Paranormal Magazine

A reported sighting this month of Okanagan Lake in Canada’s renowned Ogopogo has sparked curiosity as to whether Cadboro Bay’s mysterious water monster has surfaced recently.

Cadborosaurus willsi, affectionately known as “Caddy,” was last spotted several years ago off the shores of Galiano Island, according to Paul Leblond, a retired University of British Columbia oceanography professor who wrote a book on the Cadborosaurus in 1995.

“The search is still ongoing,” he said.

Leblond said Jason Walton, vice-president of the B.C. Scientific Cryptozoology Club, keeps a video camera at Telegraph Cove monitoring the waters for a hint of the sea serpent.

The woman who claimed she spotted Ogopogo this month said she noticed waves in the water of Okanagan Lake and snapped a photo, thinking it might be the legendary lake creature.

Leblond said his threshold of proof for Caddy sightings are higher than those who documented the Ogopogo sighting. He needs specific details, like a hump, an eye or a head, he said.

“Hell, waves are all over the place,” he said.

The first sighting of the leviathan dates back to 1932, just off Chatham Island. Since then, there have been hundreds of reported sightings among the waves of Cadboro Bay, which sparked the name Cadborosaurus.

People who say they have seen it describe a serpent-like creature with a long neck and horse-like head.

Tammy Voak, who grew up in Oak Bay, says she used to hear stories about a creature lurking in the waters as a kid, but has since dismissed it as Island folklore.

“You’d think you’d see more of it if it was out there,” she said, as she watched her kids play on the only likeness of the Caddy which can be seen now, the 100-foot-long play structure in Gyro Park modelled after the green serpent. “Yeah, you need proof,” piped in her 11-year-old son Dustin.

But Victoria’s version of the Loch Ness monster did carry enough credence to spark a short-lived tourist attraction, Caddy Tours, which operated from 2003 to 2005. The tour’s former operations manager, Eric Hildebrandt, said there was not a sea monster to be found during any of his tours, which also included viewing of other marine wildlife around Discovery Island.

He doubts the serpent exists, but said his riders enjoyed getting lost in a tale of mystery at sea. “There’s not a lot of mystery left in life,” said Hildebrandt. “So for people to believe in something mythical like that, it makes them feel kind of good.”

While Leblond likes the idea of the homegrown, entrancing tale as much the next Islander, he wants scientific proof to either validate or repudiate the murmurings about the monster.

“We hope that eventually it’s going to be cleared up. Either someone is going to catch one or it will be stranded somewhere or someone will get a photograph,” he said. “Until then, it remains a mystery.”

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Gary McKinnon has lost his appeal in the UK’s House of Lords against extradition to the US on hacking charges. The BBC News website profiles his history and his motives.

Tanzania’s President Jakaya Kikwete has condemned witchdoctors who kill albinos and harvest their body parts in the hope it will bring prosperity.

He said 19 albinos had been murdered since March 2007, and another two were missing presumed dead in the east African country.

“Sometimes, word spreads around that body parts of people with certain physical attributes like bald people or albinos contribute greatly to attaining quick prosperity,” Kikwete said in a monthly state of the nation speech late on Wednesday.

“These killings are shameful and distressing to our society,” he added.

Albinos are often accused in Tanzania of being witches themselves.

There are an estimated 270,000 people who suffer from the condition which stops them producing pigment in their skin, hair and eyes in the country of 39 million.

Kikwete blamed charlatan witchdoctors, many masquerading as traditional healers, for extracting body parts such as genitals, tongues and breasts.

“Many of the witchcraft killings happen because of a false belief that by using other peoples’ body parts they can succeed in business or in activities like mining or fishing,” Kikwete said.

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The new style Paranormal magazine hit the shelves today and needless to say we’re all pretty chuffed with it.

It was quite a challenge. I met Jazz Magazines’ publisher David Gamble and MD Stuart Mears on May 21 – and on June 2, I was in the editor’s chair, with less than four weeks to create a new magazine from scratch. Of course, we have taken nothing from the previous incarnation of the magazine other than its title, so that meant finding a new stable of writers and commission them for articles in very short order.

David was tasked with creating the new magazine’s look and I’m sure you’ll agree he’s done a blinder. With limited resources at times in terms of the imagery I was able to offer him, David designed dramatic, eye-catching pages guaranteed to grab the attention. I can imagine hosts of unsuspecting shoppers drawn in, mesmorised, by that scary eye on the front cover.

For me it has been a particular pleasure to chat with writers whose work I have read and admired for years and years, including Janet Bord, Karl Shuker and Paul Devereux. Every writer I spoke to said ‘Yes’ and each turned in a fantastic feature – and all ahead of an already tight deadline, for which I feel much gratitude.

Thanks to these writers, Jazz Publishing’s first issue of Paranormal magazine – actually, issue 27 – presents a varied and fascinating mix of mystery, a satisfying smorgasbord of strangeness.

No all I have to do – is do it all again!

And for that I’ll need your help. I’m keen for Paranormal to provide a platform for readers’ own experiences. Perhaps you have heard footsteps in a room you knew to be empty. Maybe you have seen a ghost or a UFO, or glimpsed a strange creature out in the countryside near your home. An extraordinary coincidence may have occurred in your life or an incident you dreamed about one night took place some time in the future precisely as you had dreamt it.

You are warmly invited to email in your own stories: I’ll do my best to find space for them in the magazine.

It’s a weird world out there and we’re all part of it.

UFOS have been popping up en masse over Texas and Brazil recently, grounding planes in Chicago, menacing Indiana Jones and the Energizer Bunny, and planting themselves firmly in the minds of the American public.

The spaceships arrived in San Jose this past weekend, as the floating annual symposium of the Mutual UFO Network (MUFON) was held this year at the Doubletree Inn. Co-organized by local businessman Les Valez (founder of the Organization for Paranormal Understanding and Support) MUFON ‘08 attracted nearly 600 registrants with presentations like “Britain’s X-Files,” “Resolving Current Reporting Bias of Pilots” and “Chilean Army Investigates UFOs.”

Alejandro Rojas, MUFON’s press agent, quoted from the ad campaign for the new X-Files movie, responding to the common perception that UFO researchers have hyperactive imaginations.

“We don’t want to believe,” he said. “The evidence led us to believe.”

While several attendees debated the purpose of alien visitations, there was no real consensus among the collection of researchers, field investigators, interested skeptics and “experiencers.” It’s agreed, at the very least, that so-called “UAPs” (Unidentified Aerial Phenomena, the new, politically correct replacement for the much-maligned “UFOs”), are “an observed technology beyond our own.”

Ted Roe, co-founder and executive director of NARCAP (the National Aviation Reporting Center on Anomalous Phenomena), said the Air Force coined the term “UFO” to be objective. “But just the opposite has come to be the case,” he said.

Nick Pope, who investigated UFO sightings for the British Ministry of Defence, summed up the belief of many of the attendees: “It’s always been my contention that this is a defense and aviation safety issue … and the government is the only group which can do a proper investigation.”

The hottest selling item at the MUFON shop, a sky blue T-shirt emblazoned with the phrase “Doing the Air Force’s job since 1969,” sums up the UFOlogists’ sense of above-board governmental interest in the topic. But recent sightings in Texas, a number of television shows, the 2006 sighting over Chicago’s O’Hare airport and astronaut Edgar Mitchell’s recent statements, have all contributed to a renewed interest among the general public.

“Ultimately, this subject is events-led,” Pope said, explaining that the U.K. is in the middle of the biggest wave of sightings in decades. “When they’re filmed over military bases and reported by police, it’s little wonder that our biggest daily newspaper has made this a front page story.” To much applause, he continued: “Can you imagine that happening in the States?”

Although Texas state director Ken Cherry put MUFON on the “international map” by getting the word out about January sightings in Stephenville, Texas, the federal government has yet to release any kind of official statement—on anything UFO-related. (Cherry’s report helped increase sightings reported to MUFON from 200 to 800 a month.)

While half of the attendees were local, others traveled from as far afield as Tennessee, Canada and Mexico. The international panel of speakers included a retired Belgian major general, an army pilot from Chile, an attorney from Peru and researchers from Mexico and Turkey.

Larry Lemke, a San Jose–based aerospace engineer who develops space mission projects for NASA, said he applied “the process of scientific and engineering analysis to UFO reports to uncover their cryptic aspects.”

I also learned that the hot spot replacing Area 51 is on the border of Colorado and Utah, and that some “experiencers” can draw down UFOs almost at will. One conference attendee claimed that military-grade night-vision infrared glasses can make the skies “look busier than the 101 freeway.”

The majority of speakers went out of their way to avoid such terms as “alien” and “extra-terrestrial.” From the podium, Ted Roe practically admitted that MUFON attendees telling tales of alien abduction are deluded.

“Most of the UFO community doesn’t know that there’s not one proven incursion by nonhuman intelligence,” Roe said.

That being said, many of the attendees claimed to have been affected or even traumatized by what they’ve either sighted or encountered. One Pennsylvania “experiencer” said he has been contacted and abducted by a number of different alien races.

“They’re here because radiation puts holes in space time,” he said, also informing me that pyramid-shaped UFOs are “evil” while pointing to his chest, the location of an alien implant.

The MUFON conference is one of the few places where he feels at home.

Researcher Leslie Kean, who organized a press conference aimed at governmental UFO disclosure, called for an honest discussion about unexplained phenomena.

“We deserve more openness and a serious pursuit of the facts,” Kean said.

A number of countries—including France, Britain, Mexico, Brazil, Chile and Ecuador—have already made their UFO files available to the public. “The U.S. is holding everybody else back,” she said.

“Our government doesn’t mind scaring us,” one attendee commented. “They do it all the time. I’d prefer some kind of recognition of this phenomenon, which is just as relevant as a terrorist alert, and less frightening.”

Hopkins said during the closing panel that from his research with abductees, “We don’t have much that’s pleasant or benign.” With that in mind, co-organizer Valez urges locals who feel they’ve had an experience to get in touch with OPUS. Intersecting with MUFON, the group helps “people who have had paranormal experiences.”

“Paranormal,” for OPUS, has mostly meant out-of-this-world. “There’s no question that something is happening,” said Valez, who helped get the MUFON conference held here for the first time since the 1960s. “Perhaps it’s extraterrestrial in nature. Or time-travelers, or interdimensional beings.”

Another notion is that there’s element of UFO action that’s military, and definitely terrestrial.

“It could be all of these planes that we’re dealing with,” Valez said. “The point is, we still don’t have the tools or the terminology.”

The world is abuzz with talk of the year 2012; however, not everyone is looking forward to the year with the same outlook or expectations. For some, the year hints at apocalyptic end times, a period in which the world will be thrown into utter chaos and violent upheaval. A turbulent and tumultuous epoch in which both natural and man-made disasters will decimate and possibly lead to the extinction of life as we know it. Other, more optimistic people perceive this date as a moment of awakening, a massive global transformation of consciousness…one which is to be anticipated with joy and celebration. Perhaps, the real outcome lies somewhere between the two extremes.

The mythology behind the 2012 enigma focuses on the ancient Mayan Long Count Calendar which was a Mesoamerican calendar system that mysteriously ends on December 21, 2012. Interestingly enough, that date also coincides with the winter solstice. This date further corresponds with a predicted “galactic alignment” which is believed to occur when our solar system passes directly through the center of the Milky Way galaxy. Although there is some valid argument for other “end dates” as prescribed by the intricate and sophisticated Mayan calendar, including the alternate end date of October 28, 2011 (as well as an end date of December 23, 2012, rather than December 21), most experts who have studied the Long Count agree that time is coming to an end. But what kind of an end? In the human mind, the etymology of the word “end” conjures a certain finality – one in which there is no hope. Thousands of years before our current civilization, did this seemingly simple agrarian society actually predict that life would end altogether, snuffed out in an explosive supernova of disaster upon plague, warfare upon extermination? Both the Judeo-Christian and Islamic end time scenarios, which are based upon Western fundamentalist Abrahamic thought, do indeed herald a time of literal cleansing. A time when the earth will suffer through the coming of the Four Horsemen bearing gifts of war, famine, plague and death – with the ultimate judgment day not too far behind. Certainly, there is ample evidence in other religious traditions of an ending of one age, as in the Hindu “yugas” or ages that mark a cyclical pattern of both external and internal creation and destruction.

This ongoing cycle or “kalpa” also has an end date when, according to Hindu belief, the final avatar will incarnate as Kali and bring about the destruction of all wicked people. Is that likewise an “end?” Even the oldest creation stories and mythologies tell of a cosmic cycle punctuated by a Big Ending, so to speak, although many native traditions believe that the end, though violent and deadly to be sure, would then be the beginning of a new era of peace, harmony and enlightenment. 2 The Mayans themselves have suggested that their own end date is really nothing more than the finishing point of a particular age or “underworld,” the one we are living in right now, the Galactic Underworld, and the entry point into the Universal Underworld of both conscious evolution and revolution. There is nothing in Mayan tradition, lore or belief that envisages a scenario in which we will all die and the planet will cease to exist. Rather, the idea is one of amazing and collective rebirth. A period of newfound cosmic awareness, an era in which humanity expands their collective conscious awareness. Then why all the angst and fear when people speak of 2012? Maybe, the answer is within us. Perhaps it is as simple as basic human psychology. Nobody likes change, especially when it is preceded by great stress, trials, tribulations, and challenges, the likes of which we are already seeing in the years leading up to 2012. Even if we were to ignore completely the Mayan Long Count Calendar and its Aztec sister version (which speaks of the very same end time transformation) and even if we did not ascribe to the religious traditions that await total human annihilation at the hands of a final battle between the devil and the Christ (don’t worry, the good guys will be raptured, we are told!), there is still ample evidence that the next few years will be rife with chaos, disorder and destruction. Why? Because what we resist persists and often grows, and if there is indeed a wave of spiritual transformation gaining momentum, then coming resistance will be more than enough to make us wonder if we will, indeed, wake up to a brave new world on the first morning of 2013. As we have seen over the last several years, global power is shifting to the East, with economic turmoil already gripping much of the West in a headlock of plunging home values, rising energy costs, shaky markets, and a widening gap between the rich and the poor. As we approach (if we have not already) peak oil, the quest for easily extracted fuel will exponentially increase–even as the population skyrockets in urbanized areas as well as in nations such as China and India which will only serve to further demand while supplies continue dwindling to depletion. Access to potable water threatens to plunge the entire globe into new wars, even as corporations scramble to privatize what little natural resources remain. Global climate change is destroying indigenous and island lifestyles, and creating chaos all over the world as more nations are forced to deal with brutal drought, while others battle unprecedented flooding. Warm places are getting warmer, Arctic Ice is melting, and the unfortunate people of Tuvalu are watching as their entire island sinks mercilessly into rising ocean waters. Malaria, a humid-weather disease, is moving into highlands where it never existed before while other diseases threaten to derail any attempts by our most cutting edge pharmaceuticals to fight them. West Nile Virus, SARS, MRSA and avian flu all seem poised to pounce upon nations of people unprepared for pandemics, let alone regional epidemics. And lest you think our public health and emergency preparedness systems 3 will save us, let me remind you of the horrendous failings apparent during Hurricane Katrina. But don’t despair! The news is not all awful. Science, medicine and technology promise to explode into the stratosphere in the coming years. Computer technology historically follows an established pattern known as “Moore’s Law” which describes an important trend in the history of computer hardware whereby the number of transistors that can be inexpensively placed on an integrated circuits increase exponentially, doubling approximately every two years. Some technologists believe that this increase is steadfastly moving towards a “singularity,” when growth, development and transformation will come together in a climactic head, ushering in a brave new world of artificial intelligence. Before we know it, life itself will seem to be a sci-fi movie! Quantum computers, bioengineering, human longevity experiments, and nanotechnology stand at the forefront of major advances in the way we live, and even die. With astonishing new genetic research, we may one day see the end of all disease. With the promising new exploration of bionics, we may never need worry about heart or liver failure again, knowing that we can order a new one that combines the best of both computer technology and biology – creating new types of living systems that promise to change not only our quality of life…but our whole culture itself. Naturally, some may fear the rise of artificial intelligence and the coming singularity due to the (perhaps warranted) concern that humans will be somehow made obsolete – or worse, that we may lose control to the very machinery that we created…machinery that can think faster and more efficiently than we do. Others still wait excitedly for the development of technologies which will make life easier than ever. However, even the promise of an easier life comes with a price. Rising rates of heart disease, cancer and obesity are directly linked with the increasingly sedentary lifestyles of most developed nations. Add to that existing rates of disease in undeveloped nations, and emerging diseases entering and re-entering the fray, and humanity may not be wiped out at all by a big, bold natural disaster or nuclear war. Alarmingly enough, we may get snuffed out by the tiniest of threats, those packing the biggest punch of all – viruses that invade our bodies. Viruses pose a very real, very significant threat to humankind as our bodies are too weak and stressed to fight back, with pharmaceuticals rendered ineffective from years of overuse.

Surprisingly, the greatest challenges that face humanity and the earth in general, over the next few years are all preventable. With that being said, the biggest mystery is why we are not doing more to prevent them now…while we still can…and when it truly counts. Global climate change is creating a need for new ways of co-existing with the earth. Already, water shortages are threatening to derail peace agreements and further escalate already tense relations between nations into the stratosphere of war. Even the decreasing rates of food production, coupled with over inflated prices and a global market that favors the rich, hint at another coming disaster; the spread of famine into regions never having experienced lack of food before. 4 So what can we do as individuals, communities, and nations? How does one prepare for 2012? If the world is going to end for good, then obviously no preparation is needed. However, if the Mayans and others were right, and the ending is really more of a beginning, can we indeed prepare at all? The green movement, focusing on building sustainability now, is a great place to start. We should be doing anything possible to make the coming changes less disruptive and damaging, whether that means conserving, recycling or raising awareness of the carbon “footprints” we each leave…and how we can lessen those footprints. Local communities are already springing up around the concept of contained, sustainable living, with residents pitching in by growing food, sharing water resources, bartering services and even watching out for each other’s children to create a new sense of connectedness and unity. Should this effort spread, we may be able to greatly diminish the potential for death, disaster and disease that our overpopulated, stressed out and soon-to-be tapped out planet is quickly plummeting towards. Ultimately, the year 2012 may be more about internal transformation rather than external change. Even with increasing numbers of super storms and earthquakes, an asteroid or two coming too close for comfort, the highest sunspot cycle activity in years, global shifts in political and economic power, and a host of other earthbound changes, we may need to concentrate on the internal work to be done first. Spiritual transformation is on the lips of many awaiting 2012. Perhaps by altering our collective consciousness we can change not only our own lives, but our destiny as a people. Wouldn’t it be great to wake up on the first morning of 2013 to a better world than we ever imagined? The problem is that before we can realise it…we must first have both the insight and the foresight to imagine it.

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GHOST hunters are heading for Leeds to team up with the award-winning, multi-ghost haunted, Thackray Medical Museum.

The overnight event on July 26, between 7pm and 2am, features a special ‘haunted history’ tour of the building detailing real-life experiences from the museum’s history.

Spooky sightings at the museum include a ghost of a woman known as the ‘grey lady’ in 19th century clothing seen waving to staff on the second floor, and the ghost of a man in a white coat seen by visitors around the recreation of the museum’s Victorian Street.

Workhouse

The museum, which sits next to St James’s Hospital and opposite Beckett Street Cemetery, is on the site of the former Leeds Union Workhouse founded in 1858 and which was once hit by a typhus epidemic that killed many people. It later became a geriatric unit.

The ghost hunt is being organised by paranormal events specialist Fright Nights.

Martin Jeffrey, director of Fright Nights, said: “We are very excited about our first ever paranormal investigation in Leeds and couldn’t wish for a better venue than the historic Thackray Museum.”

The museum, which was converted from hospital accommodation in 1997, includes a real life Victorian Street complete with sounds and smells, and operating theatre.

Alan Humphries, a librarian, said of the paranormal activity around the museum: “I’ve been working here for nearly 20 years and it can be rather spooky late at night – it certainly has an atmosphere.”

If you are interested in joining in the ghost hunt you can book online at www.frightnights.co.uk or ring 0114 2513232. Please do not contact the museum direct.

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Kirk session records have revealed examples of Highlanders using so-called good and bad magic on cattle.

Dr Karen Cullen, of higher education institute UHI, trawled the papers in her research for a lecture – Charmed Cows and Contentious Neighbours.

She found one minister who “dressed up” practical advice on better hygiene as a charm to allay a parishioner’s fears.

The practice of charming to either protect or harm livestock was used during the 17th and 18th centuries.

Dr Cullen, programme leader of UHI’s undergraduate honours Scottish history degree, will deliver her public lecture in Inverness on Monday.

She said: “The lecture is an off-shoot of my research of a famine of the 1690s and my interest in how weather impacts on crops.

“While doing this research I became aware of the attitudes of the population and how they were affected by famine.

“In urban areas riots broke out, but in rural areas this did not happen.

“I found in Kirk session records that in upland areas, where people were more dependent on cattle than crops, there were tensions in local communities and of people suspecting neighbours of harming their cattle.”

With little understanding of the scientific reasons behind poor productivity, people believed witchcraft was used to stop dairy cattle expressing good quality milk.

Dr Cullen said: “There is mention of cows having less profit, or goodness of milk, and people suspected a witch had taken that away.

“People then used counter charms such as putting rowan branches above the milking shed to ward off evil magic, or paying charmers to protect their cows.”

She found the church advised against using charms. However, one case surprised her.

Dr Cullen said: “Although ministers disapproved of the beliefs held by parishioners, some almost went along with them.

“One example from the 18th Century tells of a woman who believed her cow was charmed because its milk would not churn to cheese.

“Her minister suggested better hygiene, but dressed it up as a charm, a language the woman understood, and the matter was resolved.”

The practice continued in some places into the 20th Century, but the beginning to its end was the repeal of the Witchcraft Act in the mid 1700s and greater understanding of scientific explanations to natural events.

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Certificate: PG
Directed By: Mark Water, 2008
Reviewed By: Tim Isaac
Price: £19.99

(3 votes, average: 3.33 out of 5)

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After moving into the rundown Spiderwick mansion, young Jared discovers a book called ‘Spiderwick’s Field Guide To Faeries’, with a warning on it not to read it. Ignoring this advice, Jared opens the book and discovers how to access a how fantasy world humans can’t normally see. While you do feel they could have gone a bit further with The Spiderwick Chronicles, it mostly works extremely well. Freddie Highmore does a pretty good American accent as twins Simon and Jared, and holds the film together pretty well. There are moments when the CG fantasy world gets a little too hectic for its won good, but largely The Spiderwick Chronicles is great fun.

Certificate: 15
Directed By: Various, 2008
Reviewed By: Lee Griffiths
Price: £12.99

(2 votes, average: 3.5 out of 5)

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Batman: Gotham Knight brings together six Batman stories from the world’s greatest animation visionaries and comic book talents, which sees the Dark Knight battling brand new foes and establishing his place as a vigilante hero in the hazardous city of Gotham. Doing for Batman Begins and The Dark Knight what The Animatrix did for The Matrix and it’s sequels. While Gotham Knight hardly bridges any gaps at all between Begins and The Dark Knight, the half a dozen stories are diverse enough in their style and narrative to satisfy the Bat cravings of the avid fan, while casual passers-by can at least enjoy some wonderful animation from a few of Japan’s top animation studios.

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