A COUPLE OF months ago, psychologists at the University of Arizona announced the results of a survey they'd recently conducted into whether or not it was possible to contact the dead. Five mediums were asked to communicate with the deceased relatives of two sitters, who sat behind a screen and confined their replies to the words 'yes' and 'no'.
Afterwards, it was calculated that the accuracy rate of the mediums was 83 per cent; a control team, making educated guesses, managed a paltry 36 per cent. Professor Gary Schwartz, the team leader, said: 'Based on our data to date, the most parsimonious explanation is that the mediums are in direct communication with the deceased.' By remarkable coincidence (or perhaps not, such timing being beyond the comprehension of the human spirit), Hong Kong is being visited by international psychics Barbara Ellen and Alan Johnson. The pair, who have been working together for 17 years, aren't partners in the gross, corporeal sense, but are, in the words of esteemed astrologer Linda Goodman, 'twin souls'.
As well as doing readings and giving a variety of lectures and workshops (the usual: auras and chakras, exploring the etheric body, dowsing), they are fully trained mediums. Last week, they held a mediumship night in the New Age Shop. The flyer, while promising 'a moving and gentle evening', warned that mediumship cannot be guaranteed 'as spirits that do not wish to communicate cannot be forced to do so'. Nevertheless, Ellen and Johnson 'have been successfully providing survival evidence for years . . . contacting friends, loved ones and animals that have passed on'.
As it happened, a promised third presence - that of local psychic Claire Graham - was absent, due to illness. This threw no one: Ellen had, of course, predicted earlier in the day that Graham would not be coming. So it was that two mediums, nine punters, a journalist and (according to Ellen's calculation) 'a lot of spirit guides' crammed into the books section at the back of the New Age Shop. Expectations were high: it was the kind of evening when Ellen, peering at a woman in the circle, could ask, 'Your face looks familiar, have we met before?' and the woman could respond, politely: 'No, not in this life.'
Ellen and Johnson are both British. It's important to establish this fact because it explains the low-key, almost cosy, flavour of the next few hours. No juddering, whites-of-eyes spasms occurred; sensational behaviour was tantalisingly alluded to but in a comfortable, dear-oh-dear sort of way. 'Barbara transfigured once in my house, she turned into my ex-girlfriend,' said Johnson. 'Ohhh, that was nasty,' tut-tutted Ellen. 'He tried to throttle me. But I won't do anything spooky like that tonight.' On another occasion, recalled Ellen as part of her warm-up chat, the British actor James Robertson Justice came through 'within half-an-hour of his death, in fact he didn't know he was dead'. Robertson Justice, famous for his ripe performances in the Doctor series films in the 1950s, was obviously determined to keep his thespian end up as ectoplasm, and in Ellen he found a good conduit. Mumsy, firm of opinion ('Angels and archangels are a totally different cup of tea'), yet encouraging ('Oh, you won't know yourself next year'), she's like a nanny who stands no nonsense in the etheric nursery.
In this manner, she proceeded to pluck a name from the air. 'Can anyone take a Robin, living or passed?' she began. A member of the group gave an assent and Ellen mused, 'Has Robin lost a parent? No? Grandfather then . . . Robin has been through a lot of trauma, he's had his troubles, he's not a believer.'