Tuesday, August 12, 2014

Child prodigies.

GAZA


U.S. media coverage of the conflict - a recent CBS Face the Nation show with host Bob Schieffer

Bob Schieffer: In the Middle East, the Palestinian people find themselves in the grip of a terrorist group that is embarked on a strategy to get its own children killed in order to build sympathy for its cause—a strategy that might actually be working, at least in some quarters. Last week I found a quote of many years ago by Golda Meir, one of Israel’s early leaders, which might have been said yesterday: "We can forgive the Arabs for killing our children," she said, "but we can never forgive them for forcing us to kill their children."

Noam Chomsky: Well, we don’t really have to listen to CBS, because we can listen directly to the Israeli propaganda agencies, which he’s quoting. It’s a shameful moment for U.S. media when it insists on being subservient to the grotesque propaganda agencies of a violent, aggressive state. As for the comment itself, the Israel comment which he—propaganda comment which he quoted, I guess maybe the best comment about that was made by the great Israeli journalist Amira Hass, who just described it as "sadism masked as compassion." That’s about the right characterization.



Coconut water and its benefits.

Coconut water sales are up 120% in a year
The drink, which tastes like slightly sweet, slightly salty water, is said to be high in minerals such as potassium and magnesium, which are vital for muscle movement and brain operation.
Read the full story:
12 August 2014

PS
This has been literally mothers milk over the eons in Sri Lanka.
1. The colour of a 'Thambili' - young King-coconut - is golden and has been used to compare to a damsels skin as an ideal of beauty.
2. It is used in medicinal preparations.
3. It is part of an offering to the Gods.
4. Manthras are recited over it and the water is said to receive and contain magical properties.


The list would go on and on...

Monday, August 11, 2014

Ah, Harry Belafonte... 85 now, we see him age here.

email from Piyusha Atapattu
7:29 AM (22 hours ago)
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https://mail.google.com/mail/ca/u/0/images/cleardot.gif
https://mail.google.com/mail/ca/u/0/images/cleardot.gif

One of the loveliest voices ever... 

 
Walk back, down memory lane.... 
 

 
One of Harry Belafonte's best ..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kTDvCLAT8hg


P.S.
I remember this song performed by a Sri Lankan artist at the 1962 "Block Concert" of the 1960 entrants batch to the Medical Faculty, Colombo. The 'Profumo scandal' was the talk of the town those days. In the same concert the Late Dr. Karthigesu performed in an act as 'Dr. Profumo' and the ever funny Geri Jayasekara took on the role of 'Ms. Christine Keeler'. The audience was rolling in laughter. Those were the days.

A performance of Kandyan dancing, Avissawella, Sri Lanka.

Please click on the web-link below with speakers on:-

http://youtu.be/uAHIIpvWwbc

A helping hand from a long dead mother.

'My dead mother came back to help me give birth'
Clover Stoud's mother Charlotte died when Clover was five months pregnant. However, during son Dash's birth, she appeared and helped Clover through the pain
Read the full story:
11 August 2014

Sunday, August 10, 2014

Lessons for seniors.

Email from Gallege de Silva.


A 97 year old Doctor has this to say...
At the age of 97 years and 4 months, Shigeaki Hinohara is one of the world's
longest-serving physicians and educators. Hinohara's magic touch is legendary:
 Since 1941 he has been healing patients at St. Luke's International Hospital in
Tokyo and teaching at St. Luke's College of Nursing. After World War II, he
envisioned a world-class hospital and college springing from the ruins of
Tokyo
;
thanks to his pioneering spirit and business savvy, the doctor turned these
institutions into the nation's top medical facility and nursing school. Today he
serves as chairman of the board of trustees at both organizations. Always willing
to try new things, he has published around 150 books since his 75th birthday, including
one "Living Long, Living Good" that has sold more than 1.2 million copies. As the founder
of the New Elderly Movement, Hinohara encourages others to live a long and happy life,
a quest in which no role model is better than the doctor himself.

Doctor Shigeaki Hinohara

Energy comes from feeling good, not from eating well or sleeping a lot. We all remember
how as children, when we were having fun, we often forgot to eat or sleep. I believe that
we can keep that attitude as adults, too. It's best not to tire the body with too many rules
such as lunchtime and bedtime.

All people who live long regardless of nationality, race or gender share one thing in common:
None are overweight... For breakfast I drink coffee, a glass of milk and some orange juice with
a tablespoon of olive oil in it. Olive oil is great for the arteries and keeps my skin healthy. Lunch
is milk and a few cookies, or nothing when I am too busy to eat. I never get hungry because I
focus on my work. Dinner is veggies, a bit of fish and rice, and, twice a week, 100 grams of lean
 meat..
Always plan ahead. My schedule book is already full until 2014, with lectures and my usual hospital
work. In 2016 I'll have some fun, though: I plan to attend the Tokyo Olympics!

There is no need to ever retire, but if one must, it should be a lot later than 65. The current
retirement age was set at 65 half a century ago, when the average life-expectancy in Japan
was 68 years and only 125 Japanese were over 100 years old. Today, Japanese women live to
be around 86 and men 80, and we have 36,000 centenarians in our country. In 20 years we will
have about 50,000 people over the age of 100.

Share what you know.I give 150 lectures a year, some for 100 elementary-school children, others
for 4,500 business people. I usually speak for 60 to 90 minutes, standing, to stay strong.

When a doctor recommends you take a test or have some surgery, ask whether the doctor would
suggest that his or her spouse or children go through such a procedure.Contrary to popular belief,
doctors can't cure everyone. So why cause unnecessary pain with surgery I think music and animal
therapy can help more than most doctors imagine.

To stay healthy, always take the stairs and carry your own stuff. I take two stairs at a time, to get my
muscles moving.

My inspiration is Robert Browning's poem "Abt Vogler. "My father used to read it to me. It encourages
us to make big art, not small scribbles. It says to try to draw a circle so huge that there is no way we
can finish it while we are alive. All we see is an arch; the rest is beyond our vision but it is there in the
distance.
Pain is mysterious, and having fun is the best way to forget it. If a child has a toothache, and you start
playing a game together, he or she immediately forgets the pain. Hospitals must cater to the basic need
of patients: We all want to have fun. At St. Luke's we have music and animal therapies, and art classes.
Don't be crazy about amassing material things. Remember: You don't know when your number is up,
and you can't take it with you to the next place.

Hospitals must be designed and prepared for major disasters, and they must accept every patient who
appears at their doors. We designed St.... Luke's so we can operate anywhere: in the basement, in the
 corridors, in the chapel. Most people thought I was crazy to prepare for a catastrophe, but on March 20,
1995, I was unfortunately proven right when members of the Aum Shinrikyu religious cult launched a
terrorist attack in the Tokyo subway. We accepted 740 victims and in two hours figured out that it was
 sarin gas that had hit them. Sadly we lost one person, but we saved 739 lives.

Science alone can't cure or help peopleScience lumps us all together, but illness is individual. Each
person is unique, and diseases are connected to their hearts. To know the illness and help people, we
need liberal and visual arts, not just medical ones.

Life is filled with incidents. On March 31, 1970, when I was 59 years old, I boarded the Yodogo, a flight
 from Tokyo to Fukuoka. It was a beautiful sunny morning, and as Mount Fuji came into sight, the plane
was hijacked by the Japanese Communist League-Red Army Faction. I spent the next four days
handcuffed to my seat in 40-degree heat. As a doctor, I looked at it all as an experiment and was
amazed at how the body slowed down in a crisis.
Find a role model and aim to achieve even more than they could ever do. My father went to the United
States in 1900 to study at Duke University in North Carolina. He was a pioneer and one of my heroes.
Later I found a few more life guides, and when I am stuck, I ask myself how they would deal with the
 problem.

It's wonderful to live long. Until one is 60 years old, it is easy to work for one's family and to achieve
one's goals. But in our later years, we should strive to contribute to society at large. Since the age of 65,
I have worked as a volunteer. I still put in 18 hours seven days a week and love every minute of it.