This is a Kapre. A very well known character in the Philippine folklore. I had heard and read a lot of stories about it and I am not sure if I will believe in them or not until I heard from my own father. Yes, my dad told me of a story when he was still young maybe he was five or six years old when he had a weird experience.
According to him, it was 3:00 in the morning month of December when it happened. He was one of the youngest in their family and his older siblings woke him up that early so he can attend the early morning mass of the misa de galo. There were no other means of going to the church on a wee hour so my dad and his other siblings just walk a mile long distance going to the church in town.
After attending the mass, they had to walk back home and take the same long route. The sky is still dark, the weather cold and the surroundings creepy because of some hauling heard from stray dogs. My dad who is young back then could not catch up with the older ones and that was the time he had a glimpse of the unknown.
He was trying to do a big stride but could not move when he saw a big bunch of ember fell from a kaimito tree. Young as he was and innocent as he can be, he stared at the falling ember and wondered what it was. He called out his company and soon all of them came running towards him to see the tree. Everyone was shocked to witness little by little some glowing embers fall to the ground and disappeared as it hit the ground. My dad is clueless about the whole thing but the elder ones knew what it was and one of them shouted "kapreeee" that was the first time he heard about the kapre. Everyone ran as fast as he could and my dad was left crying.
That is how my dad can recall that experience which I believe in. I am not sure if there are still kapre's around but I would not want to have an encounter with them. The illustration here shows how the artist perceive the kapre to be. If you notice the drawing kind of tells me that the kapre blends in the background because he is so huge and therefore no one really sees how he looks like but that is the artist's own interpretation although I read and heard that kapre's are tall, with lots of hair and they smoke a big cigar.
I hope you enjoyed reading this real story of my dad. Thank you for reading.
credit goes to https://www.tumblr.com/blog/steempilipinas