While most costume play fans opt for robotic or cute characters, a group of young people are trying to bring various ghost characters back to life.

The group, JAKK Inc., stands for Jeritan Anda Kepuasan Kami (Your Scream, Our Satisfaction) Incorporation, has indeed lived up to its name.

Founded by best friends Aruga Perbawa Rizqi, Dimas Apriyadi Ramadian, Zoya Rasyidi and Iskandar Muda, the community has received plenty of orders to create haunted houses as well as invitations to spice up a number of events in the city with their ghostly make up and costumes.

In its third year, the club has attracted over 30 active members and has gathered 800 friends on their Facebook page.

'The four of us went to the same high school and joined a Japanese cultural club that featured a session called hyaku monogatari or ghost stories,' Iskandar, 23, told The Jakarta Post.

In the beginning, the four buddies merely shared the same penchant for theatrical horror makeup. Their first experiment was creating a haunted house for Darma Persada University in East Jakarta.

'The first haunted house turned out to be a success, so we decided to focus and set up a club for people who share the same hobby,' Aruga said.

From blood-stained mouths to female ghosts wearing white robes with long straight hair, pale skin and red tears, you name it, they can create it. Most of them have created their own ghost characters, some of which were inspired by local urban folklores, such as kuntilanak (the spirit of woman who died while pregnant).

Iskandar laughed when he revealed that he was once kicked by a girl when he dressed as a crawling ghost in an event.

'Once, a girl fainted in a haunted house. We tried to help her, but when she opened her eyes, she saw us and fainted again,' he said.

After that incident, the club made a rule that only crew members not dressed as characters were allowed to help visitors that fainted.

Marsudi, a member of the club, said he joined the club because he liked the idea of exploring horror characters with people who shared the same passion. He said that he first met Aruga and his friends during a campus event in which he volunteered to dress as a ghost.

'I learn about doing ghost make up and other aspects. We mostly learn things through trial and error,' he said.

One of his creations was called Hell Butcher, which was inspired by the film The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. His latest character was a male ghost with a bloody torn mouth wearing lurik or traditional cloth. During an event, a restaurant employee whispered 'Ki Demang' when he saw him in the costume, so that is what he decided to name the character.

He said Ki Demang was inspired by traditional Javanese song 'Lingsir Wengi'.

'I like to explore local ghosts because to me, kuntilanak and pocong [shrouded ghost] are way scarier than western ghosts,' he said.

Playing with latex to create scary effects and hunting for vintage clothes at Senen market in Central Jakarta are among their activities when they want to experiment with new ghost characters ahead of an event.

Aruga said that during downtime, club members watched horror movies or visited places such as Jeruk Purut cemetery in South Jakarta, vacant old buildings in the Old City in West Jakarta or Prasasti Museum in Central Jakarta.

'We want to preserve urban folklores in this city and redesign them in creative ways. Horror-related things can be fun,' he said.

Although they may like to dress like ghost characters, it does not mean that they are not afraid of ghosts. 'There is a reason why we watch ghost films together. Many of us are afraid to watch them alone,' Aruga said.

Popular

Freezing of protester’s bank account draws flak

Growing regional discontent

Indonesia’s rare earth push faces low-content, costly extraction hurdles