04.25.08
Posted in History, Uncategorized at 12:22 pm by Administrator
Wilshire Boulevard had a bit of commotion this week. Parts of the road were blocked off in honor of Earth Day on Tuesday, and then yesterday, Thursday April 24, the Armenian Genocide was commemorated. Demonstrators gathered by the Turkish Consulate and cars with Armenian flags cruised back and forth, while LA Police lined the area. Wish I had my camera with me, but I didn’t. Perhaps next year. As with last year, the demonstration was peaceful.
I’ve only been very briefly aware of the Armenia Genocide, so yesterday I did a quick Google and found a link to the Armenian National Institute. Evidently, April 24, 1915 is the day when the Armenian Genocide is believed to have started in Constantinople. Some say that it’s the worst event of WWI and the second most studied genocide next to the Jewish Holocaust of WWII. From a little reading, it appears (as with all wars and political unrest), the events that lead to the Armenian Genocide is quite complicated. As Christians, I think the Armenian genocide is worth studying since they were believed to be persecuted because of their Christian beliefs. We need to be informed for our own good. Wikipedia says this about the number of deaths involved:
“While there is no consensus as to how many Armenians lost their lives during the Armenian Genocide, there is general agreement among western scholars that over 500,000 Armenians died between 1914 and 1918. Estimates vary between 300,000 (per the modern Turkish state) to 1,500,000 (per modern Armenia,[81] Argentina,[82] and other states). Encyclopædia Britannica references the research of Arnold J. Toynbee, an intelligence officer of the British Foreign Office, who estimated that 600,000 Armenians “died or were massacred during deportation” in the years 1915–1916.”
To this date, the Turkish government still denies that what transpired during the years of 1915 to 1918 between their government and the Armenians was genocide (similar to how the Japanese to this day also deny the extent of their involvement of the brutal mass murders in Nanking in 1938). The Armenian Genocide is one of the major events where Christians were persecuted for their beliefs.
Okay, so this is how far I got before my computer bleeped out on me and I lost the rest of my post. Grrrrr. I don’t have the time right now to retype the rest of what was running through my mind, so will just leave it here for now. Perhaps it’s just as well that I lost it because I can calm down a bit and step back to examine whether I really wanted to say what I was thinking, heheh. However, the remembrance of the Armenian Genocide is an important one, I think, and much can be learned from it, particularly for Christians.
Marlakins
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04.18.08
Posted in Health-related--Natural Alternative Treatments, Uncategorized at 8:25 am by Administrator
Before I get lost in the day’s activities, I wanted to post a link to an article that I found very interesting. I found it interesting in light of bone marrow transplants. Generally, it’s accepted that if you have an identical twin sibling, then you have a perfect match for a BMT and you’re pretty much guaranteed a successful transplant. But I know I have read that not all identical twin BMTs are successful (not to mention I also saw a list of points that are matched for marrow transplants and there are some that they don’t know what they do yet they say those points are not important! ack!). Anyway, that made me suspicious that identical twins are not always identical. Well, here’s an article which may confirm my suspicions. It’s called, Identical Twins’ Genes Not Identical.
An example of points I thought significant were,
” For example, one twin in Bruder’s study was missing some genes on particular chromosomes that indicated a risk of leukemia, which he indeed suffered. The other twin did not. ”
Also,
“Bruder speculates that such variation is a natural occurrence that accumulates with age in everyone. “I believe that the genome that you’re born with is not the genome that you die with—at least not for all the cells in your body,” he says.”
This second point is something that I had also suspected about so-called genetic conditions. There are those who say that if it’s in your genes, then there’s nothing you can do about it. True the condition is deeper, but who’s to say that it has to always be that way? I thought that it is possible that our genes change due to our environment. This article seems to indicate that it changes for the worse such as exposures to ionizing radiation and such, but if it can go one way, they why not the other way? Don’t bodies heal and cells multiply? Also, why is it some people have a certain gene, but they don’t seem to manifest a disease associated with it. I’m particularly thinking of hematomachrosis where some people have the gene, but not all of them load iron quickly. Or why some people are born with a gene associated with a disease but it doesn’t manifest until they are adults? It’s one thing to have the gene, and another for it to express itself. I’m sure it’s much more complicated than that, but this type of thing is what has made me cringe when people say it’s “genetic.” It comes across to me as a defeatist comment when said in relation to treating illnesses. . . “It’s genetic, so you gotta accept it. . .” I hate that, ha! I know we have limits, but I don’t think we are as limited as we tend to think. And that’s why I found the article interesting. The full article can be read here:
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=identical-twins-genes-are-not-identical&ec=su_twins
Have a nice Friday.
Over and out,
Marlakins
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04.12.08
Posted in Book Reviews, Health-related--Natural Alternative Treatments, Uncategorized at 6:15 pm by Administrator
This week I finished a book called, Dancing with Rose, finding life in the land of Alzheimer’s by Lauren Kessler. The author, Lauren Kessler, writes of her experience with Alzheimer’s through her mother, and then from her experiences working temporarily as an RA (resident assistant) in an Alzheimer’s boarding care facility she called Maplewood. I have to admit that I have mixed feelings on this book. I very much enjoyed her stories and her insights as well as her new-found understanding of the “people” with Alzheimer’s. I stress “people” because one point Kessler makes, which I feel is a very valid observation, is that our society, in general, sweeps the elderly in the background especially when they become sickly and burdensome. There is a tendency to think of Alzheimer patients as if they are no longer fully living. With 5.2 million Americans suffering from Alzheimers, that’s a lot of people who need caretakers. But with the way our society is set up where both husband and wife must work jobs to support the family, the elderly suffering from severe mental and physical disabilities are relegated to boarding facilities away from home.
So what do I like about Dancing with Rose? From Kessler’s descriptions of what she had to do to take care of these people with Alzheimer’s and how different they all were was edifying to me. I think seeing what they go through helps me to have less fear and more patience for those who have lost full mental capacity. Since my illness with AA in 1999, I have had a much different outlook on people, yet since AA didn’t affect my mental capacity, I never really spent much time studying the mind or how it works. Trying to figure out and understand people with supposedly “normal” mental capacity, at times, is challenging in itself, but when someone loses that, it can be very frustrating as well as intimidating. Fortunately, no one in my family as of yet has had Alzheimer’s, although I do know other people who’s families have been affected. Strangely, according to Kessler’s book, more women are affected than men, but the few people I know of are all men. And after reading this book, I actually feel less afraid to see these guys again. Previously, I would feel so uncomfortable, that I would just stay away, but now I realize that I should not be afraid, and also not assume that they are totally gone. Understanding a bit more of the disease process helps to make me more compassionate and patient.
Another point well-taken from Kessler is that so much research is done regarding the biological workings of Alzheimer’s, but virtually no funding and research for how to live with and manage Alzheimer’s patients. There was a time when it was believed that one should not go along with any delusions an Alzheimer’s patient was experiencing, and just continually correct the patient when he was not grounded in reality. More recently, they have found that continual correction aggravates the patient more than helps, so now it’s not looked down upon to go along with whatever delusion the Alzheimer patient is experiencing. Kessler explains it nicely that it is the “person” that is important, and not that that person is off in a delusional world. So keeping the patient relaxed and comfortable is more important that continual correction to the point of aggravation. That made a lot of sense to me.
Kessler’s comment of her observations regarding Alzheimer medications is that they don’t seem to make any significant improvements in the patients, and that sometimes they seem to go down hill faster. That information seems to validate what Russell Blaylock wrote in his book Excitotoxins, the Taste that Kills. Blaylock’s explanation, if I recall correctly, is that the Alzheimer medications speed up decline because what they do is speed up synapsis, which translates into using up reserves faster and thus depleting it faster. An easy way to look at it is like a bank account. If there is no more deposits being made into the account, the faster you make withdrawals, the faster you’ll get to a zero balance.
This brings me to one of the things I didn’t like about Dancing with Rose, and that is there is no mention of alternative means. Instead, the message I seemed to feel was basically, accept the disease for what it is and even welcome it as there was even suggestion that Alzheimer’s may actually be a state of Zen Enlightenment because the patient loses all their inhibitions and is free to be whatever they feel like. To me that analogy is a bit reaching. I can understand why she and the doctor she interviewed might think that, but if that’s what Zen Enlightenment is all about, leave me out. I prefer to be able to feed myself and wipe my own butt, thank you.
Dancing with Rose was published in 2007, and as I mentioned, there was no mention of alternative treatments, but rather only comments that Alzheimer’s is still surrounded by mystery and that there is no cure. However, I have read a book called, Beating Alzheimer’s, a Step Towards Unlocking the Mysteries of Brain Diseases by Tom Warren. Warren’s book was published in 1991, sixteen “years” before Dancing with Rose. Warren’s book is about how he cured himself of Alzheimer’s naturally. To know that the rate of Alzheimer’s continues to climb and that there are millions of people around the world suffering from this disease, it is a shame that there is no mention of Tom Warren’s experiences and knowledge.
Overall, I did enjoy reading Dancing with Rose. I did learn quite a bit from it as well. So while I don’t fully agree with some of Kessler’s philosophy on the disease of Alzheimer’s, I do think the book is a good read, and even enlightening. She not only exposes what it’s like to care for various stages of Alzheimer’s, but she also exposes the experiences of the caretakers and the RAs who work with Alzheimer’s patients.
I’m finding it personally interesting that I have never been much interested in psychology, yet more recently I have found the topic of Alzheimer’s and the mental frame of mind of war veterans captivating. The next book I’ve started to read is called Death March, the Survivors of Bataan by Donald Knox. I remember hearing about shell shock and post war mental trauma, but after reading their circumstances, I can see why it happens. The curious thing is why does it happen to some, but not to others? Well, I’m started to deviate to another topic, so will hold off until I finish the next book.
Marlakins
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04.09.08
Posted in Book Reviews, Health-related--Natural Alternative Treatments, History, Uncategorized at 8:45 pm by Administrator
Today, April 9th, marks the 66th anniversary of the Fil-American surrender to the Japanese on Bataan, Philippines. I’ve read that that surrender was the largest surrender in history.
The other day I finished reading another book called, Parade of the Dead: a U.S. Army Physician’s Memoir of Imprisonment by the Japanese, 1942-1945, by John R. Bumgarner, M.D. When I was younger, I remember my parents used to say that the Japanese were monsters, and I also remember the Chinese students at my school didn’t get along very well with the Japanese students. After reading more about what happened during WWII in Asia and the Pacific, I can see why they thought that way. I don’t have much time to do much of a thoughtful post on the subject today, but it’s easy enough to do a little research on the net to see what types of things transpired during WWII. One example would be Nanking in 1938. After reading Ghost Soldiers by Hampton Sides, and Bumgarners Memoirs, I’m left numb with the knowledge of what atrocities take place during war and how dehumanizing war can make men. I realize that brutality is not limited only to the Japanese, nor are all Japanese so brutal and heartless. However, reading the accounts of what the prisoners had to endure is mind boggling, and it’s amazing that anyone survived all that. Bumgarner did not participate in the Bataan Death March, but he did end up in the Cabanatuan Prison, the largest POW camp at the time, and where many of the men who endured the Bataan Death March were later imprisoned. Starvation along with the many diseases that accompany starvation ravaged the men by the thousands. As a medical doctor, Bumgarner writes of some of his observations while he cared for many of the sick prisoners. Since they had very little medications to treat the ill soldiers, most of what Bumgarner did was observe and document the diseased conditions that resulted from malnutrition. Since I am interested in health and nutrition, I found much of his observations very interesting such as it took about 3 to 4 weeks of lack of food to start seeing clinical signs of malnutrition in the men. I had written a post a while ago regarding the Ukranian Genocide and how it is said that they suffered “10 million” victims during 1932-1933 as a result of a government planned famine. I couldn’t believe it when I read “10 million!” in “one year.” It made me wonder how long people could go on without food, but now after reading Bumgarner’s accounts, it starts to make more sense. Apparently it can only take less than a month of starvation to start seeing very severe illnesses cropping up, and to also start to become susceptible to many other opportunistic diseases. War does this time and time again. Living here in a very sheltered world, I have only seen pictures and a little footage of people starving in far away countries. Little have I realized that much of it occurs during wartime.
Okay, I’ve gotta dash for now, but I did want to acknowledge today in remembrance of the thousands who died 66 years ago in the Philippines during WWII. I can see now why my dad has been so captivated by WWII history in the Pacific. He lived through it, and only recently have I started to see why he can never forget it. I called him the other day to tell him about Bumgarner’s book, and if he had read it already. Turns out it is one that he hasn’t read yet, so I dropped it off for him the other night. I told my dad, “Look what you’ve done to me! Now I’m hooked on WWII history.” I have another book reserved on the battle of Midway. His reply to me was, “Oh, finally I’m not alone.” Certainly there are many, many more people who have many memories of WWII, but I think among our family of girls, he was the only one still carrying the memories of WWII.
Oh, wait, one last comment. For anyone interested in history of WWII in the Pacific or even anyone just interested in health and the effects of malnutrition on the human body, I recommend Parade of the Dead. Don’t ever believe anyone who tells you food isn’t linked to disease and cure. Obviously they have no clue.
Marlakins
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04.01.08
Posted in Uncategorized at 8:48 pm by Administrator
To continue from my previous post on Villa Escudero, after lunch we headed off to see what else was at the plantation. We found there was a museum that housed lots of things from Mr. Escudero’s private collection. We weren’t allowed to take pictures, but we were able to get one shot inside. . . Mum’s the word on how that happened, but here it is with us in front of one of the displays. There were many other things that I would have preferred to take a picture of, but oh well. . .
From left to right is Andrew, me, Marissa, Dad, Mom, and Uncle Rudy. One may notice that Filipinos are very heavily influenced by the Catholics. There were old floats for religious parades there as well as antique furniture, antique clothing, including clothing from the various presidents and their wives, a collection of money from around the world during the turn of the century and prior(interesting to see how the details/art work changes through time), Mr. Escudero’s private taxidermy collection (he was also a hunter), and many more items. I could have spent the whole day there browsing around, but we got in a bit late and had to leave because the museum was closing. So we snooped around the plantation more and found another popular activity there was rafting. Here’s a shot of the rafters.
These rafters could be seen from our nipa hut since the balcony of our hut hung over this side of the river. Here’s a view from our hut.
Our hut was two levels, but only the beds on the bottom level had mosquito nets. I slept upstairs in one of the beds without a mosquito net and got eaten alive by mosquitoes during the night. This was actually the one and only night I got bitten by mosquitoes on this trip. Years ago, it was different, and I got bitten much more. Here’s a pic of what the bedroom downstairs looked like.
This was the second place where we were able to enjoy a hot shower even thought it was practically a trickle, it felt sooo good! The other hot shower we were able to take was at the massage spa. My sister and I had a great Filipino massage called “hilot” by her condo on Bonafacio High Street. They had very nice restrooms and showers. Very modern like here in the states, but the shower head was even nicer than what I’m used to. Not only did they have hot running water with strong pressure, the shower heads were about 10″ in diameter. Talk about a “shower.” That was wonderful! But getting back to Villa Escudero, I really loved that balcony. I really wished that I could take out my knitting and sit there and just knit. It was so beautiful and peaceful. We talked into the night and learned of more stories from my mom and dad of when they were younger. Some of the stories were so sweet, yet some were also quite sad. Here we were chatting into the night.
Soon, dinner time arrived, so off we went to the buffet. Here’s a shot of part of the buffet. The food here was very good! I admit that I do miss the food still. Even the breakfast was delicious, and actually the most traditional Filipino breakfast that I had on the whole trip. I didn’t take any pictures of breakfast, but basically there was a couple types of fried fish, champrado (it’s like a chocolate rice pudding), scrambled eggs, hash, rice. I’m sure there was more, but that’s what sticks out in my memory of it. As far as dinner, my favorite part was the coconut bread pudding. Oh my, to die for! I love both coconuts and bread pudding and to have it both in one recipe. . . ummmmmm
Normally on the weekends, there is a performance during dinnertime. I believe it consists of some traditional folk dances and music, but alas, we were there on a Wednesday night and left on Thursday because Andrew and I we leaving the Philippines that Friday. So we missed the performance. I did take a picture of the instruments, tho. I really would have loved to hear them in action! But this picture will have to suffice for now.
After dinner we headed back. Here’s a pic of Andrew and me by the rafting dock. The atmosphere during nighttime reminded me so much of the feeling of the Pirates of the Caribbean at Disneyland. Even the sounds, ha!
Another cute little touch at Villa Escudero was the serenaders. While we sat chatting on the balcony, we heard some music. At the door we found some guys singing to us! Ha! They sang Filipino folk songs. It was really sweet, and they sounded good!
In the morning, I wanted to soak up as much as I could of that balcony. So early morning, I got up and hung out on the hammock.
Shortly after this shot, we ate our breakfast at their buffet and headed back to Manila. Oh, by the way, I just realized that I didn’t even mention where Villa Escudero is. It is in San Pablo City, boundary Tiaong, Quezon, Philippines. They even have a website which is www.villaescudero.com Addresses in the Philippines is a bit different from here in the U.S. I don’t know how mail gets to some of the homes. I’ll explain that in another post later. For now, that’s it for Villa Escudero.
Marlakins
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