January 1 - This Day in History

45 BC - Julius Caesar's Julian calendar takes effect, with the start of the year January 1¹
1801 AD - The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland formed²
1808 AD - US Congress bans the importation of slaves from Africa³
1852 AD - John George Children, a British Chemist dies⁴
1899 AD - Spanish rule in Cuba ends⁵
1912 AD - Several provinces declare independence from China and Sun Yatsen as the first Provisional President of China⁶
1937 AD - In Britain, safety glass becomes mandatory in vehicle windshields⁷
1947 AD - The Canadian Citizenship Act 1946 comes into effect, changing British citizens to Canadian⁸
1954 AD - NBC makes the first coast-to-coast NTSC color broadcast⁹
1965 AD - The People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan founded¹⁰
1971 AD - Cigarette commercials on US television banned¹¹
1989 AD - The Montreal Protocol to regulate chemicals that deplete the ozone layer comes into effect¹²
1999 AD - The Euro introduced as an accounting currency¹³
2007 AD - Leon Davidson, a chemical engineer and scientist who worked on the atomic bomb dies¹⁴

[1] "Julian calendar | History & Difference from ... - Britannica." https://www.britannica.com/science/Julian-calendar. Accessed 2 Dec. 2019.

[2] "History of Ireland (1801–1923) - Wikipedia." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Ireland_(1801%E2%80%931923). Accessed 2 Dec. 2019.

[3] "Congress abolishes the African slave trade - HISTORY." 9 Feb. 2010, https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/congress-abolishes-the-african-slave-trade. Accessed 2 Dec. 2019.

[4] "John George Children (1777–1852) | The Embryo Project ...." 25 Mar. 2018, https://embryo.asu.edu/pages/john-george-children-1777-1852. Accessed 2 Dec. 2019.

[5] "When did Spanish rule in Cuba end." https://www.answers.com/Q/When_did_Spanish_rule_in_Cuba_end. Accessed 2 Dec. 2019.

[6] "Republic of China (1912-1949) - Totally History." http://totallyhistory.com/the-republic-of-china-1912-1949/. Accessed 2 Dec. 2019.

[7] "1937 in the United Kingdom - Wikipedia." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1937_in_the_United_Kingdom. Accessed 2 Dec. 2019.

[8] "Canadian Citizenship | The Canadian Encyclopedia." https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/citizenship. Accessed 2 Dec. 2019.

[9] "NTSC - Doctor HDMI." http://www.drhdmi.eu/dictionary/ntsc.html. Accessed 2 Dec. 2019.

[10] "People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan | Military Wiki ...." https://military.wikia.org/wiki/People%27s_Democratic_Party_of_Afghanistan. Accessed 2 Dec. 2019.

[11] "History of Tobacco Regulation - The Ban on ... - Drug Library." http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/library/studies/nc/nc2b_10.htm. Accessed 2 Dec. 2019.

[12] "Montreal Protocol | international treaty | Britannica." https://www.britannica.com/event/Montreal-Protocol. Accessed 2 Dec. 2019.

[13] "History of Euro." http://www.euro-dollar-currency.com/europic/history_of_euro.htm. Accessed 2 Dec. 2019.

[14] "Leon Davidson - Wikipedia." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leon_Davidson. Accessed 2 Dec. 2019.

The Japanese Village That Believes Jesus Lived With Them

The story of Jesus is well known throughout the world. The Christian god has a son with the Virgin Mary, Jesus is crucified after being betrayed, and after three days he rises once more. There is however a period of time in Jesus's life that is unaccounted for by the Bible, commonly referred to as Jesus' 'unknown years', or the 'lost years'. It has historically been assumed that Jesus has spent this time working as a carpenter, but other theories have also appeared throughout history. One theory that appeared during the middle ages was that Jesus had visited Britain, and another more modern theory is that he had visited India ^[1]. One small village in Japan however claims that during this period, Jesus travelled thousands of kilometres to Japan and spent this time living in that village.

Shingō, in the Aomori Prefecture is a small village in the North of Japan. The terrain is extremely mountainous ^[2]. The village's population has been steadily decreasing over the past more than half century, with the village having a population of only 2,344 people as of 2018 ^[3].

The village claims that as well as Jesus visiting during his 'lost years', he also returned after 'his' crucifixion. The 'his' part will be explained shortly. The story of Jesus coming to this small Japanese town according to a sign posted near the alleged grave site claims:

"When Jesus Christ was 21 years old, he came to Japan and pursued knowledge of divinity for 12 years. He went back to Judea at age 33, and engaged in his mission. However, at that time, people in Judea would not accept Christ's preaching. Instead, they arrested him, and tried to crucify him on a cross. His younger brother, Isukiri casually took christ's place and ended his life on the cross.
Christ, who escaped the crucifixion, went through the ups and downs of travel, and again came to Japan. He settled right here in what is now called Herai Village, and died at the age of 106.
On this holy ground there is dedicated a burial mound on the right to deify Christ, and a grave on the left to deify Isukiri.
The above description was given in a testament by Jesus Christ" ^[4].

That was an exact transcription of the English version of the sign along with its inconsistent capitalisation of 'Christ'.

It can be said that in this version, Jesus did not really make much of a sacrifice for people's sins, as Jesus was scared so had his secret brother take his place while Jesus ran away. So who is this Isukiri?  While not everyone may know this, according to the Bible, Jesus did have siblings, although whether they are actually his siblings or cousins is commonly debated. Jesus had 4 brothers, James, Joses, Simon, and Judas ^[5]. So, Isukiri is not one of these people, or is he? Isukiri could be one of his brother's names who has changed over time. It could also be the name of the brother of the person who is buried in the other mound. This means that the person in the first mound may not be Jesus at all, but someone else, possibly a Christian Missionary who came to Japan, and who over time, has gradually had their story changed until they themselves were thought of as Jesus. During the 16th century, there were Christian missionaries throughout Japan. In 1614, Christianity became banned in Japan. Many of those who refused to denounce their faith were tortured or brutally killed. As a result of this, Christianity became secretive in Japan over the next two centuries. ^[4]. Another theory is that the story of this being the tomb of Christ and his brother was artificially invented. Historically, the region was not known for being the place of death of Christ. In the early 20th century, one of the burial mounds was proclaimed as the place of rest for Jesus. Before this it was thought that the tombs were the place of rest for ancient samurai, or other important people. The idea that it is the place of rest for Jesus has been accepted by some of the village people as well as people promoting the area to tourists ^[6][7].

In 2004, the village would even receive a plaque from Jerusalem as a token of friendship between this small village and one of the centres of the Christian world ^[4][7]. In Japan Christianity accounts for about 1.5% of the religious population ^[8].

References:

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unknown_years_of_Jesus
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shing%C5%8D,_Aomori
[3] https://www.citypopulation.de/php/japan-aomori.php
[4] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Lt6DEnFYuA
[5] https://www.bibleinfo.com/en/questions/did-jesus-have-any-brothers-andor-sisters
[6] https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E6%96%B0%E9%83%B7%E6%9D%91
[7] https://www.marugotoaomori.jp/blog/2019/06/20767.html
[8] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_Japan

Name Abbreviations You Might Not Have Known About

There are a lot of names in the world. Sometimes peoples' names can be a little too long, so they sometimes get abbreviated. This is a list of common name abbreviations you might not have known about.

Harold
- Harry

Samuel / Samantha
- Sam

James
- Jacob

Joshua
- Josh

Kenneth
- Ken

Leopold
- Leo

Leonard
- Leon

Michael
- Mike

Nicholas
- Nick

Mathew / Matthias
- Matt

Gwendolyn
- Gwen

Alexander
- Alex

Christopher
- Chris

Clifford
- Cliff

Daniel
- Dan

Douglas
- Doug

Edward
- Ed

Frederick
- Fred

Patrick
- Pat

Phillip
- Phil

Raymond
- Ray

Walter
- Walt

Thomathy / Thomas
- Tom

Timothy
- Tim

The Funny Ukrainian Dancing Man

The video title "Ukrainian military band - A Cruel Angel Thesis" claims that this video shows a Ukrainian military band playing the song 'A Cruel Angel's Thesis', which is the opening to the 90s anime Neon Genesis Evangelion, and which has resurfaced in more recent years as a meme. So this video was posted on YouTube on the 18th of August 2015 by the YouTuber Sergey Gorin and has since gained its meme status. So the questions are, what legacy did this video create, and is it real? Could it at all be staged or in some way edited?

Here is what seems like a direct sequel to the original. This one oddly seems to be the exact same length (38 seconds) as the original, and just listening to them side by side, the audio tracks of both appear to be identical, so on a first glance it seems to just be another

This video was copied and parodied many times. Below is an example that dubs audio over another video. It is the edit, the original video and then the audio source. The edited video credits the original sources in its description.

Remember when I said that the video was released in August of 2015, here is the original published on the 27th of June 2015, 2 whole months earlier for you to enjoy. So yes, it is fake, just a different audio track laid over an already great clip. If you are at all wondering how I found this video, I searched "funny dancing ukrainian man" on Google and the video was the first result.

Anime on the DS - DSvision

Image From: Link

When the Nintendo DS launched in the 2000s, it still did not have an built-in web browser. This meant that users could not easily access the internet (except using a special internet browser cartridge which had not yet been released), and this made steaming services nigh impossible. Streaming services at this point were not common online either for any platform. This was a time before YouTube, and when Netflix still operated by mailing DVDs. This meant that if someone wanted to get anime or other media on the DS it had to distributed physically.

After the Japanese company AM3 released their Advance Video Smart Media Player in 2003, it seemed like the next logical step would be to release an equivalent for the much newer and more powerful Nintendo DS hardware, and DSvision released in 2008 would be just that.

The system, comprising of a cartridge similar to the format that would later be used for Nintendo DS flash cartridges was used. This was a standard DS sized cartridge with a slot on the side, into which a micro-SD card could be inserted. This micro-SD card would contain the movie that you could watch on the system, in a similar way to how the smart media cards held the content for the Gameboy Advance Video. Pre-recorded micro-SD cards could be purchased, or one could buy content on the now defunct official website dsvision.jp, which sold content that could be transferred to the micro-SD card using a program known as 'DSvisionラック' or 'DSvision Rack'. Unlike the previous Advance Video for the GBA which planned to have different content types, and was not able to within its lifespan, the DSvision sold books on the official website that could be read on the DSvision. In addition to traditional books, the service also sold manga as well as educational materials. Quite notably like the previous system (the Advance Video), the DSvision had Pokemon titles including full movies which could be purchased for download, with many in the 300-500 Yen price range. The full movie MewTwo Strikes Back was available for 500 Yen in its entirety or over 85 minutes runtime, and it could fit onto your micro-SD card only taking up a measly 184 MB. And even more impressive some manga titles were available for download for a price of only 32 Yen. Some animated content could even at one point be downloaded from the DSvision website for free, including the first episode of やわらか戦車 (Soft Tank), a popular online animated series that ran for over 50 episodes, as well as モフ☆モフ (Mofu☆Mofu), which was another short online animated series.

At this point is is unknown what type of DRM was used or if a user could load their own content onto the micro-SD card to be read by the DSvision cartridge. The DSvision system would never quite catch on, and this would be another great idea that for better or for worse would not be released internationally. The DSvision website and the AM3 website would eventually disappear along with AM3 itself and it would never be seen again.

Image From: Link