Talked with someone on HelloTalk for a few days, had a decent chat, he asked if I would grab lunch with him, I said sure. We met at Ikebukuro station, grabbed some fast food and had a totally normal conversation, talked about food, sports and hobbies in our broken attempts at each others languages, had the usual awkwardness of meeting someone you can only minimally converse with, but seemed fine with no major red flags. Finished eating, he asked if I wanted to hang out at a park nearby, said he wanted to teach me more about Japanese culture.
We go to Tokiwadai station, walk to a small park, then he stops in front of a building right next to the park, then asks if he could “say a prayer for me”, which is pretty much the first time religion came up at all. He starts asking about how to spell my name and my birthday at which point I realize what’s happening and just say it’s not important, so he gives me a sheet of paper and asks me to fill out my information and I just say fuck that I’m leaving and I went home.
Googled Japan cults and sure enough there’s a picture of the building on the kenshokai website.
Overall it didn’t seem overly malicious as far as cults go but I’m curious about what the end goal is? Is it just regular missionary type work for a batty religion? Is there some money scheme? Trying to get me to buy theton measurement devices? etc.
**TL;DR**: Met guy from HelloTalk for lunch and language exchange, then he tried to get me to go to a kenshokai building with him. I’m just curious what’s the goal/motivation
27 comments
Hi, I’m totally not recruiting you for a cult but would you like to hear more information about the cult I’m in with several dozen people who will all be working to totally not recruit you into a cult?
They use attractive young women this way too.
Same as any other cult like Christians etc. They have been brainwashed from usually a young age to genuinely believe they are ‘helping’ you by getting you to join.
I had one girl from kenshokai approach me outside Tokyo station (with their standard Fujisan newspaper) and tell me bad things like covid wouldn’t exist if only everyone joined, and that in 30 years the entire world will be 100% Buddhist. Otherwise seemingly normal people who don’t realize these ideas are seriously deluded.
It’s not really about money though they do give donations to the monks for ridiculous stuff like them moving house or buying a new car. The actions of the believers are mostly selfless in as much as they think it’s their duty to help the world by spreading the religion (which in turn will make it a better place for them).
Wow someone on HelloTalk with ulterior motives besides rigorous language study? I am shocked.
The irony with cults is that if they tell you what they’re really after, they can’t get converted believers. By the time people found out they are usually committed enough to not talk badly about it…or they stand to lose a lot in life. So probably not many people have an objective view on this group.
My guess with this particular person, is that he thinks foreigners are unlikely to think poorly about Buddhist motifs. This person can reframe his motivation as “friendly cultural introduction.” This is unlikely as his end goal, but may explain why he appeared on HelloTalk. After all most people learned to say no to random flyers on the street, but people drop their guards with language exchange apps.
What’s their goal?
“The same thing we do every night — try to take over the world!”
Same as every religion (because they’re all fucking cults even if some are older)
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Praise the leader, do what you’re told and you’ll be happy.
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Fuck em all.
how gullible are you lmao why would you meet with someone for lunch on a app?
>Overall it didn’t seem overly malicious as far as cults go but I’m curious about what the end goal is? Is it just regular missionary type work for a batty religion? Is there some money scheme? Trying to get me to buy theton measurement devices? etc.
Absolutely something monetary at some point otherwise they wouldn’t bother. You’re lucky to have escaped without handing over too much personal information.
A similar thing happened to me back in May. I was walking around a small town in Nara, and an elderly lady stopped me and asked if I’d stop so she could pray for/at/with me. She wanted me to put my hands together in the traditional praying sort of way, along with her, and she just said the prayer. She then told me she was from a nearby Kanon temple, but didn’t hit me up for anything. Just asked me where I was from, then mentioned about the taihen in Ukraine, but that was just small talk, and we both went along our ways. It felt kind of nice, I thought. My mother-in-law is a pretty religious person (who, admittedly has been susceptible to creepy cult people in the past), and she’s also a cancer survivor a few times now, and it’s sort of emboldened her to seize the moment with strangers sometimes. I could imagine her doing this sort of thing to some random person if she were in a good mood. Not sure how common this is, but I guess we’ll find out the more comments to your post come in.
Either way, sorry that guy turned out to be so sneaky and manipulative. What a shame.
I have a strict ‘you ain’t getting me to no secondary location’ policy because of this 😂 Heard too many horror stories.
>he asked if I would grab lunch with him, I said sure. We met at Ikebukuro station
Whoah whoah, what the fuck am I reading.
They’re asking for personal information way too soon, they aren’t good cultists, you usually try to make the person feel more invested in your shit before scaring them off.
I do find it funny to listen for a few minutes at what some are saying, there’s some crazy conspiracies (always the Chinese plotting shit) and if I feel like messing with them I’ll make up even worse ones (though I wasn’t sure how to top the one where every Chinese resident is a secret agent from the Chinese government and they are ready to overthrow Japan when they receive the order ~~66~~)
I read half the comments in this thread before I realized OP met him on Hello Talk and not Hello Work.
I was pretty astounded that someone from hello work would ask to meet you outside….
My mother in law always warns me about this lol
You did the right thing by leaving though you were a trifle naïve in letting it get that far.
See [https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2005/07/29/national/buddhist-group-pair-admit-holding-nonconvert-captive/](https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2005/07/29/national/buddhist-group-pair-admit-holding-nonconvert-captive/)
Just looked them up. They’re nationalistic Buddhists? Sounds like a contradiction in terms.
Well what is the goal of any religion? To dedicate yourself to it.
In this case probably donate a lot of money. Think the emperor of japan is the only person who can declare world peace and he just isn’t doing it.
Try and convert other people. Then die.
Mormons tried the same thing with me
This happened to my partner not long ago. An employee they work with (government work) asked them out to lunch and they ended up at a church where they asked if they could pray for my partner which ended up in some weird belly rub in public. My partner is unable to say no and displease people and it frightens me to what extent despite being open-minded and living abroad a lot. The woman then thanked my partner, asked to go back again sometime… fortunately, that person left the country and no more involvement.
However, today, I had two women knocking on my door asking for my partner (who answered last time when only one person was there and I wasn’t), trying to get them to be involved in some buddhist stuff. They tried to sell it to me (my mistake using Japanese off the bat) and gave me some documentation (some in English), and were like “we’ll come back and speak to your partner again then”.
It’s honestly all very sketchy to me.
The cult people and gaijin hunters can always smell fresh meat. Here’s my advice:
If you want to meet Japanese people and practice Japanese, just pop into your local mom and pop restaurant or izakaya (the older looking, the better) and strike up a conversation with people. They may even make the first move. That way, you know they just want to chat and they have no ulterior motive other than keeping your patronage. Wave to your neighbors and say hi to them. Bring them Christmas cookies or some other small thing (veggies, omiyage, ect). Especially the neighborhood obachan or ojisan who polices the garbage. They’ll have your back if people try to blame bad garbage sorting on you.
Do not trust people who walk up to you on the street at all. Talking to strangers on the street is weird here. People don’t normally do that shit. So just assume anyone who does that to you is a weirdo and pretend they aren’t there. If you have to, make the “I don’t understand the language you’re speaking” face until they leave.
I’m Japanese, born and raised in the US, but I’ve noticed any Japanese person who’s super friendly, or starts talking to you out of the blue in a public space is usually cult related. Usually sokagakkai.
At least it beefs up your autobiography: *Chapter 5,603: Luncheon at 2pm with Kenshkai. Interesting Conversation. Mysterious motivations. Declined Offer. Went home and played some Mario Kart.*
I have a similar story about these guys, but I didn’t meet them online, I got approached by a young-ish guy (about 32) in a bookstore and invited to lunch the next week. I was new in Japan and wanted to meet people.
He told me he had a British friend who was going to show up to lunch and he didn’t show up, but instead a Japanese older guy (about 45) showed up. They kept trying to ask me questions that would “find my ruin” to try to figure out what they could promise me would get me into their church.
When I didn’t go into the building with them they got **very angry** and started screaming at me, but I just walked away.
Yeah, that’s the point I label someone pure evil and feel like I need a shower. Never give your name and birthday to anyone you barely know. More than half the time they use it for evil intentions. Dark web, etc. I’m glad you were smart.
According to Wikipedia, Kenshokai is a lay Buddhist organization that professes to adhere to Nichiren Buddhism, so in that sense it’s similar to Soka Gakkai. However, they don’t seem to proselytize as aggressively, and they’re not active outside Japan from what I can see.
To me, lay religious groups in Japan sit somewhere between a proper religion (Buddhism) and a cult. They’re not necessarily cults per se, but can sometimes exhibit some cult-like behavior.
Kenshokai sounds relatively harmless as long as you don’t get involved personally.
Edit:
Incidentally, Japanese people approach religion very differently. Even atheists will worship at Shinto shrines, get married in a Christian ceremony, and have a Buddhist funeral, and praying for someone at a Buddhist temple is just considered a polite thing to do. However, they shouldn’t need all your personal info to do that.
Tokyo Ghoul reference 👀 don’t go to secluded area with unknown people
I’ve been dragged to that same exact park and building by a dude named “Atsushi” long ago. I ended up posting about it here: https://old.reddit.com/r/japanlife/comments/hoougo/psa_beware_of_scouts_posing_as_friends_in_public/
Ended up seeing a lot of interesting stories from other redditors. Apparently it’s a really common scam done to foreigners. You should also be aware of the Amway scam too.