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In the stars, the cards and the grounds -- psychics eye the future
San Francisco Chronicle ^ | 12/30/5 | Singeli Agnew, Matt Villano, Sudhin S. Thanawala

Posted on 12/30/2005 12:45:05 PM PST by SmithL

As one year ends and another begins, many people reflect on the past and ponder the future. In San Francisco and throughout the Bay Area, many people believe in a variety of traditions to help them divine the future. Here is a brief sampler of some of those ways.a pantheon of saints, or orishas.

Soothing the spirit

Behind the counter at La Sirena Botanica, proprietor Mary Ehm wraps two white candles in tissue paper. Waiting nervously, a young man wipes sweat off his neck with a handkerchief.

"Don't worry dear," Ehm said. "Everything is going to be just fine." She charges him 80 cents for the slim candles and sends him on his way.

After he leaves Ehm shakes her head. "He's in here almost every day," she said. "He has a girl phobia, poor dear."

La Sirena Botanica, at 1509 Church St., is a supply store for matters of the spirit. Shoppers will find the traditional botanica offerings: orisha candles, dried herbs and coconut shells for their Santeria, Vodun or Lucumi rituals. But they will also find Buddha statues, portraits of the Hindu god Ganesh, Jewish menorahs, oil paintings of Catholic saints, delicate porcelain boxes for children's baby teeth, Indian textiles and incense.

And they will also find Ehm, often clad in a baseball hat and cuffed jeans, comfortably dispensing her particular blend of mysticism and practical advice.

For $40, Ehm will give customers a tarot card reading in the back room. But even without paying for a reading, they're likely to get words of encouragement, romantic advice and confident recommendations for rituals and remedies to aid all sorts of routine spiritual problems.

Ehm, 56, is a Santeria priestess who speaks nine languages and reads a well-worn deck of German tarot cards. Santeria is an Afro-Cuban religion that blends

(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...


TOPICS: Astronomy; Religion; Weird Stuff
KEYWORDS: groundless; santeria

Artemis "Artie" Caneri Donikian reads coffee grounds in a cup and saucer to tell fortunes in her Burlingame home. Patterns that result from the hardened grounds offer answers, she says.
1 posted on 12/30/2005 12:45:08 PM PST by SmithL
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To: SmithL

Keyword for this should say Astrology, not astronomy


2 posted on 12/30/2005 12:55:57 PM PST by HOTTIEBOY (If the enemy is in shooting range, so are you.)
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To: HOTTIEBOY

I meant topic.....


3 posted on 12/30/2005 12:56:27 PM PST by HOTTIEBOY (If the enemy is in shooting range, so are you.)
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To: SmithL
While in college I bought a book on the ancient art of palmistry. I read it and learned the various meanings that could be divined from a person's palm.

One night I was early for my weekly bridge match a Douglass College. My partner was running late so I offered to read palms. One of our foursome was hot and lacivious so I told a tale of her being married in the Spring, (it was November). She seemed surprised and became quite animated when I said that I saw three on the alter, (suggesting a bun in the oven!). she exclaimed "Oh no he won't!"

Another dorm mate who was not part of our group challenged me to read her palm. She was sitting in a wing back chair so I drug up a hassock and took her hand in mine. A chill ran up my spine and the words jumped out of my mouth. "I see a very short life with a violent ending!" She screamed and ran out of the room.

Everyone in the room was shocked and asked why I had said what I said. I did not know. Her life line was very short and ended with a jagged edge. This girl had been wearing an overcoat since the dorm was quite cool. Then one of the girls said, "Well you must have seen the scars and "guessed". I said, "What scars?" Well she had slit her wrists the past summer and the suicide was whispered about in the dorm.

Needless to say I've never read another palm!

4 posted on 12/30/2005 12:56:45 PM PST by Young Werther
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To: HOTTIEBOY

I knew you were going to say that.


5 posted on 12/30/2005 12:59:39 PM PST by SmithL (Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Lift up your gates and sing, Hosana in the highest! Hosana to your King!)
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To: Young Werther

About 15 years ago, I used to see a very reputable card. I think I went 4 times total. She was usually spot on.

One time, she did a full deck reading and after looking at about 7 cards, said that she saw a ticket in my near future and to be careful. At the end of the full deck read, she said, "Yep, in 8 days, you're getting some kind of ticket and there's nothing you can do about it."

For the next week, I stopped at every yellow, hung at every stop, and painstakingly watched my speed on the highway.

On the morning of the eighth day, I was sleeping over a friends house and was awakened to a loud beeping noise. When I went out to my car after getting dressed, there it was. A street cleaning ticket. Creepy.

I believe some people have a psychic gift, but most are just hucksters.


6 posted on 12/30/2005 1:14:31 PM PST by Woman on Caroline Street (Go sell crazy somewhere else. We're all stocked up here.)
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To: SmithL
....In the stars, the cards and the grounds -- psychics eye the future....

Sure,......it is the Psychic-9-11-Super Bowl again......

/Narnia bunk-junk.....9-11

7 posted on 12/30/2005 1:28:18 PM PST by maestro
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To: SmithL
orisha candles, dried herbs and coconut shells for their Santeria, Vodun or Lucumi rituals

Nothing for your Vicodin rituals?

8 posted on 12/30/2005 1:38:17 PM PST by mikrofon (psych-O-tropics)
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To: Woman on Caroline Street
My Grams had books for interpreting dreams. she mentioned that there had strega, (witches), in our family.

My Mom had two dreams where her father gave here numbers for playing the "numbers" game which the MAFIA ran. In both cases the numbers were right.

In 1944 I was 1 year old and she couldn't make a connection with her numbers man who sas the shoemaker in our apartment building. she was taking a relative from Pittsbugh to visit relatives in New York, (we lived in Newark). When she got home that evening she asked whether her good friend who was babysitting me had placed the bet. Florence was crying and said "No, $5 was alot of money so I took your son downtown Newark and bought him a pair of shoes!" The MAFIA would have paid $3000 on that $5 bet but alas I still have those shoes, which Mom had bronzed.

When my brother go married in 1972 she had the same type dream and bet $.50! she bought a loverly $300 dress for his wedding but I asked her why she hadn't made the bet adjusted for inflation!!! Next time she was to tell me the numbers!

9 posted on 12/30/2005 2:01:10 PM PST by Young Werther
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To: SmithL; Perdogg

Post your predictions for 2006
12/16/05 | Perdogg
Posted on 12/16/2005 2:50:00 PM PST by Perdogg
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1541998/posts
(mine)
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1541998/posts?page=78#78

The World a Century from Now
the current writer, et al | December 31 2004 | SunkenCiv, et al
Posted on 12/31/2004 12:46:20 PM PST by SunkenCiv
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/1311725/posts


10 posted on 12/30/2005 7:58:48 PM PST by SunkenCiv ("In silence, and at night, the Conscience feels that life should soar to nobler ends than Power.")
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To: Woman on Caroline Street

I went to a palm reader one time with my husband in Cambridge. The lady thought I was a college student and that I was with my dad. : ) We did not correct her...she read my life as if I was just beginning when really I had two kids and was about 15 years older than she "read". It was funny as heck.


11 posted on 12/31/2005 6:45:12 AM PST by Galveston Grl (Getting angry and abandoning power to the Democrats is not a choice.)
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