Who is Teresa Fidalgo? Debunking the fake ghost story that's got Instagram spooked
Young girl didn't die on a mountain road and she isn't going to kill you with social media
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It seems that the internet's love of nostalgia extends beyond just pop culture, with the Slender Man and copy paste ghost stories like Teresa Fidalgo getting a second wind this year, but how did the dead girl tale start and is there a shred of truth to it?
"I am Teresa Fidalgo and if you don’t post this on 20 other photos I will sleep with you forever," the quote spammed at the bottom of thousands of Instagram pictures this week somewhat ambiguously warns.
"A girl ignored and her mom died 29 days later. You can even search me on google." (sic)
Indeed you can search Teresa on Google, though her extensive search results aren't tantamount to her physical existence but more a catalogue of various regurgitations and reworkings of a story that originates with Portuguese producer David Rebordão's viral video 'A Curva'.
Aping Blair Witch Project, the found footage short sees a car of friends driving in the mountains when they pick up a hitchhiker going by the name Teresa Fidalgo.
Mostly silent, the new passenger eventually points to a spot in the road ahead of the car where she "died", with the camera panning back to her to show her face suddenly bloody before the car crashes.
While numerous White Lady stories like this have been dreamt up over the years, something about the specificity of 'Teresa Fidalgo' and her supposed (but definitely phony) links to a real accident that occurred on a Portuguese road have caught the imagination of easily-scared teenagers.
If common sense doesn't prevail when it comes to the idea of there being a teenage ghost with the supernatural ability to haunt people through social media though, and the fact she is subject to auto-correct errors like the rest of us ('Teresa Dialog' as she goes by on one pic) doesn't diminish her story in any way, take solice in the fact that Rebordão has admitted that the story is fake.
The director told Channel TVI he was very surprised by the story's success and longevity, and is trying to find funding to make new scripted films.
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