The Hollywood Roosevelt & Lost Luggage

I will start off with an apology because it's quite a lengthy story with a fair bit of background information.

This story may not seem as spectacular in comparison to some of the others, but as it might just be my first ever paranormal encounter I just had to share it and get some of your thoughts!

First off a little introduction. I'm a 27 year old male and I grew up in the city of Birmingham (England), I have always had an interest in the paranormal, but having never experienced anything personally, I have remained mostly skeptical throughout. I say mostly, as there was always an element of belief due to a story in which my Grandad experienced poltergeist activity. A story, he always described as an unexplainable experience, rather than a ghost story (even after him witnessing items being thrown across the room).

Back in January this year, I found out I had won an incredible prize off of the back of a competition I'd entered in November 2021. The competition was centred around the release of Ghostbusters: Afterlife.

The prize itself, included a 5 day trip to Los Angeles; flights, transfers, accommodation, a Sony studios tour, and a professional paranormal investigation onboard the Queen Mary! I was designated a prize manager, who ran through all of the T's & C's and worked with me to organize the lot! However, I never really noticed the lack of choice in regards to the accommodation! (More on that further on).

Unfortunately, the Queen Mary investigation was unable to be booked for one reason or another, so me and my girlfriend chose an alternative option: Los Angeles: The Fame Kills Tour.

Fast forward to Monday the 16th of May, when we started the trip of our lifetime!. Upon landing in Los Angeles Airport, we had the dreaded situation of our luggage not arriving with us!

A few stressful hours at the airport, filling out forms and trying to get through to the airline via various phone numbers, we simply gave in to the fact we just had to get on with it!

We arrived and checked in to our Hotel, The Hollywood Roosevelt. A beautiful hotel with amazing décor and a celeb filled history, not that it mattered too much to us as we had planned to be out exploring from early until late every day!

On Tuesday morning we had a call stating that our luggage had been found and that it would be sent to our hotel shortly after a flight arriving on Wednesday evening.

Skipping to the tour at 20:00, we set off on the short walk to meet our tour guide. We learned some interesting history about some of the buildings along the walk of fame and some famous hauntings reported in each. The tour eventually circled back to our hotel, which to our complete surprise, formed the final destination and grand finale of the tour! With a multitude of unexplainable stories, experiences, sightings and famous ghostly visitors, such as Carole Lombard and Marilyn Monroe reportedly residing within.

Slightly excited from this new found info, we tried to visit some of the hotspots within the hotel. (Not sure what we were expecting), but of course, we didn't encounter anything.

After a busy day of various activities on the Wednesday, we arrived back at the hotel, to find that our luggage still had not arrived. The idea of late evening drinks in the bar, quickly turned into 'comfy clothes and bed'.

At 5am I was woken up by the other half, asking if I had turned the TV on. Thinking I must have leant on the remote, I fumbled around the bed in search of it, eventually realizing it was still on the bedside table. (Outside of my arm reach). I switched the tv off placed it back on the table and lay back down... A few seconds later, the tv was back on. Dazed and slightly confused, I reached back over and switched it back off, not really thinking much of it.

As soon as I hit the pillow, the tv was lighting up the room for a third time, at this point none of my thoughts were anything out of the ordinary. So I checked the remote buttons weren't sticking, I checked there weren't any additional remotes under the pillows or mattress and gently tapped the walls to see how thick they were. (solid! I certainly don't think the neighbours' remotes signal would have been getting through). After ruling those few things out, I made a joke that maybe this was our ghostly visit! Which of course was followed by eye rolls and skepticism.

However, on the fourth time and (after my initial jokes) the tv turned on once again but this time, we watched on as the tv directly changed channels, it went down a number of times and then back up maybe one or two and back down once! As this is happening, I'm looking at the tv, then at the remote, back at the tv etc. Trying to think logically for any reasons as to why it happened again. Dumbfounded, I just switched it off again and hoped for the best.

For the fifth time, it turned on again! This time however, I proceeded to just keep the tv on, proclaiming that whatever was going on, had beaten my stubbornness. We were wide awake and so we may as well just watch it! By this time I had ruled out as much as I could, (jokingly but not so jokingly) I commented that maybe our luggage had been delivered and this was some communication from a friendly visitor, letting us know. As soon as I had finished those words, the tv turned off to standby mode. (No sleep timer was on on the screen).

Nothing more occurred after that but the sunrise, so after some chatter we were up and about getting ready for an early morning swim before we were due to hit universal studios! On the way down, we thought we would double check if our luggage had arrived. To our joy, there our bags were, stacked behind the reception desk, waiting for us to collect. As we didn't have any ID for proof on us, we thought we'd carry on and come back with it all after a swim. As I started to walk off, the other half turned back and asked the staff member if they knew the time they were delivered. I realized why she was asking and immediately traced back towards the desk. After a few taps on the computer she responded with, "early this morning, around 5am".

Simultaneously, we looked at each other, with what probably looked like a mirrored facial expression, and explained to the lady that we had experienced some "issues" with our TV repeatedly turning on and off at that same time. With no surprise or hesitation she replied that it was likely one their many "residential" guests.

We didn't stay in the pool long, so we went back to the room, my girlfriend jumped in the shower and off I went with our ID to get our stuff. When I returned, my girlfriend was just switching the shower off, so I can hazard a guess that she hadn't left the bathroom! Unsurprisingly, the tv was on, this time with just the main menu open. (which she denies having done whilst I was gone).

At no other point during our stay did the the TV turn on or off, of it's own accord in the same manner as it did. The sceptic in me has thought of many theories, justifications and ideas but it all just comes back full circle, the probability of such coincidence after coincidence is just as mind blowing.