Odysseys of George

ENGLISH OF TOMORROW EU ANNOUNCEMENT

The European Commission has just announced an agreement whereby English will be the official language of the European Union rather than German, which was the other possibility.

As part of the negotiations, the British Government conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement and has accepted a 5- year phase-in plan that would become known as “Euro-English”.

In the first year, “s” will replace the soft “c”. Sertainly, this will make the sivil servants jump with joy.

The hard “c” will be dropped in favour of “k”. This should klear up konfusion, and keyboards kan have one less letter.

There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the s ekond year when the troublesome “ph” will be replaced with “f”. This will make words like fotograf 20% shorter.

In the 3rd year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible.

Governments will enkourage the removal of double letters which have always ben a deterent to akurate speling.

Also, al wil agre that the horibl mes of the silent “e” in the languag is disgrasful and it should go away.

By the 4th yer people wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing “th” with “z” and “w” with “v”.

During ze fifz yer, ze unesesary “o” kan be dropd from vords kontaining “ou” and after ziz fifz yer, ve vil hav a reil sensi bl riten styl.

Zer vil be no mor trubl or difikultis and evrivun vil find it ezi tu understand ech oza. Ze drem of a united urop vil finali kum tru.

Und efter ze fifz yer, ve vil al be speking German like zey vunted in ze forst plas.

If zis mad you smil, pleas pas on to oza pepl.

These are pictures of my guru Mr AB Lee. Just to demonstrate the beauty of the seas. He has more amazing pictures.

Colours of Redang

Mermaid on a Horse

Enjoy.

Just got this from a friend. Well just to alert all my friends and visitors.

Cancer update
Johns Hopkins
Cancer News from Johns Hopkins:

1. No plastic containers in micro.
2. No water bottles in freezer.
3. No plastic wrap in microwave.

Johns Hopkins has recently sent this out in its newsletters. This information is being circulated at Walter Reed Army MedicalCenter as well.

Dioxin chemicals causes cancer, especially breast cancer. Dioxins are highly poisonous to the cells of our bodies. Don’t freeze your plastic bottles with water in them as this releases dioxins from the plastic.

Recently, Dr. Edward Fujimoto, Wellness Program Manager at Castle Hospital, was on a TV program to explain this health hazard. He talked about dioxins and how bad they are for us.

He said that we should not be heating our food in the microwave using plastic containers. This especially applies to foods that contain fat. He said that the combination of fat, high heat, and plastics releases dioxin into the food and ultimately into the cells of the body.

Instead, he recommends using glass, such as Corning Ware, Pyrex or ceramic containers for heating food. You get the same results, only without the dioxin. So such things as TV dinners, instant ramen and soups, etc., should be removed from the container and heated in something else. Paper isn’t bad but you don’t know what is in the paper. It’s just safer to use tempered glass, Corning Ware, etc.

He reminded us that a while ago some of the fast food restaurants moved away from the foam containers to paper. The dioxin problem is one of the reasons.

Also, he pointed out that plastic wrap, such as Saran, is just as dangerous when placed over foods to be cooked in the microwave. As the food is nuked, the high heat causes poisonous toxins to actually melt out of the plastic wrap and drip into the food. Cover food with a paper towel instead.

NOOR V. GILLANI, D.Sc
Principal Research Scientist
Adjunct Professor
Nat’l Space Science & Technol Ctr.
Atmospheric Science Department
(NSSTC, NASA-AL)
U. of AL in Huntsville(UAH)
Tel. 256 961-7942
email:gillani@nsstc.uah.edu
Fax. 256 961-7755

Checked in the medical literature :

Diry, M. Tomkiewicz, C. Koehle, C. Coumoul, X. Bock, K Walter. Barouki, R. Transy, C.
UMR-S 490 INSERM, UFR Biomedicale des Saints Peres, Paris, Cedex, France.
Activation of the dioxin/aryl hydrocarbon receptor (AhR) modulates cell plasticity through a JNK-dependent mechanism
Oncogene. 25(40):5570-4, 2006 Sep 7.

Abstract:
Environmental chemicals such as dioxin adversely affect immune, neurological and reproductive functions and have been implicated in cancer development. However, the mechanisms responsible for dioxin toxicity are still poorly understood……Dioxin-induced effects occur 48 h post-treatment initiation, a time scale, which argues for a genomic effect of the AhR, linked to induction of target genes. This novel Ahr action on cell plasticity points to a role in cancer progression.

During one of my clinic sessions, I came across this bubbly elderly lady who throughout the session was able to put on a cheerful smile. Yet deep inside, I know she was sad about the latest news that was broken to her. I could see her tears welling beneath her eyes but she maintained her smile and she maintained he poise. Just before her was another lady in her mid 30′s, who upon knowing her diagnosis broke down into tears and anger and was in denial. I asked this elderly lady, after having given my 2cents advice to somebody way beyond my age, how could she be so cheerful inside; despite her knowing her life expectancy has been shorten with her present diagnosis.
She asked me whether I knew Khalil Gibran and adviced me to read a portion of it!

This is what he wrote

” Your joy is your sorrow unmasked.

And the selfsame well from which your laughter rises was oftentimes filled with your tears.

……..

The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain.

………

When you are joyous, look deep into your heart and you shall find it is only that which has given you sorrow that is giving you joy.

When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.

…………., they are inseparable

Together they come, and when one sits alone with you at your board, remember that the other is asleep upon your bed.”

I have a story but I have yet to tell.

Wow! What can I say? I should say this was one of the best trips. The company was great!
Well, all thanks to Aaron Tan, our chief organiser under the MDC (Malaysian Diving Community) tagline brought about a weekend getaway for underwater photography enthusiast.

I met up with Aaron on Thursday after midnite at his condo. This is the second time I am meeting him after an underwater photography shootout competition a few months ago. We met up with another 2 Singaporeans, Anandh and Sofyan who left their workplace at 7pm and were stuck at the Causeway.

Diving Buddies

As I said, everything thereafter was fabulous. It has been a long time since I laughed a lot. They, Anandh and Sufyan were therapeutic. Though plenty goes censored, but at least this could be shared:
At about 6.30am just minutes before sunrise, with Aaron on the wheels and I beside and the other two tired and confused Singaporeans behind, Aaron remarks ” Oh no! the light is on!” Anandh worried and confused as we were driving his new Nissan Latio, sprung up to the front and said ” the sunglasses are on top” Quirked and surprised, Aaron repeated his statement hoping that Anandh remember the earlier conversation about petrol. Again, Anandh confidently repeated ” it on the top”. “No, not the sun, the petrol light is on” Aaron says. “Umph,Oh!Oh!Hmm… then switch off the engine!!” — Anandh, my dive buddy.

The diving was great, lots of fun. With my new Suunto D6, the dive was more confident and comfortable. Lots of pictures. And again my buddy made me laugh while ascending together and little did he realise that his legs surface before him!!! Sorry Buddy!!

Geometry of Life

The last day was picture competition day and we all submitted 3 pictures each — the organisers were nice to give me something for all three pictures. Maybe they were still trying to sell me the judge’s camera which is on sale for RM13k. No greens at present!

The pictures will tell how beautiful the trip was .. and how I fell in love with diving

The Hingebeak Shrimps

Awaiting the next trip – hopefully the same or better company.

Thanks everyone – for a wonderful trip.Till the next time.

Click below:

Garden of Eden

Continue at Redang Trip Part 2

Have we heard of Minimal Access Surgery? Well it is quite self explanatory actually, a surgical procedure performed via a small access. However in such diversified community, explaining the procedure actually can be quite comical. “Itu guna laserkah?”, ” teropong punya potongka”, “luka kecik-kecik potongka” or even ” guna camera potong ka” are some of the ways patients ask us about the above procedure. Patients, most of them, have actually heard quite a lot about this procedure and knows that this is advances in medicine and surgery and has its benefits.

Then I have older and even young surgeons asking what is so interesting in such a procedure. Isn’t the conventional open chop-chop more surgically interesting? More “fast & furious”? My answer ” True and False”.

Well, conventional surgery is what most or all of us are used to. Therefore, it becomes easier and safer but actually that too after some learning curve.So now it becomes exciting.

MAS is the way of the future. Benefits clearly outweighs the complications when a procedure becomes a norm such as laparoscopic appendectomy and laparoscopic cholecystectomy.
Yes, for the surgeon it can be tedious and frustrating in the begining but when the challenge and preserverance are conquered, and the patient recovers with a definite difference from conventional surgery — satisfaction guaranteed. Surgery is art.

A beginner in lapaoscopic surgery, should not have any restriction to convert to open method when he or she is having difficulty.

So what are the benefits:
1.Reduced post operative pain
2.Easier / Better recovery with shorter hospital stay
3.Early back to work
4. Good cosmesis
5. minimal adhesions and wound infections

And the disadvantages:
1.increased short term complications usually due to technical errors

Minimal access surgery requires totally different skills than conventional surgery. For instance, surgeons need to learn different hand-eye coordination (‘psychomotor’) skills in order to manipulate the imaging and surgical equipment; tissue appears significantly different when
viewed from inside the body; care must be taken to avoid accidental damage.

So why not laparoscopic surgery?