When the ITCZ meets the Tropical Wave

One of the things I miss living in the second and third of my worlds is the Weather Channel. Of course weather around here is pretty predicatable, at least temperatures stay within a narrow range and precipitation is of one kind only. After all this time I was excited to have found a scientific explanation for what local weather we do have. Sort of. Weather here seems to be driven by two main things: the Intertropical convergence zone and Tropical waves.

The Intertropical convergence zone (ITCZ) is basically a band of clouds and thunderstorms that circles the globe near the equator. It is where the trade winds of the Northern and Southern hemispheres meet. It moves north and south with the seasons. (Red represents July, blue January, though obviously not this year!)

Tropical waves are the bottom edges of elongated high pressure ridges that move across the oceans from east to west. The bottom edges get kind of ragged and unstable and tend to produce a lot of rain and it is thought that they can also be instrumental in producing hurricanes and typhoons.

So what happens when a Tropical Wave meets up with the ITCZ? Well, I think we are finding out! We had a lot of rain last week and I once again realized the disadvantages of small umbrellas. The heavy rain continues this week. The other night it poured all night long after having poured all evening. There was flooding in many parts of the city, which isn't unusual but this time they even cancelled school in some areas! Our new neighbor found out what we meant by the flooding garage under his place. Thankfully his little sedan still started this morning.

More on rice crisis

According to the local paper the Secretary of Tourism said :

...the issue is not the shortage of supply but the unexplained steep increase in the prices of commercial rice. The prices of rice increased by as much as [36 cents] in some parts of [the area] in a span of two weeks from [$0.77 - $1.14] amidst assurance from government agencies that there is more than ample supply to last the lean months of July to September. "It is the speculation in the prices of rice that is driving its prices up, it is the same thing with oil," he said. "The government is very suspicious on the reason behind the increase of the prices of rice," he added.

Yeah, so are we.

Rice Crisis

Apparently all the talk about a rice crisis has produced one, at least locally. In the last week the already high pice of rice increased another 25%. Yesterday at the market the best rice was selling for $1.15/kilo, up from about $0.95 last week. The price of the government subsidized rice was selling for $0.41- 0.72/kilo. This government rice is a mix of various kinds of old stock, so the cheaper stuff is old and tends to be yellowed, broken, and dirty. It is also likely to have a high mold content. In the last few days there have been huge lines of people waiting to buy up to the daily limit of 2 kilos.

This is incredibly high for poorer families, especially when the minimum wage for a full time “official” laborer is $3.18 per day. That is, if he is a full time “official” worker working for a larger company. A great number of people earn less than that because they are considered “temporary” or they work on a comission or they work for a smaller business. This comes at a time when people are also scrambling for extra money to buy school supplies and uniforms. One 15 year old who was going to finally get the opportunity to start high school this year – most kids start at age 12 - was just told by her mom that she may have to get a job instead to try to help the family instead of going to school. Yes, legally 15 year olds can’t work. But the reality is that they can and do. They are hired for extremely low wages as house helpers, they help in home-based eateries, and in the back rooms of other small businesses.

It is not only rice. The price of gasoline has been going up and recently resulted in higher fares for public transportation. It also results in higher prices for everything else. Already the shops and markets seem a bit quieter as people are using more of their money for rice and transportation and less for other stuff.

Yesterday we found out in the news that the unusally high prices of rice are only in this region of the country. The city council had an emergency meeting and decided to check out rumors of rice hoarding. Officials have reportedly begun checking out local rice sellers and large millers. It is a crime to hoard rice in this city. The city council has also asked that more government subsidized rice be allotted to this area. They also asked the public to leave the subsidized rice for the poor. (Yeah, like other people aren’t also feeling the pinch.) They also talked about trying to increase rice production in the area.

We shall see. If the price doesn’t come down soon we may end up with major problems here. The poor simply cannot afford it.

Dripping

It’s that time of year when the humidity gets so high it just falls out of the sky as rain. Last month I was attending an evening funeral service. It was outdoors and the sun had already set but it was still incredibly hot. Everybody was wet with perspiration just sitting there doing nothing. Suddenly in the middle of the service it seemed that the air saturation hit 100% and condensed into rain. It was like the sky just suddenly dropped all its moisture in the form of an exceedingly hard downpour. No thunder, no lightening, no wind, no warning. Wham! And soon it was over.

The same thing has been happening here this week. Last night for example, I was standing outside watching the cat eat. Doing nothing. Just standing there. Perspiration was just welling up and running in rivers down my face, neck, arms, back, everywhere. Not too long afterwards the sky opened up and dumped an incredibly torrential downpour. Again, no thunder, no lightning, no wind, no sprinkling, no warning. Wham! It didn’t last more than 10-15 minutes but it was an incredible amount of water.

I sometimes wonder what would happen if you bathed in an antiperspirant? Would your body blow like a volcano because the sweat couldn’t come out??? It sure would be interesting to try it and see. Maybe one of these days I will – some time when I am sure the water won’t go off in case I need an emergency bath!

And that brings up another thing. Days like these do make me wonder about this common sports drink sold around Asia, like, uh, exactly what is in it????? Is this even appetizing???? Maybe you enjoy it better if you don't speak English????

Sometimes it's better not to know

Thursday the internet was down all day – some major problem with the server affecting half the country. Friday the power was off. Somebody bombed two major transmission towers on the other side of the island. Today the water has been off all day and is still off. In fact we hear it won’t be back on until tomorrow. After all that I’m kind of starting to get nervous about what new thing tomorrow might bring!

We never did hear what caused the internet problem but it seems to be fixed. The electricity is on but I can hear the back up generator down the road going so the transmission towers apparently aren’t fixed yet. Nobody seems to have any idea why somebody keep bombing transmission towers. Is it rebels trying to send some message that nobody seems to be understanding, or at least can’t do anything about? Is it bored teenagers out for some sort of obscure fun? Is it sabateurs paid by somebody to hassle the electric company – after all, we heard that there had been some clandestine deal being brokered by some big fish to sell it to a Chinese company. It’s supposedly off now, but it does make you wonder. As for the water, we heard they are draining a reservoir. Reminds me of the time a reservoir in the capital city was closed for a day while they looked for the body of a guy who’d fallen in and drowned. They didn’t find him so they eventually threw a bunch of chlorine in and turned the water back on. Perhaps his remains are still stuck in a pipe somewhere.... I guess maybe sometimes it’s better that we don’t know why things aren’t working.

Where is Solomon?

Dealing with public health issues requires the wisdom of Solomon. Three recent public health issues come to mind: iodized salt, smoking, and iron fortification.

We all assumed that iodizing salt is a good thing, right? It is supposed to prevent unsightly goiter. In the second of my worlds there is a campaign in process to introduce iodinization. I recall a couple of young ladies going around house to house in a No village three years ago. At each house they would ask to borrow a little salt. When the people brought the salt they put it on a piece of paper and dripped a little liquid on it. If it turned purple it meant the salt was iodized and the family was praised. If it did not turn purple they were lectured on the value of buying iodized salt. Many people do now use iodized salt although coarse uniodized salt is still available and is still a little cheaper.

In the third of my worlds all salt is now iodized. If there is any uniodized salt at all, I do not know where to find it. But there has been an unanticipated side effect. According to a local endocrinologist who did research into the problem, this country never really had a problem with goiter. Most of the population also regularly eats fish and other seafood. (So I wonder why they decided to outlaw uniodized salt in the first place???) Since the phasing out of uniodized salt, however, they have seen a rash of cases of hyperthyroidism. According to the doctor, giving iodine to some people is like throwing fuel on a fire and the health problems that have resulted are worse than the problem that the iodinization was supposed to have helped.

A second public health issue is smoking. It is well known that many diseases are exacerbated by smoking. And smoke is certainly annoying to non-smokers. No one was happier than me when smoking was banned on airplanes. No more coughing and sneezing when everybody lit up after the meal (of course meals on planes are also a thing of the past it seems). Gradually the ban was extended to malls, large stores, restaurants, bars, until now about the only place you can smoke is in your own house. In one sense as a non-smoker, it’s fine with me if nobody ever smokes, but from the point of personal rights and freedom it does seem a bit overkill to not even be able to smoke outside. After all, a smoker outside is totally negligible in comparison to auto fumes and the constant burning of trash that goes on. (Did I mention that burning a smelly old tire is considered by some a way to cure disease? It is reputed to scare off evil spirits. I’d trade that foul smell for a smoker any day!)

The third public health issue that is currently underway is the requirement that all rice be fortified with iron. As mentioned in a previous post, a large percentage of people in this country are reputed to be anemic, so it was decided that the rice should be iron fortified. All stores and restaurants that sell rice are required by law to sell iron fortified rice, whether cooked or raw. As mentioned previously, people do not like the iron fortified rice. They say it looks dirty, doesn’t taste good and is gritty and they don’t like to buy it. So to maintain sales, stores have stopped premixing the iron pellets into the rice and instead include the pellet packets (1 packet per kilo) in the bags of rice so that people can mix it themselves. Of course it mostly ends up in the trash. (One more thing to burn???)

Apparently however, the law doesn’t require rice sold in the market to be iron fortified. Most poor people (who are more likely to be anemic) buy their rice at the market because they can find poorer grades of rice than what is sold in stores and so it’s a little cheaper. And now it’s even cheaper still because the stores have to pay for the iron fortifcation packets. Poor people also don’t tend to eat at restaurants. They are more likely to eat at little household run eateries which are not subject to the law. Those people also do not serve iron fortified rice because it is more expensive and they want to make a profit. So as it turns out, the poor who are anemic are not benefitting from the iron fortified rice. It is the middle class who probably is not anemic who is dealing with having to deal with the higher price and throw away the pellet packets.

So, three public health issues. Where is Solomon?

Who says TV is addicting?

Do you ever wonder about stuff like this?

Experiments conducted by researcher Herbert Krugman reveal that when a person watches television, brain activity switches from the left to the right hemisphere. The left hemisphere is the seat of logical thought. Here, information is broken down into its component parts and critically analyzed. The right brain, owever, treats incoming data uncritically, processing information in wholes, leading to emotional, rather than logical responses. The shift from left to right brain activity also causes the release of endorphins, the body's own natural opiates--thus, it is possible to become physically addicted to watching television, a hypothesis borne out by numerous studies which have shown that very few people are able to kick the television habit. It's no longer an overstatement to note that the youth today that are raised and taught through network television are intellectually dead by their early teens.

From:
Mass Mind Control Through Network Television: Are Your Thoughts Your Own? by Alex Ansari, InformationLiberation.com, Apr 21, 2008

A few months ago I was out in a No village. That village has had electricity for over 10 years now. and more and more electrical gadgets are appearing all the time -- TVs, radios, stereos, small refrigerators, irons, cake mixers, etc. I was staying at a house without a TV but they did have a computer which is sometimes used for watching CD movies. Somebody acquired a CD advertising some health supplement with video promos in half a dozen languages. So the people in the household decided to watch it. It was astonishing to me to see the whole group sitting in front of that computer screen mesmerized by some promo in languages they did not understand. I tried talking to them – they were like zombies, barely able to acknowledge my presence, having to make tremendous efforts to pull their eyes away from two suited guys sitting in a studio jabbering in Korean. Hardly an action flick! Every one of them was like that from the three year old to the elderly visiting auntie. Busy absorbing all those endorphans, I guess. A very sobering illustration of the quote above.

Rice Shortage

There has been non-stop talk of impending rice shortages in this country this past month. One local person opined that it was just the government’s way of diverting people’s attention from its other shenanigans. That may well be, but I also read an article about local merchants already talking to rice distributers on the island south of here (country B) about buying rice from that country and importing it. In turn, news in country B has bemoaned the fact that they are still not self-sufficient in rice production and must import so many tons each year. They say the government will be intensifying efforts to improve rice production this year. Meanwhile, yet another article said that a leading bulk food store chain in the US would be limiting the quantities of rice its members could buy.

I went to the grocery store today and the bins of rice seemed to be normal quantities. The price has increased significantly in the last month but it is not clear how much is due to shortages and how much is due to a recent law requiring that all white rice sold here has to be iron fortified. Somebody has to pay for the iron and I doubt it is the merchant or the government.

As an aside, the iron fortification law apparently was a response to a report that a high number of people in this country are anemic. Since everybody eats rice, it was decided that the rice had to be iron fortified. The “iron fortification” consists of rice grain sized grayish pellets that are to be mixed with the raw rice and cooked. The pellets sort of dissolve in water and then seems to be like powdered iron tablets. Most people, however, do not like it. They say it makes the rice look dirty no matter how many times you wash it, makes the cooking water gray, and they don’t like the taste, plus it makes the cooked rice slightly gritty. Merchants have to comply with the law but recently many have tried to make the product more saleable by not premixing it. Instead they are putting small packets of iron fortification pellets into the 1, 5, and 10 kilo bags of rice and letting people mix it in themselves. I suspect most of it ends up in the trash. Anyway, I am sure that those packets of iron pellets are at least one of the reasons the price of rice has risen.

To make it all even more bizarre, while in country B last month, the rice farmers were complaining about how cheap their rice sells for while the price of fertilizer and pesticides keeps going up.

In both countries they say it has been raining a lot and so the crops aren’t as good as usual.

So, what gives? Is there really a rice shortage?

"No frills" flying

I just returned from an international trip and survived the new "no frills" airline that I took. As I was reflecting on the trip, all I can say is that I earnestly hope that I will always have an alternative choice of airlines to fly on.

Why? The flights themselves weren't too bad - the planes are new Airbuses and were comfortable, everything still worked, and the pilots seemed quite able to fly them.

But the hassle factor was very high. The prices listed on banners advertising the flights were bait and switch - ie after you go to buy a ticket you find out that the advertised price didn’t include the "taxes" which are twice again as much as the advertised price. Then there was the factor that you couldn’t get the tickets thru a travel agent – you had to go yourself in person to the airline office and wait in line. Three hours after returning home they called and said they’d forgotten to charge the “fuel surcharge” so I had to go back again, wait in line again for them to charge me more. Then the price is different every time you ask. If you don’t buy the ticket today you can bet the price will be higher tomorrow. In the end, the price was not much less than the competitor’s price.

The routing and time of the flights was also difficult. Some of it was late at night, some in the middle of the night. Had to change airports in both countries. Two stops were over was 5 hours long, the other two were 12 hours. They charged for every kilo over the 20 kilo weight allowance, they serve nothing on board, not even water. Which with the new regulations about not allowing you to bring liquids on board, you are forced to buy their water if you want any. They had a limited amount of junk food for sale on the plane and even what they say they have, they may not. For example, in the flight magazine they say they sell 4 kinds of juice. But on none of the 4 flights on this trip did they have ANY juice at all. Well, okay, it’s a budget airline.

The bus and tickets and advertising material have this goofy cartoon plane character. Made me feel like I was on a kiddie plane. The airline attendants all wore tight T-shirts and low slung skirts or pants. Made me feel like a bunch of teenagers were running the place – and I wondered if they would know what to do in an emergency. I also felt a little sorry for the girls when some of the men from a neighboring country were leering a bit obnoxiously. It would be nice if they could wear a jacket over their skimpy T-shirts, at least on international flights.

They also play “games” on the flights. On one flight, my neighbor was the first one to pull out a senior citizen ID card and he got the prize – an inflatable plastic giraffe head and neck. I mean, what on earth do you do with an inflatable giraffe head and neck??? It can’t even stand up by itself. (I would personally have preferred a bottle of water!)

Even the flight magazine leaves you shaking your head. It’s full of full color pictures, and lots of slap-happy upbeat "fun" and weird stuff. For example, an article on how you can help stop global warming. I thought at first that surely it was satire but I don’t think it was. It included: 1) shave your head so you use less soap and water to wash hair. Both men and women can now shave their heads, the article claims, because two famous movie actor/actress (I didn’t recognize the names) have shaved their heads. 2) Do all your washing in the shower, like brush your teeth (I wonder if the clown that wrote the article ever tried to suck up water spraying down on him without choking to death???) Or, keep your underwear on and just wash it while on you as you take your shower. 3) Stop breathing so much. Every breath you take lets off carbon dioxide which contributes to global warming – it really did say that!!!! 4) Fly more often. Planes make contrails which help cool the earth.

Overall impression? I was glad when the trip was over. I plan to take a different airline next time.

Why are they lazy?

The other day a Chinese business woman asked me why the No people were so lazy. Even though I lived among the No people for a number of years I was still hard pressed to answer. I hadn’t really ever thought of them as lazy. But she was speaking from her perspective as an employer. She had also observed how immigrants had come into the area and were industrious, hardworking and eventually successful, unlike the No people who seemed to be stuck back in a time warp.

The quick answer is, it’s their culture. But what is it about their culture that makes them appear lazy to outsiders?

I have indeed known lazy people among the No people. One whole family in the village would far rather sit under the mango tree and strum a guitar than go attend to their fields. As a consequence, over the years they have lost all their land, selling it off bit by bit for cash to pay for things like weddings, funerals, TVs, etc. All the other villagers have long ago wearied of trying to help them. And nobody wants to loan any more money. Many will hire them sometimes to help with harvest or planting, but even then they will only work when they are hungry and then their work is slipshod and sometimes has to be redone. Now most of the children have grown up and married and most are just as unsuccessful as their parents were. One of the daughters-in-law is a very industrious gal but she has complained that her in-laws are constantly coming to them for help (ie handouts) and she is very frustrated. Another daughter-in-law who lives in town quit visiting altogether when on one visit she had to go beg rice from a neighbor to feed her 4 year old because there was nothing at all in the house.

Now, in the No culure there is a strong value of helping your family and neighbors. So people find it hard to refuse a direct request for food. But they still resent it when people from this family come asking because in the eyes of the rest of the villagers, they are lazy.

So, there definitely ARE lazy No people. But what about the rest? The cultural thing that seems to hold them all back is related to envy.

Most of the conflict in No culture results from envy. Life is organized to avoid people becoming envious of you. An envious person will at the very least gossip, backbite, slander. That is unpleasant enough but an envious person may also resort to magic - and that strikes fear in people's hearts. Their elders told them that it was useless to plant a lot of rice because others would become envious and would use malign magic to destroy the rice, make them sick, or cause other misfortune. So the motivation to be successful has been countermanded by fear of others’ envy and especially fear of magic being directed towards them. Others have found that any extra prosperity is quickly devoured by other family members. So this also demotivates people from becoming “too successful”.

The result today is that other ethnic groups move into the area and are quickly successful and prosperous while the local folk are more and more marginalized.

So, are they lazy?