One of the Japanese religions and the Jewish Faith point of origin the same?

After poking through some of the Blogs I gander at when things are slow at work, I came across one about the Jewish Faith and the Shinto Religion.

At first the title of it looked like something you'd see at the Super Market tabloid section.

It would quite odd to learn that some of the Japanese people in Japan are actually one of 12 Tribes from Israel who had to roam the desert.

See and read for yourself, thanks to Japan Probe and other sources.



Zionfestival
Uploaded by oniazuma

Part 2

Here are some Links read through regarding this comparison:

http://oniazuma.wordpress.com/2007/11/14/are-japanese-jewish-looking-at-the-mysterious-connections-between-japan-and-judaism/

http://www5.ocn.ne.jp/~magi9/isracame.htm


I plan on discussing some of these findings with Aya, though I know she is from a different religion and may not be know about Judaism, Christianity and Shinto.

This is Halloween

Aya expressed that she was interested in the American traditions such as Halloween and Christmas.

I thought it was only fair to introduce her to what teenagers enjoy during the spooky season.

We took a trip with my daughter’s arts & craft club to Salem, Massachusetts. The town was having a festival specifically to celebrate Halloween and the fact that Salem is deemed the town in America to have its first Witch Trials back circa late 1700’s.

It was a little over 2 hours to get there and once there we did a lot of walking. She entered one of the Nation’s first candy shops there and viewed the “House of the 7 Gables” from the parking lot. Heard it was an interesting tour (though we did not have time to do the tour).

Some of the bizarre things we viewed that days while walking around town was this family dressed in blood-spattered clothing (much like the people in the Texas Chainsaw Massacre movie) walking around pushing a baby carriage fully of severed body parts (disturbing to say the least) – it’s the side of the Halloween that could be left to the imagination. I supposed one could call it a roving art exhibit of the macabre.

We also isolated a date to visit a Haunted House walk-through (not a real one). I was doing a search on the web for something fun, similar to what I was used to as a kid and found this place in Douglas, Ma.

The Haunted Mansion Douglas

Of course, the night I choose was dark and stormy, literally. Fortunately for October, the weather wasn’t freezing. The rain was relentless – I can’t remember the last time I was more drenched – though I had partial cover from an umbrella and wore what I thought was a water-proof jacket. The cue for entry of this event was winding outside by a garage. The entry fee of course was the best part – all we had to do is purchase canned goods (vegetables and the like). At first I thought, how good could a thing like this that doesn’t charge real admission – I later was surprised all the work these people put into, I left impressed.

I brought all my daughters (Aya and my own). I hadn’t completely made up my mind about bringing my youngest 10 to this place, but since no one else was home to watch her, I thought she would be able to handle it; and she did.

Though Halloween has passed, I did pick up pumpkins to carve one night this week – it’s not just the day, but the events she will remember and bring home with her.

She had made a few friends at school, one of whom is that girl from Thailand who invited Aya to go Trick-or-Treating. Even though we expressed our dismay, since she is approaching 18 years old and that American kids aren't usually given candy at that age if they go door-to-door. She went to a neighboring town where there are more homes in close proximity (more candy) and accepts older teens (probably in lieu of getting their cars toilet papered, eagerly give out candy instead).

Final Matsuri!

Today we awoke bright and early to get to the Big-E (Eastern States Exhibition). This is a fair we've gone to almost every year it took place since I can remember. The parking can be crazy and this being the last day of the fair, we would find ourselves with all the late-comers.

It was a perfect day out, the temperature did not go above 80 deg. F and the sky was a Windows XP Desktop background blue with white puffy clouds (since I am typing on my laptop, I can see my desktop which closely resembled the day).

Our first target was hitting the States buildings (they have a state building for each state in New England) and inside there are vendors for a variety of businesses in that state (some food, clothing and jewelery). We love to visit the Maine State Building which has as long as I can remember those Main Baked Potato's with everything on for toppings, ohhhh so tasty!

We would come back for dinner at the Rhode Island State building to grab New England Clam chowder in a bread bowl and a couple of bags of Clam Cakes (my mouth is salivating again).

There are these large building with more vendors inside for items of your home and anything else that doesn't fit a category. Needless to say our feet and legs were sore after spending 10 hours walking around.

Near the end of the day we went to the Midway section (amusement rides and games), we never play the games since the chances of winning is slim-2-none. My own daughters went on elevated rotating swings and then the Flying Bob's which is like the old Music Express (rotating cars to music - forward and reverse at some fast speed). We asked Aya several times if she wanted to ride, but she turned each down (we were surprised). Alas came the Ferris Wheel, which Aya agreed to ride. She later explained that she visited Hawaii and rode a ride called the Zipper (cars climb and tumble in Ferris Wheel sort-of-way but vertically and narrow). After that it was "Once Bitten, Twice Shy".

The day ended with a parade complete with marching bands, floats with a hint of Mardi Gras (it's not just Tuesday I feel fat) and horse drawn carts like the Budweiser horses. They threw out beads from the floats (we all ended up getting something).

On the long ride home, all but the driver had fell asleep.

Metal Gear Solid: Code name Snake?

I know this isn't related to anything Okinawa or New England, but thought how amazing technology and robots are these days. I can't keep wondering if we are heading towards the day Terminator becomes a reality.

Farenheight 101

The kids went off the school on Monday, it was back to the usual grind after a long Labor Day Weekend.

Aya seemed to be more quiet than usual and then we noticed she was coming down with something. This is an awkward situation because now you have someone who is ill in your home that has never dealt with being away from the comforts of her home.

She complained of a headache and more of body aches, she brought along some of her own medicine from Japan (sort of little packets of power) which looked like it was from the Old School days when medicines weren't in these pills we take today but in some weighed formula on a gram scale.

She had some strips that she read her own temperature and said 38C which doesn't register since we still think in Fahrenheit and chose to use our Ear Thermometer 101 F. As my old high school teacher used to say, "You look like something the cat dragged in." - she sort of fit that description. I told her she would be wise to sit this one out and not force yourself to school, she agreed.

My fear is she will fall behind in her school work, where basically each day for her would be like 2 days for normal kids since there is some translation to consider and the time to digest what was learned lost.

She's been in bed all day except for lunch - if this continues we will have to take her to seek medical attention, oddly there are no doctors who will take the organizations insurance, only the hospital which means we would have to visit the E.R. in order to be seen and evaluated. (Not something to look forward to, most E.R. were and still are a pain since you have to sit for hours sometimes just to get Triage from the nurse.

Poking around on the net like I normally do at night, I found this little article. A hard sell, but an oddity in of itself.

REIKI 霊気

My path to the world of healing and spirituality started and progressed along with raising my three sons. In 1989, my first son, one year old then, started running a high fever. I gave him a medicine for fever and three days later his temperature was still running high. I did not know what to do. Then I remembered a book on an old Japanese hand healing method I had read and it described a healing technique, receiving universal energy thru your left hand and sending it
out through your right hand. Not really expecting it to work, I decided to give it a try and put my right hand on my son. To my surprise, it worked! It brought down his temperature in no time. Since then, I continued to experience this
magic, “I put my hands on and the problem goes away”. Every time any of my sons got sick, I helped them heal by putting my hand on them. Still it was not something I was properly taught and I had no idea on how and why it works….

Makes an interesting bed time story.