Is "I see a lady on your back" an actual Burnaby joke
Hi everyone,
I'm trying to validate something that happened a couple of years ago that still bugs me.
A few years back, I met my husband’s brother’s boyfriend ("T") for the first time during a trip. On the first night, walking back to our Airbnb after dinner, T and I happened to be walking slightly apart, giving us a brief moment alone. Out of nowhere, T turned to me and casually said:
"I see a lady on your back."
He was essentially acting like he had a "third eye" or medium abilities. I asked "What do you mean?" but didn't push further because I was caught completely off guard. As an atheist, and being the only woman in a group with three men (my husband, his brother, and T), this just felt super creepy and really unfriendly.
When I brought this up to my husband later and expressed how uncomfortable I was, he tried to find reasons to defend T, by claiming that it was probably just a "Burnaby kids thing" since they all grew up in Burnaby, BC.
I've never heard of telling a stranger "a ghost is on your back" as a standard Metro Vancouver/Burnaby joke or cultural quirk.
So I want to ask actual locals here:
Is there any truth to this being a "local joke" in Burnaby or the broader Vancouver area?