Born
free
Restoring memory in the old
This blog is about the entrants in the year 1960, to the Faculty of Medicine, University of Ceylon, Colombo. The email address for communications is, 1960batch@gmail.com. Please BOOKMARK this page for easier access later.Photo is the entrance porch of the old General Hospital, Colombo, still in existence. Please use the search box below to look for your requirement.
Tuesday, December 31, 2019
Monday, December 30, 2019
Odds and ends
Somewhere
over the rainbow
Chewing gum ancestry findings
Being a Gurka
12 May,
1945. Lachhiman Gurung, a 4-feet 11-inches tall soldier in the 8th Gurkha
Rifles, was manning a forward post in Taungdaw, Burma. Suddenly, 200 Japanese
soldiers swooped down to his post. Grenades started dropping left and right.
Gurung picked up the grenades and threw them right back to the enemy. A few
grenades later, one exploded in his hand, shattering the hand, parts of his
face, and a leg.
Gurung picked
up his bolt-action Lee-Enfield mark II rifle with his left hand and shouted,
“Come and fight.” They came and fought. And died. Rifleman Gurung kept firing
for hours, shouting “come and fight” throughout the night. In the morning,
support arrived to relieve him. There were no Japanese soldiers left by that
time. They found 87 bodies strewn around his post, with him still shouting
“come and fight.”
2 September,
2010. Bishnu Shrestha, a 5-feet 2-inches soldier in the 8th Gurkha Rifles, was
travelling by a train in West Bengal, India. Suddenly, 40 armed robbers
embarked and started looting and beating the passengers. Shrestha was off-duty.
He stood patiently observing the situation. Then the robbers made a serious
mistake. They started molesting an 18-year old girl.
Too much for
the rifleman. He pulled out his knife and leaped at the robbers, killing three
instantly and injuring eight others. He received a serious injury to his knife
hand in the fray. Facing his fearless ferocity, the rest of the robbers pulled
the chain and fled. Shrestha went over to the girl and asked, “Are you okay?”
17
September, 2010. Dipprasad Pun, a 5-feet 7-inches acting sergeant in the Royal
Gurkha Rifles, was on sentry duty in Babaji, Helmand in Afghanistan. Hearing
strange sounds nearby, he found Taliban militia planting bombs near his camp.
Before sergeant Pun could make any move, 30 Taliban militiamen descended on him
with RPGs and AK-47 guns.
Pun saw sure
death in front of him, so he decided to take as many he could with him. He
fought. First, he exhausted the 400 rounds of ammo he had, along with 17
grenades. When his ammo ran out, he set off a Claymore mine. But there still
were enemies left, so he resorted to using his rifle tripod as a weapon. After
17 minutes of fighting, there were no Taliban left.
An average
Gurkha soldier is a short and lean man. Nothing to be impressed about. But, 200
years back, when the Gurkhas were first incorporated into the British Army, a
soldier of the 87th Foot wrote in his memoirs: "I never saw more
steadiness or bravery exhibited in my life. Run they would not, and of death,
they seemed to have no fear, though their comrades were falling thick around
them".
A joke about
the Gurkha says that if a mule kicks a Gurkha in the head, the Gurkha gets a
headache and the mule gets a broken limb. One story tells that, when an Indian
Army doctor declared that his near-dead Gurkha patient can only live if he
shows enough will to survive, his commanding officer just went to the soldier
and commanded, “Live!” He lived.
Gurkhas have
served in every battle the British and Indian armies fought in the last 200
years, from the Syrian deserts to the freezing Falklands, and from the high
Himalayas to the forests of Borneo. 32,000 Gurkhas died in WWII alone, earning 2,734
bravery awards. The Gurkha Regiment has received 26 Victoria Crosses so far,
the highest for any British regiment. Hitler apparently once said, “If I had
the Gurkha, I could win the whole world.”
Gurkhas, an
umbrella term for a number of Nepalese people, claim their heritage back to the
9th century when they formed the elite force of Nepal. The British discovered
them during the Anglo-Nepalese War (1814–16). Already in conflict with China
and Tibet, the overstretched Nepalese army didn’t win, largely because of
technological differences between guns and swords.
Even when
the sword-wielding Gurkhas lost to the gun-toting British soldiers, they made
an impression. One Gurkha commander — Bhakti Thapa — surrounded by the British,
charged alone to take a cannon, slashing left and right with his knife and his
sword. By the the time he was stopped by a bullet through his heart, he had
killed dozens. And, he was 74 years old.
The British
were quick to recognize the merit of the fearless Gurkha, and in the treaty
that ensued, they demanded little land in exchange of the Gurkhas serving the
British Army. The battle cry of the Gurkha, “Jai Maha Kali, Ayo Gurkhali”
(Victory for goddess Kali, here comes the Gurkhali), is still a feared cry
across the world. Apparently, Argentine soldiers on Falklands left the island
as soon as they heard that the Gurkhas have arrived.
They are a
people who train all their lives on mountainous terrain, even if it is for
regular non-military stuff. 10,000 Gurkhas apply every year for 125 entries.
That’s a 1.25% acceptance rate, compared to 10% at West Point. For a Gurkha,
the army is the primary choice of occupation, not law or medicine or
shopkeeping.
The
selection is a process that feels just like a martial arts movie — 75 bench
jumps in one minute and 70 sit-ups in two minutes, followed by a 5-kilometre
run up a hill with 25 kilograms of rock and sand in a traditional doko basket
hanging at the back. They have to finish in under 55 minutes.
Generally,
the passing rate for Gurkhas at Combat Infantryman’s Course is 100%, with
flying colours. The Physical Fitness Test that requires a soldier to run 2.4
kilometres under 9:30 minutes is completed by an average Gurkha under 8
minutes. The secret of a Gurkha’s training is the kaida, a system of order,
ritual, and loyalty to officers and each other that is unquestioned. 99% of
Gurkhas are retained through the maximum service tenure of 22 years, the
highest for any army.
On top of
rifles and grenades, the Gurkhas carry the a simple weapon that really flames
their reputation — the 18-inch-long kukri knife. Every Gurkha soldier is issued
two of these legendary Gurkha blades, in commission since the 14th century. On
the Dussera festival, the Gurkha regiment slaughters a buffalo with a single
strike of the kukri, traditionally by the youngest recruit in the regiment. In
the past, it was used to collect bits of dead enemies.
According to
legends, once unsheathed, a kukri must taste blood. If the enemy dies,
surrenders, or flees before the kukri is used, then the Gurkha used to cut
himself to satisfy the bloodlust of the blade. In 2011, a 20-year-old Gurkha
private killed a highly sought-after Taliban commander whose body he wanted to
bring back for DNA identification. Failing to bring him in one piece, he used
his kukri and brought him back in a bag in little pieces.
The motto of
their creed is “Kaayar hunnu bhanda marnu ramro” (Better dead than live like a
coward). There have been rumors of them chopping off enemy heads, even drinking
their blood. But the average Gurkha off-battle is a gentle soul. Always polite,
courteous and helpful.
With all the
tales of their courage, skills and fearless ferocity through centuries of
history, the best comment on the Gurkhas were made by Field Marshal Sam
Manekshaw, Chief of Staff of Indian Army during the 1971 Bangladesh Liberation
War — “If anyone ever tells you he is never afraid, he is a liar or he is a
Gurkha.”
Great story
about the Gurkhas—probably a joke but captures the sense of them quite well in
my experience. A unit commander—a Brit—announces to his Gurkha platoon “today
we’ll be jumping out of airplanes at 500 feet.” His NCO’s huddle and then the
senior NCO approaches the Captain and inquires “Sir, would it be possible to
jump from 100 feet instead” to which the officer replies “Good heavens no
man—the parachute wouldn’t have time to deploy.” To which the Gurkha responded
with “ah, so we’ll be using parachutes then.”
When I was a
child in Canada there were stories about the Gurhkas. It was said that in WWI
they would sneak behind enemy lines at night. Slip past the German sentries
into the barracks where they were sleeping, slit the throats of every 10th man,
and leave undetected.
Sunday, December 29, 2019
Saturday, December 28, 2019
1960 Medical entrants, Colombo, Batch blog.
1.
Please
click on the underlined batch blog to see the home web-page.
2.
Click on
the red title - Older posts - in the bottom
right hand page to see earlier postings up to the start of this blog in March
2009.
3.
Look at
the box saying - Search this blog - on the
right hand side of each page - and type what you want to search for eg.your
name, or reunion, subject etc
4.
You can
see the listings of the blog posts in alphabetical order in red on the right-hand
side of each page, under the heading Blog Archives.
You can scroll down searching for any posting that you are interested in. Click
on that particular link to see the posting.
5. Under the title, My Blogs, you can see all the blogs that I publish.
Click on each of them to read the posts in each one.
Hope you enjoy watching the pages
of this blog on the doings of the 1960 batch entrants, Medical Faculty,
Kinsey Road.
-
Philip Veerasingam
|
Odds and ends
It was fascination
Verbal skills in the left-handed
Treating erectile dysfunction
Thursday, December 26, 2019
Odds and ends
'Baila' - 'Biwwa nedha'
New words of the decade
Near death experiences
James Watson of DNA fame
Tuesday, December 24, 2019
Merry Christmas 2019
A Merry Christmas 2019 to all.
Please click on each one of the web-links below and sing along:-
Please click on each one of the web-links below and sing along:-
Monday, December 23, 2019
Saturday, December 21, 2019
Odds and ends
'Silent
night' in Maori
Twenty years ago, researchers watched people get it on
in an MRI for science
Marijuana & the heart
Paracetamol during pregnancy
Friday, December 20, 2019
Merry Christmas 2019
A Merry Christmas 2019 to all of you.
Please click on each one of the web-links below and sing along:-
Thursday, December 19, 2019
Karals on the BBC
| By Clare Murphy Health reporter, BBC News |
The UK's most eminent expert in complementary medicine says high street herbal remedies are either useless or dangerous, while a study suggests the "tailored" preparations concocted by herbal practitioners are a waste of money.
St
John's Wort: good for depression but not with prescription drugs
|
But are we really wrong to have fallen in love with the humble herb?
It is said we've never had it so good: living longer thanks to the leaps and bounds made by medical science.
And how do we express our thanks?
According to the critics, by turning our backs on the mainstream and dabbling in the occult - or at the very least the unproven: spending millions of pounds each year on herbal formulas for conditions ranging from an itchy patch of skin to terminal disease.
"I used to say if it made my patients feel better then it was ok by me," says Professor Michael Baum, a professor emeritus of surgery.
"But increasingly I feel one has to speak out against it - because there's no knowing where this hocus pocus will end up."
Really that bad?
As far as Professor Baum is concerned, if a treatment is subjected to scientific rigours and found to be efficacious then it should be integrated into mainstream medicine and put in the hands of doctors - at which point the label "alternative" ceases to apply.
And there are indeed herbs which have passed these tests - although only about a dozen of the many hundreds on offer.
Dr Lakshman Karalliede
Toxicologist |
Gingko for instance is known to be effective in treating dementia, Valerian insomnia and Devil's Claw musculoskeletal pain.
But that does not mean they should be bought freely over the counter, argues Professor Edzard Ernst, the first professor of complementary medicine in the UK and a believer in the power of herbal treatments.
"The ones that work tend to be for serious conditions," he says, "and self medication for these is really not advised."
One of the principal problems is interaction with existing prescription drugs. Herbal remedies are known to interfere with all sorts of medication - from common anti-coagulants to anti-HIV drugs.
At the extreme end of the spectrum, a transplant patient who has taken St John's Wort while low in the aftermath may find it seriously affects his body's ability to accept a new organ and his chances of survival.
Referring on
But because doctors in the UK are seen as notoriously uninterested in herbal therapies - unlike their colleagues in Germany where herbs form part of frontline care - they may be unlikely to ask their patient if they are taking any remedies.
"And for his part the patient may not confide because he is afraid of being sneered at," says Dr Lakshman Karalliedde, who has just published a book promoting the safer use of herbal medicines and looking at potential herb-drug interactions to help GPs prescribe.
Brought up in Sri Lanka amid ancient Ayurvedic Medicine traditions, Dr Karalliedde was trained in Western medicine and worked for many years in toxicology at Guy's and St Thomas's hospital in London.
"Of course a lot of herbal medicine is nonsense," he says. "But some of it isn't.
"What we really need is proper research to establish both the benefits and the risks: some members of the medical community don't like herbal medicine because they are used to playing God and worry that it may encroach upon their territory."
But despite the fears that the proponents of herbal medicine are luring patients away from their doctors, one practitioner suggests quite the opposite is true.
"I've been doing this more than 20 years, and if anything people seem to have a much better relationship with their doctor these days," says Alison Denham, a fellow of the National Institute of Medical Herbalists. "The numbers seeking this kind of help really aren't increasing.
"And I'm the first to say, 'have you seen your doctor?'"
Odds and ends
When
a child is born Song
Hormones controlling your body
Meaning in life
https://youtu.be/glz64q1vaLs
Monthly contraceptive pill
Monthly contraceptive pill
Wednesday, December 18, 2019
Odds and ends
Twelve
days of Christmas Song
https://youtu.be/koEwSFVmJSI?t=5Communism versus Socialism
Genetic make-up of psychiatric illness
'Middle ages - facts
https://www.ba-bamail.com/content.aspx?emailid=34546Tuesday, December 17, 2019
Monday, December 16, 2019
Friday, December 13, 2019
Wednesday, December 11, 2019
Odds and ends
Santa
Claus is coming to town - Song
Bird eggs vibrate to communicate
Mice hallucinate
1799 partying
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7271999/Party-like-1799-hippy-crack-dates-18th-century.html
Tuesday, December 10, 2019
Odds and ends
Scarlet
ribbons
https://youtu.be/UAuqEajP4o0?list=TLPQMTExMjIwMTk3fkLE4LtB8A&t=4
Brain control of wheel chair
Gut feeling
Monday, December 9, 2019
Odds and ends
Jim Reeves – Christmas songs
Quality of life
Twist facts
Transplant of testis
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-7773585/Serbian-man-born-without-testicles-gets-one-transplanted-twin.htmlSunday, December 8, 2019
Odds and ends
Mary’s
Boy Child
https://youtu.be/xGqXy_iD4kc
Liver lung diseases
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-7632359/Liver-lung-disease-reversible-study-suggests.html
Faster battery charge
Saturday, December 7, 2019
Odds and ends
Silent
night - Carol
https://youtu.be/SuP-cO0foV8
Exercise and Prostate Cancer
The most beautiful women of the
ancient world
Anti-ageing foods
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