My name is Manuela Ballen, I am 44 years old and I live in Johannesburg, South Africa.

A few weeks ago I had an experience which I feel is worth mentioning.

I live in a street where all our houses are only on one side of the road and opposite us is the school field. There are beautiful oak trees lining the pavement opposite us and the street lights are normally quite dim because they are partly obscured by the trees.

It was quite windy that evening and I had gone to bed after my bath. I normally sleep with my curtains open (I do not know the reason) and I feel quite relaxed as the street light shines into my room, just enough for me to see what is in my bedroom.

I remember quite clearly being absolutely 100% awake, I was not even sleepy at all. Suddenly there was this bright, bright light that filled my room, coming from the window. I remember watching this beam as it rose from floor level right up almost to the roof. It was so bright it looked like it was coming from a spotlight. I also remember listening for the sounds of a helicopter (we do have them flying over our area quite often actually) or a police car but there was just this silence (actually come to think of it I couldn’t even hear the wind). I was feeling quite scared at the time (I don’t get scared often because I lived in a haunted house when I was a teenager and believe me, coming face to face with a poltergeist who throws you out of bed against the wall and tries to kill you – this was mild).

After a few minutes the light was gone and I went to the window but saw nothing. The next night it was exactly the same weather conditions and I lay in bed watching the street light shining into my room. Believe me the light was nowhere as bright as I had seen the night before.

The only thing I regret was that I had not looked at the time when I saw the light and when it had gone because perhaps I would have lost time.

I am certain I was contacted and I will be undergoing regressive hypnosis to find out if I was indeed “abducted” as I have a feeling I was.

I have a 13 year old daughter who also had an experience when she was about 2 and a half years old (I am telling this on her behalf because she has no recollection of it whatsoever)

My daughter was sleeping the one evening (when she was 2 and a half) and she woke up saying that “they want me to play with them”. I asked her who and she said “the children behind the curtains”. I went to look and saw no one. She then looked at me, quite seriously, and asked me “can’t you hear them calling me?”, I asked her what they looked like and she said “they are little with no hair and big eyes”. I got the shock of my life cause I knew she was talking about Greys. I then told her that if they asked her to play she should say “no” because her mom said she couldn’t play with them.

There were no more incidents after that except when she was about 10 or 11 and she kept saying she saw aliens in the curtains.

She still has to fall asleep (even now) with her curtains open, the light and the tv on and only when she is asleep can we switch if off.

My daughter also seems to exist most of the time in the “dream world” where she can just “switch off” anytime she chooses, her concentration levels are not too wonderful. Don’t know if there’s a connection to all of this.

What actually has my interest is the fact that both my daughter and I have to sleep with our curtains open, there seems to be a pattern here. I know in abduction cases there seems to be family connections.

Well these are our experiences……

- UPDATE - 2003/08/13 -

I remember seeing a shadow just before the light disappeared from my room. The next morning I got up to go to the bathroom and what came out of me can only be described as "not the norm". Three big egg size gelatinous blobs of a greenish blue colour came out of me. As these blobs hit the water at the bottom of the loo they made a hissing sound and the blobs separated into tinier blobs (like mercury hitting a solid surface). The next time I went to the loo there was nothing. I have also had flashes of images of the beings with whom I had my experience.

These beings are much taller than the average greys, they were certainly taller than me (I am 5 foot 6 inches). Their skin was more white than the greys and the eyes werent as prominent a feature. They had a bigger nose and bigger mouth as well. They had bulbous fingers which were very long. I can remember feeling like a cattle being probed and prodded but these flashes are few and far between. I have done a lot of work with my Spirit Guide and he tells me that I was gone for 50 minutes, these beings did try and harvest eggs from me but they were unsuccessful.

I did ask my Guide if I have any hybrid offspring alive (which would be awful, knowing that a part of me is living with these beings) but fortunately there are none. I couldnt bring myself to ask him if there were any that died".

That is what has been happening to me these past few days. I was interviewed by Voorblad (Kyknet DSTV) and my interview was aired on 1 April 2003. I must say that I was treated with great respect and dignity and I have great respect for Voorblad's professionalism.