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Your honor, my client pleads ‘not guilty’ by reason of Chupacabra.
The “Chupacabra” defense may not be as absurd as is sounds if you live in Honduras, where a report has surfaced of a man found dead with his shoe off, a bite mark on his “calcañal” (heel) and no blood in his body. While his family would like to blame a human, especially a rich one they can sue for damages, there doesn’t appear to be a suspect. And if there was one, that bite mark and lack of blood would have any good lawyer calling a cryptozoologist as his first witness.
“The day laborer was found dead by his relatives and as they relate, he did not have a drop of blood.”
Not even a bloody hand-print
As reported by Tiempo and HCH Noticias (which show a photo of the area and one of a really fake Chupacabra), the incident occurred on February 13, 2019. The victim was a day laborer or peasant working outdoors in El Naranjo de Siguatepeque, a village high in the Central Mountains of Honduras. He had apparently sat down on a stone to rest and took off his shoes. Those who found his body also found a hole in the ground that they suspect was where the Chupacabra or some other creature came from and attacked the man. No blood remained in his body and it’s assumed none was on the ground because who found him told the media that they suspected a blood-sucking Chupacabra.
Why didn’t they suspect aliens, like many across the central U.S. who find mutilated cattle and other livestock with strange wounds, no blood and no clear evidence of what might have killed them? Well, Chupacabras are part of Honduran legends and have been blamed for many similar livestock deaths, including at least 35 in 2017 in the Monterrey village of Choloma in northwest Honduras, where a young boy witnessed a “white and ugly animal” in a pasture where later some mutilated livestock were found. In April 2018, 30 more cattle killings occurred in a village near Choluteca. Unfortunately, these and many other crimes go unresolved in a country that is short on police, especially honest ones. When even the police blame events like these on Chupacabras, locals wonder if it’s just a convenient excuse for laziness, especially when officials warn people not to get drunk and fall asleep in the street … you could become a victim of a Chupacabra.
No fingerprints?
Or some sicko murderer. Which brings us back to the poor day laborer in El Naranjo de Siguatepeque. His body was found at night, so it appears it was in the same spot for hours. There’s no report of any other wounds by whatever might have killed him or scavengers. There should either be blood on the ground or in the body, although most likely congealed by then. Vampires? The Hondurans would rather believe in Chupacabras. A sicko murderer with a lawyer skilled in the Chupacabra defense? Stranger things have happened.
Let’s just hope that whatever it is, it hasn’t made a permanent move from animals to humans.
Paul Seaburn (CLICK HERE TO READ AND SEE MORE)
I often like to look into reports that truly skirt around the periphery of the paranormal and cryptozoology, he cases that stand out as being particularly odd and baffling. Such cases truly tax the imagination and leave us scrambling to try and explain just what in the world could be going on, and challenge our notions of what we think we know. Here I have collected together an eclectic mix of very weird encounters with everything from jellyfish floating through the sky, to squid-like beasts and octopod monsters roaming the wilderness, so sit back, buckle up, and enjoy this journey to the other side of the bizarre.
One of the stranger things one could see soaring through the skies is a jellyfish, but there are actually numerous reports throughout the world of just that. These incredibly bizarre entities are often reported as looking very similar to a typical jellyfish one would find bobbing about in the sea, only in this case aoring through the air, and in some accounts they are described as being able to change density, color, or size, and to be able to go almost completely transparent, and there have even been cases of some sort of bioluminescence present. They are variously reported as moving about on their own through some unknown form of propulsion or merely at the whim of the air currents, and they are always just about as otherworldly as can be.
There have been particularly strange accounts of encounters with flying jellyfish going back decades. In the 1950s a police man in England claimed to have had a run in with a low flying sky jellyfish as he was riding his bicycle on patrol. He claimed that it drifted right down in front of him and that he actually bumped up against it, describing the sensation as similar to brushing up against a soft blanket, and that it had a slightly unpleasant smell of mildew. In 1958 there was also report from Florida, where a policeman named Faustin Galegos found a translucent purple blob about the size of a soccer ball outside of his house. He claimed that when he had approached it seemed to be some sort of dying creature, and when he picked it up the thing just sort of evaporated in his hands.
A more recent account was given on the site Phantoms and Monsters, and comes from a witness in Perth, Australia, who is referred to merely as “BD.” The witness claims that in 2012 he was out in front of his house one evening having a cigarette when his attention was drawn to the curious sight of the light patterns of the stars being disrupted by something passing over them. At first he thought it might be a plane, but it soon became apparent that this was no aircraft. The witness explains:
As it got closer, the way it moved resembled the way a jellyfish would swim if it was horizontal. It was hard to describe, but it looked to be expanding at the front like a balloon, then using that air to propel itself along. It was roughly 100 meters above me and I watched it for 10 minutes. After that it was out of sight. This was during a clear night sky in Australia. I am very familiar with aircraft as I live relatively close to Jandakot airport and we see/hear them all the time. It was certainly not a machine of any kind.
I yelled out to my Mother-in-Law who was staying at the time to come out and look. She also saw it. I filmed it on my smartphone, but being 8pm at night it was pitch black and you couldn’t see anything. If I had to guess, I would say the feeling I was left with is that it was some kind of creature. It moved gracefully and gradually in large deliberate movements. Like a large bird would do with a large flap of its wings, then gliding for a bit, although this was unlike anything I could describe. It appeared to be translucent in parts and remained at the same altitude and speed but just completely silent.
Amazingly, there was a follow up report from a different witness, who claims that he and a friend saw what appears to be the same or a similar creature around Perth at around the same time as this sighting. The witness says of the creature:
I would like to confirm the story of the flying jellyfish like creature as described on your forum by “BD,” There were two of us actually not just myself. We were in Perth CBD actually having a glass of wine on a quite loud jazz music playing balcony about 10 meters from the ground. I am so thrilled to find out there is another person who has seen this. The creature was behaving exactly as described by “BD” so basically like jellyfish but without any long tentacles – about a size of a balloon.
It was kind of changing according to the different colored lighting attached to the balcony and it was flying upwards so effortlessly. It is really precious I have finally found this. I have been searching for so long. I have to be honest I don’t recall the exact day but it must have been the same night as “BD” mentioned. We had seen it around 9-10pm either friday or saturday. The creature wasn’t too shy either meaning it didn’t fly in a hurry. Would gladly put my hand on my heart on this one and now may actually try to find it again, but who knows how often do they appear.
A very odd claim was posted on the site Norcalblogs, from a commenter calling himself Pie Guevara, who claims that his uncle, an Oscar Guevera, had taken part in a scientific survey of these sorts of creatures in the 1950s and 60s. The remote areas north of San Fransisco had apparently experienced a spate of sightings for over a decade of what were usually referred to as “Space Jellies,” which would congregate in the upper atmosphere along the coast, after which they would soar up into the upper atmosphere out of sight. Pie provides a letter that he allegedly received from his uncle, which outlines the phenomenon and his study of it, and reads:
This coalescence of “space jellies”, as we called them, was assumed to be part of a seasonal migration pattern in and about the western Pacific. With a small joint grant fund from several philanthropic scientific organizations (which shall remain unnamed), I developed a small, high altitude, long distance ultralight aircraft (the first of its kind) assisted by an in-flight deployable and detachable ovoid helium balloon. This platform was developed as it had become evident through observation and experimentation that the behavior of these creatures was disturbed by the approach of larger aircraft. It was not by coincidence that the craft bore a distinct resemblance to the large, presumably mature form, of “space jelly” creatures themselves.
Working within a shoe-string budget, I deployed a modified aqualung attached to a motorcycle helmet and a small forge bellows that was fashioned into a crude but effective and light weight re-breathing system for high altitudes. For warmth I wore a gorilla suit (procured from a costumer’s auction in Emeryville) and had it fitted with a lining of goose down. From below the aircraft was lowered a fair sized grappling hook with several large mackerels tied to it with bailing wire. Inside of six weeks in the fall of 1973 I had snagged most of these diaphanous jelly fish like buggers. None of the captured survived the experience and within minutes dissolved into an odd steamy smoke. On my final expedition, as per standard operating procedure, I reached the specified location at an altitude of 9500 feet, deployed the balloon, and floated up into the remaining few of these creatures which, apparently, died of fright on the spot, dissolving into threadlike wisps before me.
Besides the regrettable loss of the subjects under study there was one more unfortunate circumstance. On the last mission, after jettisoning the balloon, I was flying in from the Pacific over the Farallons at about 5000 feet towards my hidden base of operations in a remote area of [redacted]. I was spotted by a US Navy crew on a practice and shakedown cruise flying a restored antique Consolidated Vultee PB2Y Coronado that was to be displayed in a few days at a Fleet Week exposition near Fisherman’s wharf. They veered off course, followed me, and executed a close and slow pass-by over San Francisco Bay. So close I could see the faces of the pilot and crew. The flying boat then abruptly dropped altitude and beached near the Mare Island Naval Shipyard in what, for all intents and purposes, appeared to be an emergency landing.
Weeks later I learned, through some Navy sources in Vallejo who hung out Fridays at the [redacted] Bar and Grill, that the pilot and crew recovered from the plane had babbled incoherently and for days all they could get out of them was, “Flying fish bear … flying fish bear …” Needless to say this story has never been declassified and likely never will be. The only reason I relate it now is lay to rest any fears that may still exist about these creatures and confident in the knowledge that no one in their right mind would ever actually believe it.
This is truly a far-out and spectacular account, and one can’t help but wonder how much veracity any of it holds. A guy in a gorilla suit collecting flying jellyfish from the upper atmosphere? Flying Fish Bears? It is all quite beyond bizarre. You can’t make this stuff up, folks. In December of 1999 there was a rather unusual sighting of something like this at Vitebsk, in the Republic of Belarus. The two witnesses described the object as being somewhat tubular or cigar-shaped, with a front part that was rounded and asymmetric, and a rear part that seemed blurred. It was apparently a blue and red color, and exhibited a somewhat transparent quality, as well as what looked to be some sort of flickering bioluminescence. Whatever it was moved with a sort of undulating movement and made no noise during the sighting, and after a while it was reported as just vanishing into thin air. The witnesses would claim that it was not an aircraft, and that they had had the distinct impression that it was a living creature, saying it somewhat resembled an animal known as the glass squid (Cranchiidae).
Glass squid
What could such creatures be? One idea is that they are a type of theoretical organism known as an “atmospheric beast.” Atmospheric beasts, or atmospheric life-forms, as they are often called, are said to be organisms that live their entire lives floating high in the atmosphere, undetected by humans. These creatures are most often described as having bodies that are semi-solid, or almost insubstantial, with some reports even claiming that they are able to adjust their density from almost immaterial and invisible to more solid, depending on as yet unknown factors. Numerous theories have been posited as to how such seemingly fantastical organisms could manage to stay adrift in the air, such as air bladders or very low body densities.
The appearance of these atmospheric beasts varies wildly. Accounts have variously described them as amorphous and cloud-like behemoths, finned squid-like creatures, floating jellyfish, translucent, vaporous blobs, flitting rods, amoeba-like organisms, gelatinous oddities, and even dragons. The sizes of atmospheric beasts likewise run the gamut from tiny and bird-like, to gargantuan monsters hundreds of feet long. Although these enigmatic creatures are said to typically lurk too high in the atmosphere or to be too insubstantial to see with the naked eye, there are instances when one might become observable for some reason. Indeed, there has been a substantial amount of sightings reports over the years from all over the world describing unusual flying monsters that do not fit into the typical mold of thunderbirds or other flying cryptids. These atmospheric life forms have even allegedly been photographed, and there have been reports of the gelatinous remains of dead ones on occasion. Are such sightings evidence of this type of lifeform?
While flying jellyfish are weird enough, let’s move on to something just about as strange. One thing that one would not typically expect to find out walking around on land is an octopod beast, but there have been some downright surreal reports of these as well. One earlier and very weird case comes from the battlefields of World War II, in particular the Battle of Okinawa, in Japan. Lasting from April until June of 1945, the 82-day-long battle was envisioned as the first step in a planned eventual invasion of the Japanese Okinawa Islands and on to the mainland. It was the largest amphibious assault of the Pacific Theater, and saw some of the fiercest, most intense, and bloodiest fighting of the entire war. From here among the many scattered dead bodies strewn about in the aftermath of the fighting come some odd tales of encounters some Japanese troops allegedly had with something very bizarre indeed.
Fighting at the Battle of Okinawa
There are some scattered stories of Japanese troops surveying the smoking battlefields and telling of seeing what appeared to be very large octopuses picking through the corpses. These creatures were said to be around 4 feet in height, and rather than slither about like one would expect a normal octopus to do, they were said to walk about on their tentacles with their heads held above the ground. When one of the beasts was startled or on alert, it would apparently stretch its tentacles up to hold its head higher, like a camera mounted upon a tripod. Making it all more sinister is that the soldiers who saw these creatures claimed that they seemed to be actually coming to feed upon the corpses of the fallen. It is hard to know what to make of these reports, and one wonders if it just wasn’t a spooky forgotten wartime legend of the battlefield.
Then we have what has come to be known as the “Octosquatch.” In the summer of 1961, a 29-year-old truck driver named Arquimedes Sanchez was driving along a precipitous mountain road through the Basque mountains in Spain at around 11PM, along with an unnamed companion, on their way to the town of Puerto de Barazar. As they rounded a bend, their headlights hit a bizarre and rather monstrous being standing upon an embankment nearby, which prompted the pair to stop their vehicle.
When they peered through the murk ahead of them they claim that they saw a “hairy octopus,” which stood around 4 feet tall, with glowing eyes and “tentacle-like” arms. The witnesses and the thing apparently sat there completely frozen and immobile for several minutes, both parties probably just as startled and scared as the other, before Sanchez snapped out of it and slammed the accelerator, which caused the weird apparition to scurry backwards away from the threat, after which Sanchez backed up and tried again, apparently intent on running it over. Interestingly, the otherworldly intruder refused to take off into the night, instead always just managing to avoid being run over, as if it were all a game. Finally the two men, neither who were willing to step out of the vehicle to investigate, drove off to leave the being behind, never to be seen again.
In more recent years, in December of 2014 there was a very odd report taken by the Mutual UFO Network (MUFON), concerning an outlandish bipedal creature that was sighted and almost hit by a car in the vicinity of the sleepy town of Carmel, in Highland County, Ohio. The witnesses, a former Marine and his wife, had just moved to the area, and one evening they were driving along the rural road through a wooded area towards their home when a 7-foot-tall creature with muscular, very bendable, tentacle-like legs, and a tubular body without any arms or head ran in front of their car and into the woods on the other side of the road, narrowly avoiding being hit by the vehicle in the process.
It would later be described as being a dull, sickly grey in color and looking sort of like a “walking squid,” and after the report was featured in the local paper there was a lot of speculation as to what it might be. One of the most popular ideas is that this was merely a misidentified deer that had just happened to be witnessed in a strange, bipedal pose. This sort of makes sense, as white-tailed deer are known to rear up on their hind legs and even take a few steps in that position, but it seems odd that one would walk so far, and it doesn’t really seem to totally match the witnesses’ description. Interestingly, the witnesses also claimed that there was a large sphere of grass near their house that is always greener than the surroundings and where snow does not gather, so make of that what you will. Whatever it is, the “Walking Squid” Of Carmel, Ohio, is a truly bizarre case that can’t easily be explained away.
Here we have looked at an array of utterly bizarre tales of jellyfish, squid, and octopus-like creatures popping up in the oddest of places. These obviously could not be considered normal examples of these types of animals, so what were they? Some sort of undiscovered species? Aliens? Interdimensional interlopers? Are they just tall tales or hallucinations? No matter what the answer may be, these are certainly highly odd cases that go beyond the strange, and elude any easy classification.
Brent Swancer (CLICK HERE TO READ AND SEE MORE)
Few things about the workings of the human mind are more unusual than dreams. Even while the body sleeps, our minds remain incredibly active, often producing vivid, colorful imagery and scenarios that border the fantastic.
While there is still debate about the psychology of dreams, and what role they may play in understanding the workings of the human mind, a unique hospice study currently underway in the northeast is revealing unique insights into what occurs in the mind during the process of dying.
Dr. Christopher Kerr, chief medical officer at Hospice Buffalo, has been involved in the study of dreams for many years. According to the facility’s website, Kerr’s research background involves several past studies that focused on dreams and visions experienced by patients toward the end of their lives. “The results of his studies generated enormous response in the non-medical community, both nationally and internationally, through coverage that has included the New York Times, Huffington Post, The Atlantic, BBC, Scientific American and Psychology Today.”
One of the common features of end-of-life dreams is the appearance of loved ones. A recent CBS feature out of Pittsburg described how one of Kerr’s patients, a man named Horace, described seeing his wife appear “suddenly” in a dream he had. Another woman described seeing her deceased sister appear to her in a similar dream.
In other instances, entire groups of deceased family members were reportedly seen in dreams preceding death. One woman described seeing the faces of family members that included her parents, an uncle, and a brother-in-law.
Common to all of these experiences is the feeling of comfort that the patients described having felt after experiencing such dreams.
Dreams and visions the likes of those described in Kerr’s research might be categorized as part of the broader phenomenon known as the “near-death experience.” The term was coined in the 1970s by psychologist Ramond Moody, M.D., who detailed such experiences in his popular 1975 book, Life After Life. Among the characteristics Moody used to define near-death experiences where:
As Kerr describes, such experiences are largely ignored by the medical community, despite the fact that they often appear to lend an element of calm and comfort—at times, even insight—for the terminally ill and dying.
“What we know of dying is based on what we’ve seen as witnesses,” Kerr said in a TEDx talk he gave about his work in 2015, noting the often grim and unsettling perceptions many have about death and the dying process.
“So if there’s light in the process of dying, it’s in the experience, not in the observing.”
Micah Hanks (CLICK HERE TO READ AND SEE MORE)
Silver State Monsters: Cryptids & Legends of Nevada is the new book from David Weatherly. You’ll know David from his previous books Black Eyed Children and Strange Intruders (among others). As you’ll guess from the title of David’s new book, this one is focused on the subject of Cryptozoology, or the study of unknown animals. And, as you’ll also see, it’s very much a regional study of strange creatures. I particularly like regional-based books on unknown animals, mainly because you’re far more likely to get highly detailed accounts, rather than brief entries in a book that might be focused on a nationwide or worldwide study. And, with that said, let’s take a look at the book. It’s good to see that the foreword comes from Lyle Blackburn, one of the leading figures in the field of Bigfoot-based research.
As Lyle notes of David: “He’s the type of researcher that puts his weathered boots on the ground in order to evaluate the latest in paranormal cases, as well as those which have become staples in our modern culture. And now with Silver State Monsters, David hits the road again, this time to explore a land that’s literally steeped in mystery.” Lyle’s words are important, as they accurately show that David is one of those who regularly hits the road and goes on expeditions in search of the creatures he’s writing about. In other words, David is not an armchair researcher. In fact, an armchair researcher is the very last thing that Cryptozoology needs. There’s no real alternative to getting out into the field, which is exactly what David does. And that approach shines throughout the pages of Silver State Monsters.
I guess that many people view Nevada as a huge desert, known for being home to Las Vegas and Area 51. But, as this book shows, there’s way more going on, all of a beastly and monstrous nature. David begins with an excellent chapter titled “Water Creatures in the Desert.” We’re talking about Nevada’s equivalents of Nessie, Champ and Ogopogo. We learn of an 1868 case from the Aurora, Nevada newspaper, the Esmeralda Union, which describes the sighting, by one Reuben Strathers, of a beast with “a head in shape not unlike that of the crocodile, with forefeet near the neck, with with tail of enormous length, which lay perfectly quiet, and only the body part moving, which apparently was covered with scales, glistening in the morning sun.”
Then, there’s the story of a bizarre monster seen in Lake Tahoe. It tells of something that sounds like it came straight out of the pages of an H.P. Lovecraft novel. The description of the animal was of “an upside-down pink bowl with legs – or tentacles I suppose – coming out of it; too many to count…it made a noise, like it was struggling to breathe, loud wheezing.” Bizarre? Yep! But, as David shows Lake Tahoe has a long history of mysterious beasts in its depths. In fact, David devotes no less than thirteen pages to what has become known as “Tahoe Tessie.” Similarly, we get nine pages on the “Walker Lake Serpent,” which is described as an immense snake-like animal, and known to the local Native Americans. Add to that the mysterious, ominous, crying “Water Babies” of Pyramid Lake and what you have is an excellent section on Nevada’s water-based “things” of the very weird type.
When you think of Nevada, you probably don’t think of Bigfoot. But, you should. Although I was aware of a number of Bigfoot reports from Nevada, I wasn’t aware of the sheer level of such reports of what David refers to as “Sasquatch, Giants & Wildmen.” One such report, from 1973, describes an encounter reported by two couples out at Lake Tahoe – a place we have already addressed in relation to lake-monsters. In this case, the creature was described as “shiny,” “about seven feet tall,” and with a face “like a gorilla’s.” It’s interesting to note that now and again reports surface of more than one type of cryptid seen in the same area, and that one is a perfect example. Then, there’s the very weird matter of the Bigfoot seen on the highly sensitive Nevada Test Site in 1980. It’s a strange tale that blends cryptozoology and conspiracy into one heady mix. As does the saga of “Battle Mountain Bigfoot,” which focuses on what the U.S. Government may know about Bigfoot in Nevada.
Check out the chapter “Giants in the Deserts,” too. This is an excellent section of the book, which details David’s very own road-trip to Nevada’s Lovelock Cave, a place which has – for some researchers – become inextricably connected to Bigfoot lore. David tackles the matter of ancient legends of the Paiutes, and of giant and dangerous creatures said to roam the land centuries ago. And he does so in a very balanced fashion, scrutinizing the various theories that have been put forward to try and understand the truth behind the tales. David says: “While the legends are fascinating, the obvious question is how much truth is there to the whole story…? Were these creatures, these giant cannibals, just a part of the spiritual belief system of the tribe? Were they pure mythology?” A great deal of sensationalized material has been written about this particular saga and it’s to David’s credit that he handles it all in a responsible fashion.
In the final sections of the book we are treated to accounts of what are referred to as “flying anomalies.” Not quite something along the lines of Mothman, but things akin to Native American Thunderbirds. A UFO connection to unknown animals is studied in a genuinely weird case from 1925. Giant snakes are profiled, as is a spiky cat known as the “Cactus Cat.” And everything rounds off with the matter of Nevada’s “Hell Dogs,” which are not unlike the “Phantom Black Dogs” of the U.K. For fans of Cryptozoology, this is a book not to be missed.
Nick Redfern (CLICK HERE TO READ AND SEE MORE)
A small marsupial relative that lived with the dinosaurs 69 million years ago has been discovered in the Arctic. The creature, which was the size of a mouse, lived on the northernmost landmass which means that at that high latitude it would have been in complete darkness for four months of the year.
Jaelyn Eberle, who is the curator of vertebrate paleontology at the University of Colorado, Boulder Museum of Natural History, and one of the people who discovered the new species, discussed the surprising discovery by saying, “We don’t think about finding tiny marsupials at 85 degrees north latitude.”
Although the Earth’s climate was warmer 69 million years ago than it is today, the Arctic’s average temperature still would have only been about 43 degrees Fahrenheit. Eberle suggested that these creatures perhaps lived in burrows underground because of the cold weather. It would have also ran around the conifer forests where the dinosaurs roamed, such as the meat-eating relative of the Tyrannosaurus rex and the herbivore duck-billed dinosaurs.
The side of a steep riverbank in Alaska was where scientists discovered the jawbone as well as the tiny teeth of the animal which they named Unnuakomys hutchisoni. In the native Inupiaq language, “unnuak” translates to “night” while “mys” is the Greek word for “mouse”.
(This is not the “night mouse”)
Studies conducted revealed that the “night mouse” was part of a group named Metatheria which also consists of marsupials from today. It only weighed approximately one ounce and it is believed that it ate insects because of its sharp teeth.
In other news, an Arabian Caracal has been spotted in Jebel Hafeet National Park in Al Ain, United Arab Emirates. The sand-colored, medium-sized cat with long, tufted black ears was last seen in Abu Dhabi 35 years ago in 1984.
The footage of the caracal was captured on one of the more-than 45 cameras that are operated by the Environment Agency – Abu Dhabi (EAD). They use these cameras to monitor animal species that are considered to be threatened in Abu Dhabi. What’s even more amazing is that they were able to take photographs of the male caracal during the day as well as at night.
Picture of a Caracal
While there are caracals in the mountainous areas, it’s rare to see one on the Arabian Peninsula because of the destruction of habitat as well as illegal hunting in the area. In fact, it was so rarely seen that it was considered to be extinct in the wild.
“The rediscovery of the Arabian Caracal in Abu Dhabi highlights not only the importance of the preservation of vital habitats in the emirate, but also sheds light on the advanced research tools and methods we apply to learn more about our environment and all that it encompasses,” said Dr. Shaikha Salem Al Dhaheri who is the acting secretary-general at EAD.
Jocelyne LeBlanc (CLICK HERE TO READ AND SEE MORE)
If you know who Peppa Pig is, you’re obviously a parent of a pre-school child. If you know who Momo is, you’re obviously a concerned parent of children who may have heard about the alleged bizarre suicide challenge associated with this equally bizarre character. If you know that Momo has infiltrated Peppa Pig videos, you’re obviously the parent of a child at a primary school in England who has been warned by school officials that your child may be watching videos and receiving instructions to turn on the gas in the house or perform some other destructive act. Whatever happened to fun and harmless cartoons like Elmer Fudd chasing Bugs Bunny while singing “Kill da wabbit!”? Never mind.
We have become increasingly aware of highly inappropriate videos circulating online and are being viewed by children across the school. These video clips are appearing on many social media sites and YouTube (including Kids YouTube). One of the videos starts innocently, like the start of a Peppa Pig episode for example, but quickly turn into an altered version with violence and offensive language.
Another video clip is going by the name of ‘MoMo’ which shows a warped white mask which is promoting children to do dangerous tasks without telling their parents. Examples we have noticed in school include asking the children to turn the gas on or to find and take tablets.
As you can imagine, this is highly distressing for the children to view. We encourage you to be vigilant when your child is using any device or watching any clips. We would also encourage all parents/carers to remind the children of our school online rules:
KS1: If it upsets you, switch off the screen and tell an adult.
KS2: Save it, block it, report it.
If you have any concerns or questions, please speak to your child’s class teacher.
The Manchester Evening News reports that the above message was posted on the Facebook page of Haslingden Primary School in Rossendale, Lancashire, after a concerned parent in Bolton south of Lancashire reported that her son’s teacher told her the boy was threatening other students. When confronted, the boy blamed Momo, who had told him to tell other students that Momo was coming after them too. Soon after the news hit, Northcott Community Special School in Hull issued a similar warning, as did other schools in the UK. Another child reportedly cut some of her hair off after watching a Momo video. (You can see the video here … if you dare.) There’s no word on whether YouTube or the makers of Peppa Pig have any comments.
The real Momo sculpture
Why the building hysteria? If you recall, the Momo suicide challenge was blamed for the death by hanging of a 12-year-old girl in Argentina in 2018. The figure itself is a sculpture created by Japanese doll artist Midori Hayashi for the special effects company, which has no connection to the Momo challenge. While the furor seemed to die down later in the year, it looks like it’s back again with a younger target audience, at least in the UK. Experts say the most sinister aspect of the meme is not the instructions to kill or self-harm but that fact that whoever wrote the app is collecting data on the user.
Why isn’t this latest Momo/Peppa Pig hysteria permeating the always susceptible parents in the U.S.? It could be that they’re more concerned about Peppa Pig, which is being blamed for teaching young American kids to speak with a British accent. Really!
Peppa Pig
If you’re concerned about Momo, talk to your kids, monitor their phone and computer usage, get to know their friends, talk to their teachers and be a parent.
If you’re concerned about Peppa Pig, you probably don’t want your kids watching Pepe Le Pew either.
Paul Seaburn (CLICK HERE TO READ AND SEE MORE)
For centuries there has been the idea that the soul can exist independently of the body, and many practices and philosophies have sprouted up around the notion that we can intentionally cause this to happen. The basic concept behind what is called “astral projection,” is that with enough training and focus one can cultivate the ability to willfully eject their soul from their physical bodies and observe the physical world or other more spiritual realms free from the tethers of their earthly body. It essentially like dying and having one’s soul released, only without the death part and the option to return back into one’s physical body when the journey is complete. When disengaged from the body it is claimed that the disembodied soul can travel vast distances, allowing us to see faraway places as if we are really there. Considering this, would it be possible for someone to astrally project to space, or even other worlds and beyond? According to some very weird accounts, yes.
A basic idea among those who subscribe to the idea that astral projection is real is that there is no reason why one should not be able to bventure out beyond our own planet. Apparently it is totally possible, as an article on The N.I.T.E. Post explains:
Outer space is technically still on the physical realm, and as such subject to exploration via astral projection. But because outer space is vast beyond imagining, the distance travelled by astral projectors will vary depending on their focus and skill. Leading astral projection figures, Robert Bruce and Robert Monroe, both claimed to have astral projected deep into space, seeing the celestial bodies that are part of our solar system. Of course, it is very difficult to concretely confirm whether or not what they are able to see is actually in the physical realm, or simply a manifestation in the astral realm, because scientific instruments are not yet that advanced to accurately visually observe what astral projections see in detail.
Ok, then. Are you with us so far? Amazingly, there are reports of people projecting themselves to other worlds going way back. One of the earliest and weirdest of such reports is the case of the Swedish philosopher, inventor, scientist, and mystic, Emanuel Swedenborg, who claimed that in 1774 he had a potent spiritual awakening. During this time, he said he gained the power to open his mind to speak with angels or demons, and to make psychic journeys, an ability which he used to travel across Heaven, Hell, and to other parts of the solar system, not through the power of any technology, but through the power of God.
Swedenborg spectacularly claimed that he had been guided along on this journey by God and angels, and that he saw many wondrous things in other parts of our universe. Among his many detailed accounts, some of the more interesting are what he claimed to have seen in our solar system. He said that he had visited Mars, the Moon, Mercury, Saturn, Jupiter, and Venus, and that each of these places had their own unique civilizations. The Martians were described as being totally without body hair and wearing tree bark for clothing. They apparently lived in a peaceful Utopian society where there was no crime or war. On Venus there were claimed to be two races of people, a benevolent, peaceful tribe, and another dedicated to violence, war, and thievery. Saturn had its humble people who lived simple lives and buried their dead by covering the bodies with leaves. The people of Mercury were said to wear tight-fitting clothing and to be stern and serious deep thinkers and philosophers, while the population of Jupiter were jovial jokesters and liked to walk about on their hands. The Moon was supposedly populated by a race of stout dwarves with booming voices, of which Swedenborg would write:
The inhabitants of the Moon are small, like children of six or seven years old; at the same time they have the strength of men like ourselves. Their voices roll like thunder, and the sound proceeds from the belly, because the moon is in quite a different atmosphere from the other planets.
In 1884 there is an account of a medium referred to as Hélène Smith, in France, and whose story was written of by the hypnotist and occultist Theodore Flourney. It was claimed that Ms. Smith could go into a trance and project her consciousness to the planet Mars, where she would tell Flourney of the wondrous sights she was seeing there in real time. Flourney wrote of one such mind-boggling session as follows:
From the beginning … Mlle. Smith perceived, in the distance and at a great height, a bright light. Then she felt a tremor which almost caused her heart to cease beating, after which it seemed to her as though her head were empty and as if she were no longer in the body. She found herself in a dense fog, which changed successively from blue to a vivid rose color, to gray, and then to black. She is floating, she says, and the table, supporting itself on one leg, seemed to express a very curious floating movement. Then she sees a star growing larger, always larger, and becomes finally ‘as large as our house.’ Hélène feels that she is ascending; then the table gives, by raps: ‘Lemaitre, that which you have so long desired!’ Mlle. Smith, who had been ill at ease, finds herself feeling better, she distinguishes three enormous globes, one of them very beautiful. ‘On what am I walking?’ she asks. And the table replies: ‘On a world—Mars.’
Hélène then began a description of all strange things which presented themselves to her view, and caused her as much surprise as amusement. Carriages without horses or wheels, emitting sparks as they glided by; houses with fountains on the roof; a cradle having for curtains an angel made of iron with outstretched wings, etc. What seemed less strange were people exactly like the inhabitants of our earth, save that both sexes wore the same costume, formed of trousers, very ample, and a long blouse, drawn tight about the waist and decorated with various designs. The child in the cradle was exactly like our children, according to the sketch which Hélène made from memory after the séance….
We are struck by two points, the complete identity of the Martian world, taken in its chief points, with the world in which we live, and its puerile originality in a host of minor details…. One would say that it was the work of a young scholar to whom had been given the task of trying to invent a world as different as possible from ours, but real and who had conscientiously applied himself to it loosening the reins of his childish fancy in regard to a multitude of minor points in the limits of what appeared admissible according to his short and narrow experience. All the traits that I discover in the author of the Martian romance can be summed up in a single phrase, its profoundly infantile character.
It is all very strange indeed, and she would make meticulous notes and sketches of what she saw during these enigmatic excursions. Indeed, so detailed were her accounts that she was even supposedly able to translate the Martian language into French, and that the language has “an acoustic quality altogether its own due to the predominance of certain sounds, and has a peculiar intonation difficult to describe. Flourney was obviously not impressed, though, taking it all to be quite delusional.
In 1898, two Victorian occultists, a stockbroker and second-generation spiritualist by the name of Frederick Leigh Gardner and a theater manager named Annie Horniman, both of whom were involved in the occult movement called the Golden Dawn, and both of whom thought they had what it took to project astrally to other worlds, got together to do just that. They would claim that over the course of many sessions they were able to travel all over the solar system, encountering a winged and armored man on Saturn, “a greyness of dust and cobwebs and a strong atmosphere of illusion” on Jupiter, and various other wonders on Venus, Mars, and Mercury, the only limit being that they seemed unable to travel to the sun.
Such fanciful claims continue into the 1900s, and one of these was organized by another member of the Golden Dawn named Dorothea Hunter, this time their destination the planet Mars. In December of 1900 they gathered at a flat and began the ceremony, which involved hexagrams, incantations, and visualization exercises, and Hunter would write of this ritual in part:
We sat in a semi-circle at the north side of the Altar, facing the South, when Mars was in Virgo at the time. Deo Date then made the Invoking Hexagrams of Mars round the room […] We then mentally formulated the Hexagram of Mars in red light at that point of the compass. The upper triangle appeared flaming, and an armed figure of somewhat earthly type appeared to look through it. […] We did not stop to examine this figure much, but went through the Hex, astrally, and found ourselves in a region of flames [where] a gigantic, mail-clad Angel appeared, with winged helmet, and great flame-coloured wings from his shoulders. There was some diversity of opinion concerning his sword. […] Then we vibrated the Names and rose in what we thought at first was a blade-shaped shaft of White Light. . . We seemed to have been led through the path of Mars on to a solar plane. All the planets are but rays, or differentiations of the Sun, it is true, but some special teaching was evidently to be given us by this abrupt transition from Mars.
Mars was apparently a popular destination for astral projection during the era, it would seem. In the early 1900s there was also the purported 1906 psychic journey of a Sackville G. Leyson, who happened to be the president of the “Society for Psychical Research” at the time. Through astral projection, Leyson said he had managed to travel to Mars, of which he gave a quite detailed description. According to Leyson, the landscape was perpetually shrouded in red clouds and mist, and there was an odd substance like snow that often fell, but which was not cold and made the ground soft.
He said that the planet was populated by two different races of beings with vastly different physical appearances. One was a race of hulking giants covered in hair, who towered over him and had a single eye in the middle of their foreheads, elephant-like ears, the nose of a lion, and who lived in rock huts above-ground. There was also claimed to be a smaller race of dwarves, who only came up to Leyson’s knees. These diminutive creatures supposedly lived in underground lairs, had webbed hands and feet, a fish-like face with no nose, bulbous eyes on the sides of their heads, and the ability to scale sheer walls like an insect. It is widely believed that this report was likely a piece of creative journalism, but it is certainly strange enough to warrant mention.
There are many other such reports from the 20th century, and considering the very outlandish descriptions that we now know to be false, it seems that this all must merely be the wild imaginings of a time before we had the technology to understand our solar system, mixed with the pervasive popularity of the occult and spirit mediumship of the era. Yet such wild tales of astral travel to other worlds have persisted well into the modern day as well. One practitioner of astral projection named Monal Bhoyar gives a typically bonkers account of this, claiming to have travelled to Mars and Jupiter in 1975, 1976, and 1977. Bhoynar claims that his excursion to Jupiter was carried out in August of 1977, and he makes it very clear that these observations were made before the Voyager II passed the planet. Of Jupiter he would say:
There is preponderance of yellow and purple colours in the sky of the Jupiter. No other colour was seen in the sky of Jupiter. There was a greenish shade in the yellow, which was in the sky. The clouds were of the purple colour, they were gathering together rapidly and disappearing rapidly. These clouds were quite thick having greater density as compared to our clouds. They moved just like moss on water. If we throw a stone in the pond, this moss quickly moves away and quickly comes together, similar was the movement of the clouds of the Jupiter. On the Jupiter there was dim light similar to the light present in Maharashtra at about 7.30 pm. in the month of September. I did not see the Sun there.
The sky on the Jupiter was not blue like ours, but it was darkish. I saw three full moons in the sky situated like the sign of “therefore” in mathematics. It appeared like a triangle of the Moons. Then I saw four full moons at a time, as if a square of the Moons ia formed. Later on, I saw many moons about five to six, at a time, – all were half-moons On my right hand was their lighted half portion, while on my left hand was their dark half region. The moons were shining considerably less than our moon, and were smaller in size than our moon, about 3/4th the diameter of our moon. I saw a band of multiple black round bodies in the sky as is shown in the figure, like a scorpion.
In my previous experiment of Mars, I felt that I was standing on the ground of the Mars. But this time, I could not feel that I was standing on the ground of the Jupiter; I felt that I was floating. There was black rock. There was no dust. There was no breeze of the wind. There was no sound of any kind. There was no beauty seen in the sky, as I saw in the sky of the Mars, so I did not feel enthusiastic and happy. On the contrary, I felt depressed and morose. On the Jupiter, there was no water, running or stagnant. There was no human, no beast, no bird, no insect, no plant, and no other life. I could not see any Astral body, too, on the Jupiter.
This particular account was apparently published in various newspapers in India, such as the Indian Express and Tarun Bharat, among others, and the witness even claimed to have sent his amazing results to the Indian Prime Minister on 27th October 1977 and received receipts as proof. Is there any truth to it? Who knows? More recent and perhaps even more bizarre is a poster on Quora who claimed in 2018 thread that for years he had been to various other planets, sometimes far in the past, through astral projection, and says of this:
My journeys to the other planets began years ago when I awoke one night in the soul body to find an olive-complexioned, Asian-looking monk in a tan robe standing in my bedroom. He asked me to come with him and then vanished into a hole in the ceiling. Leaving my physical body behind, I followed and saw him flying up what looked like a fluorescent tube or tunnel. About midway up the tunnel gravity seemed to reverse and we dropped down onto the starlit surface of an alien planet. When I uttered surprise at how bright the stars were, my guide explained that the planet was Mars and that the brightness was due to its very thin atmosphere.
We were standing in a desert landscape with arid plains in the foreground and dark mountain ranges in the distance. The monk pointed across the rock-strewn plain where hooded figures in brown or tan robes were being chased by soldiers in jeep-like vehicles. The robed monks appeared to be heavily outnumbered and outgunned. Many were shot and killed by their pursuers, while only a few made it to safety in the mountains. My guide informed me that the monks were freedom fighters struggling against the tyranny of the ruling class. From my position in orbit, I send out a telepathic call to all my friends – Souls on the surface below who might want to assist me.
Soon I behold many Soul forms ascending rapidly from below and gathering in a great swarm around me. When all who want to come are present, we begin chanting the word HU, which is a powerful mantra to connect us to the Sound Current. With the power of the HU behind and within us, we accelerate out into space to our destination. For my part, I have been to the moon in the soul body on several occasions and have never found any signs of life there. It was just as airless and barren for me as it was for the Apollo astronauts when they physically set foot on it.
What, no moon cities and dwarfs? Adding to the overall weirdness is another recent account from a witness named Ian McLaren, who claims that he can also travel to other worlds through astral projection, even planets that we know nothing of. In this case he claims to have been to the ominous and mysterious planet Nibiru, a theoretical planet which some paranormal enthusiasts argue will at one point collide with Earth to cause a massive, extinction-event cataclysm. Yet according to this witness it seems like an alright place for the most part. He claims:
At one stall I met two humanoid spirit guides who invited me to join them on a short journey to the Sirius Constellation which took about 10 minutes each way (there is no speed limit on astral travel) where we landed on planet Nibiru which was lit by three co-ordinated suns (Sirius A, B and C). When one sun set, the next in sequence rose so the planet was never in darkness. Nibirans are chosen from earth humans who have qualified and shown themselves worthy of immortality. As there is no such thing as death on Nibiru the only option for any spirits who are getting unduly bored with eternal life, is to return to earth for another cycle of reincarnations until they can again “work their passage” and can quality for transfer to to a higher plane. Part of the test for life on Nibiru is to convince the assessment panel that you embrace the Quaker tradition of pacifist lifestyle as on Nibiru there are no Armed Forces. Death is not an option.
There is no Police force as there is no crime. There are no medical facilities, nurses, doctors or hospitals as no one ever gets injured or falls sick. Everyone arrives at Nibiru with a comprehensive education so no schools, colleges or University with their associated stresses. On arrival my two Spirit Guides logged me in to the Visitor’s Book and we started our tour. Clothes are optional as it is a very comfortable climate. We walked forward along a path and into a fresh water lake. Having fully functioning gills/lungs there was no risk of drowning. I stroked a fish of the style of a dolphin and lay on its back while it took me on a tour of the lake. I noticed that aircraft were solar powered with having limitless light. Speedboats derived their power from the water and the use of dis-similar metals. All parachutists landed safely so no broken ankles and they were able to walk away from every landing. All food options were vegetarian. It is my choice of planet if I maintain a good record for the remainder of this incarnation. I’ve had quite enough of the way things are going on this plane even if it is relatively civilised compared to the lower, darker planes.
What in the world? Is any of this remotely even plausible or have we derailed completely off the deep end? All of these accounts seem to go far out beyond the ordinary, and while colorful and certainly interesting one is left ot try and figure out what to make of it all. Is there anything to the idea that one can travel out beyond their physical form to reach space and other planets? Or is this all a bunch of mumbo jumbo that has no basis in reality? These tales seem to offer no proof either way, and remain just entertaining and curious anecdotes, leaving the whole concept quite an outlandish trip into the bizarre that will probably not have any sensible conclusion that we can all relate to any time soon.
Brent Swancer (CLICK HERE TO READ AND SEE MORE)
