Acknowledged
grandmaster of qigong (literally, ‘working with life energy’) Li Ching-yuen at
71 joined the Chinese army and taught troops the finer points of unarmed
combat. Records have it he lived to 256 years, married 23 times, and fathered
over 200 children. One of Li’s disciples reported of having met a much older
man, about 500 years old who taught the disciple qigong exercises and gave out dietary
recommendations purportedly to extend the lifespan to superhuman proportions.
For Li, “inward
calm and peace of mind combined with breathing techniques were the secrets to
incredible longevity.”
One of the
quaint herbs that the grandmaster subsisted on is Centella asiatica, gotu kola or what we know hereabouts as takip-kuhol—two leaves a day keeps old
age at bay, so insists an adage—which, when taken with a spoonful of honey can keep
the blaze in gray and groin matters roaring. However, Li is no longer around to
endorse the virtues of the herbs he fed on to keep in shape despite old age.
Too, pharmaceutical firms won’t take kindly an old man’s say-so about the
wonders of an unsightly weed that teems near ditches and waterlogged cesspools.
Advertising
hotshots would rather bank— that word alone conjures having an unconfirmed P2.4
billion cash in stash and 41 real estate properties unsold and likely gaining
unearned increments—on the latest 71-year-old darling of the crowd, the current
idol enjoying unadulterated adulation bordering on reverence of a 54-million
strong electorate that represents a huge market to dump to whatever sells,
including blatant lies, pyramiding scams, and pick-up lines.
As form is
all it takes, never mind perform or platform, this macho embodiment of the zeitgeist and he-manity even admitted
candidly that he takes the ‘little blue pill’—suggested retail price at P3,500
for a box of 4 tablets, so we checked—to, uh, how do we say this without
getting bleeped or edited, allow his flagpole to plug hole. (Now that’s so
properly evocative of patriotism, eh?)
The adoring
hordes of the faithful would likely writhe in the ecstasy of the promised
exertions he would do upon mounting the highest position of responsibility in
all the land, ay, would they scream their lungs out in religious fervor,
“Praise the lewd!”
Welcome a new
poster boy against erectile dysfunction. And all he needs to do as he flashes a
box of the “little blue pill” before his fans’ worshipful homage is ply out a
few words with a leer inciting to seduction and a get down to the
naughty-gritty wink, and they’d be buying the pitch and the product—without as
much a second thought.
“Lambot sa imo?”
Sure, pure manure
Dumping
excess nitrogen into croplands does not increase the capacity of any plant or
weed for higher uptake of fertilizer— a plant can only use a mere 20% of the
fertilizers in the soil. The better option is to use fungi and soil-borne
bacterial colonies to render growth enhancers more soluble for better plant uptake.
As is, fertilizer broadcast onto farmers’ fields have been found to be
polluting rivers and lakes, even leaching into drinking water wells for more
than 80 years. Findings affirm that “fertilizer applied today will continue to
pollute water for decades because it’s building up in the soil.”
Unused
nitrogen stays in the soil and turns into harmful inorganic nitrates—not the organic
kind from plants that signals increased blood blow to the nether parts of the
male anatomy to trigger tumescence, yes, gorging on salads and greens is a sexy
habit. High nitrate levels in the soil pollute drinking water.
Nitrogen in
the form of crystalline urea—which has up to 46% nitrogen content-- is a
nutrient for plants; applied as fertilizer, the nutrient helps increase crop
yields. And in a bid to bolster crop yields, most farmers apply an excess of
fertilizer that, in turn, leave large amounts of unused nitrogen in the soil. It’s
the soil that gets sick, and water run-off drips down into the water table that
can, in the long run, turn the water to taste salty and harmful to human
health.
An
alternative method of earth-friendly farming has turned to using organic wastes
as source of plant nutrients. The higher the organic content of the soil, the
healthier— and of better eating quality, with higher food nutrient and
phytochemical content—are the crops grown on such healthy soil.
Among the current
crop of aspirants to the highest elective post in the land, there is only one
who can provide help to the growing numbers of the nation’s agro-entrepreneurs
who have turned to organic farming. His pronouncements, well-received without
as much a whit of thinking by his adoring fans, ought to be broadcast in the
nation’s 12 million hectares of cultivated croplands for higher yields and
lesser harm from inorganic nitrates.
This
candidate, whose minions have rendered to compost over a thousand human
victims, spouts through blood-and-thunder speeches top-grade compost. Sure,
pure manure for farmlands and farmers who should be thankful.
It’s the
level of toxicity that we ought to be wary of, though.
Zero love life
The endless
whining and unabashed insertion in policy pronouncements about the outgoing numero uno’s having a zero love life
must have stoked fires of resentment in the millennial generation that comprise
the greater bulk of the nation’s voters. Here is a nation hobbled with the
highest teenage pregnancy rates among the six Asean economies, with 24 babies
seeing the light of day every hour and nearly 15 percent of girls in the 15-19
age group are either pregnant for the first time or are already full-fledged
moms. Here is a young population that statistics somehow validate, of unbridled
fecundity.
And the head
of state has made it a habit of plying complaints about his lack of a love
life? What gives?
In glaring
contrast, the current darling of presidential poll surveys must have endeared
himself to all and sundry by his admission that he has two wives, two
mistresses, and most likely, countless flings. That’s probably a lot of loving.
How could not a self-confessed roué earn the admiration of a populace that must
have been fed up with a Malacañang top resident’s constant reminding to people
of what he sorely lacks?
As common
sense would have us believe, “Bored people are boring people; unloved people
are unloving people.”
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