Suffering for their faith

Here in the tropical rainforest, being pious can be a chronic trial, especially for women. Covering up the entire body in this hot, very humid environment means that perspiration does not evaporate easily. Skin problems are almost unavoidable and keeping body odor under control is a constant struggle. But even the head is not exempt. Apparently many young women have developed ear problems from wearing head coverings all the time. With no air circulation, the heat and humidity make it easy for the ear canal to get infected with fungus, the itching causes scratching which in turn leads to outer ear canal infections with purulent drainage. Many struggle often with smelly drainage from their ears because of this. (Usually the smelly ear drainage is only found in young kids with immature ear canals who play in water a lot and have chronically wet ears but apparently is now common also in pious women.) Another problem is their hair, Many complain that their hair is hard to manage, falls out and they have a lot of trouble with an itchy scalp. This too is related to high humidity making chronically damp skin a haven for fungus and bacteria. But unmanageable hair also provides a motivation to continue covering it up.

Their grandmothers wore loose see-through head coverings for religious functions only. They wore cotton sarongs and open necked blouses. But the push of modern piety (and fashion, I mght add) is that girls tend to wear chic pants but their head and neck must be covered tightly with heavy opague material, so that only the face itself can be seen and they are being encouraged to wear it all the time not just for religious functions. Nowdays women are out and about more at school and work and don’t have long periods at home where they can take off the gear and give their skin a break.

This is likely the reason that when you go to government offices you will see the pious female civil servants move so languidly. Government civil service uniforms are made from a heavy synthetic gabardine and pious women will wear long skirts and long-sleeved jackets made of that stuff in addition to the occlusive head coverings. Most work in unairconditioned offices. To survive an entire shift it makes sense that you would want to move slowly and avoid sweating as much as possible.

Attention investors: light, cool, opague fabrics which allow air circulation and wick away moisture please! Meanwhile, invest in the powder and skin, ear, and hair medication industries.

Never eat fish in the dark

The brownouts continue. During last night’s brownout it rained really hard with lightening and visceral-jarring thunder. There are a couple of kerosene lamps but the light is only enough to show you the big things. I decided to eat early since there’s not much else I could do in the dark. Dinner was what was left over from the group meal at lunch. The rice had the faintest whiff of starting to go off so it was best to eat it early anyway as it obviously wasn’t going to get any better later on. And with the constant brownouts refrigeration isn’t much of a help. As I was munching on a piece of a fish, I couldn’t really see it well. I thought I was avoiding the spine but somehow got a piece of it stuck in my throat. So here I am in the dark in a torrential downpour in a guesthouse by myself with a fishbone caught in my throat facing a two day weekend. I remembered being told that bread was good for fishbones caught in the throat and remembered seeing part of a loaf in the freezer compartment of the useless refrigerator. It wasn't frozen and although it was definitely on the old side, in the dim light I didn’t see any major discolorations or anything. So I quickly ate a piece. Like magic it cleared the obstruction. Whew!

Conclusion? Never eat fish in the dark!!

Banana flowers, ferns, and kerosene lamps

Here I am in the deep dark center of southeast Asia! Well, it really IS dark. This town, along with many others, is experiencing rotating brownouts. It seems that nation wide the government owned power company is having trouble keeping its act together. The brownouts are daily and anywhere from 6-20 hours long at all kinds of different times but most likely during peak hours.

So what do you do when you are stuck all evening in a guesthouse in a town you don’t know with only a candle and a kerosene lamp for light - and your computer battery is already dead? Why you sit and talk with the night watchman/janitor, what else?!

Since he couldn’t do his job either being as how he couldn’t see to sweep the floors or clean he shared a bit of how he copes with life here. The rise in oil prices has prompted changes even in this remote area. The government has been trying to wean the people off of kerosene because kerosene is cheap while some other kind of fuel (aviation?) fuel, which is made from kerosene is expensive. If kerosene use can be decreased, there will be more available to make the other kind of fuel. So people are being encourage to use gas (LPG). Anyway, July was telling me that his wife still uses kerosene for cooking, since LPG is exensive and often difficult to find here. But now they are limited to 10 liters of kerosene a month. They have to show their family ID card to get a coupon and can only get it in the district in which they reside. So he gathers firewood to supplement the family’s kerosene ration. They boil their drinking water on a wood fire as well as anything else that takes a long time.

We talked about food. He said he raises his own chickens and a couple of pigs. He said a lot of people are now feeding special growth formula to chickens so that they mature fast and can be sold at an early age. He didn’t think that was a good thing so he avoids buying chicken at the market unless it’s live and he knows it was free range. He was suprised to hear that in the third of my worlds people buy special growth feed for their piglets. He didn’t know of anybody around here using that stuff though he had once heard that it existed. He said some people buy chicken guts in bulk at the market for their pigs because apparently the leftover chemicals in the chicken tissue stimulates growth in the pigs too.

He talked about how a lot of people spray pesticides on the “sweet” vegetables (I guess things like green beans, carrots, etc. that you have to plant) just before picking them to sell even though the instructions plainly say you must wait several days before it is safe to pick, much less eat. He said he won’t buy or eat it. They grow stuff in their yard and he described many of the traditional edible leaves and plants that grow by themselves or can be had for free. One of his favorites is banana flowers, another is ferns that grow wild near his house. He said the river used to be full of fish but some people nowdays use fish-stunning chemicals so they can make bigger catches and so the fish population isn’t like it used to be. He said that 20 years ago you could easily have ½-1 kilo of fish with only about 10 minutes of fishing. But now it can take hours. He doesn’t like spending that kind of time so he prefers to “fish” at the market.

We talked about formalin and how it is being used with wild abandon as an all-purpose food preserver. In addition to fresh noodles, soybean curd, and ocean fish, he said even people selling wild pig meat they hunt in the forest are starting to use it.

From there we discussed the recent fuel crisis and on and on. By ten I decided to go wear out a flashlight and try to get at least a little paper work done. The lights came on after 11pm just as I was nodding off over the papers, but by then I was too sleepy to finish...

Thousands of people will die

What is faster than a speeding bullet?
The grapevine.
What is faster than the grapevine?
Rumors on the internet.

A few days ago a friend sent me the following email:

July 18, 2008 – [Country X] will get 8.1 earthquake, thousands of people will die. PLS. LET US BE ALERT AND
MARK THIS DATE JULY 18, 2008, FRIDAY. LET'S BE PREPARED, AND LET US ALL PRAY THAT THIS WILL NOT HAPPEN TO US.
IF POSSIBLE: PLS. DON'T GO TO WORK ESPECIALLY THOSE WITH OFFICE LOCATED IN HIGH PLACES, BUILDINGS, CONDOS AND MALLS.
NOTHING TO LOSE IN THIS KIND OF REMINDER. MAYBE, THIS IS GOD'S WAY TO SAVE YOU, YOUR FAMILY , YOUR FRIENDS AND YOUR OFFICEMATES OR LESSEN CASUALTIES. LET'S ALL PRAY AND MARK THIS DATE.
PLS. FORWARD TO ALL YOUR CONTACT LIST TO WARN YOUR RELATIVES, FRIENDS AND YOUR LOVED ONES AND ALL PEOPLE LIVING IN [COUNTRY X]
.
AGAIN: REMEMBER JULY 18, 2008 – HAVE AN ALARM ON THIS DATE.

IF YOU WANT TO READ MORE….

This was followed by a long story of a Brazilian mystic called Mr. Juseleeno Nobulega DaRoose , and a list of major catastrophes he predicts over the next 10 years. There was also a list of all sorts of major world events he supposedly predicted with great accuracy. It said he had been a Nobel Peace Prize winner so I did a web search figuring if that was true then surely he’d be on the web. All I found were dozens and dozens of Chinese and other Asian language blog pages with the same story – only highlighting whatever “prophecies” applied to their particular country. Eventually I discovered the name had been mangled but that there is indeed a Brazilian mystic called Jucelino Nóbrega da Luz who makes his living predicting catasrophes around the globe, some of which happen, some of which don’t. (I mean, how likely is it that there will be earthquakes in countries in the earthquake zone? And how likely is it that volcanoes will erupt along the Ring of Fire?)

The interesting thing is that this story has now spread all over the place and gets worse all the time. The 8.1 earthquake of a few days ago was 10.1 yesterday and today my helper overheard her neighbors talking aboutthe coming 10.5 earthquake. The internet rumor has moved to the text world, and text rumors spread even faster than internet rumors. Everyday we hear of more and more people discussing this earthquake and praying that it won’t happen. Taxi drivers, shop keepers, fellow passengers, neighbors, church mates. I expect by next week there will be special prayer meetings called all over the city. (And who knows how strong the earthquake will be next week???)

Dealing with beggars

In many parts of the world begging still flourishes. There are many assumptions about begging and its causes. Those who come from places where begging is unknown often are horrified by beggars. They assume that no one would be begging unless they were absolutely destitute. But over the course of time I have become aware of the fact that there are many reasons people beg.

Many years ago I lived in a large city in the second of my worlds. There weren’t many beggars back then but those who were around tended to be of two sorts: lepers and the mentally disturbed. The lepers were agressive beggars and I suppose the thought of being touched by them motivated many a reluctant giver! They had their established begging spots – outside the post office and outside of mosques and churches when services were held. They would be brought to the sites by car and picked up at the end of the day. The government actually provided housing, stipend and medical care for them but this was a way of getting extra. Many people did give, after all charity is a good religious duty, but others told me they refused to give because they said the guys just used it for gambling. Others said they were part of a syndicate and most of what they collected went to their bosses. Others saw giving as a way to show God they were grateful it wasn’t them who had leprosy. As for the mentally disturbed, many people out of pity would feed them and give them clothing. In smaller communities and face to face neighborhoods people know who is in need and why, and they deal with them appropriately. But in large cities begging can be done more anonymously.

In recent years, however, the numbers of beggars in that city has increased substantially and a large number are children. Nothing is more heart-rending than a grimy little kid out there begging. Those from places where begging is unknown are undone at the sight and would probably be apalled at what that city is doing about the begging problem. Starting in December, it will be a crime to give to beggars. That’s right. If you are caught giving to a beggar you face up to 3 months in jail or a fine of about $166. If someone, even a child, is caught begging he faces fines of up to $500 (ha, ha, ha) or up to three years in jail.


Now you may think that is harsh. But according to the local government, most of those children are being used and exploited by adults in syndicates who use them to raise money as a business, a begging business. A few are street kids who prefer the freedom of living on the streets to living at home, going to school, etc. Children are at extremely high risk of abuse in these situations, in fact you can probably assume that they will be abused. The mayor’s office says that people are welcome to help street kids but that cash should be given to the social organizations which have been set up to help them rather than giving directly to the beggars themselves.