After Harry Potter, here is another Fantasy book but this is for real. “Mysteries of the Unexplained” is a collection of the true life events which defy normal explanation. My dad gifted this book to me when I was school. Even today, it fascinates me as it did then.It covers a range of topics from Zombies of Africa to Unidentified flying objects. Here is a sample of some interesting facts from the book.

A Shared Fate: A man riding a moped was killed by a taxi in Bermuda in 1975, exactly a year after his brother had been killed – on the same street, by the same taxi driver, carrying the same passenger and on the same moped.

A dog named toy: Two identical twins were adopted by different families shortly after their birth. They re-united after 40 years and discovered that each had been named James, each had law enforcement training, each married a women named Linda, had a son each. One named James Alan and the other James Allan – had divorced and married a second wife named Betty. Both had dogs named Toy!!!

Futility and The future: In 1898 Morgan Robertson published a novel about pride, greed and stupidity. It was called the wreck of the Titan, or futility and described the maiden voyage of a transatlantic luxury liner named Titan. Although reportedly unsinkable, Titan strikes an iceberg and sinks, with enormous loss of life.

In 1912, the Titanic which was touted to be unsinkable sank during her maiden voyage. The following similarities pertained between the book and the real tragedy.

                                                Titan                 Titanic

Month of the wreck                  April                   April

Passengers and Crew               3000                   2,207

Life Boats                                 24                      20

Tonnage                                   75,000               66,000

Length                                      800Ft                 882.5ft

Propellers                                 3                        3

Speed of Impact                       25Knots            23Knots

Unaccountable Knowledge: Many of you would have heard the story of Dagon tribe of west Africa. Preserved at the core of their deepest religious teachings is the detailed knowledge of a star which is quite invisible to the naked eye. The star they describe is known to us as Sirius B which they call Po Tolo. It is a White Dwarf and although small and fait, it is extremely dense and heavy and hence exerts gravitational pull it’s  much larger neighboring star, Sirius A. 

The Dogon name for Sirius B, Po is the name of the smallest seed known to them, they also claim that it is the heaviest star and the color of the star is white. All the qualities of a White Dwarf is attributed to this star – smallness, heaviness and whiteness. They go on to say that the stars orbit is elliptical with Sirius A as one of the focus of the ellipse (as it is) and the orbital period is 50 years (the actual value is 50.04 +/- .09). They also attribute a third star in the Sirius system, which is yet to be discovered.

In addition to this Dogon’s astronomical lore includes the fact that Saturn has rings and Jupiter has 4 moons. They have four calendars for Sun, moon, Sirius and Venus and have long known that planets orbit the sun.

The Dogon’s claim that their astronomical knowledge was given to them by beings who came to visit them from Sirius star system!!!

Fascinating, isn’t it? This book is more than 25years. I wonder if any of the mysteries have been explained now.