Home Remedy

Unheard of experience on tonsil stones.

Sometimes back, I felt a little discomfort in my throat,  thought it was something that I had gulped down along with food or liquid. For about a week, I felt something got stuck in my throat and it would not glide down the throat along with chewed food. No changes in the feelings, neither my eating was disturbed nor had any severe pain. Decided to see the doctor for a fear of silent causes that would affect my throat and progressing to dreadful diseases. Discussed with my family, suggestion given was;  consult a general practitioner before going for a scan or a scope.

After ten days, I visited a doctor with anxiety, the huge medical equipments flashed through my mind. Waited for an hour at the doctor's door. Finally, I was called, I told the story of my throat discomfort. He took a tongue press to check, along with he used a torch, I had to make ‘aah aah’ sound with tongue down. He gently pressed up and down that made me cough, surprisingly I coughed out and a small whitish mass flew out my mouth and landed on the floor. Doctor picked it up that settled on the floor. He showed it up and said ‘tonsil stone’. A new word in my dictionary, with astonishment I repeated 'tonsil stone'. I have heard of kidney stones and not tonsil stones. A very rare case for him. He took the specimen to his colleagues and said loudly 'look tonsil stones'.

Great relief after ten days of anxiety.

I posted the same specimen picture in my Facebook account, majority comments except one proved, it was something that is not heard of. Probably she may have had experienced the same. She suggested, gargle with asafoetida solution. Asafoetida is used mostly in Indian cooking to enhance flavour and to reduce gas formation. I tried it for the next three days, to my surprise the bits that remained dissolved and disappeared during the mouth rinse.

My curiosity to learn more about tonsil stones made me search in Safari. Let me share what more I got to know. Tonsil stones are known as tonsillithos or tonsilliths. Hardening of mucus, accumulation of bacteria or dry cells in the crypts, the tonsil pockets. Tonsils function as walls to prevent foreign elements from slipping through to the lungs. When the bacteria gets collected they fill the crypts causing  little or more discomfort to a person.

Colour may be grey, yellow or white. Though symptoms vary from person to person it can be related to bad breath being the most obvious though some may have redness or irritation in tonsils. The hardened bacteria is benign though it occupies in oral region between the tongue and the palate.

This occurs mostly in teens and to those with large tonsils. May afflict if the dental hygiene is poor.

Besides the cure I tried, there are other self cure options too to get rid of the tonsil stones; scrape with extremely soft tooth brush, use a cotton bud to express them from the tonsil pockets,  a simple pain free method, gargling with salt solution to loosen them. A cure beyond all this could be the tonsillectomy surgery.

Home remedy I would recommend is gargle with asafeotida solution for immediate relief.

Boab Tree in Kings Park.

I was amazed with an iconic tree in a park in Perth, Western Australia. The huge 36 tonne tree from it's original home Warmun, North Western Australia's Kimberley region is in Kings Park now.

The tree uprooted and travelled 3200km from North to South and survived all its way to be replanted in Kings Park. A Huge Botanical garden that boasts as one of the world's largest inner city parks.  

A 25 metre trailer with police escorts transported it. After a couple of days of traveling by the trailer truck it reached it's final destination.  This was the longest land journey for a mature tree of this size and kind. This iconic tree was planted on 20th July 2008 in Mt Eliza Escarpment overlooking the Swan and Canning rivers. A huge crowd of 3000 people witnessed this planting ceremony. The local Nyoongar folks performed a smoking ceremony to welcome the tree.

More about this Boab tree-an ancient tree with 750 years of age, weighs 36 tonnes, trunk width five metres, 2.5 metre in diameter height 14 metres and shaped like a bottle, has twisted branches at a height with pod like fruits. It's a deciduous tree shedding leaves in the dry season. The Nyoongar, the people of it's birth region call it 'Gija Jumulu'. They offered it as a gift to the Kings Park and the Park authorities accepted the offer to add to the other 14 existing small Boab trees that were transplanted earlier in Roe Garden. It was a sheer relocation due to building up of a bridge and the extension of the Northern Highway. Before the gigantic tree left its original home the aborigines also had performed a smoking ceremony to bid farewell.

Now, in the new accommodation no new person goes without a glimpse of the giant size tree with cultural and historical value. It's fenced, attracts tourist from all over the world. Boab tree grows slow to live long. This particular tree in Kings Park is considered young as some others are known to be 2000 years old. 

The special gift received a world wide media coverage in July 2008. Though it has the scientific name Adansonia gregorrie, jumulu is popularly known as Boab in Gija language, Gija and Jumulu put together Gija Jumulu a name given by the indigenous people but Boab is a convenient  name and it's the forever name of the tree.

The park authorities in Australia is committed to plant conservation and this Boab tree has adjusted very well on its new accommodation.

The cost of the travel was absorbed by many local companies and the government. 

The Boab is located at the end of the Forrest car park in Fraser Avenue. Do not miss when you go the Kings Park and Botanical Garden in Western Australia.

Temples in Tamil Nadu, India

Tirumala Venkateswara Temple

Mohini alangaram of Shri Ranganathar

 

Long absence, contents stagnant, had not been contributing for a long time, now my recent visit to few temples in India had given me the spirit to contribute one more article. Hope the spirit remains in me to contribute periodically.

My recent visit to Tamil Nadu was a wonderful experience, spent most of the time visiting temples in parts of the state and one at Andhra Pradesh border.

Darshan simply means prayers extended by a devotee to an almighty god/goddess. During this visit my husband and I wanted to accomplish many darshan as possible. We firstly went on an organized tour to Tirumalai Thirupathi temple in Andhra Pradesh. Travelling time to and fro was 7 to 8 hours because of the poorly maintained roads. Not only this, had to wait another 3 hours to get a glimpse of the deity Thriupathi Venkateswara. With tired legs and mind we had a glimpse of flash which lasted about few seconds only. The whole tour took about 18 hours and with the payment of Rs 300/- for each person just for the flash of sight of the all mighty god. Virtually the devotees irrespective of young or old pushed by the attendants at the sanctuary. We were very disappointed with the treatment and the long wait. Our needs were taken care of during the tour though the facilities were not up to our expectation.

Next visit was to Sri Ranganathar temple in Trichy, not far from the place we stayed, again the rush, the queue etc. We decided to use the fast lane getting the Rs 250 tickets. Again a glimpse of Sri Ranganathar in horizontal position. 

The third temple visited was Karpaga Vinayagar temple at Pillayar patti, also close to the place we had put up. No payment, no tickets, no special people treatment, excellent management, No glimpse or glance of Lord Ganesha. Peacefully, were allowed to sit in front for few minutes to pray to Lord Ganesha.

Our final temple visit was to Kannudaya Nayagi amman temple in Nattarasankottai a village away from hustle and bustle cities. This temple is a crowd puller as well. Bought Rs 5 ticket to get closer to the deity.

A special and meaningful temple to me.

In summing up our temple visits; I am very delighted with the darshans in each and every temple but what is dissatisfying is the treatment and monetary approaches prevailing in these divine places. Does god demand/expect these before a devotee gets the darshan or the devotees force themselves to this rush.

We have decided to worship the same deities in less crowded temples.

My dislike is the monetary approach at these divine places.

  

Obesity

An overweight person is commonly referred as a fat man; our mind perceives the person as less active and unpleasant to look at. Are you obese, if so ask yourself a question, am I healthy, attractive and active. The answer is - no. About 97 million adults in the US are obese. Globally, obesity is on the increase, three in ten are obese.

Obesity in medical term is the excess accumulated fat that results in adverse effect on health. In other words, body weight that is undesirable and considered unhealthy. Eat enough to sustain your daily activities, eating more and burning least calories eventually stores the unused fat and results in overweight.

Causes of obesity can be due to various factors, firstly, consuming large amount of food, not doing enough exercise and lastly genetic factors. Next, to determine whether you are underweight, overweight or obese know your ‘Body Mass Index’ or commonly known as BMI. Weight is divided by height in squares- kg/ m2 is the formula.  

Obesity leads to deadly diseases particularly heart ailments, diabetes, osteoarthritis, high blood pressure and certain types of cancer.

My BMI is 20.83 is considered normal, the range of 18.5 to 25.0 is neither underweight nor overweight. The secret is my weight is 52kg and height is 158cm. BMI 25 is overweight and from 30 onwards is obese and 40 is considered morbidly obese.

For self check go to http://www.bestcalculator.org/miscellaneous/bmi-calculator.php

Having checked BMI do not sit idle, exercise clean habits. Change food habits to fit your lifestyle, balanced diet is utmost important.  Do simple exercise or walk at least for half an hour daily to lose excess calories.

Stay healthy! How? Discipline comes first eat less if you like the food very much. No frequent snacking, avoid it. Reduce the intake of any white food stuff like sugar, rice, wheat flour etc. Be your servant, shift from auto machines to physically demanding work.

Quote from a stay healthy person:-

“I was also following something my mother taught me. When you are enjoying a real good meal, stop when the food is still good. So, I guess it's good for me to stop now,”

Mahathir Mohamad

Dislike for today is obesity.

Help the needy.

6^th August, a day to remember, my birthday today, the first one to greet me is little Sanjay with a broad smile though he is not able to greet in words his smile cost trillions and I felt like receiving from trillion people. Little Sanjay to friends and relatives all I could say is A Big Thank You.

Today I went to a temple which is like my mum’s place. After prayers had the usual breakfast of bread and coffee, then proceeded to browsing the dailies to feed my hunger for news updates .  Today, an article about a medical student who pursues her course at one of the local colleges captured me.  A daughter to a single mother with two siblings finds it difficult to finance her course. The mother a sole bread winner gets enough only to raise the family. It was highlighted in the paper about her appeal to the public for donation. A 5 ringgit from every Indian in the country would suffice to meet her money needs. I called up the MIC  branch in Negri Sembilan to verify the published news. I then paid a small amount into her account.  Small may be the amount, the satisfaction was very huge.

We had a wonderful lunch with one of my daughter’s family who lives here.  My grand children and everyone showered me with gifts. I accepted them happily though I’m not the one who awaits this kind of gesture. I yearn for love and loving words.  I deeply felt the absence of my other two daughters.  Wishes from them were far yet close on webcams. However, the afternoon was a memorable one.

Whoever reads my blog and wishes to donate this bright and capable girl, please do so. Details of the Marsha college student:                                                                                                        

Kumutha A/P Jeyaprakash, CIMB account No 1415-0076736-52-6  

My likes for today is happiness derived from my tiny mini contribution. My likes will be multiplied if many others follow suit.

Dislike- Current English Standard

English doesn’t belong to the English alone, a global language that is deteriorating in standard in our country. Gone are days good English was spoken among Malaysians. Not everyone gets to learn to speak English from home. School is where children learn to pick up languages. Bahasa Melayu as a medium of instruction, students are fluent with it. What about English, it is losing importance when emphasis is not given on mastering the subject. The frequent change in Education system is only experimental in nature. The children fall prey to this, a family with 4 to 5 children would have to bear with the changes and consequences. One child would have learnt some subjects in Bahasa Melayu and another learns in English and another will go back to Bahasa Melayu. Even before the result is enjoyed the change comes in action. The victims are our future generation and not the policy makers.

So much so this situation has attracted commercial organization from various countries to teach English to Malaysians. Imagine we are learning English from the Japanese and the Koreans.  Many of us send our children to these courses to gain proficiency in order to face the tertiary demands. How many can afford this, the courses are not cheap.  Those who cannot afford this will shy away from the language.

Before the seventies we Malaysians had good command of English and were admired by our neighbours. Now we admire them for the same reason. English is a language of knowledge let it live in our Education system-Math and Science in English should remain and not changed. 

Likes

Recycle is the topic for my likes today. Trash of today is immeasurable, how much is reused is a question. If the secret behind recycling is revealed, then everyone will move forward to make a change.

Once I was made fun of by my visitors for using a plastic spoon in my sugar jar. For a moment I thought the sugar had turned bad or they found some ants in the jar. It was none of these they laughed at, it was the spoon that I recycled. I collect the spoons that accompany food parcels and put to reuse accordingly.

Reuse of waste materials generates benefits locally and globally. Less use of raw material that come from natural resources like water, timber and mineral, this is the number one secret behind recycling. Consequently, reduce energy usage, reduce water and air pollution caused by manufacturing sector.

Recently, I read an article on how they manufacture sanitary napkins out of old unused clothes in Mumbai. It is cheap for those who can’t afford the branded ones in the market. In another story in Indonesia a guy collects drink cans and makes decorative items. Oil from our kitchen is converted to biodiesel. For more info please visit, fathopesenergy.com  A man in US had gone to extend of building a house from recyclable materials.

Much of our household waste can be turned to wealth. Reduce, reuse, recycle at home.  Help sustain the environment for our future generation. Remember the three R’s.