PINAKAMAKUNAT yata sa may 1,250 species ng kawayan ang bayog—na malimit gamiting haligi sa bahay-kubo. Tumatagal kasi ng 50 taon, lalo na ‘yung higit dalawang taon ang edad… ‘yung taga sa panahon na halos dilaw na ang kulay… nakakabungi sa ngipin ng lagare ang kasinsinan ng makunat na himaymay.
Siyempre, panalo sa lutuin ang labong ng bayog—may sangkap na pait. Kailangang ibabad ng tatlong araw sa tubig na may timplang apog para mapalis ang pait… para masalinan ng mineral na pampatibay ng buhok, kuko’t ngipin. Sa ganoong timpla, mananatili ang mapusyaw na puti ng himaymay, mas malutong pa sa kagat. Mapapagkamalang mataas na uri ng palmetto cabbage o ubod ng niyog kapag isinangkap sa lumpia.
Tinimtimsa saluyot at bagoong ang karaniwang luto nito—katiting lang ang protina sa supling ng kawayan, pulos himaymay o digestible fiber lang… na mas masisikmura kaysa tinatawag na moral fiber ng mga sikat at sikwat na tao sa pamahalaan.
Saka mainam sa katawan ang bisa ng ganoong himaymay. Kinakaskas-linis ang sikmura’t bituka pati na mga ugat na dinadaluyan ng dugo… sinasalakab ang low density lipoproteins (LDL) o kolesterol na pasimuno sa sakit sa puso’t stroke. Hindi makakadagdag-bilbil ang labong kaya malalantakan ng mga nais maging kainaman ang hubog ng katawan.
Balagwit o pingga na pang-igib ng tubig na, nagagamit ding Thai stick at Shaolin pole ang ganoong shoulder pole. Paulit-ulit na inihahampas sa dibdib, tiyan, mga bisig at hita ang Thai stick—para kayang indahin ang bigwas, suntok, kaldag o tadyak na dadapo sa katawan sa full contact sports, halimbawa’y boxing. Psychological conditioning for the body to endure jolts of pain.
At sa kamay ng dalubhasa tulad ng aking abuela, mapanganib na sandata ang makunat na pingga… na madalas lumagapak sa aking tumbong noon kapag nalaman na ako’y nakipagbabag… aba’y 28,000/sq. inch ang tensile strength o tibay ng bayog—23,000 lang sa bakal. Kaya balagwit na hamak-hamakin mas matindi pa sa truncheon dahil nagiging sandatang Shaolin.
Matibay man kahit magaang na sangkap sa payak na dampa, talagang mas mura kaysa palochina, coco lumber o segunda manong kahoy ang bayog—na walang tinik na taglay. Sa loob lang ng limang taon, ang ipinunla’y nagiging kulumpon—3 sentimetro sang-araw ang pagbulas ng kawayan.
At sa ganoong singkad ng panahon, makakatikim na ng labong, may mapuputol pang sangkap para sa bahay kubo.
Ipaubaya na sa mga malikhain ang pagbuo ng kahit na balsa lang… kahit na tagni-tagning lunday na tahanan. Hindi na hihiling na bumuo sa kawayan ng luxury liner o lantsa’t yate na isasalang a la “Kon-Tiki” ni Thor Heyerdahl o daong ni Noah sa unday ng mga Ondoy, Pepeng, at iba pang namumuong unos.
Dire necessity ought to give birth to ingenious design.
Napakaraming kawayan sa paligid—may 49 species sa Pilipinas, kabilang na ang bayog—lalo na sa mga masikap na mag-uukol ng talino’t panahon. Maraming mga tiwangwang at nakaligtaang lupa. Doon makakapagpalago, makakapagpalaki ng bayog—kaysa magpalaki ng bayag.
Saturday, October 10, 2009
Tahanang Walang Hagdan
WALA talagang ikalawang palapag sa naturang tahanan kaya tiis na lang sa lublob-baha ang mga naroon na pawang may kapansanan. Na pawang mas higit karapat-dapat amutan ng tulong. Dahil sila ang mga uri ng taong hindi hihilata o magmumukmok saanmang evacuation center, maghihintay sa dating ng relief goods.
Mataas ang pagpapahalaga nila sa sarili, parang ‘yung tinukoy minsan ni Oscar Wilde—pare-pareho man tayong nadapurak at nakalublob sa lusak, mayroon pa ring nakatutok ang paningin sa mga bituin… kahit na saklot pa rin ng dilim.
Nasalanta ng baha ni Ondoy ang kanilang mga makina’t kasangkapan sa kabuhayan. Lupaypay man at may kapansanan sa katawan, inot na itutuloy lang ang kanilang gawaing ginagampanan. Marupok man ang katawan, mananatili ang tibay na taglay sa dibdib at isipan.
Lumpo na kung lumpo. Pero kaya naman nilang tumindig sa sariling paa. Direst misfortunes may crush the faint of heart and weak of will, never the unyielding spirit of those in Tahanang Walang Hagdan. Lumpo man, hindi naman laman lampa na ilalampaso ng kalamidad.
Teka, nalalapit na rin lang ang kapaskuhan, mas mainam para sa mga korporasyon na bumili ng bulto-bultong corporate giveaways sa kanila. Napakaraming mapagpipilian doon.
Mga magulang, ninong at ninang: makakabili ng mga gawang-kamay na laruan at educational toys sa Tahanang Walang Hagdan.
Tutal, ginawa yatang panggatong o ninakaw na ang mga upuan at school desks sa mga paaralan sa mga paaralan na ginawang evacuation centers, palitan na lang ang mga ganoong kagamitan. Gumagawa rin ang mga taga-Tahanang Walang Hagdan ng mga ganoong kasangkapan para sa mga paaralan at tanggapan.
Abala sa lapat-kamay na gawain ang mga tagaroon, walang panahon para mangipuspos o manlumo sa mga malupit na unday ni Ondoy at Pepeng. Sasagi tuloy sa isipan ang isa sa mga kahanga-hangang bayani mula Tanauan, Batangas.
Frail of body yet Herculean, aye, promethean of mind, the late “Sublime Paralytic” moved men, events, even the course of our nation’s history. He was moved from place to place on a hammock, borne on the shoulders of two aides—he wasn’t that helpless in his younger years.
He had taken to walking from the family hut in barrio Talaga to a school in far-flung Lipa City—a leg-sapping, stamina-wracking 20-kilometer or so daily trudge through treacherous terrain. Steeling the mind with knowledge may entail going through hardships and difficulties.
Such a regimen was no stranger to Virginia E. Montilla, 48, social services and administrative director for Tahanan.
School was virtually at an arm’s length—or about three kilometers away from the dormitory in Cubao where she and 20 other Tahanan scholars took residence throughout their college days. The pair of “aides” that gave them mobility: their hands steering their wheelchairs across stretches of asphalt roads… on into the future.
Mataas ang pagpapahalaga nila sa sarili, parang ‘yung tinukoy minsan ni Oscar Wilde—pare-pareho man tayong nadapurak at nakalublob sa lusak, mayroon pa ring nakatutok ang paningin sa mga bituin… kahit na saklot pa rin ng dilim.
Nasalanta ng baha ni Ondoy ang kanilang mga makina’t kasangkapan sa kabuhayan. Lupaypay man at may kapansanan sa katawan, inot na itutuloy lang ang kanilang gawaing ginagampanan. Marupok man ang katawan, mananatili ang tibay na taglay sa dibdib at isipan.
Lumpo na kung lumpo. Pero kaya naman nilang tumindig sa sariling paa. Direst misfortunes may crush the faint of heart and weak of will, never the unyielding spirit of those in Tahanang Walang Hagdan. Lumpo man, hindi naman laman lampa na ilalampaso ng kalamidad.
Teka, nalalapit na rin lang ang kapaskuhan, mas mainam para sa mga korporasyon na bumili ng bulto-bultong corporate giveaways sa kanila. Napakaraming mapagpipilian doon.
Mga magulang, ninong at ninang: makakabili ng mga gawang-kamay na laruan at educational toys sa Tahanang Walang Hagdan.
Tutal, ginawa yatang panggatong o ninakaw na ang mga upuan at school desks sa mga paaralan sa mga paaralan na ginawang evacuation centers, palitan na lang ang mga ganoong kagamitan. Gumagawa rin ang mga taga-Tahanang Walang Hagdan ng mga ganoong kasangkapan para sa mga paaralan at tanggapan.
Abala sa lapat-kamay na gawain ang mga tagaroon, walang panahon para mangipuspos o manlumo sa mga malupit na unday ni Ondoy at Pepeng. Sasagi tuloy sa isipan ang isa sa mga kahanga-hangang bayani mula Tanauan, Batangas.
Frail of body yet Herculean, aye, promethean of mind, the late “Sublime Paralytic” moved men, events, even the course of our nation’s history. He was moved from place to place on a hammock, borne on the shoulders of two aides—he wasn’t that helpless in his younger years.
He had taken to walking from the family hut in barrio Talaga to a school in far-flung Lipa City—a leg-sapping, stamina-wracking 20-kilometer or so daily trudge through treacherous terrain. Steeling the mind with knowledge may entail going through hardships and difficulties.
Such a regimen was no stranger to Virginia E. Montilla, 48, social services and administrative director for Tahanan.
School was virtually at an arm’s length—or about three kilometers away from the dormitory in Cubao where she and 20 other Tahanan scholars took residence throughout their college days. The pair of “aides” that gave them mobility: their hands steering their wheelchairs across stretches of asphalt roads… on into the future.
Furyu
SA self-sustaining 70-square meter lot na binalangkas noong rehimeng Ferdinand E. Marcos: 25 sq. m. ang nakalaan sa sampalapag na dampa, 45 sq. m. sa tanimang lupa na nakapaligid. Pumapatak na 35% allocation for structure, 65% for Nature—the entire scheme of sharing spaces is meant as enhancement to the dweller’s humanity and inner quality of life.
‘Yung kabuuan ng 70 metro kuwadradong lote ang mismong lawak ng pamamahay para sa pinakapayak at masinop na pamumuhay. Maisasalin sa mas malawak na latag ng lupain at pamayanan ang ganitong hatian, 35% for structure, 65% for Nature.
Sa Japan, 75% ang inilaan sa Kalikasan, 25% sa pamayanan at sambahayan. Sa inaakala nating masikip na Hongkong, 70% ang sa Kalikasan, 30% sa mga pamayana’t sambahayan.
Magugunita ang iginiit ng isang mistiko ukol sa ganitong pagpaparaya ng mas malaking bahagi ng lupain sa Kalikasan: “Hindi sisidlan ng kapangyarihan ang kalawakan. Ito mismo’y kapangyarihan!”
Magugunita muli na sa kalawakan ng disyerto nag-ayuno ng 40 araw si Kristo: baka sa tagpuan ng lupain at papawirin sa ganoong kalawakan sumagap ng dagdag pang kapangyarihan. Nakayanan nga ang lahat ng ipinukol na tukso ng diyablo.
Kapangyarihan man ang kalawakan, pekpek pa rin ang hindi malilimutang masarap kapag masikip o makipot—at natukoy na ng pananaliksik na nag-uudyok ng buryong, sexual perversions at paghina ng katinuan at pagkatao ang mga sikip na puwang.
Sa madaling sabi, cramped spaces reduce humanity of their dwellers.
At lumalawak naman pati na saklaw ng isipan at katangian ng diwa sa mga malawak na lunan.
Pero likas na yata ang pagkadayukdok ng Penoy bugok sa pekpek… kaya nagpupumilit na isalaksak ang sarili sa mga masikip.
Sa mas malaking sisidlan, mas marami ang maisasalin. Kaya ipinapayo ng mga dalubhasa sa feng shui (furyu sa Japan) na kailangan daw mapalis ang mga kalat at pampasikip sa alinmang panig ng tahanan. Kailangang magbigay-daan, lumikha ng puwang sa mga bagong kasaganaan na pupuno sa nilikhang puwang.
Maiisip: tiyak na kasabwat ang mga feng shui experts sa paglalatag ng planong panlunsod o urban planning ng Hong Kong… kaya marahil 30% lang ng land area ang nakatokang tindigan ng mga gusali, 70% ang nanatiling laan sa Kalikasan… sa tinatawag na life support, life enhancement systems for human dwellers. Call that “urban renewal.”
Sa kumpareng anluwage napulot ko ang naiibang taguri sa mga naturang puwang—Godspace o puwang para sa Maykapal na dapat laging nakahihigit ang lawak kaysa manspace o puwang para sa tao. Hindi maganda na ipagkait ng karaniwang tao ang puwang para sa Maykapal sa kanyang pamamahay… sa pamumuhay.
Sa mga pamamahay at pamumuhay ng Penoy bugok talagang ikinait at kinamkam ang puwang para sa Diyos—walang Godspace sa condo, wala rin sa squatters’ area.
‘Yung kabuuan ng 70 metro kuwadradong lote ang mismong lawak ng pamamahay para sa pinakapayak at masinop na pamumuhay. Maisasalin sa mas malawak na latag ng lupain at pamayanan ang ganitong hatian, 35% for structure, 65% for Nature.
Sa Japan, 75% ang inilaan sa Kalikasan, 25% sa pamayanan at sambahayan. Sa inaakala nating masikip na Hongkong, 70% ang sa Kalikasan, 30% sa mga pamayana’t sambahayan.
Magugunita ang iginiit ng isang mistiko ukol sa ganitong pagpaparaya ng mas malaking bahagi ng lupain sa Kalikasan: “Hindi sisidlan ng kapangyarihan ang kalawakan. Ito mismo’y kapangyarihan!”
Magugunita muli na sa kalawakan ng disyerto nag-ayuno ng 40 araw si Kristo: baka sa tagpuan ng lupain at papawirin sa ganoong kalawakan sumagap ng dagdag pang kapangyarihan. Nakayanan nga ang lahat ng ipinukol na tukso ng diyablo.
Kapangyarihan man ang kalawakan, pekpek pa rin ang hindi malilimutang masarap kapag masikip o makipot—at natukoy na ng pananaliksik na nag-uudyok ng buryong, sexual perversions at paghina ng katinuan at pagkatao ang mga sikip na puwang.
Sa madaling sabi, cramped spaces reduce humanity of their dwellers.
At lumalawak naman pati na saklaw ng isipan at katangian ng diwa sa mga malawak na lunan.
Pero likas na yata ang pagkadayukdok ng Penoy bugok sa pekpek… kaya nagpupumilit na isalaksak ang sarili sa mga masikip.
Sa mas malaking sisidlan, mas marami ang maisasalin. Kaya ipinapayo ng mga dalubhasa sa feng shui (furyu sa Japan) na kailangan daw mapalis ang mga kalat at pampasikip sa alinmang panig ng tahanan. Kailangang magbigay-daan, lumikha ng puwang sa mga bagong kasaganaan na pupuno sa nilikhang puwang.
Maiisip: tiyak na kasabwat ang mga feng shui experts sa paglalatag ng planong panlunsod o urban planning ng Hong Kong… kaya marahil 30% lang ng land area ang nakatokang tindigan ng mga gusali, 70% ang nanatiling laan sa Kalikasan… sa tinatawag na life support, life enhancement systems for human dwellers. Call that “urban renewal.”
Sa kumpareng anluwage napulot ko ang naiibang taguri sa mga naturang puwang—Godspace o puwang para sa Maykapal na dapat laging nakahihigit ang lawak kaysa manspace o puwang para sa tao. Hindi maganda na ipagkait ng karaniwang tao ang puwang para sa Maykapal sa kanyang pamamahay… sa pamumuhay.
Sa mga pamamahay at pamumuhay ng Penoy bugok talagang ikinait at kinamkam ang puwang para sa Diyos—walang Godspace sa condo, wala rin sa squatters’ area.
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Kicking carcinoma
“The life of the body is a tranquil heart, but envy is a cancer in the bones.”
Proverbs 14:30
PETTY felon dies from a gunshot wound. But the malignant growth that was gnawing at his innards lives on. Famished for information, such a colony of cancer cells—in couch potato mode-- feeds ravenously on a diet of trashy movies, gaining a semblance of awareness, a will to live, even a hunger to spawn children in its own hideous image. Such horror of oncology was plied in Clive Barker’s 1980s uptake on cancer, “Son of Celluloid.”
The mass of tissues mocks its doltish felon-host barely eking less than an aimless existence. It crows about its superiority as a form of life that has imbued itself with a thirst for learning and loftier ambitions. Carcinoma -- as an anomalous bit of genetic information-- stockpiles more and more information, turns into a self-aware entity and aspires to become more than Homo sapiens.
Similarly besieged from within by carcinoma colonies, the do-or-die protagonist in Norman Spinrad’s 1960s sci-fi uptake, “Carcinoma Angels” brings the battle inside his body; he mounts a no-quarters-asked-no-quarters-given assault to decimate every pernicious cell that was eating his insides.
Spinrad suggests that spontaneous remission did not correlate with any external factor. The fight against cancer must be waged--and won—within to bring healing.
As the dust of an all-out inward war had settled, kick-ass protagonist had reclaimed his own territory, emerges triumphant— conquest completed and there’s the consequent spontaneous remission.
Such far-fetched combative modes of wiping out carcinoma wouldn’t stir interest in medical circles. Too, pharmaceutical outfits—they bankroll research and development for new drugs-- have little interest in pursuing alternative cancer therapies. Alternative treatments plied out in fiction and unorthodox healing circles are generally inexpensive and cannot be patented. Drug firms can only rake in profits with a drug that can be patented.
Like equally top number deadly killer heart disease, cancer is a multidimensional malaise. That’s why it is nearly impossible to study the effects of diet, therapeutic agents, and other influences in the traditional research framework. Investigating several variables calls for dozens of experiments— and that requires gargantuan amounts of research funding.
Too, the conventional experimental tack calls for checking one substance at a time in a proverbial seeking for a needle buried in a haystack. Such a search mode-- hopefully-- may zero in on an active biochemical principle or pharmacological agent that can cure cancer.
Another drawback: too tough to design a double-blind study to find out whether combinations of various elements or components that go into natural therapies can zap carcinoma; double-blind studies are designed to pinpoint one or few therapies that work.
With his life on the line ticking and trickling away, the desperate cancer patient may, short of running amok, likely take after the bellicose mode of Spinrad’s protagonist in “Carcinoma Angels.” He carries out whatever imponderable solution it takes to extirpate hordes of malignancy within threatening metastasis for its final conquest.
ECHOING the counsel of a wise king in the Scriptures to nurture a tranquil heart and shun envy that can burrow into the marrow, a martial artist named Li Ching-yuen (1677-1933) spilled out the topmost secret to longevity: “Keep a quiet heart.”
The brutal physical regimen in any system of unarmed combat, say, karatedo (literally, “way of the empty hand”) represents the tip of the iceberg—the repetitive drills to hone the entire body’s reflexes for fighting embodies the pinky finger, the entire regimen is a full arm’s length that covers cultivation of the spirit, the emotions, an inner rhythm and the mind. Indeed, old-fashioned martial skills aim to nurture more of the psyche rather than the sinew. It is an out-and-out attitude makeover and some.
In pushing the limits of physical prowess a wee bit at a time in a self-effacing regimen, the martial arts initiate may step into the realm beyond the physical. This, after the cares and fears of the heart are hushed still—there is irony in that gaining expertise in the art of warfare, one may find peace.
Consider isshin-ryu (translates as “one heart-stream” or “one truth-stream” where the ancient character for “heart” also stands for “truth” or “reality”) a typical style of karatedo. Getting to the black belt level of skills, a learner has to go through endurance repetitions hundreds of times. Say, focused slamming of one’s fists onto a twine-wound punching pad called makawara, lashing out a dose of 100-300 kicks for each leg, including a non-stop 25-kilometer jog. Such generous doses of physical punishment look a tad close to an ascetic’s self-inflicted mortification of the flesh, or a religious penitent’s acts of atonement.
Then again, reports point to a 16-year old youth stricken with cerebral palsy—he saw action in the World Karate Championship held in Pittsburgh, U.S. from June 18-20. Srimanth Bal of Gujarat, India had to square off and win over cerebral palsy, a non-contagious condition that cause physical disability in human development.
Srimanth could not walk for eleven years; he was bound to his wheelchair and had to be force-fed. He could not walk without help. His father came to know about karate therapy and sought out for help the president All India Isshinryu Karate Association.
Recalls Srimanth’s coach: "Five years ago in 2004, we started giving him training. At that time he could not even walk. Initially, it was very difficult how to train him. But, I guided him and trained him.”
Plunging into earnest training for five years, the boy ploughed off on the path to recovery and control of his limbs. Too, he has earned the kuro obi or black belt level of skills, an arsenal of martial know-how which he plied out at a global level competition.
HEWING to the Albert Einstein assertion, “Imagination is more important than knowledge,” fictionist Norman Spinrad dumps his never-say-die cancer-stricken protagonist right into the character’s bloodstream—all 70,000 miles spanning the length and breadth of the human body; a network of highways, byways and wee ways through which carcinoma are likely ferried and pumped all-through to infest the victim. The unlikely culprit that, as Spinrad suggests, abets carcinoma to worsen into metastasis and corrupt the corpus?
The heart, it is.
There must be more than medical wisdom in King Solomon’s divine-inspired proverb: “The life of the body is a tranquil heart…”
Why, the “nin” character in ninjutsu (or art of the ninja literally translates as “heart art”) is a variant for heart and must have inspired the Brooklyn, New York-based National Children’s Leukemia Foundation to ply out Ninja Power Martial Arts Therapy— “a unique program that blends the ancient wisdom of the martial arts with the mind-body approach of modern integrative medicine."
The combative arts therapy “offers powerful messages of hope, opportunities for success and achievement, concrete techniques to manage pain and fear, the opportunity to connect with peers without feeling ‘different’, and time to feel ‘normal’ and in control. (A) child… torn down physically and psychologically by disease, rebounds with martial arts therapy, gaining control of negative emotions and rebuilding self-confidence and self-esteem.”
Children—including cancer-stricken 2-5 year-olds—drill through defensive moves in hour-long group sessions that also include meditation, visualization and breathing techniques. In meditation, children can cultivate their own intrinsic energies, becoming empowered and focused on positive outcomes.
“Breathing techniques and visualization help children conquer pain and negative emotions while physically engaging karate movements can boost children psychologically and improve balance and coordination. Learning karate improves self-confidence and self-esteem, and children quickly develop their own ‘indomitable spirit,’ cites the NCLF online prospectus.
NO food and drug regulatory body of any nation would hazard approval of curative quackery, hence, qigong— literally “breathing skills,” a soft martial art that relies on use of ki, chi, qi or life force in mortal combat—took a bad rap under the Mao Ze Dong regime in China. Qigong advocate Guo Lin cured herself of uterine cancer after 10 years of practicing such art, but the state prevented her from sharing such martial cum therapeutic know-how to other cancer sufferers—“she began teaching her method to people suffering from cancer and chronic illnesses in 1970. Her first student, a worker who suffered from serious heart disease, was cured after practicing her qigong. Her second student, a factory worker, was cured of his stomach cancer after a year of assiduous practice,” recounts author David A. Palmer in “Qigong Fever: Body, Science, and Utopia in China.”
Cites Palmer: “Between 1971 and 1977, Guo Lin was interrogated seven times by the (government authorities). In spite of the harassment, the number of people who came to practice with her grew, until she was able to train coaches to lead practice groups in other parks, and an informal organization of practitioners was created to study and publicize her (quaint anti-cancer treatment) method.”
There was no retreat no surrender for this femme fatal of a martial artist. Soon, Guo Lin had the backing of Communist Party cadres who had benefited from her method. A retired navy officer turned up as ardent supporter and took Guo Lin to several work units, looking for a permanent base for teaching and practice. By 1977, two officials at Beijing Normal University risked offering the campus as a center for Guo Lin’s tutorials.
Sensing a new political climate at the heels of Mao’s death, to the health ministry she submitted a report summarizing seven years of experience teaching qigong and claimed that it was a cure for cancer. Too, she began to organize regular, formal courses at Beijing Normal University.
“‘Experience sharing assemblies’ were also held, at which practitioners could share and summarize the benefits of the method. In a turn of events, Guo Lin was invited to lecture at dozens of universities, factories and official units. Thousands of people began to learn her qigong method in parks and public spaces around the country,” writes Palmer.
Thus, qigong blossomed as a regimen for primary health care, a mode of preemptive strike at a dreaded menace of the 21st century that zapped dead 6.7 million in 2002 and may decimate 10.3 million by 2020 to emerge as the world’s top killer.
KARATEDO as a way of life saw the light in an archipelago at the southernmost tip of Japan: Okinawa, as reports have it, “has a population of about 1.3 million, and has 55 centenarians per 100,000 people, the highest ratio in the world.”
The unarmed mode of combat was plied out by the island’s fishers and farmers who fought off sword- and spear-wielding samurai warriors centuries ago. Apart from the draconian physical regimen befitting karatedo, Okinawans have steeled themselves in the nobility of a near-Spartan lifestyle feeding on the fruits of the land and the bounties of the sea.
It would be too tough to turn up a double-blind study to figure out whatever it is in karatedo that quells carcinoma. It could be the quaint breathing techniques, the supposedly healing sounds expelled during form practice. It might be the hours of meditation and rapt absorption beneath the torrents of a waterfall, the appreciation for serene beauty manifest in nature, the explosive striking techniques, a pared-down lifestyle that celebrates frugality… that’s a kaleidoscopic assortment that can be dismissed by any food and drug agency: “No approved therapeutic claims.”
Proverbs 14:30
PETTY felon dies from a gunshot wound. But the malignant growth that was gnawing at his innards lives on. Famished for information, such a colony of cancer cells—in couch potato mode-- feeds ravenously on a diet of trashy movies, gaining a semblance of awareness, a will to live, even a hunger to spawn children in its own hideous image. Such horror of oncology was plied in Clive Barker’s 1980s uptake on cancer, “Son of Celluloid.”
The mass of tissues mocks its doltish felon-host barely eking less than an aimless existence. It crows about its superiority as a form of life that has imbued itself with a thirst for learning and loftier ambitions. Carcinoma -- as an anomalous bit of genetic information-- stockpiles more and more information, turns into a self-aware entity and aspires to become more than Homo sapiens.
Similarly besieged from within by carcinoma colonies, the do-or-die protagonist in Norman Spinrad’s 1960s sci-fi uptake, “Carcinoma Angels” brings the battle inside his body; he mounts a no-quarters-asked-no-quarters-given assault to decimate every pernicious cell that was eating his insides.
Spinrad suggests that spontaneous remission did not correlate with any external factor. The fight against cancer must be waged--and won—within to bring healing.
As the dust of an all-out inward war had settled, kick-ass protagonist had reclaimed his own territory, emerges triumphant— conquest completed and there’s the consequent spontaneous remission.
Such far-fetched combative modes of wiping out carcinoma wouldn’t stir interest in medical circles. Too, pharmaceutical outfits—they bankroll research and development for new drugs-- have little interest in pursuing alternative cancer therapies. Alternative treatments plied out in fiction and unorthodox healing circles are generally inexpensive and cannot be patented. Drug firms can only rake in profits with a drug that can be patented.
Like equally top number deadly killer heart disease, cancer is a multidimensional malaise. That’s why it is nearly impossible to study the effects of diet, therapeutic agents, and other influences in the traditional research framework. Investigating several variables calls for dozens of experiments— and that requires gargantuan amounts of research funding.
Too, the conventional experimental tack calls for checking one substance at a time in a proverbial seeking for a needle buried in a haystack. Such a search mode-- hopefully-- may zero in on an active biochemical principle or pharmacological agent that can cure cancer.
Another drawback: too tough to design a double-blind study to find out whether combinations of various elements or components that go into natural therapies can zap carcinoma; double-blind studies are designed to pinpoint one or few therapies that work.
With his life on the line ticking and trickling away, the desperate cancer patient may, short of running amok, likely take after the bellicose mode of Spinrad’s protagonist in “Carcinoma Angels.” He carries out whatever imponderable solution it takes to extirpate hordes of malignancy within threatening metastasis for its final conquest.
ECHOING the counsel of a wise king in the Scriptures to nurture a tranquil heart and shun envy that can burrow into the marrow, a martial artist named Li Ching-yuen (1677-1933) spilled out the topmost secret to longevity: “Keep a quiet heart.”
The brutal physical regimen in any system of unarmed combat, say, karatedo (literally, “way of the empty hand”) represents the tip of the iceberg—the repetitive drills to hone the entire body’s reflexes for fighting embodies the pinky finger, the entire regimen is a full arm’s length that covers cultivation of the spirit, the emotions, an inner rhythm and the mind. Indeed, old-fashioned martial skills aim to nurture more of the psyche rather than the sinew. It is an out-and-out attitude makeover and some.
In pushing the limits of physical prowess a wee bit at a time in a self-effacing regimen, the martial arts initiate may step into the realm beyond the physical. This, after the cares and fears of the heart are hushed still—there is irony in that gaining expertise in the art of warfare, one may find peace.
Consider isshin-ryu (translates as “one heart-stream” or “one truth-stream” where the ancient character for “heart” also stands for “truth” or “reality”) a typical style of karatedo. Getting to the black belt level of skills, a learner has to go through endurance repetitions hundreds of times. Say, focused slamming of one’s fists onto a twine-wound punching pad called makawara, lashing out a dose of 100-300 kicks for each leg, including a non-stop 25-kilometer jog. Such generous doses of physical punishment look a tad close to an ascetic’s self-inflicted mortification of the flesh, or a religious penitent’s acts of atonement.
Then again, reports point to a 16-year old youth stricken with cerebral palsy—he saw action in the World Karate Championship held in Pittsburgh, U.S. from June 18-20. Srimanth Bal of Gujarat, India had to square off and win over cerebral palsy, a non-contagious condition that cause physical disability in human development.
Srimanth could not walk for eleven years; he was bound to his wheelchair and had to be force-fed. He could not walk without help. His father came to know about karate therapy and sought out for help the president All India Isshinryu Karate Association.
Recalls Srimanth’s coach: "Five years ago in 2004, we started giving him training. At that time he could not even walk. Initially, it was very difficult how to train him. But, I guided him and trained him.”
Plunging into earnest training for five years, the boy ploughed off on the path to recovery and control of his limbs. Too, he has earned the kuro obi or black belt level of skills, an arsenal of martial know-how which he plied out at a global level competition.
HEWING to the Albert Einstein assertion, “Imagination is more important than knowledge,” fictionist Norman Spinrad dumps his never-say-die cancer-stricken protagonist right into the character’s bloodstream—all 70,000 miles spanning the length and breadth of the human body; a network of highways, byways and wee ways through which carcinoma are likely ferried and pumped all-through to infest the victim. The unlikely culprit that, as Spinrad suggests, abets carcinoma to worsen into metastasis and corrupt the corpus?
The heart, it is.
There must be more than medical wisdom in King Solomon’s divine-inspired proverb: “The life of the body is a tranquil heart…”
Why, the “nin” character in ninjutsu (or art of the ninja literally translates as “heart art”) is a variant for heart and must have inspired the Brooklyn, New York-based National Children’s Leukemia Foundation to ply out Ninja Power Martial Arts Therapy— “a unique program that blends the ancient wisdom of the martial arts with the mind-body approach of modern integrative medicine."
The combative arts therapy “offers powerful messages of hope, opportunities for success and achievement, concrete techniques to manage pain and fear, the opportunity to connect with peers without feeling ‘different’, and time to feel ‘normal’ and in control. (A) child… torn down physically and psychologically by disease, rebounds with martial arts therapy, gaining control of negative emotions and rebuilding self-confidence and self-esteem.”
Children—including cancer-stricken 2-5 year-olds—drill through defensive moves in hour-long group sessions that also include meditation, visualization and breathing techniques. In meditation, children can cultivate their own intrinsic energies, becoming empowered and focused on positive outcomes.
“Breathing techniques and visualization help children conquer pain and negative emotions while physically engaging karate movements can boost children psychologically and improve balance and coordination. Learning karate improves self-confidence and self-esteem, and children quickly develop their own ‘indomitable spirit,’ cites the NCLF online prospectus.
NO food and drug regulatory body of any nation would hazard approval of curative quackery, hence, qigong— literally “breathing skills,” a soft martial art that relies on use of ki, chi, qi or life force in mortal combat—took a bad rap under the Mao Ze Dong regime in China. Qigong advocate Guo Lin cured herself of uterine cancer after 10 years of practicing such art, but the state prevented her from sharing such martial cum therapeutic know-how to other cancer sufferers—“she began teaching her method to people suffering from cancer and chronic illnesses in 1970. Her first student, a worker who suffered from serious heart disease, was cured after practicing her qigong. Her second student, a factory worker, was cured of his stomach cancer after a year of assiduous practice,” recounts author David A. Palmer in “Qigong Fever: Body, Science, and Utopia in China.”
Cites Palmer: “Between 1971 and 1977, Guo Lin was interrogated seven times by the (government authorities). In spite of the harassment, the number of people who came to practice with her grew, until she was able to train coaches to lead practice groups in other parks, and an informal organization of practitioners was created to study and publicize her (quaint anti-cancer treatment) method.”
There was no retreat no surrender for this femme fatal of a martial artist. Soon, Guo Lin had the backing of Communist Party cadres who had benefited from her method. A retired navy officer turned up as ardent supporter and took Guo Lin to several work units, looking for a permanent base for teaching and practice. By 1977, two officials at Beijing Normal University risked offering the campus as a center for Guo Lin’s tutorials.
Sensing a new political climate at the heels of Mao’s death, to the health ministry she submitted a report summarizing seven years of experience teaching qigong and claimed that it was a cure for cancer. Too, she began to organize regular, formal courses at Beijing Normal University.
“‘Experience sharing assemblies’ were also held, at which practitioners could share and summarize the benefits of the method. In a turn of events, Guo Lin was invited to lecture at dozens of universities, factories and official units. Thousands of people began to learn her qigong method in parks and public spaces around the country,” writes Palmer.
Thus, qigong blossomed as a regimen for primary health care, a mode of preemptive strike at a dreaded menace of the 21st century that zapped dead 6.7 million in 2002 and may decimate 10.3 million by 2020 to emerge as the world’s top killer.
KARATEDO as a way of life saw the light in an archipelago at the southernmost tip of Japan: Okinawa, as reports have it, “has a population of about 1.3 million, and has 55 centenarians per 100,000 people, the highest ratio in the world.”
The unarmed mode of combat was plied out by the island’s fishers and farmers who fought off sword- and spear-wielding samurai warriors centuries ago. Apart from the draconian physical regimen befitting karatedo, Okinawans have steeled themselves in the nobility of a near-Spartan lifestyle feeding on the fruits of the land and the bounties of the sea.
It would be too tough to turn up a double-blind study to figure out whatever it is in karatedo that quells carcinoma. It could be the quaint breathing techniques, the supposedly healing sounds expelled during form practice. It might be the hours of meditation and rapt absorption beneath the torrents of a waterfall, the appreciation for serene beauty manifest in nature, the explosive striking techniques, a pared-down lifestyle that celebrates frugality… that’s a kaleidoscopic assortment that can be dismissed by any food and drug agency: “No approved therapeutic claims.”
Saturday, March 07, 2009
Paala’la’y gamot sa taong nakakalimot
Rogelio G. Mangahas wrote:
DONG, nilalabanan ko ang grabidad ng kalimot kaya yata ako napuwersa ni Mila Aguilar na magmember dito. Di ko pa gaanong alam ang mga detalye nito kaya incomplete ang mga entries, kung baga.
Dong Ampil de los Reyes wrote back:
SA tuos ng advertising industry, mahigit sa $15 bilyon ang halaga ng puwang sa gawing kanan ng sama-samang profile ng umaabot na sa 5 milyong tao na nakaanib sa Facebook—na mas astig talaga at mataas ang antas kaysa Friendster, kahit sa DesktopDating na pawang social network engines sa Internet.
Talagang napakaraming saklot ng lungkot saanmang lukot at kuyukot ng mundo. Kaya nagsulputan pati sa Internet ang mga lunan o website para mapagkunan ng kausap sa panulat, katipan sa pagtatagpo, kalaguyo, kasiping, kasumping o kasabwat sa kinagigiliwang gawain.
Mantakin naman, kabilang na ang kartada nating dalawa sa bunton ng mga kartada sa Facebook—mga hilatsa ng pagmumukha, larawan, tala, at samut-saring kuntil-butil na maisasalpak. At ang kapirasong puwang sa may kanan ng Facebook profile, nagkakahalaga ng $15 bilyon… sa timbangan ng halaga, dapat lang na tapatan din ng katumbas na halaga.
Teka, dekada 1980 pa lang, umiinom na ang katoto nating Edgardo M. Reyes (Sa Mga Kuko ng Liwanag, Laro sa Baga, Bangkang Papel sa Dagat ng Apoy, atbp. marikit na nobela’t maikling kuwento) ng lecithin supplements. Para masalag ang daluhong ng kalimot at manatiling may talim-balisong ang isipan.
Naitala ko nga pala sa aking Facebook profile ang mga pagkain na mayaman sa lecithin—na choline nga ang taguri sa ngayon… uulitin ko na lang, saka dadagdagan ng iba pang pagkain:
To create acetylcholine (Ach), DMAE (dimethylaminoethanol) works with choline. Ah, the brain turns up neurotransmitters with choline, so needful a nutrient for overall brain health and functioning. When there’s not enough choline intake in your diet, the brain swipes it from other parts of your brain-- why, it starts eating itself alive to keep on doing vital functions like heart and lung regulation.
You need at least 35 mg of DMAE a day. Fish is a good food source, especially sardines and anchovies—oo, kahit mga mumurahing tunsoy, tinapang Salinas, dilis at bagoong!
Healthful levels of choline intake: 425 mg a day for women; 550 mg for men; and as much as 1500 mg a day if you’re a senior citizen. Best food sources of choline are (in mg per 100 g of food):
Raw egg yolks – 682
Beef liver -- 418
Whole cooked eggs – 272
Chicken liver – 290.
Wheat germ --152
Bacon --125
Pork --103
A choline metabolite, betaine should also be considered for intake. Foods with the highest betaine concentrations per 100g:
Wheat bran—1506
Wheat germ—1395
Spinach—725
Mga ganitong uri ng sulatin ang natotoka ngayon sa ‘kin ng isang pasulatan sa Makati… masayang gawain. Nadaragdagan ang nahahango kong kaalaman.
--hellspawnshop@hotmail.com
DONG, nilalabanan ko ang grabidad ng kalimot kaya yata ako napuwersa ni Mila Aguilar na magmember dito. Di ko pa gaanong alam ang mga detalye nito kaya incomplete ang mga entries, kung baga.
Dong Ampil de los Reyes wrote back:
SA tuos ng advertising industry, mahigit sa $15 bilyon ang halaga ng puwang sa gawing kanan ng sama-samang profile ng umaabot na sa 5 milyong tao na nakaanib sa Facebook—na mas astig talaga at mataas ang antas kaysa Friendster, kahit sa DesktopDating na pawang social network engines sa Internet.
Talagang napakaraming saklot ng lungkot saanmang lukot at kuyukot ng mundo. Kaya nagsulputan pati sa Internet ang mga lunan o website para mapagkunan ng kausap sa panulat, katipan sa pagtatagpo, kalaguyo, kasiping, kasumping o kasabwat sa kinagigiliwang gawain.
Mantakin naman, kabilang na ang kartada nating dalawa sa bunton ng mga kartada sa Facebook—mga hilatsa ng pagmumukha, larawan, tala, at samut-saring kuntil-butil na maisasalpak. At ang kapirasong puwang sa may kanan ng Facebook profile, nagkakahalaga ng $15 bilyon… sa timbangan ng halaga, dapat lang na tapatan din ng katumbas na halaga.
Teka, dekada 1980 pa lang, umiinom na ang katoto nating Edgardo M. Reyes (Sa Mga Kuko ng Liwanag, Laro sa Baga, Bangkang Papel sa Dagat ng Apoy, atbp. marikit na nobela’t maikling kuwento) ng lecithin supplements. Para masalag ang daluhong ng kalimot at manatiling may talim-balisong ang isipan.
Naitala ko nga pala sa aking Facebook profile ang mga pagkain na mayaman sa lecithin—na choline nga ang taguri sa ngayon… uulitin ko na lang, saka dadagdagan ng iba pang pagkain:
To create acetylcholine (Ach), DMAE (dimethylaminoethanol) works with choline. Ah, the brain turns up neurotransmitters with choline, so needful a nutrient for overall brain health and functioning. When there’s not enough choline intake in your diet, the brain swipes it from other parts of your brain-- why, it starts eating itself alive to keep on doing vital functions like heart and lung regulation.
You need at least 35 mg of DMAE a day. Fish is a good food source, especially sardines and anchovies—oo, kahit mga mumurahing tunsoy, tinapang Salinas, dilis at bagoong!
Healthful levels of choline intake: 425 mg a day for women; 550 mg for men; and as much as 1500 mg a day if you’re a senior citizen. Best food sources of choline are (in mg per 100 g of food):
Raw egg yolks – 682
Beef liver -- 418
Whole cooked eggs – 272
Chicken liver – 290.
Wheat germ --152
Bacon --125
Pork --103
A choline metabolite, betaine should also be considered for intake. Foods with the highest betaine concentrations per 100g:
Wheat bran—1506
Wheat germ—1395
Spinach—725
Mga ganitong uri ng sulatin ang natotoka ngayon sa ‘kin ng isang pasulatan sa Makati… masayang gawain. Nadaragdagan ang nahahango kong kaalaman.
--hellspawnshop@hotmail.com
Thursday, March 05, 2009
Right to retort left to extort
DALAWANG linggo daw na inalimura
Nitong pahayagang para bang maruya—
Apoy sa ilalim walang patumangga
Sa ibabaw naman, kulo ng mantika.
At nang mapika nga itong mambabatas
Nais makaresbak, agad bumalangkas
Nito ngang kakatwang panukalang batas—
Balita’t malita dapat na parehas!
Kapag binatikos si Senador Kumag
O si Gunggongressman ay aming kinaldag
Pahina o airtime hitang ibubukas—
Kumag at gunggong man.. dapat makaroskas...
Mungkahing tit for tat kapag pinairal
Ang krimeng libelo baka raw matanggal
Totoo’t palpak mang hayag na paratang
Pwede nang irambol sa pahina’t airtime…
Ang katoto naming mga kartunista
May kiliti’t anghang kapag bumibira
Kapirasong puwang kung reresbakan pa
Pati comic relief… makakadismaya.
Halimbawa na lang itong “Pugad Baboy”
Bakbakan ba naman ang mga diktador?
Unano’t pandak daw at may pagkaulol
Santambak na pygmy agad ang nasapol…
Pa’no kung mainis silang mga pandak,
Lalo na nga silang megalomaniac?
May talipandas ngang naging talipandak
Na hanggang sa ngayon ay namamayagpag…
Ano nang cartoon strip ang ibubulaga
O pansamantalang papalitan kaya?
May sense of ill-humor o makakasuya
Kapag humirit na iyong tinutuya?
(Pero sa totoo, mas nakakatawa
Pati talumpating binibigkas nila
Second thought o utot man ang ibubuga
Maaaliw tayo—talagang talaga!)
Ah, the right to reply ibigay sa diyablo
Upang maihayag ang mga numero—
Iyong kumbinasyong tatama sa lotto…
Upang sambayanan, instant milyonaryo!
--hellspawnshop@hotmail.com
Nitong pahayagang para bang maruya—
Apoy sa ilalim walang patumangga
Sa ibabaw naman, kulo ng mantika.
At nang mapika nga itong mambabatas
Nais makaresbak, agad bumalangkas
Nito ngang kakatwang panukalang batas—
Balita’t malita dapat na parehas!
Kapag binatikos si Senador Kumag
O si Gunggongressman ay aming kinaldag
Pahina o airtime hitang ibubukas—
Kumag at gunggong man.. dapat makaroskas...
Mungkahing tit for tat kapag pinairal
Ang krimeng libelo baka raw matanggal
Totoo’t palpak mang hayag na paratang
Pwede nang irambol sa pahina’t airtime…
Ang katoto naming mga kartunista
May kiliti’t anghang kapag bumibira
Kapirasong puwang kung reresbakan pa
Pati comic relief… makakadismaya.
Halimbawa na lang itong “Pugad Baboy”
Bakbakan ba naman ang mga diktador?
Unano’t pandak daw at may pagkaulol
Santambak na pygmy agad ang nasapol…
Pa’no kung mainis silang mga pandak,
Lalo na nga silang megalomaniac?
May talipandas ngang naging talipandak
Na hanggang sa ngayon ay namamayagpag…
Ano nang cartoon strip ang ibubulaga
O pansamantalang papalitan kaya?
May sense of ill-humor o makakasuya
Kapag humirit na iyong tinutuya?
(Pero sa totoo, mas nakakatawa
Pati talumpating binibigkas nila
Second thought o utot man ang ibubuga
Maaaliw tayo—talagang talaga!)
Ah, the right to reply ibigay sa diyablo
Upang maihayag ang mga numero—
Iyong kumbinasyong tatama sa lotto…
Upang sambayanan, instant milyonaryo!
--hellspawnshop@hotmail.com
Wednesday, March 04, 2009
Square meal, round tummy
Kuro ng anak sa doodles11006@gmail.com:
A FELLOW warned me that I’m getting bigger and told me to exercise more, some say I look healthier than I was last year when they first saw me. At 65 kilos I think it’s healthy, right? I'm still doing something about my tummy. You were right it’s easy to get big but hard to trim down. I’ve lessen my intake of carbs but it’s not working fast enough. I want my abs back. Mabigat ba ang Apo mo? Simulan mo na kasi ilakad para ma- exercise, ha-ha-ha-ha. I always refer to her as Musaba as dubbed by Aaron. Can’t you send some pics of the kittens before they are to be sentenced outside by Mama especially the white kitten you mentioned?
Turo ng ama sa tagakataga@yahoo.com:
AT 10 stones wrapped on a delicate bone structure, that’s not really fab—flab that’s what. All it takes to snap any rib encaging the heart like pretzel is one PSI—a pound per square inch of pressure. You’ve got to say adios to adipose... or you just continue inflicting undue torture on your heart with the slow build of flab pressure.
Trimming down isn’t about lopping off calorie intake—no, not dumping three square meals on a round tummy. What counts is spreading out intake of quality carbohydrates in five wee meals, yeah, you read right: five.
And when I say quality carbohydrates, I’m talking about unpolished cereals-- say, rolled oats with the unsightly dirt-looking bran tacked on each grain, crushed whole wheat, unpolished rice… Include kamote, gabi, yams like ubi and tugui—their long-chain biochemical make-up is nothing short of wonderful that even our innards can appreciate… it takes longer time for the enzymes and such gastric juices in our insides to work on these complex carbohydrates… so we feel full for longer periods…
And they spawn no spike in the body’s blood sugar level after ingestion… this is the beauty of slow food. On sekantot, oops, second thought, ingestion’s just like lovemaking, to be done in solemn adagio, like that ponderous cadence of Johann Pachelbel’s “Canon in D.”
Sobra na tummy, palitan na! Indeed the tummy area holds the dan tien, the body’s axis and center of gravity where every movement flows from. Washboard abs shouldn’t include the washing machine plunked on ‘em…
Kuo Yun-shen, the jian or master who perfected the peng ch’üan (an explosive push) or so-called “Demon Hand” spent three years of his incarceration doing a variant of the three-hugging position. His hands were in heavy chains, so taking that position—and doing the rhythmic breathing (count two, inhale; count eight, hold breath down to diaphragm level; count four, exhale) must have been agonizing.
Thanks to daily practice of that precursor to the “Demon Hand” my six-pack abs hasn’t bulged into a beer keg… Do that. You’ll even find out for yourself how chi or life force revitalizes, firms up your entire body.
Uh, the white kitten was named Miao Ze-dong.
A FELLOW warned me that I’m getting bigger and told me to exercise more, some say I look healthier than I was last year when they first saw me. At 65 kilos I think it’s healthy, right? I'm still doing something about my tummy. You were right it’s easy to get big but hard to trim down. I’ve lessen my intake of carbs but it’s not working fast enough. I want my abs back. Mabigat ba ang Apo mo? Simulan mo na kasi ilakad para ma- exercise, ha-ha-ha-ha. I always refer to her as Musaba as dubbed by Aaron. Can’t you send some pics of the kittens before they are to be sentenced outside by Mama especially the white kitten you mentioned?
Turo ng ama sa tagakataga@yahoo.com:
AT 10 stones wrapped on a delicate bone structure, that’s not really fab—flab that’s what. All it takes to snap any rib encaging the heart like pretzel is one PSI—a pound per square inch of pressure. You’ve got to say adios to adipose... or you just continue inflicting undue torture on your heart with the slow build of flab pressure.
Trimming down isn’t about lopping off calorie intake—no, not dumping three square meals on a round tummy. What counts is spreading out intake of quality carbohydrates in five wee meals, yeah, you read right: five.
And when I say quality carbohydrates, I’m talking about unpolished cereals-- say, rolled oats with the unsightly dirt-looking bran tacked on each grain, crushed whole wheat, unpolished rice… Include kamote, gabi, yams like ubi and tugui—their long-chain biochemical make-up is nothing short of wonderful that even our innards can appreciate… it takes longer time for the enzymes and such gastric juices in our insides to work on these complex carbohydrates… so we feel full for longer periods…
And they spawn no spike in the body’s blood sugar level after ingestion… this is the beauty of slow food. On sekantot, oops, second thought, ingestion’s just like lovemaking, to be done in solemn adagio, like that ponderous cadence of Johann Pachelbel’s “Canon in D.”
Sobra na tummy, palitan na! Indeed the tummy area holds the dan tien, the body’s axis and center of gravity where every movement flows from. Washboard abs shouldn’t include the washing machine plunked on ‘em…
Kuo Yun-shen, the jian or master who perfected the peng ch’üan (an explosive push) or so-called “Demon Hand” spent three years of his incarceration doing a variant of the three-hugging position. His hands were in heavy chains, so taking that position—and doing the rhythmic breathing (count two, inhale; count eight, hold breath down to diaphragm level; count four, exhale) must have been agonizing.
Thanks to daily practice of that precursor to the “Demon Hand” my six-pack abs hasn’t bulged into a beer keg… Do that. You’ll even find out for yourself how chi or life force revitalizes, firms up your entire body.
Uh, the white kitten was named Miao Ze-dong.
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Tough 25 (Also-random things)
IN the pre-information technology age, all it took to read anyone like a book was certain tools like phrenology or a reading of the physique’s tell-tale signs, after Shakespeare, “Our bodies are our gardens… our wills are gardeners.” (There are a lot of inept gardeners who can’t even tend bars or beer gardens.) And sri lanka, the richness of character is evidenced by its form, gait, and movement— aah, “the quality of life is determined by the quality of movement.”
To read another’s mind, get that bloke’s speech/writing pattern down pat—the barrage of verbiage or economy of words points to the mind-set, the psychological make-up. We use words, words use us. We define with words; words define us.
It has become hip in cyberspace to come up with a list of 25 facts, factoids, and whatever you fancy jotting down about yourself… the list-up is plunked pat on one’s Facebook, Desktop Dating or Friendster account… para may maunawaan ang mga kaibigan hinggil sa ‘yo. ‘Hirap din talaga makipagsosyalan, pero pagbigyan natin pati mga masugid at masungit na tagasubaybay sa tudling na ito:
1. Learned ABC, the first few English phrases, and read the primer “Pepe and Pilar” at age 3. Tutored by Nanay—that was in 1957 when a transistor radio passed for household entertainment.
2. Sang to himself in the early boyhood years but the adults got wind of such, turned him into a jukebox of sorts, no dime needed to put into— threats of a spanking did it. The erstwhile choirboy would rather not sing under duress to this day.
3. Fell in love at age 3 with Mimosa pudica—the lowly makahiya—for its sunburst of pink pistils and thorny stems that defied the graze of goats. Learned later that its infusion can staunch post-partum blood-flow… the plant certainly lives up to its name, mahiyaing puday.
4. Fell in love anew at 4 with Eichornia crassipes—the water hyacinth—for the peacock tail array of its blooms-- so many Argus eyes looking back at me. (Hopefully in adoration.)Then it turned out the runaway plant that clogs waterways had roots that took out the noxious odors and toxins in water.
5. Collects seeds and rootstock of plants he chances upon roadsides and mountain trails—nope, he’s not out to do a bit of Shunamitism on ‘em the way der Fuhrer Adolph Hitler’s minions did… uh, seeds can pack fiery life force in themselves.
6. Sleeps on his prayer rug whenever his panganay na apo is at home; two or three cats sleep with him, usually curling up about his tummy… they’re probably keeping themselves warm, uh, does he have bonfires of vanities and verities in his belly?
7. Loves to cook slow food—the sort that entails a layering of flavors and melding of savory notes. Learned such cookery from Lola and Nanay.
8. Does a pray-over, blessing, mantra, katha, sulat, oracion on whatever he cooks to render ‘em kosher. Dr. Masaru Emoto figured that intention can transform the molecular structure of fluids into wonderful patterns, did he not?
9. Whips up one-of-kind “Balbacoa a la Dong,” bovine trotters in a rich cocktail of pureed liver, black salted beans, camote chips, and a bevy of spices—that don’t hurt those with gout or arthritis. And his “Kimchi a la Dong” is dulcetly incendiary.
10. Learned the rudiments of brujeria from a mangkukulam-turned-born-again-Christian in the 1980s. Mangkokolum na, Kulamnista pa ngayon.
11. Learned shorin-ryu karatedo and kobudo weaponry atop a sawdust dump in the 1960s; earned kuro-obi rank at age 10. That’s gaining more ABC—agility, balance, coordination.
12. Still does aubade or a daily salutation to the sun as if he’s into Shinto.
13. Misses the Angelus of halcyon days—so he makes do with the rites of vespers hour before a TV set, doing a Sufi scholar’s chant… “Allahuma kaffi…..” (And that’s just the beginning.)
14. Turned into an unabashed doting gramps at age 54, 30 years after he became a father.
15. Bitten by dogs for countless times in his childhood years—but remains a rabid company of the canine kind… they’ve got what it takes to carry a decent tune.
16. Still does cartwheels, sanchin kata and headstands… and what passes for the six healing sounds of qi gong like a gleeful imp… despite his age.
17. Is a huge fan of U2, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Queen, Eraserheads, and Billy Joel… plus Philip Kindred Dick, Howard Philips Lovecraft, Walter Lippman, Harlan Ellison, and Ray Bradbury. They do poetry, don’t they?
18. Adores Bach, Hydn, Beethoven, Beatles, Vivaldi, Van Halen, and Wagner. They’re into heavy metal that’s gone way, way off the table of elements, are they not?
19. Still makes the rounds of wet markets, sniffing for rare finds, say, ulang (crayfish) or ayungin (silver perch)…
20. Watches “Jesus Christ Superstar,” “Cats,” and “Fiddler on the Roof” again and again and again… Breathless over a “Sweeney Todd” vignette with the protagonist howling, “My arm is complete…” the hand’s extension a flat razor blade with chased silver handle.
21. Was then squeamish and unreasonably afraid of the talahib and cane sugar grass blade… now packs three butterfly knives (baling sungay) like needful articles of underclothing… just in case.
22. His ring finger is longer than his middle finger… augury pointing up sangfroid… reptilian cold bloodedness under pressure… supposedly a lycanthrope’s tell-tale physical trait.
23. Stern consentedor of a father… kasabwat ng mga anak sa kabalbalan.
24. Has a monitor lizard’s keepsake scar on the first phalanx of his middle finger, left hand… been bitten there, biter was cooked into delicious adobo allowing me to bite back. Nemo me impune lacessit.
25. Usually writes with legs tucked in a lotus pose as if still curled in a foxhole, uh, didn’t Voltaire say, “To write is to be at war?”
To read another’s mind, get that bloke’s speech/writing pattern down pat—the barrage of verbiage or economy of words points to the mind-set, the psychological make-up. We use words, words use us. We define with words; words define us.
It has become hip in cyberspace to come up with a list of 25 facts, factoids, and whatever you fancy jotting down about yourself… the list-up is plunked pat on one’s Facebook, Desktop Dating or Friendster account… para may maunawaan ang mga kaibigan hinggil sa ‘yo. ‘Hirap din talaga makipagsosyalan, pero pagbigyan natin pati mga masugid at masungit na tagasubaybay sa tudling na ito:
1. Learned ABC, the first few English phrases, and read the primer “Pepe and Pilar” at age 3. Tutored by Nanay—that was in 1957 when a transistor radio passed for household entertainment.
2. Sang to himself in the early boyhood years but the adults got wind of such, turned him into a jukebox of sorts, no dime needed to put into— threats of a spanking did it. The erstwhile choirboy would rather not sing under duress to this day.
3. Fell in love at age 3 with Mimosa pudica—the lowly makahiya—for its sunburst of pink pistils and thorny stems that defied the graze of goats. Learned later that its infusion can staunch post-partum blood-flow… the plant certainly lives up to its name, mahiyaing puday.
4. Fell in love anew at 4 with Eichornia crassipes—the water hyacinth—for the peacock tail array of its blooms-- so many Argus eyes looking back at me. (Hopefully in adoration.)Then it turned out the runaway plant that clogs waterways had roots that took out the noxious odors and toxins in water.
5. Collects seeds and rootstock of plants he chances upon roadsides and mountain trails—nope, he’s not out to do a bit of Shunamitism on ‘em the way der Fuhrer Adolph Hitler’s minions did… uh, seeds can pack fiery life force in themselves.
6. Sleeps on his prayer rug whenever his panganay na apo is at home; two or three cats sleep with him, usually curling up about his tummy… they’re probably keeping themselves warm, uh, does he have bonfires of vanities and verities in his belly?
7. Loves to cook slow food—the sort that entails a layering of flavors and melding of savory notes. Learned such cookery from Lola and Nanay.
8. Does a pray-over, blessing, mantra, katha, sulat, oracion on whatever he cooks to render ‘em kosher. Dr. Masaru Emoto figured that intention can transform the molecular structure of fluids into wonderful patterns, did he not?
9. Whips up one-of-kind “Balbacoa a la Dong,” bovine trotters in a rich cocktail of pureed liver, black salted beans, camote chips, and a bevy of spices—that don’t hurt those with gout or arthritis. And his “Kimchi a la Dong” is dulcetly incendiary.
10. Learned the rudiments of brujeria from a mangkukulam-turned-born-again-Christian in the 1980s. Mangkokolum na, Kulamnista pa ngayon.
11. Learned shorin-ryu karatedo and kobudo weaponry atop a sawdust dump in the 1960s; earned kuro-obi rank at age 10. That’s gaining more ABC—agility, balance, coordination.
12. Still does aubade or a daily salutation to the sun as if he’s into Shinto.
13. Misses the Angelus of halcyon days—so he makes do with the rites of vespers hour before a TV set, doing a Sufi scholar’s chant… “Allahuma kaffi…..” (And that’s just the beginning.)
14. Turned into an unabashed doting gramps at age 54, 30 years after he became a father.
15. Bitten by dogs for countless times in his childhood years—but remains a rabid company of the canine kind… they’ve got what it takes to carry a decent tune.
16. Still does cartwheels, sanchin kata and headstands… and what passes for the six healing sounds of qi gong like a gleeful imp… despite his age.
17. Is a huge fan of U2, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Queen, Eraserheads, and Billy Joel… plus Philip Kindred Dick, Howard Philips Lovecraft, Walter Lippman, Harlan Ellison, and Ray Bradbury. They do poetry, don’t they?
18. Adores Bach, Hydn, Beethoven, Beatles, Vivaldi, Van Halen, and Wagner. They’re into heavy metal that’s gone way, way off the table of elements, are they not?
19. Still makes the rounds of wet markets, sniffing for rare finds, say, ulang (crayfish) or ayungin (silver perch)…
20. Watches “Jesus Christ Superstar,” “Cats,” and “Fiddler on the Roof” again and again and again… Breathless over a “Sweeney Todd” vignette with the protagonist howling, “My arm is complete…” the hand’s extension a flat razor blade with chased silver handle.
21. Was then squeamish and unreasonably afraid of the talahib and cane sugar grass blade… now packs three butterfly knives (baling sungay) like needful articles of underclothing… just in case.
22. His ring finger is longer than his middle finger… augury pointing up sangfroid… reptilian cold bloodedness under pressure… supposedly a lycanthrope’s tell-tale physical trait.
23. Stern consentedor of a father… kasabwat ng mga anak sa kabalbalan.
24. Has a monitor lizard’s keepsake scar on the first phalanx of his middle finger, left hand… been bitten there, biter was cooked into delicious adobo allowing me to bite back. Nemo me impune lacessit.
25. Usually writes with legs tucked in a lotus pose as if still curled in a foxhole, uh, didn’t Voltaire say, “To write is to be at war?”
Thursday, January 29, 2009
Never say diet!
(Or eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow you diet)
RICE and fish ‘til they rest in peace—that’s no longer the perennial Filipino diet that has turned any which way, shaped over the years by the available food choices and a weakened peso purchasing power that can hardly grapple with ever-rising food costs. Once dirt-cheap galunggong or round scad fetches P80 a kilo as of January 2009. Some 30 million families grub on less than a U.S. dollar daily (about P50); so they turn to more affordable instant noodles, P5 per 65-gram packet oozing with salt and industrial-strength flavors to hush howling tummies.
Weight- and waist-watchers the world over can take a cue from the Pinoy daily food fare that guarantees restricted calorie intake. Fact is, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization country profile sort of paints Filipinos as fashionably skinny—nearly 32% of preschool children are underweight-for-age, about 20% of adolescents and 13.2% of adults including adults were underweight making them chronically energy deficient.
More than half of local households had less than 100% per capita energy intake— why, calorie restriction diets which supposedly prolong life isn’t a craze yet hereabouts—resulting in loss of body fat among adults and stunted growth for children.
On the other hand, overweight and obesity affect a significant proportion of children, adolescents and adults—pleasingly plump but predisposed to certain health risks as evidenced by the rising trend in prevalence of diseases of the heart and vascular system.
Consider diet: a particular selection of food, designed or prescribed to improve a person's physical condition or to prevent or treat a disease. Today, the term connotes a food regimen to improve one’s physical condition likely to pare down unsightly bulges or cause weight loss. From vintage 1970s Atkins to celebrity endorsed Zone, every letter of the English alphabet stands for as much 10 diets, each seeking to shed a dieter’s pounds. There’s even a 3-hour diet, a-pound-a-day-in-21-day diet—each touted to induce weight loss.
The most current weight-loss fad, the morning banana diet has Japanese women going bonkers over Philippine bananas—which accounts for over 90% of bananas consumed in Japan, making local exporters richer by $400 million in 2007. To shed excess avoirdupois—a pharmacist invented the diet for her overweight hubby—the dieter can splurge on bananas and lukewarm water for breakfast, eat anything for lunch or dinner before 8 p.m., and hit the sack before midnight.
It turns out that the human brain works best with around 25 grams of glucose running in the blood stream— roughly the same amount found in a banana. So, a banana binge for breakfast may likely make the dieter go bananas.
The fad spread via social networking sites, peaked in popularity by 2007 and turned up books, testimonials from actors, and a television show. Fact is sweet potato or the humble camote— body-builder chow which has powered Jamaica’s Usain Bolt to several gold medal-swiping runs in the 2008 Beijing Olympics-- has higher and more bio-available potassium and energy-dense simple sugar than bananas. In fairness, camote may likely draw the attention it deserves, become the cynosure of weight-watcher’s eyes in due time.
MOST delicious-sounding of all weight-loss regimes: “The Chocolate Diet” a low calorie, low fat diet plan with small amounts of chocolate allowed daily cooked up by British diet author and editor Sally Voak promises a loss of seven pounds in two weeks. The catch: chocoholic shuns off chocolate in the first week to rein in dark cravings, a 50-300-calorie daily chocolate allowance in the second week.
The diet, spelled out in a $20 book has an exercise add-on: choco-bingers, sugar addicts and premenstrual cravers are advised to walk briskly for at least 20 minutes daily, be involved in a relaxing exercise such as swimming or yoga a couple of times a week.
The diet is touted as good for chocoholics who don’t want to give up the cravings. Too, it promotes intake of veggies—but the calorie allowances are too low for most dieters and those who are very physically active. And it may not be helpful for non-chocoholics.
THE regimen of ascetics, passive dissenters like Mohandas K. Gandhi fasting to the death for political ends, and some 30 million Filipinos still scrimping on grub on their tables to keep body and soul together: calorie restriction or anti-aging diet.
However, while the lifespan of many animals (monkeys, rats, spiders) were extended with restricted calorie intake, many theories exist as to why the various experiments on animals have resulted in longevity. And it’s tough for the dieter since sufficient nutrition (vitamins and minerals) must be maintained while lowering energy intake as much as possible.
Even so, this diet has gained many adherents the world over, fired with hopes of living long lives.
DR. Robert Atkins wrote about the Atkins Diet in the 1970s and had Time Magazine dubbing it “the most popular diet program.”
The weight loss program is hinged on the process of ketosis-- the lowered level of carbohydrate intake nudges the body to use up its fat reservoirs. Too, carbohydrates coax creation of insulin to convert the excess to fat—less carbohydrate, less insulin, less add-on fat.
The diet has four phases-- each with a carefully controlled level of carbohydrate intake:
·Phase 1 lasts for at least two weeks and calls for a maximum of 20 grams of carbohydrate intake-- no starchy vegetables, fruits, grains, or breads.
·Phase 2 involves adding more fibrous vegetables (carbohydrates) until the so-called “Critical Carbohydrate Level for Losing” is reached. The calibrated increases in carbohydrate intake are carefully managed on a week-by-week basis.
·Phase 3 and 4 keeping up stages in which carbohydrate intake can be increased - but only until the point that weight is maintained. Shun any food that may lead to weight gain.
Atkins has been very successful for many people and has resulted in not only significant weight loss - but also health improvement. Atkins is a high-fat diet—and most government health agencies recommend not more than 30% fat in our diet. But with Atkins you can easily consume more fat than this.
Too, one must question how healthy is ketosis -- it may have the desired short-term effect, but what about the long term? And certain organs may be overworked to sustain the process of ketosis.
LITERALLY the father of all diets, Chankonabe is a deliciously revolting fare taken twice a day to gear up girth with blubber— and sumo wrestlers have to pile up poundage in gargantuan proportions for the demands of the sport. Records have it even sumo grand champions—they pack as much as 800 pounds in heft—don’t die from split-second bursts of violence in the ring, Heart and brain attacks do ‘em in.
Chankonabe is legal steroid, a hand-me-down concoction from the 19th century— gallons of chicken, fish, horse meat, pork or beef stock a-simmer in a huge wok, tossed in with chunks of miso (fermented soy bean paste), tofu, carrots, cabbages, leeks, potatoes, lotus roots, daikon radishes, shiitake mushrooms, and burdock roots… a yummy protein-packed brew that, Japanese believe, helps make the bones denser. It’s healthy taken in moderation.
But sumo wrestlers ought to have bottomless appetites— 10 bowls of chanko, eight huge bowls of rice, 130 pieces of sushi, and 25 portions of barbecued beef washed down with beer plus an occasional side dish of shrimp siomai (steamed dumplings), omelettes or fried chicken is routine eating for one meal. A wrestler named Takamisugi attained legend status for downing 65 bowls of the stew— about 29 pounds of beef—in one sitting. He stopped: his jaws got tired munching.
Proteins and carbohydrates provide 4 calories; fats pack 9 calories per gram. But not all foods have the same number of calories per unit of volume, say, a cup of cucumbers has 14 calories while one cup of raisins bursts with 520 calories. That's the secret for bulking up: choose calorie-concentrated foods.
The best proteins for gaining muscle come from lean meat-- chicken, lean beef, egg whites, turkey and fish. Shun fatty cuts of beef, as well as pork, sausage, bacon and whole milk products because they ooze with huge amounts of artery-clogging, unhealthy saturated fat.
GOUT gets the goat of overweight people—keeping up a healthy body weight keeps it at bay. Too, extra fluid intake can help flush uric acid crystals out-- beer and alcoholic drinks can’t and ought to be shunned. Along with prescribed medications, a low purine diet can bust bouts with joint aches. Certain foods pack purine, the chemical that turns into uric acid when broken down in the body.
A gout management diet includes foods that are high in complex carbohydrates, low in protein and low in fat.
Shun these high-purine foods like the plague: beer, anchovies (bagoong Pangasinan or Balayan included), organ meats (brains, kidney, liver, tripe, innards or the sweetbreads that go into heavenly kare-kare, callos, dinuguan, or bopis), game meats, gravies, yeast, meat extracts, sardines, herring, scallops.
These can be taken in moderation: fresh and saltwater fish, shellfish, eel, meat, poultry, meat soups and broth, asparagus, mushrooms, cauliflower, spinach, legumes, oatmeal, bran, wheat germ, whole-grain breads and cereals, eggs.
Some people have found strawberries helpful while certain nutrients in dark berries may help ease down hellfire in joint points, even lower the uric acid. Oily fish like salmon, or fatty acids in virgin coconut or olive oil or nuts ease inflammation too.
FOLLOWING a low-carbohydrate diet akin to Atkins, dieters Neris Thomas and India Knight together shed 140 pounds in one year—their combined weight was 434 pounds—and turned up the “Idiot Proof Diet” to share what they learned with others.
The food regimen, spelled out in their Idiot Proof Diet book—retails at $25—consists of three phases, Phase 1 is an all-low carbohydrate stage similar to the Atkins diet induction phase. The initial is the most extreme— with carbohydrate and caffeine intake at the pits—and it took six months for Thomas and Knight to get through this.
In Phase 2 dieters are permitted a daily carbohydrate allowance of 40-100 grams. By Phase 3 dieters can slowly add carbohydrates each week-- if there’s weight gain occurs, pare down on carbohydrates again.
In all phases of the diet, refined carbohydrates and sugars are shunned—refrain from bread, pasta, rice, potato and desserts. Recommended: meat, poultry, seafood, eggs, cheese, butter, cream, green vegetables, avocado, nuts, and herb tea. Dieters are encouraged to increase their exercise—walking is acceptable-- to at least 20 minutes daily.
The authors point up the psychological aspects involved in weight loss. They also acknowledge how closely food intake is related to emotional well being.
As idiot-proof as it gets, the diet doesn’t involve calorie-counting, and is easy to follow with familiar foods. The rub: the weekly grocery bill can balloon since high protein foods and fresh produce fetch high prices. Too, high protein diets can lead to constipation owing to inadequate fiber intake. The consequent rapid rate of weight loss may not be healthy and there is the risk of increased weight gain after carbohydrates are reintroduced.
QUALITY of living depends on the liver, goes the quip. Dr. Sandra Cabot of Australia must have taken that in earnest, plied out “The Liver Cleansing Diet” in 1997 that became a serious bestseller.
Poor diet and nutrition hampers the functions of the liver— a major actor in neutralizing toxins and metabolism plus some 500 other functions. Dr. Cabot avers that improved liver function can induce weight loss—she had worked with 1540 patients for two years that had a 100% success rate via liver cleansing. Impaired liver functions can touch off these symptoms that, it is claimed, can be weaned with a liver cleansing diet:
· Abdominal bloating
· Overweight
· Poor digestion
· Frequent fatigue and headaches
· Ill moods
· Bad breath and coated tongue
· Irritable Bowel Syndrome
· Sluggish metabolism and allergies
· Overloaded immune system
· Hypertension
· Alcohol intolerance or excess alcohol intake
· Inability to lose weight
The liver detox diet calls for the dieter to :
· Eat only when hungry.
· Drink 8-12 glasses of filtered water every day.
· Limit intake of refined sugars, shun artificial sweeteners.
· Identify and refrain from allergy-causing foods.
· Eat fresh food, with plenty of raw fruits and veggies.
· Avoid excessive saturated or damaged fats.
Heaping the onus of health issues on the liver is a tad simplistic an approach to dieting. Too, there is dearth of scientific evidence to bolster claims that detoxifying diets are effective.
A “Low Salt Diet” aims to cut the daily intake of sodium chloride, the common table salt. Daily recommended intake of sodium is 2.4 grams-- or a teaspoon of table salt per day.
Studies have ascertained that a reduction of sodium can lead to a lower blood pressure: a level of 1,500 mg—less than a half-teaspoon-- has been found to have the best affect for people with high blood pressure (or hypertension).
Many foods contain ‘hidden’ quantities of sodium, so it pays to read the food label. Better still shun canned, convenience, cured or processed foods that pack oodles of salt in various guises.
THE three-phase “South Beach Diet” plan was drawn up by cardiologist Dr Arthur Agatston based at Mount Sinai Hospital, South Florida for his overweight heart patients. The patients lost weight and got excellent health results.
A two-week induction phase without rice, pasta, and breads starts out the South Beach Diet. Right off, weight loss at this period ranges from 8 to 13 pounds. Meats, shellfish, chicken, turkey, and fish can be taken-- along with nuts, fat-free cheese, eggs, salads, and veggies.
Phase 2 puts the carbohydrates back on the menu-- very sparingly, that leads to weight loss of 1-2 pounds a week.
Phase 3 is toughing it and loving a healthy lifestyle, eating health-giving foods and keeping the ideal weight.
Sane and sound principles of eating in balance, little-and-often, carbohydrates of low glycemic index—or those that don’t cause blood sugar levels to soar instantly-- make up the South Beach diet that had socked positive impact on the feeding habits of millions.
Drawback: There are some food items, say, turkey and salmon, that aren't budget-friendly and good nutritious foods fetch premium prices than highly-processed convenience chow.
SOUTHERN Mediterraneans have a lower incidence of heart disease than their Western counterparts. The good culprit: lower levels of saturated fat in their food fare. Voila: Mediterranean Diet that offers oodles of vegetables and fruit, salads slathered with olive oil, bread, pasta, and other grains. Plus wee amounts of animal-based protein from occasional intake of fish and poultry; red meat is rarely eaten. Low to moderate quantities of wine—a glass a day with a meal-- and some eggs round out the menu.
Southern Mediterranean peoples—in Greece, Spain and Italy-- don’t see their everyday food fare as a heart-healthy diet—it’s a way of life.
THE “Macrobiotic Diet”-- it hews close to the Far Eastern philosophy of macrobiotics (or "Great Life")-- has the numbers on its menu down pat:
· 50% whole grains
· 25% seasonal vegetables, cooked or raw.
· 10% protein foods - such as fish or legumes.
· 5% seaweeds
· 5% soups
· 5% fruit, nuts, or seeds
Its adherents contend that food should be organically grown, eaten fresh and—no wolf downs, please-- chewed slowly, in a relaxed manner.
Sugars, spices, alcohol, eggs, meat, and cheese are out as these can whack out the body's tenuous yin and yang equilibrium.
Macrobiotics is more of a way of life than just weight loss diet.Too, there are claims made about the healing properties of the macrobiotic diet—say, cancer and heart conditions have been tamed by this diet.
Here's the rub: there lurks nutritional deficiencies in this diet-- particularly calcium and iron.
CHEW that cud of diets but for most Filipinos, despite a hundred or less grassroots food terminals called Bagsakan Centers up in the drawing boards, access to food is still the most pressing woe. To address this, the Food and Nutrition Research Institute (FNRI) has turned up nutritious meals, P22 a pop that needs to be dished out for the dirt-poor in 46,000 barangays all over the country.
RICE and fish ‘til they rest in peace—that’s no longer the perennial Filipino diet that has turned any which way, shaped over the years by the available food choices and a weakened peso purchasing power that can hardly grapple with ever-rising food costs. Once dirt-cheap galunggong or round scad fetches P80 a kilo as of January 2009. Some 30 million families grub on less than a U.S. dollar daily (about P50); so they turn to more affordable instant noodles, P5 per 65-gram packet oozing with salt and industrial-strength flavors to hush howling tummies.
Weight- and waist-watchers the world over can take a cue from the Pinoy daily food fare that guarantees restricted calorie intake. Fact is, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization country profile sort of paints Filipinos as fashionably skinny—nearly 32% of preschool children are underweight-for-age, about 20% of adolescents and 13.2% of adults including adults were underweight making them chronically energy deficient.
More than half of local households had less than 100% per capita energy intake— why, calorie restriction diets which supposedly prolong life isn’t a craze yet hereabouts—resulting in loss of body fat among adults and stunted growth for children.
On the other hand, overweight and obesity affect a significant proportion of children, adolescents and adults—pleasingly plump but predisposed to certain health risks as evidenced by the rising trend in prevalence of diseases of the heart and vascular system.
Consider diet: a particular selection of food, designed or prescribed to improve a person's physical condition or to prevent or treat a disease. Today, the term connotes a food regimen to improve one’s physical condition likely to pare down unsightly bulges or cause weight loss. From vintage 1970s Atkins to celebrity endorsed Zone, every letter of the English alphabet stands for as much 10 diets, each seeking to shed a dieter’s pounds. There’s even a 3-hour diet, a-pound-a-day-in-21-day diet—each touted to induce weight loss.
The most current weight-loss fad, the morning banana diet has Japanese women going bonkers over Philippine bananas—which accounts for over 90% of bananas consumed in Japan, making local exporters richer by $400 million in 2007. To shed excess avoirdupois—a pharmacist invented the diet for her overweight hubby—the dieter can splurge on bananas and lukewarm water for breakfast, eat anything for lunch or dinner before 8 p.m., and hit the sack before midnight.
It turns out that the human brain works best with around 25 grams of glucose running in the blood stream— roughly the same amount found in a banana. So, a banana binge for breakfast may likely make the dieter go bananas.
The fad spread via social networking sites, peaked in popularity by 2007 and turned up books, testimonials from actors, and a television show. Fact is sweet potato or the humble camote— body-builder chow which has powered Jamaica’s Usain Bolt to several gold medal-swiping runs in the 2008 Beijing Olympics-- has higher and more bio-available potassium and energy-dense simple sugar than bananas. In fairness, camote may likely draw the attention it deserves, become the cynosure of weight-watcher’s eyes in due time.
MOST delicious-sounding of all weight-loss regimes: “The Chocolate Diet” a low calorie, low fat diet plan with small amounts of chocolate allowed daily cooked up by British diet author and editor Sally Voak promises a loss of seven pounds in two weeks. The catch: chocoholic shuns off chocolate in the first week to rein in dark cravings, a 50-300-calorie daily chocolate allowance in the second week.
The diet, spelled out in a $20 book has an exercise add-on: choco-bingers, sugar addicts and premenstrual cravers are advised to walk briskly for at least 20 minutes daily, be involved in a relaxing exercise such as swimming or yoga a couple of times a week.
The diet is touted as good for chocoholics who don’t want to give up the cravings. Too, it promotes intake of veggies—but the calorie allowances are too low for most dieters and those who are very physically active. And it may not be helpful for non-chocoholics.
THE regimen of ascetics, passive dissenters like Mohandas K. Gandhi fasting to the death for political ends, and some 30 million Filipinos still scrimping on grub on their tables to keep body and soul together: calorie restriction or anti-aging diet.
However, while the lifespan of many animals (monkeys, rats, spiders) were extended with restricted calorie intake, many theories exist as to why the various experiments on animals have resulted in longevity. And it’s tough for the dieter since sufficient nutrition (vitamins and minerals) must be maintained while lowering energy intake as much as possible.
Even so, this diet has gained many adherents the world over, fired with hopes of living long lives.
DR. Robert Atkins wrote about the Atkins Diet in the 1970s and had Time Magazine dubbing it “the most popular diet program.”
The weight loss program is hinged on the process of ketosis-- the lowered level of carbohydrate intake nudges the body to use up its fat reservoirs. Too, carbohydrates coax creation of insulin to convert the excess to fat—less carbohydrate, less insulin, less add-on fat.
The diet has four phases-- each with a carefully controlled level of carbohydrate intake:
·Phase 1 lasts for at least two weeks and calls for a maximum of 20 grams of carbohydrate intake-- no starchy vegetables, fruits, grains, or breads.
·Phase 2 involves adding more fibrous vegetables (carbohydrates) until the so-called “Critical Carbohydrate Level for Losing” is reached. The calibrated increases in carbohydrate intake are carefully managed on a week-by-week basis.
·Phase 3 and 4 keeping up stages in which carbohydrate intake can be increased - but only until the point that weight is maintained. Shun any food that may lead to weight gain.
Atkins has been very successful for many people and has resulted in not only significant weight loss - but also health improvement. Atkins is a high-fat diet—and most government health agencies recommend not more than 30% fat in our diet. But with Atkins you can easily consume more fat than this.
Too, one must question how healthy is ketosis -- it may have the desired short-term effect, but what about the long term? And certain organs may be overworked to sustain the process of ketosis.
LITERALLY the father of all diets, Chankonabe is a deliciously revolting fare taken twice a day to gear up girth with blubber— and sumo wrestlers have to pile up poundage in gargantuan proportions for the demands of the sport. Records have it even sumo grand champions—they pack as much as 800 pounds in heft—don’t die from split-second bursts of violence in the ring, Heart and brain attacks do ‘em in.
Chankonabe is legal steroid, a hand-me-down concoction from the 19th century— gallons of chicken, fish, horse meat, pork or beef stock a-simmer in a huge wok, tossed in with chunks of miso (fermented soy bean paste), tofu, carrots, cabbages, leeks, potatoes, lotus roots, daikon radishes, shiitake mushrooms, and burdock roots… a yummy protein-packed brew that, Japanese believe, helps make the bones denser. It’s healthy taken in moderation.
But sumo wrestlers ought to have bottomless appetites— 10 bowls of chanko, eight huge bowls of rice, 130 pieces of sushi, and 25 portions of barbecued beef washed down with beer plus an occasional side dish of shrimp siomai (steamed dumplings), omelettes or fried chicken is routine eating for one meal. A wrestler named Takamisugi attained legend status for downing 65 bowls of the stew— about 29 pounds of beef—in one sitting. He stopped: his jaws got tired munching.
Proteins and carbohydrates provide 4 calories; fats pack 9 calories per gram. But not all foods have the same number of calories per unit of volume, say, a cup of cucumbers has 14 calories while one cup of raisins bursts with 520 calories. That's the secret for bulking up: choose calorie-concentrated foods.
The best proteins for gaining muscle come from lean meat-- chicken, lean beef, egg whites, turkey and fish. Shun fatty cuts of beef, as well as pork, sausage, bacon and whole milk products because they ooze with huge amounts of artery-clogging, unhealthy saturated fat.
GOUT gets the goat of overweight people—keeping up a healthy body weight keeps it at bay. Too, extra fluid intake can help flush uric acid crystals out-- beer and alcoholic drinks can’t and ought to be shunned. Along with prescribed medications, a low purine diet can bust bouts with joint aches. Certain foods pack purine, the chemical that turns into uric acid when broken down in the body.
A gout management diet includes foods that are high in complex carbohydrates, low in protein and low in fat.
Shun these high-purine foods like the plague: beer, anchovies (bagoong Pangasinan or Balayan included), organ meats (brains, kidney, liver, tripe, innards or the sweetbreads that go into heavenly kare-kare, callos, dinuguan, or bopis), game meats, gravies, yeast, meat extracts, sardines, herring, scallops.
These can be taken in moderation: fresh and saltwater fish, shellfish, eel, meat, poultry, meat soups and broth, asparagus, mushrooms, cauliflower, spinach, legumes, oatmeal, bran, wheat germ, whole-grain breads and cereals, eggs.
Some people have found strawberries helpful while certain nutrients in dark berries may help ease down hellfire in joint points, even lower the uric acid. Oily fish like salmon, or fatty acids in virgin coconut or olive oil or nuts ease inflammation too.
FOLLOWING a low-carbohydrate diet akin to Atkins, dieters Neris Thomas and India Knight together shed 140 pounds in one year—their combined weight was 434 pounds—and turned up the “Idiot Proof Diet” to share what they learned with others.
The food regimen, spelled out in their Idiot Proof Diet book—retails at $25—consists of three phases, Phase 1 is an all-low carbohydrate stage similar to the Atkins diet induction phase. The initial is the most extreme— with carbohydrate and caffeine intake at the pits—and it took six months for Thomas and Knight to get through this.
In Phase 2 dieters are permitted a daily carbohydrate allowance of 40-100 grams. By Phase 3 dieters can slowly add carbohydrates each week-- if there’s weight gain occurs, pare down on carbohydrates again.
In all phases of the diet, refined carbohydrates and sugars are shunned—refrain from bread, pasta, rice, potato and desserts. Recommended: meat, poultry, seafood, eggs, cheese, butter, cream, green vegetables, avocado, nuts, and herb tea. Dieters are encouraged to increase their exercise—walking is acceptable-- to at least 20 minutes daily.
The authors point up the psychological aspects involved in weight loss. They also acknowledge how closely food intake is related to emotional well being.
As idiot-proof as it gets, the diet doesn’t involve calorie-counting, and is easy to follow with familiar foods. The rub: the weekly grocery bill can balloon since high protein foods and fresh produce fetch high prices. Too, high protein diets can lead to constipation owing to inadequate fiber intake. The consequent rapid rate of weight loss may not be healthy and there is the risk of increased weight gain after carbohydrates are reintroduced.
QUALITY of living depends on the liver, goes the quip. Dr. Sandra Cabot of Australia must have taken that in earnest, plied out “The Liver Cleansing Diet” in 1997 that became a serious bestseller.
Poor diet and nutrition hampers the functions of the liver— a major actor in neutralizing toxins and metabolism plus some 500 other functions. Dr. Cabot avers that improved liver function can induce weight loss—she had worked with 1540 patients for two years that had a 100% success rate via liver cleansing. Impaired liver functions can touch off these symptoms that, it is claimed, can be weaned with a liver cleansing diet:
· Abdominal bloating
· Overweight
· Poor digestion
· Frequent fatigue and headaches
· Ill moods
· Bad breath and coated tongue
· Irritable Bowel Syndrome
· Sluggish metabolism and allergies
· Overloaded immune system
· Hypertension
· Alcohol intolerance or excess alcohol intake
· Inability to lose weight
The liver detox diet calls for the dieter to :
· Eat only when hungry.
· Drink 8-12 glasses of filtered water every day.
· Limit intake of refined sugars, shun artificial sweeteners.
· Identify and refrain from allergy-causing foods.
· Eat fresh food, with plenty of raw fruits and veggies.
· Avoid excessive saturated or damaged fats.
Heaping the onus of health issues on the liver is a tad simplistic an approach to dieting. Too, there is dearth of scientific evidence to bolster claims that detoxifying diets are effective.
A “Low Salt Diet” aims to cut the daily intake of sodium chloride, the common table salt. Daily recommended intake of sodium is 2.4 grams-- or a teaspoon of table salt per day.
Studies have ascertained that a reduction of sodium can lead to a lower blood pressure: a level of 1,500 mg—less than a half-teaspoon-- has been found to have the best affect for people with high blood pressure (or hypertension).
Many foods contain ‘hidden’ quantities of sodium, so it pays to read the food label. Better still shun canned, convenience, cured or processed foods that pack oodles of salt in various guises.
THE three-phase “South Beach Diet” plan was drawn up by cardiologist Dr Arthur Agatston based at Mount Sinai Hospital, South Florida for his overweight heart patients. The patients lost weight and got excellent health results.
A two-week induction phase without rice, pasta, and breads starts out the South Beach Diet. Right off, weight loss at this period ranges from 8 to 13 pounds. Meats, shellfish, chicken, turkey, and fish can be taken-- along with nuts, fat-free cheese, eggs, salads, and veggies.
Phase 2 puts the carbohydrates back on the menu-- very sparingly, that leads to weight loss of 1-2 pounds a week.
Phase 3 is toughing it and loving a healthy lifestyle, eating health-giving foods and keeping the ideal weight.
Sane and sound principles of eating in balance, little-and-often, carbohydrates of low glycemic index—or those that don’t cause blood sugar levels to soar instantly-- make up the South Beach diet that had socked positive impact on the feeding habits of millions.
Drawback: There are some food items, say, turkey and salmon, that aren't budget-friendly and good nutritious foods fetch premium prices than highly-processed convenience chow.
SOUTHERN Mediterraneans have a lower incidence of heart disease than their Western counterparts. The good culprit: lower levels of saturated fat in their food fare. Voila: Mediterranean Diet that offers oodles of vegetables and fruit, salads slathered with olive oil, bread, pasta, and other grains. Plus wee amounts of animal-based protein from occasional intake of fish and poultry; red meat is rarely eaten. Low to moderate quantities of wine—a glass a day with a meal-- and some eggs round out the menu.
Southern Mediterranean peoples—in Greece, Spain and Italy-- don’t see their everyday food fare as a heart-healthy diet—it’s a way of life.
THE “Macrobiotic Diet”-- it hews close to the Far Eastern philosophy of macrobiotics (or "Great Life")-- has the numbers on its menu down pat:
· 50% whole grains
· 25% seasonal vegetables, cooked or raw.
· 10% protein foods - such as fish or legumes.
· 5% seaweeds
· 5% soups
· 5% fruit, nuts, or seeds
Its adherents contend that food should be organically grown, eaten fresh and—no wolf downs, please-- chewed slowly, in a relaxed manner.
Sugars, spices, alcohol, eggs, meat, and cheese are out as these can whack out the body's tenuous yin and yang equilibrium.
Macrobiotics is more of a way of life than just weight loss diet.Too, there are claims made about the healing properties of the macrobiotic diet—say, cancer and heart conditions have been tamed by this diet.
Here's the rub: there lurks nutritional deficiencies in this diet-- particularly calcium and iron.
CHEW that cud of diets but for most Filipinos, despite a hundred or less grassroots food terminals called Bagsakan Centers up in the drawing boards, access to food is still the most pressing woe. To address this, the Food and Nutrition Research Institute (FNRI) has turned up nutritious meals, P22 a pop that needs to be dished out for the dirt-poor in 46,000 barangays all over the country.
Monday, December 22, 2008
Wanted: Wet nurse for Musa
Taka ng kumadre sa marive_94061@yahoo.com:
AS any adult, I fear failure on this course on walking just because I get too lazy and tired sometimes. Where do these kids get all their energy? I drink as much milk as they do, what gives?
Tuka ng kumpadre sa tagakataga@yahoo.com:
THANKS for mom’s mammary, the milk of maternal kindness is 2.38% protein at birth, tapers down to around 1.2% percent protein in six months. The insane notion that humans need huge amounts of protein—that consequently wears down both liver and kidneys—has prompted infant formula manufacturers and dairy industries to dump tons of killer protein melamine in milk formula with the view to increased protein levels that make the grade in current industry-recommended tests. How stupid!
I’ve been asking around for a wet nanny for our Musa—her mom’s breast has ceased churning out the ichor apt to nurse a growing goddess, well, it’s the work stress and the frenzied humdrum of workaday deadlines she has to slog through… that won’t be healthy lapping for Musa. Or any infant for that matter.
A friend is volunteering her 38-year old aunt who’s nursing a one-year old. I’m asking for an interview to figure out 38-24-36, I mean, the prospective wet nurse’s eating regimen, psychological make-up, stress factors that can impact on lactation and add-on hormones, all that jazz that goes into the minutiae of lactose quality.
Brujo verde y verdadero ang lolong ito ni Musa, talagang lintik sa quality control which entails-- to make a clean breast of it—exploring shapely fleshy knoll and suckling that nursing mom’s ample samples.
Ay, tatlong manikurista na pala ang tahasang nagsabi sa ‘kin, ang ganda raw ng hubog ng mga paa ko… parang sa alpombra o carpets lang daw sanay yumapak… parang hindi kailanman tumuntong sa lupa… kasi nga’y hindi pumipitpit o yumuyurak, buong lamyos at banayad na yumayapos sa pisngi ng lupa ang talampakan ko sa paglalakad. No heavy tread as a gesture of respect to Gaea or Mother Earth whose son Antheus drew strength from such contact with terra firma.
I’ll be off with the missus to riparian parts of Pangasinan. To celebrate some peace and quiet for the year ahead. I’ll be doing some cart wheels on the sand, perform a storm dance or two (which sends me a modest downpour), a few hours of hatha yoga head stand—this has a tendency to revert grey hairs to midnight black so I won’t be doing much, I like the flowering talahib crowning my head—and some chi nei tsang practice on boles of coconut palms.
For humans, body reflexes hit their peak at 39—so we wander and trudge through in a wilderness, going around in circles like the Moses-led nation on the march spent 40 years on before settling down to a hardscrabble tract of real estate. Myelin sheaths in our brains wear out at 40… and we wonder if life really begins by running to stand still (thanks to the Irish band U2 for the idiom) when we get to 40.
AS any adult, I fear failure on this course on walking just because I get too lazy and tired sometimes. Where do these kids get all their energy? I drink as much milk as they do, what gives?
Tuka ng kumpadre sa tagakataga@yahoo.com:
THANKS for mom’s mammary, the milk of maternal kindness is 2.38% protein at birth, tapers down to around 1.2% percent protein in six months. The insane notion that humans need huge amounts of protein—that consequently wears down both liver and kidneys—has prompted infant formula manufacturers and dairy industries to dump tons of killer protein melamine in milk formula with the view to increased protein levels that make the grade in current industry-recommended tests. How stupid!
I’ve been asking around for a wet nanny for our Musa—her mom’s breast has ceased churning out the ichor apt to nurse a growing goddess, well, it’s the work stress and the frenzied humdrum of workaday deadlines she has to slog through… that won’t be healthy lapping for Musa. Or any infant for that matter.
A friend is volunteering her 38-year old aunt who’s nursing a one-year old. I’m asking for an interview to figure out 38-24-36, I mean, the prospective wet nurse’s eating regimen, psychological make-up, stress factors that can impact on lactation and add-on hormones, all that jazz that goes into the minutiae of lactose quality.
Brujo verde y verdadero ang lolong ito ni Musa, talagang lintik sa quality control which entails-- to make a clean breast of it—exploring shapely fleshy knoll and suckling that nursing mom’s ample samples.
Ay, tatlong manikurista na pala ang tahasang nagsabi sa ‘kin, ang ganda raw ng hubog ng mga paa ko… parang sa alpombra o carpets lang daw sanay yumapak… parang hindi kailanman tumuntong sa lupa… kasi nga’y hindi pumipitpit o yumuyurak, buong lamyos at banayad na yumayapos sa pisngi ng lupa ang talampakan ko sa paglalakad. No heavy tread as a gesture of respect to Gaea or Mother Earth whose son Antheus drew strength from such contact with terra firma.
I’ll be off with the missus to riparian parts of Pangasinan. To celebrate some peace and quiet for the year ahead. I’ll be doing some cart wheels on the sand, perform a storm dance or two (which sends me a modest downpour), a few hours of hatha yoga head stand—this has a tendency to revert grey hairs to midnight black so I won’t be doing much, I like the flowering talahib crowning my head—and some chi nei tsang practice on boles of coconut palms.
For humans, body reflexes hit their peak at 39—so we wander and trudge through in a wilderness, going around in circles like the Moses-led nation on the march spent 40 years on before settling down to a hardscrabble tract of real estate. Myelin sheaths in our brains wear out at 40… and we wonder if life really begins by running to stand still (thanks to the Irish band U2 for the idiom) when we get to 40.
Palaka... plog!
ANYAYAHAN ang kahit isang palakang kabkab— toad, the ugly-looking venomous and warty sort akin to adversity, “wears yet a precious jewel in its head/and this our life exempt from public haunt/ find tongues in trees/ books in running brooks/ sermons in stones…/ and good in everything.”
Kapag namamalagi ang palakang kabkab sa inyong halamanan o bakuran, pagpasok ng salapi sa inyong bulsa’t tahanan ay maalwan… magaan.
Kakaiba ang awit o bukambibig na mantra ng palakang kabkab kaysa mga talamak na palakanto’t palakanta. Taimtim na paanyaya sa pagpuksa sa mga sagabal sa maginhawang pamumuhay ang inihahasik sa paligid ng palakang kabkab. Toads sound out a Sanskrit seed syllable, an earnest prayer of thanks… an attitude of gratitude that nudges deities and angelic beings to heap their blessings and rain bounties upon the household.
Mariwasang tauhan ni William Shakespeare sa “As You Like It” ang nagsaad sa kabuluhan ng res privata, the primacy of privacy— na katugon ng res publica, republika na nakaukol sa usaping pamayanan. At palakang kabkab nga ang masigasig na sagisag ng sagana’t mainam na pamumuhay… kung ititiwalag ang mga usyoso’t mahilig manghimasok, ah, our life exempt from public haunt.
Sapol din pala ni Shakespeare ang payong feng shui hinggil sa palakang kabkab.
Sa palayok na may nakatanim na sagittaria madalas tumalungko ang mga kasambahay naming palakang kabkab—tatlo sila. May isang paminsan-minsang sumasalampak sa talukap ng taklobong sanaw sa tubig sa tabi ng pintuan, nakikinig na mataman sa alimbukay ng himig ng “Water Music” ni George Frederick Handel. O pagala-gala sa yamungmong ng mga halaman sa dakong timog silangan, hindi na nga pinapansin ng aming mga aso’t pusa.
Ah, that croaking choir melded with distant thunder, an incessant downpour, and chirp of crickets can shunt the brain waves into a theta mode… the skein that a Buddhist lama weaves his awareness into during deep meditation…
Dalawang aklat-pangkalusugan ng mga bata ang kailangan kong isalin sa Pilipino sa 2009, hindi maipagkatiwala sa iba ang pagsasalin… P2.50 bawat kataga ang bayad… tig-40,000 kataga o higit pa ang English version niyong dalawang aklat… na ako rin ang sumulat… hahaba ang bawat pangungusap… dagdag-bayad.
I’ve told the book publishers years back that Pilipino isn’t exactly a technical tongue, why, I’m often beset with the technical inadequacy of the language… take edible frogs, venomous toads and execrable toadies that defy translation in our tongue… tugak na madalas dagitin ng tagak ay palakang bukid ang taguri, ginagawang batute… na kapag nasobrahan talaga nang lantak, mapapako sa hatinggabi o tanghaling tapat ang tagdan ng orasan sa hinaharap, kailangang sa hiwa ng hiwaga maitarak…
“Toad” isn’t palaka, it has to be translated as palakang kabkab…
Kapag namamalagi ang palakang kabkab sa inyong halamanan o bakuran, pagpasok ng salapi sa inyong bulsa’t tahanan ay maalwan… magaan.
Kakaiba ang awit o bukambibig na mantra ng palakang kabkab kaysa mga talamak na palakanto’t palakanta. Taimtim na paanyaya sa pagpuksa sa mga sagabal sa maginhawang pamumuhay ang inihahasik sa paligid ng palakang kabkab. Toads sound out a Sanskrit seed syllable, an earnest prayer of thanks… an attitude of gratitude that nudges deities and angelic beings to heap their blessings and rain bounties upon the household.
Mariwasang tauhan ni William Shakespeare sa “As You Like It” ang nagsaad sa kabuluhan ng res privata, the primacy of privacy— na katugon ng res publica, republika na nakaukol sa usaping pamayanan. At palakang kabkab nga ang masigasig na sagisag ng sagana’t mainam na pamumuhay… kung ititiwalag ang mga usyoso’t mahilig manghimasok, ah, our life exempt from public haunt.
Sapol din pala ni Shakespeare ang payong feng shui hinggil sa palakang kabkab.
Sa palayok na may nakatanim na sagittaria madalas tumalungko ang mga kasambahay naming palakang kabkab—tatlo sila. May isang paminsan-minsang sumasalampak sa talukap ng taklobong sanaw sa tubig sa tabi ng pintuan, nakikinig na mataman sa alimbukay ng himig ng “Water Music” ni George Frederick Handel. O pagala-gala sa yamungmong ng mga halaman sa dakong timog silangan, hindi na nga pinapansin ng aming mga aso’t pusa.
Ah, that croaking choir melded with distant thunder, an incessant downpour, and chirp of crickets can shunt the brain waves into a theta mode… the skein that a Buddhist lama weaves his awareness into during deep meditation…
Dalawang aklat-pangkalusugan ng mga bata ang kailangan kong isalin sa Pilipino sa 2009, hindi maipagkatiwala sa iba ang pagsasalin… P2.50 bawat kataga ang bayad… tig-40,000 kataga o higit pa ang English version niyong dalawang aklat… na ako rin ang sumulat… hahaba ang bawat pangungusap… dagdag-bayad.
I’ve told the book publishers years back that Pilipino isn’t exactly a technical tongue, why, I’m often beset with the technical inadequacy of the language… take edible frogs, venomous toads and execrable toadies that defy translation in our tongue… tugak na madalas dagitin ng tagak ay palakang bukid ang taguri, ginagawang batute… na kapag nasobrahan talaga nang lantak, mapapako sa hatinggabi o tanghaling tapat ang tagdan ng orasan sa hinaharap, kailangang sa hiwa ng hiwaga maitarak…
“Toad” isn’t palaka, it has to be translated as palakang kabkab…
Sunday, December 21, 2008
Sapin sa paa
NAG-ABOT ang Egay Serrano ng P500 sa isang maybahay—solong magulang, tinutustusan ang isang anak, naaamutan pa ang ilang kaanak sa karaniwang P100 sang-araw na tubo ng maliit na tindahan. Tiyak na mauuwi ang iniabot ng katoto sa dagdag-puhunan niyong tindahan. Lalago’t lalago kahit katiting lang ang halagang iyon.
Katumbas ng halagang pinakawalan ni Serrano ang tinatawag na “double happiness” sa wikang Tsino. Natukoy sa isang pananaliksik nitong 2008 na may hatid na ligaya ang P250 na ilalaan sa kapwa sa araw-araw— nagbigay at dinoble ng Egay ang ganoong halaga. May kalakip na ngiti ang nagbigay. Hindi naman makapaniwala’t may sukling ngiti ang binigyan. Double happiness.
‘Yung lukot lang ng pagmumukha ng tatay ni Kris Aquino sa P500 ang sakbibi ng lungkot.
Nah, I’d rather not peg a measure of happiness on monetary quantum doled each day to just anybody. Why, members of a certain toil cartel called OPECPEC, female sex workers lurking or lurching along pocked pockets of Avenida Rizal in Sta. Cruz, Manila or Aurora Blvd., in Cubao, Quezon City—they’re busy bodies, P300 to P500 a pop. Nagpapaligaya rin sila sa kapwa. Mas marangal pa nga sila kaysa mga batugan na laging nakatunganga, naghihintay ng biyaya.
Yeah, it is likely Christ’s beatitudes can only refer to those with upbeat attitudes—blessed are the poor in spirit, so the first of the nine attitudes are trotted… ah, the spiritually famished may have to imbibe currant-flavored vodka, armagnac, or similar robust spirits… and blessed indeed are the cross-eyed for they shall see God twice…
Kibit-balikat nang mailahad sa ‘kin ang tungkol sa magkapatid na walang sapin sa paa.. yapak na pumapasok sa eskuwela… hikahos ang mga magulang, ni hindi makabili ng tsinelas para sa kanilang anak… kapag may iniingatang yaman ang kalooban, lalabas at lalabas ‘yan.
‘Tang ina kasi ng pagiging maparaan at malikhain ang pangangailangan.
Uhugin pa ‘kong paslit nang makakita ng kotso, bakya o clogs na gawa mula sa tinilad na kawayan… na mas matindi kung hahaginit sa mukha ni George W. Bush… samut-saring laruan nga ang nauukit namin mula sa kawayan… makakakuha ng samut-saring sangkap sa tabi-tabi lang lalo’t nasa kanayunan…
Nakakita na rin ako ng mga damong karagumoy at ragiwdiw na tinayantang, nilala… mukhang mamahaling sandalyas ang kinalabasan…
Nakakita na rin ako ng sandalyas na hinabi mula sa mga tangkay ng palay… pati nga tatami o alpombrang Hapon ay habi mula sa dayami…
Sa’n magmumula ang mga payak na kasangkapan sa pamumuhay kundi sa yaman ng kalooban?
Kaya kahit sa pagtulong, timpi at tipid pa rin ako. ‘Yun ngang pinakahuling inamutan ko ng tulong, namilipit pa’t nagkikisay. Humahalinghing: “Aah… yours is too long!”
Kapag may imbak na yaman sa kalooban, lalabas at lalabasan ‘yan.
Mwa-ha-ha-haw!
Katumbas ng halagang pinakawalan ni Serrano ang tinatawag na “double happiness” sa wikang Tsino. Natukoy sa isang pananaliksik nitong 2008 na may hatid na ligaya ang P250 na ilalaan sa kapwa sa araw-araw— nagbigay at dinoble ng Egay ang ganoong halaga. May kalakip na ngiti ang nagbigay. Hindi naman makapaniwala’t may sukling ngiti ang binigyan. Double happiness.
‘Yung lukot lang ng pagmumukha ng tatay ni Kris Aquino sa P500 ang sakbibi ng lungkot.
Nah, I’d rather not peg a measure of happiness on monetary quantum doled each day to just anybody. Why, members of a certain toil cartel called OPECPEC, female sex workers lurking or lurching along pocked pockets of Avenida Rizal in Sta. Cruz, Manila or Aurora Blvd., in Cubao, Quezon City—they’re busy bodies, P300 to P500 a pop. Nagpapaligaya rin sila sa kapwa. Mas marangal pa nga sila kaysa mga batugan na laging nakatunganga, naghihintay ng biyaya.
Yeah, it is likely Christ’s beatitudes can only refer to those with upbeat attitudes—blessed are the poor in spirit, so the first of the nine attitudes are trotted… ah, the spiritually famished may have to imbibe currant-flavored vodka, armagnac, or similar robust spirits… and blessed indeed are the cross-eyed for they shall see God twice…
Kibit-balikat nang mailahad sa ‘kin ang tungkol sa magkapatid na walang sapin sa paa.. yapak na pumapasok sa eskuwela… hikahos ang mga magulang, ni hindi makabili ng tsinelas para sa kanilang anak… kapag may iniingatang yaman ang kalooban, lalabas at lalabas ‘yan.
‘Tang ina kasi ng pagiging maparaan at malikhain ang pangangailangan.
Uhugin pa ‘kong paslit nang makakita ng kotso, bakya o clogs na gawa mula sa tinilad na kawayan… na mas matindi kung hahaginit sa mukha ni George W. Bush… samut-saring laruan nga ang nauukit namin mula sa kawayan… makakakuha ng samut-saring sangkap sa tabi-tabi lang lalo’t nasa kanayunan…
Nakakita na rin ako ng mga damong karagumoy at ragiwdiw na tinayantang, nilala… mukhang mamahaling sandalyas ang kinalabasan…
Nakakita na rin ako ng sandalyas na hinabi mula sa mga tangkay ng palay… pati nga tatami o alpombrang Hapon ay habi mula sa dayami…
Sa’n magmumula ang mga payak na kasangkapan sa pamumuhay kundi sa yaman ng kalooban?
Kaya kahit sa pagtulong, timpi at tipid pa rin ako. ‘Yun ngang pinakahuling inamutan ko ng tulong, namilipit pa’t nagkikisay. Humahalinghing: “Aah… yours is too long!”
Kapag may imbak na yaman sa kalooban, lalabas at lalabasan ‘yan.
Mwa-ha-ha-haw!
Running to stand still
Liham ng kumadre sa marive_94061@yahoo.com:
AM just now learning the concept of kronos compared to the staid and definitive linear time even as my culture memory is steeped in it. Asian--particularly, the Filipino-- sensibility flows on circular movement of time where the point of a start or of an end is never acutely discernible. It is a blessing and a curse. Therein lies your child-like grip to a firmly-grounded present as well as Nietzsche’s concept of eternal return. He was sensible enough to glance at the world as if time was gone in order to understand such cycle. Must have been a challenge had you faced each other in a time continuum that brought you holding and accepting kismet and fate as cursives to a present we HAVE to believe in; even, as he looked how crooked things can look straight when knowing that the world is spinning between here and no longer.
You know, I will go back to our lessons in aikido to expound on my evolving meditative awareness. It is completely different from the one I learned in my profession and as different as the writer's muse whispering ear-worms. I am now in beginner's level 2. My body is responding voluntarily and easily to daily pilatesian and yogic summons and it is good. My boy-mentor just reached his 7th hundred-years, it seems, last week and he challenges me still by his ability to stand or sit in stillness when he should be driving everyone crazy. Can they really be so young and yet so old? I am now learning to stand still and listen to decibels beyond the hearing of the ordinary listeners. Yes, I know how it feels to be looked at like an alien or a crazed being just because I am developing new modes of communicating and understanding. Wala akong pakialam. Why, that feels good, saying that.
Another part of the course is walking. A course in walking? Yes, barefoot. With thin cardboard slippers. In Nike walk-abouts. In Goretex hikers. On pebble. On sand. On cement. On wood. On green, green grass. On hot. On cold. On ice. In water. Against sand. In a minute. In five. In an hour. For hours on a pair of shoes the sensei will choose-- that will be my final exam for this course. (Btw, I did so well in the falling exam, I won a bamboo sword. How about that? But between us, I felt like a thief getting one while the little ones clapped on.) I look forward towards the torment and joyous enlightenment my sensei promises. In this course, the feet rules. The world rests on it and perceptions of the experience defines how a student will finish the complete beginner's level.
Hilam ng kumpadre sa tagakataga@yahoo.com:
ASTIG talaga ‘yung batang binanggit mo—it takes mental mettle to rein the body to a stillness of sorts… well, life’s a whirl… even a snail’s shell configures a swirl of winds hurling out even shadows on its path.
Remember Ray Bradbury’s “A Sound of Thunder”— at a point in a time continuum, a wee butterfly was crushed underfoot… And so much was lost, generations of greens that could have fed multitudes and sprung forth civilizations, gone in a careless… senseless… insensate step…
Taking steps can be so sublime. I can’t let you in on how walking the walk is done. Can’t share my sturdy nimble legs… and they tell me I’ve been investing lots of time, exertions, and insertions between some damsels’ legs… mwa-ha-ha-ha-haw!
Martial elders have it, it takes around 30 years to absorb the spirit of the108 movements in taikiken… and the learner has to gain mastery over those moves before moving on to walking meditation… aikido is moving meditation, poetry in motion… malupit talaga ano? And all it boils down to is nurturing that all-aware feeling of being at home in one’s body—beyond the confines of kinesiology, anthropometrics, milieu, time or terrain…
“Time won’t leave me as I am, but time won’t take out the child in this man,” so ululated U2’s Bono in allusion to Jesus Christ’s counsel to worldly-wise savant Joseph of Arimathea, “Unless you become a child again, you will not enter the kingdom of God.”
Christmas is for kids like Musa and the kid in you and me— no kidding.
AM just now learning the concept of kronos compared to the staid and definitive linear time even as my culture memory is steeped in it. Asian--particularly, the Filipino-- sensibility flows on circular movement of time where the point of a start or of an end is never acutely discernible. It is a blessing and a curse. Therein lies your child-like grip to a firmly-grounded present as well as Nietzsche’s concept of eternal return. He was sensible enough to glance at the world as if time was gone in order to understand such cycle. Must have been a challenge had you faced each other in a time continuum that brought you holding and accepting kismet and fate as cursives to a present we HAVE to believe in; even, as he looked how crooked things can look straight when knowing that the world is spinning between here and no longer.
You know, I will go back to our lessons in aikido to expound on my evolving meditative awareness. It is completely different from the one I learned in my profession and as different as the writer's muse whispering ear-worms. I am now in beginner's level 2. My body is responding voluntarily and easily to daily pilatesian and yogic summons and it is good. My boy-mentor just reached his 7th hundred-years, it seems, last week and he challenges me still by his ability to stand or sit in stillness when he should be driving everyone crazy. Can they really be so young and yet so old? I am now learning to stand still and listen to decibels beyond the hearing of the ordinary listeners. Yes, I know how it feels to be looked at like an alien or a crazed being just because I am developing new modes of communicating and understanding. Wala akong pakialam. Why, that feels good, saying that.
Another part of the course is walking. A course in walking? Yes, barefoot. With thin cardboard slippers. In Nike walk-abouts. In Goretex hikers. On pebble. On sand. On cement. On wood. On green, green grass. On hot. On cold. On ice. In water. Against sand. In a minute. In five. In an hour. For hours on a pair of shoes the sensei will choose-- that will be my final exam for this course. (Btw, I did so well in the falling exam, I won a bamboo sword. How about that? But between us, I felt like a thief getting one while the little ones clapped on.) I look forward towards the torment and joyous enlightenment my sensei promises. In this course, the feet rules. The world rests on it and perceptions of the experience defines how a student will finish the complete beginner's level.
Hilam ng kumpadre sa tagakataga@yahoo.com:
ASTIG talaga ‘yung batang binanggit mo—it takes mental mettle to rein the body to a stillness of sorts… well, life’s a whirl… even a snail’s shell configures a swirl of winds hurling out even shadows on its path.
Remember Ray Bradbury’s “A Sound of Thunder”— at a point in a time continuum, a wee butterfly was crushed underfoot… And so much was lost, generations of greens that could have fed multitudes and sprung forth civilizations, gone in a careless… senseless… insensate step…
Taking steps can be so sublime. I can’t let you in on how walking the walk is done. Can’t share my sturdy nimble legs… and they tell me I’ve been investing lots of time, exertions, and insertions between some damsels’ legs… mwa-ha-ha-ha-haw!
Martial elders have it, it takes around 30 years to absorb the spirit of the108 movements in taikiken… and the learner has to gain mastery over those moves before moving on to walking meditation… aikido is moving meditation, poetry in motion… malupit talaga ano? And all it boils down to is nurturing that all-aware feeling of being at home in one’s body—beyond the confines of kinesiology, anthropometrics, milieu, time or terrain…
“Time won’t leave me as I am, but time won’t take out the child in this man,” so ululated U2’s Bono in allusion to Jesus Christ’s counsel to worldly-wise savant Joseph of Arimathea, “Unless you become a child again, you will not enter the kingdom of God.”
Christmas is for kids like Musa and the kid in you and me— no kidding.
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
Apúntalo o te vas a olvidar
Saad ng kumadre sa marive_94061@yahoo.com:
I TOOK Mandarin, Nippongo, German and French in the 90's for want of anchor, expression as well as solutions to matters that cloyed at me. I figured know more than three languages and the answers will follow. NOT. Not true, either. At first, I marveled at and delved on the daily lessons at first. Ako lang yata ang enrolled in four languages. You should have seen the registrar's clerk. Nakangisi ba naman ang damuho as he said, "English not enough for answers, huh?" Years later, today, I grasp at his meaning and his wisdom. Oo nga. Why need all these languages when one only needs the simplest-- or, even the best one, there is: the filled silence and quietude of the knowing heart. My conclusions early were useless, irrelevant to the true worth of the languages.
Your Chinese is it. You're right. No wonder the world and its many secrets were so easy for this race to muster, to master and lord over. They conquered and ruled it, remember? The world was explained in short, tersely concise terms: a world unconjugated, impermutated, untransformed, uncluttered with tenses and times must have been so easy to rule. The laws of order and the language were singularly austere and powerful. This skill I still need to learn. This was the essence that eluded me when I was trying to cram for answers by spreading my bases thin over modes of expression that did not prove kind to my ennui.
Sadsad ng kumpadre sa tagakataga@yahoo.com:
INIWAN ko silang subsob sa usapan… mas angkop sabihin, asapan o pausok lang… spinmeister ng pulitiko at babaeng peryodista na nag-aaral daw ng abugasya dahil wala lang magawa sa buhay.
Hindi naman nabubulabog ng pausok na siga ang mga pesteng kulisap sa punong mangga. Lalong hindi nauuntag ng asap ang mga usbong upang mamulaklak… it’s the potassium content in the bonfire’s leftover ashes that coaxes the tree into flowering. Kaya kaanak na kemikal na pang-embalsamo sa tusino’t longganisa ang panghilamos-dahon ng mga namamakyaw ng mangga. Para mauntag sa pamumulaklak ang puno.
Sabi nga’y paligiran na lang ng abo ng sinunog na ipa ang puno— strew chaff reduced to charnel and ash, to the essential element that touches off flowering. Bakit pa kailangan ang maligoy na pasiklab ng apoy, paghahasik ng makakaluoy na init at asap? Both action and words can be reduced to their essence…
Ganoong mga larawan ang kidlat na gumuguhit sa ulunan ko. Kaya iniwan ang spinmeister sa pulitika at pulpol na peryodista.
Sapol ni Solomon sa Kawikaan 10:19, “Ikinukubli sa baha ng mga kataga ang mga kasinungalingan… kaya maingat magbitiw ng salita ang paham.”
Ah, Tagalog as we know it reportedly has over 80 skeins in Batangas, derived from “batangan,” earthen water vessel. At may mga nalulunod nga sa sambasong tubig… may naghihilamos… nagmumumog… nagtatampisaw… lumalangoy. Gagawing salaminan ng sarili ang tining-linaw ng tubig.
Masarap din naman—sa Batangas-- ang “chocolate ah.” Aguado.
I TOOK Mandarin, Nippongo, German and French in the 90's for want of anchor, expression as well as solutions to matters that cloyed at me. I figured know more than three languages and the answers will follow. NOT. Not true, either. At first, I marveled at and delved on the daily lessons at first. Ako lang yata ang enrolled in four languages. You should have seen the registrar's clerk. Nakangisi ba naman ang damuho as he said, "English not enough for answers, huh?" Years later, today, I grasp at his meaning and his wisdom. Oo nga. Why need all these languages when one only needs the simplest-- or, even the best one, there is: the filled silence and quietude of the knowing heart. My conclusions early were useless, irrelevant to the true worth of the languages.
Your Chinese is it. You're right. No wonder the world and its many secrets were so easy for this race to muster, to master and lord over. They conquered and ruled it, remember? The world was explained in short, tersely concise terms: a world unconjugated, impermutated, untransformed, uncluttered with tenses and times must have been so easy to rule. The laws of order and the language were singularly austere and powerful. This skill I still need to learn. This was the essence that eluded me when I was trying to cram for answers by spreading my bases thin over modes of expression that did not prove kind to my ennui.
Sadsad ng kumpadre sa tagakataga@yahoo.com:
INIWAN ko silang subsob sa usapan… mas angkop sabihin, asapan o pausok lang… spinmeister ng pulitiko at babaeng peryodista na nag-aaral daw ng abugasya dahil wala lang magawa sa buhay.
Hindi naman nabubulabog ng pausok na siga ang mga pesteng kulisap sa punong mangga. Lalong hindi nauuntag ng asap ang mga usbong upang mamulaklak… it’s the potassium content in the bonfire’s leftover ashes that coaxes the tree into flowering. Kaya kaanak na kemikal na pang-embalsamo sa tusino’t longganisa ang panghilamos-dahon ng mga namamakyaw ng mangga. Para mauntag sa pamumulaklak ang puno.
Sabi nga’y paligiran na lang ng abo ng sinunog na ipa ang puno— strew chaff reduced to charnel and ash, to the essential element that touches off flowering. Bakit pa kailangan ang maligoy na pasiklab ng apoy, paghahasik ng makakaluoy na init at asap? Both action and words can be reduced to their essence…
Ganoong mga larawan ang kidlat na gumuguhit sa ulunan ko. Kaya iniwan ang spinmeister sa pulitika at pulpol na peryodista.
Sapol ni Solomon sa Kawikaan 10:19, “Ikinukubli sa baha ng mga kataga ang mga kasinungalingan… kaya maingat magbitiw ng salita ang paham.”
Ah, Tagalog as we know it reportedly has over 80 skeins in Batangas, derived from “batangan,” earthen water vessel. At may mga nalulunod nga sa sambasong tubig… may naghihilamos… nagmumumog… nagtatampisaw… lumalangoy. Gagawing salaminan ng sarili ang tining-linaw ng tubig.
Masarap din naman—sa Batangas-- ang “chocolate ah.” Aguado.
Sunday, December 14, 2008
Gatla ng gunita sa tubig
TUMATALAB hanggang ikapitong salinlahi ang sumpa ng makata.
Huwag mangamba ni mabahala— that’s only for Irish poets and Celtic bards initiated in priestly function, hindi sa mga sampay-bakod na nagsasalansan ng mga taludtod na naglipana daw sa mga dalubhasaan at pamantasan sa bansa.
Igpaw na agad: nahapyawan namin ang patalastas sa pahayagan na magbibigay ng panayam sa Makati si Dr. Masaru Emoto hinggil sa mga katangian ng tubig. Hindi na pinansin. Pulos mga kilabot na basketbolero o basketbulaan kasi ang kinuhang endorsers para sa panayam.
Lumitaw sa pananaliksik ni Emoto na tahasang nalilimbagan ng gunita ang tubig. Masasalinan ng kamandag ng masamang pita. Madadalisay kapag nilagakan ng taimtim na dalangin.
Kaya tiyak na makabutas-bubong ang tubo ng utang na nakalista sa tubig.
Meron pa ngang nabungkal: “In 2006, Emoto published a paper together with Dean Radin and others in the peer-reviewed Explore: The Journal of Science and Healing, in which they describe that in a double blind test approximately 2000 people in Tokyo could increase the aesthetic appeal of water stored in a room in California, compared to water in another room, solely through their positive intentions.”
Pero wala raw batayan sa kanluraning agham ang pamamaraan pati na natuklasan ni Emoto sa kanyang pananaliksik sa kakaibang katangian ng tubig. Kaya lumalabas na wala pa ring binatbat sa scientific community si Emoto.
Sana’y hindi na nga ipinagkalat pa anumang natukoy ni Emoto— na magiging dalisay kapag binasbasan ng lama o Buddhist priest ang tubig na tigmak sa polusyon.
Na ang talagang pinupuntirya ng makatang ollave, bard or druid ay ang taglay na tubig sa katawan— about 75% of the human brain and the entire body is water-- ng kupal na kasumpa-sumpa.
Na kung isang wannabe President Mar Roxas lang ang hahagupit ng mahayap na kataga sa tropang “Ale Baba and Plenty Thieves,” the assault by insult would just be shrugged off and won’t cause a whit of harm.
Roxas isn’t a bard, neither is he a poet. Was he ever initiated in arcane priestly function as lamas, brujos, curanderas, warlocks, and shamans are?
Pinakamalambing ko yatang pusa si Hsing-I, na halaw naman ang ngalan sa isang pamamaraan sa wushu para gatlaan ng pamatay na lagda ang 75% of the human body component which is mostly water… may matitira pa namang beef jerky at mga buto sa katawan matapos upakan ng hsing-i.
Lilimasin lang ang tubig sa buong katawan. Paunti-unti. Hindi biglaang pagpatay.
Lumiligwak sa galak marahil ang mga gunitang inilimbag noon ng aking mga musmos na supling sa kanilang pagtatampisaw sa mga bukal at batis ng Makiling at Sierra Madre… tiyak na may nakalagok na ng kahit gapatak niyon, nakatighaw sa lungkot at uhaw… o pumailanlang na sa mga ulap at paulit-ulit na ihahaplos ng ambon saanmang latag ng lupain.
Huwag mangamba ni mabahala— that’s only for Irish poets and Celtic bards initiated in priestly function, hindi sa mga sampay-bakod na nagsasalansan ng mga taludtod na naglipana daw sa mga dalubhasaan at pamantasan sa bansa.
Igpaw na agad: nahapyawan namin ang patalastas sa pahayagan na magbibigay ng panayam sa Makati si Dr. Masaru Emoto hinggil sa mga katangian ng tubig. Hindi na pinansin. Pulos mga kilabot na basketbolero o basketbulaan kasi ang kinuhang endorsers para sa panayam.
Lumitaw sa pananaliksik ni Emoto na tahasang nalilimbagan ng gunita ang tubig. Masasalinan ng kamandag ng masamang pita. Madadalisay kapag nilagakan ng taimtim na dalangin.
Kaya tiyak na makabutas-bubong ang tubo ng utang na nakalista sa tubig.
Meron pa ngang nabungkal: “In 2006, Emoto published a paper together with Dean Radin and others in the peer-reviewed Explore: The Journal of Science and Healing, in which they describe that in a double blind test approximately 2000 people in Tokyo could increase the aesthetic appeal of water stored in a room in California, compared to water in another room, solely through their positive intentions.”
Pero wala raw batayan sa kanluraning agham ang pamamaraan pati na natuklasan ni Emoto sa kanyang pananaliksik sa kakaibang katangian ng tubig. Kaya lumalabas na wala pa ring binatbat sa scientific community si Emoto.
Sana’y hindi na nga ipinagkalat pa anumang natukoy ni Emoto— na magiging dalisay kapag binasbasan ng lama o Buddhist priest ang tubig na tigmak sa polusyon.
Na ang talagang pinupuntirya ng makatang ollave, bard or druid ay ang taglay na tubig sa katawan— about 75% of the human brain and the entire body is water-- ng kupal na kasumpa-sumpa.
Na kung isang wannabe President Mar Roxas lang ang hahagupit ng mahayap na kataga sa tropang “Ale Baba and Plenty Thieves,” the assault by insult would just be shrugged off and won’t cause a whit of harm.
Roxas isn’t a bard, neither is he a poet. Was he ever initiated in arcane priestly function as lamas, brujos, curanderas, warlocks, and shamans are?
Pinakamalambing ko yatang pusa si Hsing-I, na halaw naman ang ngalan sa isang pamamaraan sa wushu para gatlaan ng pamatay na lagda ang 75% of the human body component which is mostly water… may matitira pa namang beef jerky at mga buto sa katawan matapos upakan ng hsing-i.
Lilimasin lang ang tubig sa buong katawan. Paunti-unti. Hindi biglaang pagpatay.
Lumiligwak sa galak marahil ang mga gunitang inilimbag noon ng aking mga musmos na supling sa kanilang pagtatampisaw sa mga bukal at batis ng Makiling at Sierra Madre… tiyak na may nakalagok na ng kahit gapatak niyon, nakatighaw sa lungkot at uhaw… o pumailanlang na sa mga ulap at paulit-ulit na ihahaplos ng ambon saanmang latag ng lupain.
Sunday, December 07, 2008
Ferdinand Marcos noon, Manny Pacquiao ngayon
Sa kalatas-Facebook inilatag ng kumadreng liyag:
STRANGE that you mentioned FM--the only nationalist worth his weight in historical gold, George Lucas' “Star Wars,” tadhana (btw, FM's “Iginuhit ng Tadhana” attests to your premise about the word's origins and its iteration to matters of fate and predestination) to siddhana. Henry Miller once described the exemplars that move the world do so with example more than doctrine. Whether they be great leaders or the evil forces in a much-loved sci-fi film anthology, he calls them "poets of (repeatable and discernible, my terms) action who make a little difference whether they be forces for good or forces for evil." I understand that this eschews predestination, then, even as fate clings and controls, huh?
Wordsmith-ing is such a consuming, lonely task. One can create any truth and it does not really matter whether it works, sells, is believed or understood. I see your writing such as this and I wonder how lonely it gets up, out, down there? This above favorite author says it so well, "honest criticism does not really matter; what one (really) wants is unrestrained passion: fire for fire."
Boy! The Santa Cruz Mountains and forests proved too spooky. Marami yatang mga kaluluwang sumama sa akin. I came home more afire than the quiet, stillness, emptiness and calm I went to seek.
So much for that. I think if I don't close this down, I am down the road to perdition.
Halik sa Musang liyag. Mabuti na lang malayo ako at walang bigote.
Iginatla ng kumpadreng Kulamnista:
FM was into saddhana… raja yoga-- so I was once told by an elder who was into such arcane studies—that had his mind steeled and honed sharper than a scalpel’s. He was gyre that sucked into his maelstrom the brightest lights of his era to steer the course of our nation’s history. All we’ve got to show for somehow is Manny Pacquiao. And he isn’t exactly into statecraft. The era of winners segued to a generation of whiners…
Character is kismet, fate is character— or whatever’s done in the past is done in the here and now, will be done again and again in the future. Or the unforgiving burden of an eternal return (as Friedrich Nietzsche has it). Uh, that underpins my fascination with the Chinese tongue: no tenses, no verb transformations, conjugations and permutations to peg a time segment. Just a child-like grip on the continuum of a present moment.
May mga kalapit-bahay na buong maghapon at magdamag na nakatunganga lang sa akin… mayroong running commentary sa bawat gawi’t gawa ko sa araw-araw na pamumuhay. I go through stationary meditation postures, nothing fancy, to nurture the life force that can be unleashed for healing or killing—chi, rei-ki, prana, menstruum, maybe kalimasada. Pikang-pika ang mga hinayupak na nagmimiron, pulos kantiyaw.
Ah, genius or unfathomed depths of understanding can be a quantum of solace. Stupidity is immeasurable. Anyway, a recent paper from King’s College of London dumps political correctness, points up that intelligence is sexy, packs top-quality sperm for transmission of genetic traits, better endowed for a Darwinian mode of survival and getting to the top. Between you and me, I’d say there’s not much company up, out or down here…
Uh, “meditation” stepped into English lexicon sometime in the 1390s. The word had its roots in the Latin modus—measure, manner—and has spread into such terms as moderate, modern, physician (from medicus), and to heal (mederi-- may kabalbalan ang English, naging remedy). That implies what you do as a doctor: meditation.
“Meditative awareness is unity with the present moment”—and this grumpy gramps feels much such in the quality of attention that his panganay na apo provides him with in their silly moments together… Bibinyagan si Musa sa Disyembre 12, siyam ang nagkukumahog na maging ninong o ninang… hindi naman makapalag ang nanay at tatay.
Mahigpit na yakapin at hagkan sa noo’t puyo ang aking inaanak. Para sa ‘kin.
STRANGE that you mentioned FM--the only nationalist worth his weight in historical gold, George Lucas' “Star Wars,” tadhana (btw, FM's “Iginuhit ng Tadhana” attests to your premise about the word's origins and its iteration to matters of fate and predestination) to siddhana. Henry Miller once described the exemplars that move the world do so with example more than doctrine. Whether they be great leaders or the evil forces in a much-loved sci-fi film anthology, he calls them "poets of (repeatable and discernible, my terms) action who make a little difference whether they be forces for good or forces for evil." I understand that this eschews predestination, then, even as fate clings and controls, huh?
Wordsmith-ing is such a consuming, lonely task. One can create any truth and it does not really matter whether it works, sells, is believed or understood. I see your writing such as this and I wonder how lonely it gets up, out, down there? This above favorite author says it so well, "honest criticism does not really matter; what one (really) wants is unrestrained passion: fire for fire."
Boy! The Santa Cruz Mountains and forests proved too spooky. Marami yatang mga kaluluwang sumama sa akin. I came home more afire than the quiet, stillness, emptiness and calm I went to seek.
So much for that. I think if I don't close this down, I am down the road to perdition.
Halik sa Musang liyag. Mabuti na lang malayo ako at walang bigote.
Iginatla ng kumpadreng Kulamnista:
FM was into saddhana… raja yoga-- so I was once told by an elder who was into such arcane studies—that had his mind steeled and honed sharper than a scalpel’s. He was gyre that sucked into his maelstrom the brightest lights of his era to steer the course of our nation’s history. All we’ve got to show for somehow is Manny Pacquiao. And he isn’t exactly into statecraft. The era of winners segued to a generation of whiners…
Character is kismet, fate is character— or whatever’s done in the past is done in the here and now, will be done again and again in the future. Or the unforgiving burden of an eternal return (as Friedrich Nietzsche has it). Uh, that underpins my fascination with the Chinese tongue: no tenses, no verb transformations, conjugations and permutations to peg a time segment. Just a child-like grip on the continuum of a present moment.
May mga kalapit-bahay na buong maghapon at magdamag na nakatunganga lang sa akin… mayroong running commentary sa bawat gawi’t gawa ko sa araw-araw na pamumuhay. I go through stationary meditation postures, nothing fancy, to nurture the life force that can be unleashed for healing or killing—chi, rei-ki, prana, menstruum, maybe kalimasada. Pikang-pika ang mga hinayupak na nagmimiron, pulos kantiyaw.
Ah, genius or unfathomed depths of understanding can be a quantum of solace. Stupidity is immeasurable. Anyway, a recent paper from King’s College of London dumps political correctness, points up that intelligence is sexy, packs top-quality sperm for transmission of genetic traits, better endowed for a Darwinian mode of survival and getting to the top. Between you and me, I’d say there’s not much company up, out or down here…
Uh, “meditation” stepped into English lexicon sometime in the 1390s. The word had its roots in the Latin modus—measure, manner—and has spread into such terms as moderate, modern, physician (from medicus), and to heal (mederi-- may kabalbalan ang English, naging remedy). That implies what you do as a doctor: meditation.
“Meditative awareness is unity with the present moment”—and this grumpy gramps feels much such in the quality of attention that his panganay na apo provides him with in their silly moments together… Bibinyagan si Musa sa Disyembre 12, siyam ang nagkukumahog na maging ninong o ninang… hindi naman makapalag ang nanay at tatay.
Mahigpit na yakapin at hagkan sa noo’t puyo ang aking inaanak. Para sa ‘kin.
Con us?
ELI Soriano man na may dating daan
Tiklop sa Abalos—“may dalawang daan…”
Kaibang anito ang sa Malakanyang
Kaya may Dureza na nagdadasalsal!
ATM ang budhi nilang naroroon
At ecu tatacut kahit isang milyon
Ang ipaparada ng El Shaddai ngayon--
Hinokus-pokus ng “Hello Garci” noon…
Kahit magtungayaw ang mga cardinal
Back off lang sila sa bulyaw Jose Pidal
Incumbent Pestedent na hindi man halal
Kakapit-bayawak nang hindi matanggal.
Kaya ang diskarte nitong mga kampon
Ang impeach Gloria bid kagyat itinapon
Dapat daw baguhin ay ang Konstitusyon
Upang ating bayan medyo makabangon…
Dati nang pakulo muling pinausok
Paningin ng madla ay tinusok-tusok
Brocha-cha lang muna saka isusuksok
Sa p’westo ang punong balakyot na pa-cute.
Dapat lang ibuka tambok ng bukana
Upang makahimod sibasib-brocha-cha
Tiyak na titirik pati mga mata
Kapag titihaya lang sa pagnanasa…
Talipandak yata’y sobrang apurado
Mapako sa p’westo’y nais masiguro
Kangkang o Con-Con man, ipinaareglo
Sa mga galamay niya sa Kongreso…
Con-Con man o kangkang, lalo daw masarap
Nang Saligang Batas ganap na malaspag
Mabobong Pulungan agad nang maglunsad
Sila-sila na lang bumuo ng “Con us!”
Sa trono ng poder masarap lumuklok
Hanggang pati tumbong maagnas, mabulok
Ito ang aralin na dapat matalos
Sobra-sobrang power kasunod… pagsabog!
Luklukan ng poder: silya elektrika!
Boltaheng dadaloy ibig dagdagan pa
Elektrisidad man kapag sobra-sobra
Nakaupong reyna’y tiyak matutusta…
Tiklop sa Abalos—“may dalawang daan…”
Kaibang anito ang sa Malakanyang
Kaya may Dureza na nagdadasalsal!
ATM ang budhi nilang naroroon
At ecu tatacut kahit isang milyon
Ang ipaparada ng El Shaddai ngayon--
Hinokus-pokus ng “Hello Garci” noon…
Kahit magtungayaw ang mga cardinal
Back off lang sila sa bulyaw Jose Pidal
Incumbent Pestedent na hindi man halal
Kakapit-bayawak nang hindi matanggal.
Kaya ang diskarte nitong mga kampon
Ang impeach Gloria bid kagyat itinapon
Dapat daw baguhin ay ang Konstitusyon
Upang ating bayan medyo makabangon…
Dati nang pakulo muling pinausok
Paningin ng madla ay tinusok-tusok
Brocha-cha lang muna saka isusuksok
Sa p’westo ang punong balakyot na pa-cute.
Dapat lang ibuka tambok ng bukana
Upang makahimod sibasib-brocha-cha
Tiyak na titirik pati mga mata
Kapag titihaya lang sa pagnanasa…
Talipandak yata’y sobrang apurado
Mapako sa p’westo’y nais masiguro
Kangkang o Con-Con man, ipinaareglo
Sa mga galamay niya sa Kongreso…
Con-Con man o kangkang, lalo daw masarap
Nang Saligang Batas ganap na malaspag
Mabobong Pulungan agad nang maglunsad
Sila-sila na lang bumuo ng “Con us!”
Sa trono ng poder masarap lumuklok
Hanggang pati tumbong maagnas, mabulok
Ito ang aralin na dapat matalos
Sobra-sobrang power kasunod… pagsabog!
Luklukan ng poder: silya elektrika!
Boltaheng dadaloy ibig dagdagan pa
Elektrisidad man kapag sobra-sobra
Nakaupong reyna’y tiyak matutusta…
Saturday, November 22, 2008
Pfft goes our Christmas gifts
Lahad ng anak sa doodles11006@yahoo.com:
WE joke about the oil tanker that got hijacked off Somalia. That tanker was Aramco's and it came from my area, ha-ha-ha. There goes our safety awards for December-- there are millions worth of oil in that tanker. Safety awards are keepsakes for employees from both Aramco and job contractors as reward for year-long observance of safety rules. I got a cutlery set last year. Looks like a cellphone will be this year’s giveaway. But I'm rooting for an external memory hard drive or a made-in-Germany hardware tool set.
Much talk was spent among us on why the supertanker Sirius Star was not armed. The route it took was dangerous and the tanker was the biggest Aramco has. This business of hijacking and kidnapping is nearly everywhere, ha-ha-ha. Nakaka-bad trip ang Senate investigation kay Joc-joc Bolante.
How is my niece doing? Is she ok now? Aaron also informed me that she was hospitalized, I thought she was with you guys most of the time.
I called in sick today-- my tonsils had been acting up and I better not push myself. Mahirap magkasakit dito lalo na 'pag taglamig na.
Luhod ng ama mula noqualmasabomb@yahoo.com:
THAT route passing through the Suez Canal is less costly in terms of time and fuel—that man-made canal provides such efficiencies, trenchant pirates provide multi-billion payment woes for Lloyds of London. Reports say it’s S.O.P for pirates in that part of the globe to take any vessel they wish to, why, they’re still holding 16 ships and more than 250 sailors, practically making a laughingstock out of George Wimp Bush’s global war against terror, pwe-he-he-he!
Yeah, no reprisals, no punitive or preventive measures, no surgical strikes on pirate lairs… pirates can enjoy their spoils and strike with impunity, unperturbed by NATO, the U.S. war fleets, and all sophisticated surveillance satellites hovering over those parts.
Ah, captive vessels like Sirius Star (that’s “dog star,” brightest orb in the celestial sphere) and furtive vassals like Joc-joc Bolante… Disco Volante (literally “spinning disk”), a vessel of villainy in the James Bond movie, “Thunderball” was blown to smithereens. Joc-joc is no whirling dervish but one who spins laughs for sick entertainment… sasambulat at magkakalasug-lasog din kaya siya? I’m not one to suggest a shift in inquiry tack, say, debriefing, outright tactical interrogation or pumping him up with sodium amythal prior to Senate hearings, mwa-ha-ha-haw!
La Mesa Heights, a village of some 50 homes right inside the La Mesa Dam forest reservation—that’s where Musa and her mom and dad will be residing for a few years or so. I’ve been telling her that we’ll catch fighting spiders and pit ‘em in combat, watch blazes of fireflies in the night, snare a stray chameleon or two, and put up patches of cherry tomatoes, holy basil, and herbs for cookery… Once a week, itinerant peddlers from Angat Dam which feeds the La Mesa water reservoir bring exotica like freshwater eels (kasili), silver perches (ayungin), native catfish, and salted boar and venison meat cuts… am I drooling? I’ve got some genteel friends living in that same village.
Over beers, I was told by one fair damsel of a friend there: “Our parents raised us to appreciate things that matter. A posh house to live in can’t rub off its posh into you. Expensive clothes, cars, gadgets, all that can’t infect you with a measure of self-worth. Fine eating on your table don’t provide you with a taste for the finest things… Our parents valued education, iba ang may pinag-aralan.”
Tag-init ng ulo dito, nagsisimulang sumakit ang mga bulsa, malapit na kasi ang Pasko-ho-ho-ho!
WE joke about the oil tanker that got hijacked off Somalia. That tanker was Aramco's and it came from my area, ha-ha-ha. There goes our safety awards for December-- there are millions worth of oil in that tanker. Safety awards are keepsakes for employees from both Aramco and job contractors as reward for year-long observance of safety rules. I got a cutlery set last year. Looks like a cellphone will be this year’s giveaway. But I'm rooting for an external memory hard drive or a made-in-Germany hardware tool set.
Much talk was spent among us on why the supertanker Sirius Star was not armed. The route it took was dangerous and the tanker was the biggest Aramco has. This business of hijacking and kidnapping is nearly everywhere, ha-ha-ha. Nakaka-bad trip ang Senate investigation kay Joc-joc Bolante.
How is my niece doing? Is she ok now? Aaron also informed me that she was hospitalized, I thought she was with you guys most of the time.
I called in sick today-- my tonsils had been acting up and I better not push myself. Mahirap magkasakit dito lalo na 'pag taglamig na.
Luhod ng ama mula noqualmasabomb@yahoo.com:
THAT route passing through the Suez Canal is less costly in terms of time and fuel—that man-made canal provides such efficiencies, trenchant pirates provide multi-billion payment woes for Lloyds of London. Reports say it’s S.O.P for pirates in that part of the globe to take any vessel they wish to, why, they’re still holding 16 ships and more than 250 sailors, practically making a laughingstock out of George Wimp Bush’s global war against terror, pwe-he-he-he!
Yeah, no reprisals, no punitive or preventive measures, no surgical strikes on pirate lairs… pirates can enjoy their spoils and strike with impunity, unperturbed by NATO, the U.S. war fleets, and all sophisticated surveillance satellites hovering over those parts.
Ah, captive vessels like Sirius Star (that’s “dog star,” brightest orb in the celestial sphere) and furtive vassals like Joc-joc Bolante… Disco Volante (literally “spinning disk”), a vessel of villainy in the James Bond movie, “Thunderball” was blown to smithereens. Joc-joc is no whirling dervish but one who spins laughs for sick entertainment… sasambulat at magkakalasug-lasog din kaya siya? I’m not one to suggest a shift in inquiry tack, say, debriefing, outright tactical interrogation or pumping him up with sodium amythal prior to Senate hearings, mwa-ha-ha-haw!
La Mesa Heights, a village of some 50 homes right inside the La Mesa Dam forest reservation—that’s where Musa and her mom and dad will be residing for a few years or so. I’ve been telling her that we’ll catch fighting spiders and pit ‘em in combat, watch blazes of fireflies in the night, snare a stray chameleon or two, and put up patches of cherry tomatoes, holy basil, and herbs for cookery… Once a week, itinerant peddlers from Angat Dam which feeds the La Mesa water reservoir bring exotica like freshwater eels (kasili), silver perches (ayungin), native catfish, and salted boar and venison meat cuts… am I drooling? I’ve got some genteel friends living in that same village.
Over beers, I was told by one fair damsel of a friend there: “Our parents raised us to appreciate things that matter. A posh house to live in can’t rub off its posh into you. Expensive clothes, cars, gadgets, all that can’t infect you with a measure of self-worth. Fine eating on your table don’t provide you with a taste for the finest things… Our parents valued education, iba ang may pinag-aralan.”
Tag-init ng ulo dito, nagsisimulang sumakit ang mga bulsa, malapit na kasi ang Pasko-ho-ho-ho!
Monday, November 17, 2008
Hampas-lampas kay de la Paz
Mahirap nga namang mabimbang ni Misis
Kaya inako na ng kawawang pulis—
Si de la Paz lang ang tanging eurologist
Na sablay ang tangka sa perang naipit.
Kahit na si Misis ang siyang natutop
Maginoong Mister magkukusang-loob
Aako sa sala kahit pa mabulok
Sa pagkakapiit o pitpit ng beklog…
Kung sisipatin po bilang na six point nine—
Milyon o posisyon na katakam-takam
Umaatikabo talagang kainan,
Inungkat pa natin at ibinuyangyang!
On my own better half, ganoon nga yata
Ang naging pag-amin na kanyang ginawa
O “on my own behalf” na ngang nagparaya
Upang ipagtanggol ang esposang mutya…
Ang euronary track inspection talaga
Napakabusisi at nakakapika!
Pati nakatagong katiting na pera
Tila mga hita—pilit ibubuka.
One hundred five thousand euros na nakalkal
Sana ay ginawang traveller’s checks na lang
Kahit saang customs man iyon mabungkal
Wala nang hinalang may tangkang illegal…
Misis ang natutop, Mister ang umamin
Hanggang sa Senado—Mister ang nadiin…
Misis ang nagpuslit, inako ni Mister
Mister ang sumabit, lusot si Kumander…
Tayong mga mister—kahit pa heneral—
Haharap saanmang igting ng labanan
Kahit Senate hearing pa ang pagtapunan
Susunod sa atas ng esposang mahal…
Kung tayo’y dadayo saan pa mang nasyon
Upang makatuklas: Clitourist attraction!
Esposa’y iwanan, tayo’y maglimayon
Ligtas pa tayo sa euro tract infection.
Nawa’y naging aral sa mga mahilig
Posisyong six point nine na kaibig-ibig
Magbitbit-gumamit niyong traveller’s chicks…
Este, nagkamali… dapat traveller’s checks!
Kaya inako na ng kawawang pulis—
Si de la Paz lang ang tanging eurologist
Na sablay ang tangka sa perang naipit.
Kahit na si Misis ang siyang natutop
Maginoong Mister magkukusang-loob
Aako sa sala kahit pa mabulok
Sa pagkakapiit o pitpit ng beklog…
Kung sisipatin po bilang na six point nine—
Milyon o posisyon na katakam-takam
Umaatikabo talagang kainan,
Inungkat pa natin at ibinuyangyang!
On my own better half, ganoon nga yata
Ang naging pag-amin na kanyang ginawa
O “on my own behalf” na ngang nagparaya
Upang ipagtanggol ang esposang mutya…
Ang euronary track inspection talaga
Napakabusisi at nakakapika!
Pati nakatagong katiting na pera
Tila mga hita—pilit ibubuka.
One hundred five thousand euros na nakalkal
Sana ay ginawang traveller’s checks na lang
Kahit saang customs man iyon mabungkal
Wala nang hinalang may tangkang illegal…
Misis ang natutop, Mister ang umamin
Hanggang sa Senado—Mister ang nadiin…
Misis ang nagpuslit, inako ni Mister
Mister ang sumabit, lusot si Kumander…
Tayong mga mister—kahit pa heneral—
Haharap saanmang igting ng labanan
Kahit Senate hearing pa ang pagtapunan
Susunod sa atas ng esposang mahal…
Kung tayo’y dadayo saan pa mang nasyon
Upang makatuklas: Clitourist attraction!
Esposa’y iwanan, tayo’y maglimayon
Ligtas pa tayo sa euro tract infection.
Nawa’y naging aral sa mga mahilig
Posisyong six point nine na kaibig-ibig
Magbitbit-gumamit niyong traveller’s chicks…
Este, nagkamali… dapat traveller’s checks!
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Tough finding a hermitage, Lao Lianben…
PANAHON ngayon ng purgis—mga purdoy na burgis—na mas masahol pa ang mga gawi’t ugali kaysa isinusukang batugang burgis nitong nakalipas na dekada 1970. ‘Yung purgis basyo na’ng bulsa, bangkarote pa’ng kukote— pampasikip lang sa Pilipinas, pabigat na pasanin ng lupain. Nabanggit mo sa isang kaibigan na meron kang kapitbahay na purgis ngayon…
Lilinawin ko: “kahanggan” ang wastong kataga, mali ang “kapitbahay.” Angkop ang kahanggan sa mga nasa hangganan ng kinatindigan ng bahay. Mismong si Hesukristo ang naglinaw sa katuturan ng “kapitbahay” sa kanyang kuwento ukol sa isang mapagkupkop na mula pa sa Samaria—o Sumeria yata na sinilangan ni Abraham, saklaw sa kasalukuyang panahon ng Iraq na ipinababoy nga ni George W. Bush para makamkam ang krudo nito.
As Christ had it put, being a neighbor is not a function of proximity but of propinquity— humans have different mind-sets that dwell in separate realms of the heart. You dwell in Zen, I dwell in Zen— hah, we’re neighbors. Even if you’re in Parañaque while I’m in San Jose del Monte.
Kahit iharap mismo si Jose Rizal na maghapon at magdamag na magsusulat lang ng bagong “Noli Me Tangere” o “El Filibusterismo,” tutuyain lang ng kahanggan mong gunggong. Alam kong maghapon at magdamag ka ring subsob sa iyong sining—para kang ermitanyo, ‘di ba?
Hindi matanggap ng mga bugok at batugang purgis ang ganoong gawi ng mapagpunyaging pamumuhay. Kaya katakut-takot na bantot ng palipad-hangin ang ibabalibag sa ‘yo, sa mga katulad mong walang humpay sa gawa.
Kahit naman ako ang bigyan mo ng obra—na kapit na kapit, umaangkop sa umiiral na katiwasayang Zen sa lawak ng pamamahay naming mag-anak—hindi ko matatanggap. Sa sining tanggulan ko kasi natuklasan ang kaigtingan at pagtitimpi ng Zen. Sa galaw, gawi’t gawa ko na lang masisilayan iyon, sa araw-araw na pamumuhay na mas matingkad at mataas ang antas ng kasiningan.
There’s this sinking feeling that you were put smack in those parts by Divine Providence as shimmering accent— to highlight the contrast between an inutile, barren, mindless blabbering existence of a purgis and your purpose-driven life. That cretin exists. You live.
Chickens cackle on their way to the slaughter; our battalions move on in silence, in triumph after triumph.
Mwa-ha-ha-haw!
Lilinawin ko: “kahanggan” ang wastong kataga, mali ang “kapitbahay.” Angkop ang kahanggan sa mga nasa hangganan ng kinatindigan ng bahay. Mismong si Hesukristo ang naglinaw sa katuturan ng “kapitbahay” sa kanyang kuwento ukol sa isang mapagkupkop na mula pa sa Samaria—o Sumeria yata na sinilangan ni Abraham, saklaw sa kasalukuyang panahon ng Iraq na ipinababoy nga ni George W. Bush para makamkam ang krudo nito.
As Christ had it put, being a neighbor is not a function of proximity but of propinquity— humans have different mind-sets that dwell in separate realms of the heart. You dwell in Zen, I dwell in Zen— hah, we’re neighbors. Even if you’re in Parañaque while I’m in San Jose del Monte.
Kahit iharap mismo si Jose Rizal na maghapon at magdamag na magsusulat lang ng bagong “Noli Me Tangere” o “El Filibusterismo,” tutuyain lang ng kahanggan mong gunggong. Alam kong maghapon at magdamag ka ring subsob sa iyong sining—para kang ermitanyo, ‘di ba?
Hindi matanggap ng mga bugok at batugang purgis ang ganoong gawi ng mapagpunyaging pamumuhay. Kaya katakut-takot na bantot ng palipad-hangin ang ibabalibag sa ‘yo, sa mga katulad mong walang humpay sa gawa.
Kahit naman ako ang bigyan mo ng obra—na kapit na kapit, umaangkop sa umiiral na katiwasayang Zen sa lawak ng pamamahay naming mag-anak—hindi ko matatanggap. Sa sining tanggulan ko kasi natuklasan ang kaigtingan at pagtitimpi ng Zen. Sa galaw, gawi’t gawa ko na lang masisilayan iyon, sa araw-araw na pamumuhay na mas matingkad at mataas ang antas ng kasiningan.
There’s this sinking feeling that you were put smack in those parts by Divine Providence as shimmering accent— to highlight the contrast between an inutile, barren, mindless blabbering existence of a purgis and your purpose-driven life. That cretin exists. You live.
Chickens cackle on their way to the slaughter; our battalions move on in silence, in triumph after triumph.
Mwa-ha-ha-haw!
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