Fruits, vegetables & toxins

‘Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. And as I gave you the green plants, I give you everything.' (Genesis 9:3)

A Malaysian guy who claimed himself was the first-born to a young farming couple from Cameron Highlands, shared through the web his insights of the common practices of farmers there and the issue of vegetables and toxins. We all know pesticides are harmful both directly and indirectly. Pesticides that are sprayed on crops are also fed to farm animals. Residues are stored in the animals' fat and tissue, and enter our bodies when we eat the meat.

According to him, there are two kinds of chemical sprays used there, namely, the fungicides and the pesticides. The former are used to protect the plant from fungus and the latter against buds, snails, caterpillars etc. For the leafy veggie, normally less sprays are needed, especially when they are young unless there is an outbreak. Anyway, any spray at this juncture will have less harmful effects because the veggie would only be consumed many days later and the toxins could have gone. When the veggie is maturing, the farmers usually apply pesticides one week before harvest. Of course, not all farmers follow that faithfully.

The other group of plants is the beans or “qua” which can be harvested continuously for quite awhile. In order to protect the “plant” as well as the “fruit”, the farmers have no choice but to spray the plants with both pesticides and fungicides even if he is harvesting the fruits again the next day. For example, for example, if the harvesting period is 20 days, he may spray 1 or 2 times of the chemicals since the spray is only effective for a week. For long beans the harvest is on alternate days and the harvesting period is up to 35 days. Chilli and eggplants can last even longer. So for this group of beans/"qua", the chances of the fruits been contaminated with recent toxic sprays is very high. His advice is take more leafy veggie which should have less spray and for the other group of beans/"qua", try to soak them in water for a longer period. In fact, avoid eating with the “skins” or scrub them off. The risk of consuming chemicals outweighs the benefits of vitamins they may offer.

It thus appears to me, may be we should consider reducing eating those fruits that are difficult to peel or scrub, such as stairfruits, bitterguards, eggplant, beans etc.There are always substitutes in food chains. Water alone does not remove all traces of chemicals found in veggies and fruits. For people who always eating out, consuming those vegetables served by ‘mixed vegetable’ stalls don’t seem to be a wise choice. You just don’t believe how these workers washed the vegetables. In fact, they don’t even bother to wash some of them such as chilli and cabbage!

Here is one suggestion how to wash vegetables and fruits. I wonder how many of us bother to follow it consistently:-

First, fill a large bowl with warm water. Pour in 1/2 cup of salt and 1/2 cup of vinegar. Mix the solution well and put the fruits and vegetables into the bowl .Wash the outsides of them thoroughly with hands. Rinse them in clean tap water and dry them off using a towel.

Eating healthily

Eating well certainly is not the same as eating healthily. I find it difficult to ‘eat healthily’ even though I am not working now. The temptation is to give up the laborious and boring regime of ‘eating healthily’ in favor of ‘convenient’ food. In Singapore, it is just too convenient for people to eat out such that ‘eating out’ has become a lifestyle or hobby. If Singaporeans become increasingly unhealthy over the years, it probably have to do with the easy accessibility of eateries, making worst by the fact that more those newly established eateries served Western food rather than Chinese food. I still remember when I attended my mother’s funeral two years ago in Malaysia, I had a hard time looking for cooked food stalls even in a decent town.

To eat healthily, one really has to invest time, put in efforts and be disciplined. If I am a full-time worker, it would be an uphill task to adopt the diet regime I am now on. Typically I have to spend half-a-day preparing my daily meals- chop, slice, cut vegetables, meat, making juice, boil herbs, and many rounds of washing. To find outside food that is steamed, boiled or stirred-fry is difficult. More often than not, it is deep-fried, grilled or baked. Even for pastries, they are now usually topped up with cream, sugar, cheese, or chocolate. Plain food is hard to find now as ‘exotic’ food is more in demand.

'Gangnam style society?

And he said to them, “Take care, and be on your guard against all covetousness, for one's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.” (Luke 12:15)

The government has stepped in again to curtail the euphoria in the property market by restricting the tenure of mortgage loans. The fact that currently more than 45% of the new loans are at least 35 years or longer is indeed alarming. Maximum tenure is the game in property investment now. People are buying on the premises that interest rate and vacancy rate will stay forever low, and the monthly rental is sufficient to meet the repayment installments. The other presumption is that property price can only go one way-up (uninterruptedly)! When my friend recently told me that one of her clients, a medical doctor, actually owned eight properties, I realized where the huge demand for property comes from.

The ‘feel rich’ phenomenon is most pronounced in the last two years after the frenzy rise in the property prices. Many people are trying to borrow big and for longer period, hoping to make money to achieve their ‘dream lifestyle’ or ‘retirement fund’. The more disturbing thing is that older people are joining the 'party'. This ‘wealth illusion effect’ can make one being carried away and over-estimate his ability to service the loan. All these remind me of the ‘Gangnam style’ video by Korean singer, Psy. In most countries, it is the economy that the property market, but in this country, it seems the other way round. Are we creating a ‘Gangnam style’ society?

In Korea, Gangnam is the icon of the rapid economic development of South Korea in 1970s and 80s where landowners and speculators became wealthy practically overnight from the real estate investment frenzy. It has become the most wealthy and affluent area in the entire South Korea. Its name has come to be associated as a place where people are rich, girls are pretty and everything is supposed to be cool and fun, with upscale fashion and lavish lifestyle that set the trends for others to follow. However, it also inspires a mixture of desire, envy and bitterness, causing social rifts amongst the people. People living there spending big on foreign luxury goods to highlight their wealth while those who uphold the virtues of hard work and sacrifice finding themselves barely making ends meet.

Signs of  ‘Gangnam style’ culture is already here. There are more Lamborghini, Ferrari, McLaren found on the road (what can the owners do with these cars other than flaunt their wealth?); up-market restaurants are mushrooming, and not forgetting, more ultra luxury apartments designed by world renowned architects are built here.

'Poor English'

It has been said that it is easy to learn English but difficult to master it. Grammatical rules are at times confusing and difficult to remember. Just last Monday, The Straits Times carried a ‘Speak Good English’ quiz. Here are some interesting yet amusing examples of common grammatical errors:

1. No footwears allowed- ‘footwear’ is uncountable noun- If we add ‘s’, it means that something belongs to the footwear!

 2. We discussed about the holiday but I was not really paying attention- No preposition ‘about’ is required. The verb ‘discuss’ behaves like the verbs ‘consider’ but not like the verb ‘talk’.

3. Once you get this letter, revert back to me- ‘Revert back’ means to ‘go back back’. ‘Get back to me’ is more appropriate.

4. The staffs are specialists, recruited from all over the world-’Staff’ also means ‘stick’ or ‘rod’ which is countable. When we use ‘staffs’, we are saying that a collection of sticks were recruited instead of a group of employees!

Parents' intervention in education

‘For the protection of wisdom is like the protection of money, and the advantage of knowledge is that wisdom preserves the life of him who has it.’ (Ecclesiastes 7:12)

‘Keep hold of instruction; do not let go; guard her, for she is your life.’ (Proverbs 4:13)

I have been giving tuition for free to this Primary 3 boy since February this year. He comes from a disadvantage home. So far, the progress he made has been slow though I put in my best efforts. May be this has to do with lack of parents’ intervention and strategizing in his education. I do think parents’ involvement plays a significant role in helping a child to do well in life later on. Education is the primary means here for socio-economic mobility. However in recent years, children from more successful people are found to do better than those from the lower-income families. Things have changed compared to the past. Children nowadays are generally less ‘self-reliant’ and motivated. So if they are left on their own, they may not do well under the present highly competitive education system.

Is every school a good school? I don’t think so especially for secondary school level onwards. Just ask those who are teachers. They will tell you that resources are not the same for all the schools. How do we assess a school? Again the most objective method is academic success. Given a choice, no parents would want to base their choice of school for their kids on non-academic yardsticks like arts, music and sports. Academic success is the most recognizable form of success in life to most people, so is our society. Just look at how scholarships are awarded. We are still far from giving our children a more well-rounded education which involves also areas like character development and nurturing compassion for humanity.

Parents can strategize their children education in different ways. One of them is through private tuition. Private tuition has its place for certain situations. Classroom style of tuition generally is not so effective but one-to-one tuition benefits academically weaker children like this boy, who do need help in what they could not understand in class. In a typical class of forty students, it is impossible for teachers to give individual attention to each child. Ironically, examination questions have becoming tougher over the years! In the past, I used to think that primary 3 is still a ‘play year’ until I taught this boy. In fact, primary 3 seems to be a ‘defining’ year , where a child has to build a good foundation so that he can handle well for his upper primary education.