite the thing. Since the Metro’s opening, there have been reports of supernatural entities who like to frequent the tunnels and stations of the Metro. So maybe if we’re lucky, we might see something on our trip to Mexico City.
22:16 – 22:20 (Chris): I hope so. You’re going to get into those entities? All right, I’m going to keep my eyes open. I’m going to remember these descriptions.
22:21 – 22:50 (Sheryl): There’s a lot. So we’ll start where most people would start when visiting Mexico City: the Benito Juárez International Airport station. So it’s along the yellow line, also referred to as Line 5. The Benito Juárez Airport is the busiest airport in Latin America and the Terminal Aerea Metro station sees tens of thousands of living visitors every day and apparently also a dead one.
22:51 – 23:23 (Sheryl): The spirit of a little girl has been spotted in the Metro station playing with a red ball. The people who have seen her note that at some point the little girl loses control of the red ball she is playing with… playing with, sending the ball towards a random bystander. If the bystander picks up the red ball, the little girl will ask them to help her tie her shoe and when the person crouches down to tie the little girl’s shoe, they will see the legs of the little girl have disappeared before they can reach her shoes, followed shortly thereafter by the little girl completely disappearing.
23:24 – 23:30 (Chris): Wow, I’m just imagining them disappearing like a mirage in the desert. Yeah.
23:31 – 23:43 (Sheryl): In some stories about the little girl, it’s actually said that her eyes turn black and she lets out a low growl before she vanishes. Demon? Or part angry dog.
23:44 – 24:14 (Sheryl): And even in other stories when the ball arrives at the feet of the bystander and they stoop down to pick up the ball, they find that it’s actually the little girl’s head and not the ball at all. I think though I would be able to tell the difference between a red ball and a human head. Kids have big heads. I mean they’re… your skull doesn’t grow usually as you grow. Yeah, it’s like the size of a human of an adult head. And there’d be hair on top. I think I could tell the difference.
24:15 – 24:25 (Chris): That’s fair. Unless there’s things about Mexicans I don’t know. If you see them in their homeland, they all have spherical red heads.
24:26 – 24:50 (Sheryl): For the next stop along the Mexico City Metro line, we will follow Metro Line 3, which is the longest line in Mexico. Apparently, like Metro’s competitor in New York City, this line is known to be a place where people encounter rodents of unusual size, aka giant rats. The ones from The Princess Bride?
24:51 – 25:12 (Chris): That’s right. Actually quite literally. The northern tunnel along this line has been a place where some people have spotted rats as large as dogs. That’s pretty darn big.
25:13 – 25:28 (Sheryl): You also have to keep in mind that Chihuahuas are from Mexico. Oh. So it could just be a normal rat. Yeah, so it could just be a normal rat, but when they said “dogs,” my first thought was like Freddy’s size dog. And I was like, “That is a big rat.”
25:29 – 25:50 (Chris): You know, they call Chihuahuas “rat dogs.” That’s true, it could have just been a Chihuahua. A Chihuahua of unusual size. Either way, what’s unnerving is that these rats have been known to attack people. During the 1970s there were rumors that a rat the size of a pig attacked and killed a young girl who was waiting for the train with her parents.
25:51 – 26:10 (Chris): Oh, that was a big rat. It is a big rat. On top of all the weird rat activity, some transit workers in the area have reported a deformed fur-covered humanoid figure hiding in the shadows at the station of Tlatelolco station.
26:11 – 26:16 (Chris): You know I’ve seen this episode of Ninja Turtles and that is the Rat King and he controls all the rats, even Master Splinter. That’s right.
26:17 – 26:50 (Sheryl): The Rat Man has also been reported at Viveros station and his strange cries have apparently been heard all the way to Miguel Ángel de Quevedo station, Q-U-E-V-E-D-O. Quevedo. Quevedo. Sounds right. Speaking of strange cries, there is one station situated between two cemeteries: a British cemetery and a Spanish cemetery. And it is known as Panteones station, or in English, Graveyard station.
26:51 – 27:02 (Chris): Nice. We don’t have Graveyard station here. We have like boring ones like Valley Line and Grandin. I don’t even think we have any stations that are stopping near cemeteries. That’s true too. At least we don’t know there’s bodies buried there.
27:03 – 27:26 (Sheryl): At this station, people say they can hear knocking sounds and sometimes a strange shadow will appear a few feet ahead of you and then disappear as you approach. It’s like “Knock knock knock. Hello? I’m not dead.” It’s also said that transit workers in the area hear screaming in the tunnels after hours and upon investigation they cannot find a worldly source for the noises.
27:27 – 27:40 (Chris): That’s unsettling. I mean, if you’ve got a train station between two cemeteries, you kind of have to expect some strange screaming and other entities appearing. I feel like that’s just asking for it. What else are you going to do as a ghost other than wail down the tunnel and see how it carries your unearthly voice?
27:41 – 28:10 (Sheryl): We’ll now travel to an interesting place at the end of the orange line, also called Line Number 7. Barranca del Muerto, which translates to Ravine of the Dead. This station was apparently built near a mass grave for soldiers who were killed during the Mexican Revolution. There is an urban legend from this station where a man who was taking the last train out of Barranca del Muerto station fell asleep in the car and woke up to find the train was parked in the tunnel for the night.
28:11 – 28:34 (Sheryl): But he noticed it was just a short distance from the next station’s platform, so he decided it wasn’t worth waiting till morning to leave, so he got out of the train and walked slowly along the tracks to get back to the station. Suddenly he saw two men fighting on the tracks and it looked like one of the men was in the process of killing the other. The train passenger approached the two men to try break up the fight, but stopped when he realized that the taller of the two men was biting the other on the neck.
28:35 (Chris): Vampire.
28:36 – 28:50 (Sheryl): At this point, the train passenger yelled out “Vampire!” Well done, Chris. I am already trained. And he ran as fast as he could to the nearest police station to report what he had seen. Not surprisingly, the police did not take his story seriously and no formal investigation was launched into the vampire of Orange Line Number 7.
28:51 – 29:10 (Chris): You know what? The cops were like, “I ain’t going, that’s a freaking vampire.” For our next metro stop, we have a slightly less scary story for you. At Tasqueña station, there’s a ghost who helps guide people to the nearby bus station.
29:11 – 29:32 (Chris): That is a helpful ghost. Yeah, so in Mexico City apparently it’s uncommon for bus stations and metro stations to be close together. All right, never should the two meet. So this means you’re often walking like quite the distance to catch your connecting bus. That’s interesting. Like, it’s not all the stations, but here they do combine the LRT and the bus station.
29:33 – 29:49 (Sheryl): Yeah, at least the end of the line. The end of the line usually connects with a bunch of different buses. You’re not just like out in the middle of nowhere. But yeah, it’s apparently very uncommon in Mexico City. So between the bus terminal and the metro terminal at Tasqueña station are booths with various vendors and shops, which can make it easy to get lost when trying to navigate between the two locations.
29:50 – 30:12 (Sheryl): The story about the helpful ghost started sometime in the ’80s when the area was extremely dark, like it had poor lighting, and it was often full of criminals. You were likely to be beaten or robbed or sometimes even murdered if you passed through the area at night. I mean, they… sounds like they should do something about this. I think they fixed the lighting. Okay. I could be wrong, I haven’t been there to check this out, but they made it sound like it’s not a problem anymore.
30:13 – 30:41 (Sheryl): But at the time, people were warned… people were warned to make sure to pass through the area as quickly as possible and to never go alone. The ghost story states that when it’s very late at night and you are alone, an old man will approach you and suggest that the both of you walk together to the metro station. If you agree to take him up on his offer, the man will walk ahead of you and only walk in the shadows until he reaches a dark parking lot near the metro station, where he will completely disappear.
30:42 – 30:52 (Chris): Ah, okay. Shepherding the lost bus people to their station. It is believed that the ghost was a man who was murdered in the parking lot and now walks with people to help them get to the metro station safely. That is like a very courteous ghost.
30:53 – 31:12 (Chris): Imagine that being your like entire afterlife is just walking the same route over and over and over again helping people get to the bus. It’s like, “You know what? It’s not fine, and it’s never going to happen again. Not on my watch.”
31:13 – 31:42 (Sheryl): Another helpful ghost has also been spotted at Pino Suárez station, which is where Line 1 and 2 intersect. Like the story about Line 7, this ghostly encounter occurred after the train had left the station, and a transit worker was checking the line for hazards. He noticed another worker a bit further down the line who was apparently also checking the line for hazards, so he went to confront the other man.
31:43 (Chris): “Okay, this is my job.”
31:44 – 32:22 (Sheryl): The strange employee told the transit worker that it was his job to check the line for hazards, but the first worker didn’t recognize him. So he snapped a photo of the strange man with his phone. The next day, the transit worker showed the photo of the strange man to his supervisor, and the supervisor was shocked. He told the transit worker that he recognized the strange man as an employee who had been killed by a runaway train who struck him while he was completing his track checks at the end of the night. Since this first encounter, various other transit workers have reported seeing the dead employee still checking the tracks near Pino Suárez station.
32:23 – 32:41 (Chris): Ah, cool. He is also a courteous ghost. I wonder if he’s related to the one who accompanies you to the correct bus stop. Oh, maybe. Maybe they’re the same person. You never know. I guess I don’t know how far apart those two transit stations are, so cannot confirm one way or another. If you’re a ghost, you got time.
32:42 – 33:11 (Sheryl): Line 2 is also famous for another ghostly encounter as well. The line intersects with what would have been the center of the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan. Well done. Thank you, it’s fine. So it’s no wonder that people report seeing the ghost of an Aztec man dressed in ancient Aztec clothing at both Pino Suárez and Zócalo stations.
33:12 – 33:42 (Chris): I guess your ghost is going to have the same outfit he had when you died, or at least what was popular at your time. Yeah. There’re also… the ghost is also sometimes spotted in the connecting tunnels as well. During most of the encounters, the man is seen crying and he seems confused. He is heard asking people where he is or trying to figure out what happened to him. In some stories the man is dressed as a Jaguar Knight and he asks people to direct him to the location of his missing army.
33:43 – 34:03 (Chris): You know those stories about like time slips where people suddenly find themselves in the same place but everything has changed and then they eventually find out it’s either 20 years ago or this is 10 years in the future and then like other people corroborate seeing the person? I’m hoping he’s not a ghost and like he actually got back to his own time.
34:04 – 34:24 (Sheryl): Well, so I actually wonder if you’re onto something there, because in other stories the man is dressed as a peasant and he comments to onlookers that he’s disappointed about the destruction of his beautiful city and critiques modern Mexico. “What are these things rolling around on big rubber round things?”
34:25 – 34:42 (Sheryl): And you know what? Like, it feels a little bit unfair because although I haven’t been to Mexico City, from the videos we’ve been watching and the stuff we’ve been looking at, I think it actually is kind of beautiful. It’s true. Maybe they miss when it was more wild. All the greenery and everything.
34:43 – 35:12 (Sheryl): Zócalo station is also the site of another interesting ghost encounter. In 1975 there was a train accident at Viaducto station. This event was the worst accident in the history of Mexico City Metro. 31 people died. Locals believe that because of this, a ghost train can now be spotted at 3:00 a.m. passing from Zócalo station to Allende station. Although Viaducto station is a few stations away from both Zócalo and Allende station, the train was heading along the same line when the accident occurred.
35:13 – 35:32 (Chris): I wonder what happens if you get on the ghost train. Oh, well don’t worry. The ghost train will pass through the stations, but will not stop to pick up any passengers. It is also said that you should avoid falling asleep on the last train of the night between Zócalo and Allende station, because if you do, you’ll wake up passing through a ghost terminal and you may never return to the world of the living.
35:33 – 35:51 (Chris): Oh, and then you’re stuck in ghost world? You’re stuck in ghost world. That’s pretty cool. We should start that tradition here. I mean, the most terrible of train accidents in Edmonton was the car that hit the new LRT line and nobody died.
35:52 – 36:14 (Chris): We should make… you know how on the inside of the public transportation they have the advertisements all along the roof of the bus? We should just make something that goes in there that’s like a PSA: “Don’t fall asleep or you’ll wake up at the ghost station.” Oh, you know what? They have those like “Artists on the Way” things that sometimes show up on the trains. 100% we could write like a story and see if we can submit it to them for that.
36:15 – 36:31 (Chris): Yep. Big time. P.S. This is a true story and tell my family I’m still out here. For our last stop on the Mexico City Metro, not far from where Line 1 and 2 intersect, is a station where the green line and the gray line meets. A junction for Line B and Line 8, which seems confusing.
36:32 – 36:40 (Sheryl): I don’t know why you would have those two intersect with each other. Yeah.
36:41 – 37:13 (Sheryl): But that’s okay. Made sense at the time, probably. The station is known as Garibaldi station. It first opened in 1994 and soon began to play host to a witch… bruja. She is said to be a woman who dresses in black and covers her face in a black veil. I think this is my sister. Well, maybe. She can be seen gliding soundlessly across the platforms and the tracks in the station. Oh yeah, Sydney doesn’t glide. No.
37:14 – 37:34 (Sheryl): It is said that if children are left unattended at Garibaldi station, she will kidnap them, dragging them back to her lair somewhere in the Metro tunnels. Luckily we’re leaving Freddy at home because he would definitely follow the ghost back to her lair. It’s true. He’d probably ask her for pets. Follow her around all the time. Yep. And that ends the tale of the haunted Mexico City Metro.
37:35 – 38:00 (Chris): Ah, very cool. Well, I’m going to keep an eye out for all these things. Yes. I’ll… I’ll send you the… the written script of what I’ve got and you can put together a list of train stations that we need to stop at. Excellent. I’m going to look for balls bouncing. I’m going to look for a shrieking rat-man. And just rodents of unusual size or large Chihuahuas, I’ll look out for them too.
38:01 – 38:29 (Sheryl): And a vampire. And the vampire. Just the one vampire, I’m a little disappointed. We don’t have to worry about the witch because we’re not unattended children, nor do we have unattended children. We’ll have to make a decoy child and just see who runs away with it. If a lady glides along and scoops it up, we follow that lady. I do think we should test her time slip theory, though.
38:30 – 38:52 (Chris): Oh yeah. I don’t know how we do that, but I… I like that idea. Do we tell them? Do we tell them about the Conquistadors and warn them in advance? It’s like, “They’re carrying disease, man, you got to wash your hands.” And maybe burn them before they can touch you. Burn the visitors. They’re not your friends, stay away.
38:53 – 39:21 (Chris): Like, you see all those stories about like how the Spanish showed up and then they burned all of the scrolls and things of the temples and tried to destroy as much as they could about the past. If we could change that… I’m excited to see the history when we’re there, too. Me too. It’s going to be a great time. We will take the ghosts of the Mexican Metro and run it through the Curse-O-Meter now.
39:22 – 39:24: (Machine noise and bird chirp)
39:25 – 39:53 (Sheryl): And the results for the ghosts of the Mexican Metro is: Probably Cursed. It’s not all bad. No. There’re helpful ghosts and there’re less helpful ghosts, and you might be picking up a disembodied head rolling around as a trick by a little girl. Yeah, I… I do have a slight concern about the large rats, I don’t know what could produce rats that size, but we don’t have rats in Alberta, so it’s hard for me to know.
39:54 – 40:21 (Chris): Well, also in Ninja Turtles, it’s called mutagen and it makes your rats humongous. That’s right. We didn’t know back then, but the Ninja Turtles are actually from Mexico. It’s true. And I think… they’re self-taught ninjas. So it doesn’t come as part of the mutagen, so these… these just might be brawlers and not ninjas, which would be harder to fight, I think. Oh, what about Luchadores is the word for like Mexican wrestlers? Yep.
40:22 – 40:48 (Sheryl): What about Teenage Mutant Ninja… or Teenage Mutant Luchador Turtles? I like it. Okay. TM, TM. Yep, it’s our new property now. That’ll be the next podcast or YouTube series. Thank you very much for the tales of the metro lines of Mexico. I really like those stories and I will keep an eye out for the ghosts. Yeah, I’d be curious to see in our future travels if I can find ghost stories before we go that we can go debunk or check out or something.
40:49 – 41:13 (Chris): And if you yourself, the listener, have encountered lost Aztec warriors wandering around Mexico City, you can tell us about it. Email us at probablycursedpodcast@gmail.com. You can also reach out to us on our other social media. We have Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, BlueSky. Yep, and a Tumblr. Nice. And YouTube. We’re all over the place.
41:14 – 41:33 (Sheryl): Yeah, we would love to hear your stories or any episode suggestions you may have. And also a reminder, check out our online shop at probablycursed.etsy.com. You can check out our artifacts, artworks that we’ve made, and the purchase of everything on there helps fund this podcast and gets us closer to our dream of owning a Probably Cursed museum.
41:34 – 41:56 (Chris): Well, that’s it for today’s episode. Be sure to listen to us next month for whatever we come up with by that time. It’s my episode, so I have no ideas yet, but it’ll be good whatever it is. Mine’s already finished. Well done. I wish I could be competent.
41:57 – 42:21 (Sheryl): That… that is the fun of having to work the day before Christmas a full day when there’s no work coming in. I suppose that’s true. Well, until next month, stay spooky. Stay spooky, everyone.
41:22 – 41:43: (Outro music)
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