Crash

Driven 70,000 miles now in my trusty Skoda Felica. I have to report no accidents or near misses. But for many people this is not the case. This is the car when it snowed last year.

In the 1980's I was involved in a crash in Norfolk travelling to an event with my cousin Kelvin and some friends.

We became distracted by a low flying plane and the driver did not slow down for the corner. The skoda was rear wheel drive and when the driver tried to correct the turn he over steered and lost the front wheels as they began to slide. At high speed we span in the road across oncoming traffic and into the other side of the road landing with the car on its side! All jumped out and got back ready for the explosion, but nothing happened so we pushed it back level and to our relief the car was still in working order.

After heavy snow the car looked like this!

Time of Excesses

Planning a page on how to live on practically nothing. This picture sums up the world today.

These maps shows us were the poor people live. The first is the % of people living on $1.25 a day or less. The second map is % of population malnourished.

To help focus on what it really means to be poor here is a suggested list of what you must do.

The Great Ascent by Robert L. Heilbroner

First, take out the furniture: leave a few old blankets, a kitchen table, maybe a wooden chair. You've never had a bed, remember?

Second, throw out your clothes. Each person in the family may keep the oldest suit or dress, a shirt or blouse. The head of the family has the only pair of shoes.

Third, all kitchen appliances have vanished. Keep a box of matches, a small bag of flour, some sugar and salt, a handful of onions, a dish of dried beans. Rescue those moldy potatoes from the garbage can: those are tonight's meal.

Fourth, dismantle the bathroom, shut off the running water, take out the wiring and the lights and everything that runs by electricity.

Fifth, take away the house and move the family into the shed.

Sixth, by now all the other houses in the neighborhood have disappeared; instead there are shanties - for the fortunate ones.

Seventh, cancel all the newspapers and magazines. Throw out the books. You won't miss them - you are now illiterate. One radio is now left for the whole shantytown.

Eighth, no more postman, fireman, government services. The two- classroom school is 3 miles away, but only 2 of your 7 children attend anyway, and they walk.

Ninth, no hospital, no doctor. The nearest clinic is now 10 miles away with a midwife in charge. You get there by bus or bicycle, if you're lucky enough to have one.

Tenth, throw out your bankbooks, stock certificates, pension plans, insurance policies. You now have a cash hoard of $25.

Eleventh, get out and start cultivating your three acres. Try hard to raise $300 in cash crops because your landlord wants one-third and your moneylender 10 percent.

Twelfth, find some way for your children to bring in a little extra money so you have something to eat most days. But it won't be enough to keep bodies healthy - so lop off 25 to 30 years of life.

Free Drink

Expensive teas and coffee are not an option, for many the garden can supply good tasty drinks especially in hot counties. Lemon grass is an excellent example.

I remember visiting a the poor southern mountain region of Poland one Christmas and they had a big pot brewing away, wish I knew exactly what they were drinking.

The British would have drank nettle drew in poorer times.

Hibiscus flowers make a drink that many counties traditionally use, i was pleased to hear a drink company is now using African hibiscus as a high end drink product that sells well in the US. This is a case of win win, the rich purchasers feel good about supporting the poor hibiscus farmers and revitalizing a dying tradition industry.

An Answer

Kiva is a big success story that helps people get out of poverty in a simple way. You invest £25 into a chosen person and receive it back in full after a agreed length of time.

www.kiva.org

Learnt Something Today

We like to categorize people. Today a strange thing happened. I needed to cross a busy road and to my surprise a shiny new Bentley stopped for me. This big sporty car obviously had a caring driver. I would never associate extravagant cars with this type of behaviour. Maybe I can learn a important lesson here. Never prejudge people. Individuals must be viewed as unique.

Borneo Photo

This picture is so cool!

PD Dialysis

Peritoneal Dialysis

Got the call from the nurse today saying I must visit to prepare for PD on the 4Th January.

Basically you get a tube inserted into your tummy.

The peri-toneum is the lining of the abdominal cavity that has a large enough surface area to do the same job as the kidney, the dialysis solution fills the large cavity and the dangerous toxins are leached into the solution over some time. After the treatment has finished the solution is then flushed away.

The solution used to clean your body is quite a large volume(2-2.5lt) for each dialysis session. The treatment is a daily treatment that is psychologically better than the normal blood dialysis so I am one of the lucky few allowed PD dialysis.

My dialysis is planned for only a few months so I may not be given the automatic PD machine.

Problems with PD

Anyone with injuries to the abdomen, bowel problems and infections would not be allowed PD because of the risk of peritonitis.

Healthy people who have the option of PD still run a high risk of peritonitis, treatment for this will have to be carefully administered at high cost.

Kidney Disease

Uremia

This is a build up of nitrogenous waste products in the blood including urea.

Symptoms are loss of appetite, lethargy, fatigue, nausea, cold, bone pain, itching, shortness of breath and seizures, with late symptoms being decreased mental acuity and coma.

Can be diagnosed when Kidney function is below 50%.

GFR - Glomerular filtration rate.

The rate of filtered fluid through the Kidney .

GFR at the different stages of the disease

Normal kidney function – GFR above 90mL/min/1.73m² and no proteinuria.

1) CKD1 – GFR above 90mL/min/1.73m² with evidence of kidney damage

2) CKD2 (Mild) – GFR of 60 to 89 mL/min/1.73m² with evidence of kidney damage

3) CKD3 (Moderate) – GFR of 30 to 59 mL/min/1.73m²

4) CKD4 (Severe) – GFR of 15 to 29 mL/min/1.73m²

5) CKD5 Kidney failure - GFR less than 15 mL/min/1.73m² Some people add CKD5D for those stage 5 patients requiring dialysis; many patients in CKD5 are not yet on dialysis.

Creatinine

This is a by product from muscle tissue that is produced in a steady flow. The kidneys job is the keep the creatinine level stable by filtering out excesses.

Creatinine levels in the blood are used to diagnoses early stage kidney failure.

End stage Bun - to - creatineine ratio is used to monitor fidney failure more accurately at later stages of the disease.

Tea at M & S

A pot of tea cost £1.70 the cheapest drink, coffee is over £2 .

Nippa Hut - Mindanao Philippines

Nippa Hut, a photo by jemmans on Flickr.

This small dwelling is built using local material mostly being bamboo. The ground is natural earth. The setting is in a coastal village in a forested region that is quite unspoilt. Lives are very simple here with no running water or electricity.

Restaurant Sign in Tagalog

The photo was taken in General Santos Mindanao near a small place I was staying for a while.

When you are trying to learn the languages this is a good type of place to learn new words. I took the photo partly to do a blog and to get the words.

Calderita is Kaldereta in Tagalog.

Kaldereta is a popular dish in the Philippines, especially on Luzon island. The common ingredients is goat shoulders with tomato paste and liver spread.

Kaldereta is originally a goat stew made with tomato sauce, potatoes, spices, liver spread, olives, bell peppers and hot peppers. Originally adapted from the Spanish during their 300 year occupation of the Philippines.

Kaldereta is a favorite Filipino meal served during parties, festivities and other special occasions in the Philippines. It is a Spanish-influenced dish that became to be Filipinos' favorite and made their own versions. Originally, the main ingredients of this dish includes goat meat, tomato sauce, liver, pepper and cheese.

Variations of this dish is with beef, chicken and or pork. Beef Kaldereta is a common dish in the Philippines made with stewing cuts of beef simmered until tender. Another is with chicken or pork because of the price and availability.

Kilawin

kinilaw / kilawin — Filipino vinegared raw fish similar to ceviche

Papait

This is a green plant that is used in salads.

The papait (mollugo oppositifolia) is popular among bitter-loving ilokanos who has the distinct and rather unique taste preference for something bitter, the more bitter, the better.

Sinampalukang

This is a chicken dish with Tamarind Soup normally written Sinampalukang Manok

Adobo

This is a picked meal or Marinated meal usually meat

Bricks

Very Old Wall, a photo by jemmans on Flickr.

These bricks were made with local red clay. They were used by the victorians to face buildings. I new that victorians prefered natural stone and this was the poor mans material of its time.
When reading a book about London called 'LONDON the biography' I was supprised to learn the real reason for the choice of red brick. London used to suffer from terrible fog that sometimes bought the visability down to a very low level. The red colour was chosen so people could see where they where going in the fog. In some cases a carriage would fail completely to see a house in stone hidden by the fog.

Kidneys on the Mind

To most people they are served with steak, in the form of a delicious crusty pie. To me they are different, they are a part of me that has failed to work normally and I therefore am very aware of them every day now.

The medical people say a human kidney is the approximate size of your hand. So it is quite a large organ with the capacity to work in all normal life's condition including mild poisoning. Even with 85% damage, most people will have no symptoms.

Unfortunately my kidneys began to show signs of disease in October 2010 when I was tested when applying for a drugs trial.

Kidney disease or CKD is a progressive chronic illness that is categorized into 5 stages with stage 5 being the last stage before complete failure.

Stage 1-3 are the best stages to be diagnosed because at this level you can change your diet to slow or stop the progress of the disease. Most people get diagnosed at stage 4 like I was.

At stage 4 your kidney is under great stain and is working much harder so the kidney is in steady decline taking normally two year before failure, or sometimes sadly less as in my case.

The Kidney post I write now is at stage 5, a bit late to start blogging, but I felt it needed to be written. Even with getting close to 10% function I feel quite well, but I expect to feel unwell in the near future.

For many people the only treatment is going on dialysis, a medical replacement of the kidney. In my case I am one of the lucky ones who is basically youngish and healthy enough to be able to have a kidney transplant.

This is the operation looking from the lower back area.

This is the result, a third kidney is placed in the front tummy area.

If my brother is a suitable donor then I hope to have a live kidney transplant from him next year, the signs are all positive so far.

A live kidney is better than a dead kidney for two main reasons, one you can set a fixed date for the operation, in my case a Wednesday. The other reason is the dead kidney will take up to 5 days to recover and begin to work, during this time dialysis may be needed. My hope is to avoid all dialysis which saves a lot of money and effort.

I hope to do some more posting about the operation and post the final scars of my brother and mine also.

Here is one I found on the web.

Bridge in mountain valley

Bridge in mountain valley, a photo by jemmans on Flickr.

Mountain stream that looks like it turns into a raging river at times. The water flows down to Marrakesh and keeps the city alive, the water tastes good.
The hand built bridge serves a few houses or field access. The sign seems to indicate a restaurant is over the bridge also.

Mountain road

Mountain road, a photo by jemmans on Flickr.

Mountain road on the Atlas mountains foothills, the houses are painted pink to hide the sand dust from the Sahara Desert. There are many popular and willow trees in the area, and olive trees grow on the steeper area and also line the streets and also in plantations.

The white van brings tourists from the city 60km away, not too many on the day we went.

Atlas Mountain Setting

One reason to visit Morocco was to see the Atlas Cedar tree in its native setting, unfortunately I did not do enough research and found out they grow in another region in Morocco. So here we have the ordinary pine I am not sure what type it is.

Atlas Mountain Setting, a photo by jemmans on Flickr.

In Morocco the Atlas mountains rise to an amazing 15,000 feet giving the snow cover. The photo is about 3000 feet in the foot hills that are populated by villages. The Berber people sought refuse in the mountains against enemies that would finish them off in the flat lands oasis of Marrakesh. Mountain tribes around the world would have a similar story to tell, it is unnatural to try to live in these harsh places.

Time to Start Dating

This young girl caught my eye, but would the family approve. Kissing could be a hazard, but I am sure the lip jewelry is removable. Getting a visa could be another problem.

Lychee for Sale

Lychee for Sale, a photo by jemmans on Flickr.

These attractively presented lychees are sold to tourists in the Atlas Mountains Morocco.

Head profile of a Camel

Head profile of a Camel, a photo by jemmans on Flickr.

Do not see camels very often, this one is near the airport in Marrakesh. I was pleased to see them close up on the hike trip to the airport. Getting a camel to yourself is one of the advantages of walking, you miss so much when using normal modes of transport.
The last time to see camels was in near the Taj Mahal again for tourist.