In Amsterdam, I stayed at the Grand Amrath Hotel, it’s reputed to be haunted, I didn’t know it because unlike 80% of travellers who read reviews before they book a hotel, I didn’t do any research.

Grand Hotel Amrath â€" located on the historic site where Dutch sea voyages were made from in the 16th and 17th centuries

I stayed there because it was the hotel of choice for the Phocuswright team. It’s a very old hotel. Actually it’s ancient because to us in Asia, any hotel over 30 years is beyond old. The structure was built in 1912 as the head office of six shipping companies. Called Scheepvaarthuis, it was located on a site from where many sea voyages departed during the 16th and 17th centuries. I guess this must be where they departed to colonise Malacca as well as most of what is Indonesia today.

The first room they gave me looked out on a construction site and had a thin layer of dust everywhere. I asked for a change because it reminded me too much of home. My neighbourhood in Singapore is having a new train station built and I now live amid piling, digging and drilling. All the things hotels say about making guests feel at home â€" rubbish. We don’t want to feel at home, we want to feel like we’ve been transported to another place â€" it’s why we travel.

Anyway, I got transported to another room â€" this time, an inside facing room which means it was pretty dark all day and all night.

I am pretty fearless when it comes to ghosts. In Asia, we have a deep and abiding respect for the supernatural. I grew up on stories of Pontianaks (a certain kind of demon in Malaysia) and my own family has their stories of exorcism and possession, a few of which I witnessed growing up.

My friends are always asking me how I can sleep in strange hotel rooms all over the world, especially the old hotels, and I guarantee you if you ask any of your friends from Asia if they’ve had spooky encounters in hotels, they’ll have a story to tell you.

In fact, I remember when I first tried to write a book of fiction, my publisher told me to write a ghost story, it being the best-selling genre in Singapore and he suggested a travel book of ghost stories. I am still working on the idea.

Anyway, I have to confess at the Grand Amrath, I slept each night with the lights on â€" this is an ancient tactic we in Asia think keeps ghosts away. Well, one morning, I woke up with all the lights off and my wardrobe doors open â€" and I imagined someone had come in through the night and tried to dress in the dark.

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