They may have been spared the horror of seeing actual ghosts, but authorities in Sragen regency, Indonesia say three people quarantined in a haunted house for breaking a COVID-19 self-isolation order begged and cried to be released from the psychological torture of their containment facility.

Last week, authorities in the regency warned that citizens coming from COVID-19 red zones must self-isolate at home for 14 days or they would be locked inside an abandoned haunted house. Three citizens who violated the order in Sepat village found out the hard way that the authorities were for real.

They only made it to a week.

“The three asked to go home because they were no longer comfortable and they said they were having nightmares. One of them also cried out of fear and boredom,” Sepat village Chief Mulyono told Liputan 6 yesterday.

“But they did not see any ghosts.”

Mulyono added that the three have promised to self-isolate at their respective homes out of fear of returning to the haunted house.

The village chief also believes that the threat of quarantine in the haunted house has worked wonders in convincing villagers to self-isolate. He said that recent returnees have voluntarily shut themselves in at home or in other, non-haunted empty houses as a precaution against the spread of the coronavirus in the village.

There you have it. Traditional incarceration may or may not rehabilitate an Indonesian, but spooking them certainly does the trick.

Related — Men dressed as ‘pocong’ spook village in Central Java into self-isolation

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