Sunday, March 29, 2009

Kuala Lumpur

My first port of call is the teeming Malaysian city of Kuala Lumpur, rivalling in size, so I believe with that of the Thai city of Bangkok. This is my second visit here, although on the previous occasion I was here only very briefly, overnight. My first impressions,as on the previous occasion, are that of a mixture of old world living, colonialism, and modern architecture. Almost alongside of one another are to be seen new buildings in the process of active construction, and other older abandoned buildings,only partially completed.

Upon checking my figure on the comparison of Kuala Lumpur and Bangkok, I find that I have mad a gross mis-calculation, with Kuala Lumpur just a little over one tenth the size, at 6.9 million against Bangkok at 64 million.

It was my intention to post some photos at this stage. The computer tells me that it will not allow for this procedure to progress so for the moment, I must request that you be satisfied with the written word.

Suffice it to say that I have checked out the market situation and have found the usual trash and treasure markets, night markets, and so on, and of course the food markets. And yes there are the usual supermarkets to be found scattered around. They are very limited, to our way of thinking, in their availability of fresh produce. The avocados were even coming from Australia, and oranges from California. The farmers markets were not so easy to find, as the people with whom I spoke did not seem to understand what it was I was looking for. Yet when I did find them, they were almost just around the corner, so to speak. And yes, I found a stall selling Durian, and sampled it too. So far, not as good as Thai. I will keep trying.

Today, I am off to find Chinatown, amongst other things. And yes it is hot, just like being in Cairns at the moment. Last night we had a thunder storm, with very little rain. The majority of the population is Muslim 60.4%, and this is the state religion. If you are Malay, you are Muslim as stated in the constitution. 19% are Buddhist, mostly Chinese. 9.1%Christian. 6.3% Hindu.

Friday, March 20, 2009

Autism & Vaccination

Dan Olmsted

"A specter is haunting the medical and journalism establishments of the United States: Where are the unvaccinated people with autism?" ---Dan Olmsted

[Dan Olmsted did the research the vaccine industry and media refused to do and found no autism in the unvaccinated Amish and Homefirst Medical Services children.]

Web: http://www.ageofautism.com/

See: Vaccine autism proven Unvaccinated children healthier

"I have not seen autism with the Amish," said Dr. Frank Noonan, a family practitioner in Lancaster County, Pa., who has treated thousands of Amish for a quarter-century. "You'll find all the other stuff, but we don't find the autism. We're right in the heart of Amish country and seeing none, and that's just the way it is."
In Chicago, Homefirst Medical Services treats thousands of never-vaccinated children whose parents received exemptions through Illinois' relatively permissive immunization policy. Homefirst's medical director, Dr. Mayer Eisenstein, told us he is not aware of any cases of autism in never-vaccinated children; the national rate is 1 in 175, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. "We have a fairly large practice," Eisenstein told us. "We have about 30,000 or 35,000 children that we've taken care of over the years, and I don't think we have a single case of autism in children delivered by us who never received vaccines. "We do have enough of a sample," Eisenstein said. "The numbers are too large to not see it. We would absolutely know. We're all family doctors. If I have a child with autism come in, there's no communication. It's frightening. You can't touch them. It's not something that anyone would miss."
Dr. Jeff Bradstreet, a Florida family practitioner with ties to families who homeschool their children for religious reasons, told Age of Autism he has proposed such a study in that group. "I said I know I can tap into this community and find you large numbers of unvaccinated homeschooled," said Bradstreet, "and we can do simple prevalence and incidence studies in them, and my gut reaction is that you're going to see no autism in this group." http://www.upi.com/ConsumerHealthDaily/view.php?StoryID=20060728-111605-3532r

[Feb 2008] MMR AND THE SIMPLE TRUTH ABOUT AUTISM Does the measles-mumps-rubella vaccine cause autism? I vote yes. Of course, that’s just one man’s opinion – but one who’s spent the last three years listening to parents and enlightened pediatricians and combing through adverse events reports and just generally trying to think for himself.

OLMSTED, THE AMISH AND AUTISM By Mark Blaxill

[Oct 2007] Olmsted on Autism: I'm not vaclempt!

[April 2006] The Age of Autism: Pox -- Part 1 By Dan Olmsted vaccines/olm44.html

The Age of Autism: The story so far By DAN OLMSTED

The Age of Autism: 'A pretty big secret' By Dan Olmsted
The Age of Autism: The Amish anomaly By Dan Olmsted

[April 2006] The Age of Autism: Christian's mom speaks By Dan Olmsted

The Age of Autism: Hot potato on the Hill By DAN OLMSTED copy Expect to hear all kinds of excuses, including that one, from the powers that be as to why such a conclusive study couldn't, shouldn't and really mustn't be done. Then ask yourself, Why?

Article links collected by Sheri Nakken:

Sunday, March 15, 2009

Farm Update March 16

This may well be the last up-date on the farm prior to my departure on my annual ROW Lecture Tour which commences on Saturday 28 March, with my return being two months later on Thursday 28 May.

As usual, this will be a very busy time with my first port of call being Kuala Lumpur, in Maylasia. From there I travel to Colombo, Sri Lanka, and to Chennai, in India. Then to Slovenia, Austria, Denmark, the UK, IOM, and on to the USA, where my destinations are, Chicago, Ann Arbor, Toledo, Cleveland, NY, Wilmington,Hots Springs,Houston,San Diego, Los Angeles, then back to OZ, with a stop-over in Sydney to see my daughter, and home to Cairns. I will be making posts along the way on this blog, so do keep in touch, and do feel free to make comments.

With all of that ahead of me, I wished to make sure that some new plants were in the ground and establishing themselves on the new trellis prior to my leaving.

This is the newest trellis which was completed only last week which I planted with passion fruit vines today. The first, and oldest trellis is to be seen to the right and in the background.






This was the second trellis built which I was only able to complete last week also with the able assistance of my friends. In the first instance it required about one month for me to build one on my own. In the last, and third instance, we completed it in two days.





Here we have the first of the young papaya trees that were planted yesterday. It is my intention to plant 15 or 16 in this fenced area. Un fortunately we are unable to grow without a fence to protect them from roaming animals, including the neighbours cattle, wallabies and kangaroos, to name the most prevalent ones.

Wednesday, March 4, 2009

Farm Update March 09

Nothing could be much stranger than the weather. Always a major conversation piece, it most certainly is so at the moment at the farm. February and March are normally our wettest months, and February lived up to its reputation this year. On the other hand, since we have moved into March the rain seems to have abandoned us, and we have been experiencing quite cool conditions for this time of the year, and virtually no humidity. This leaves us wondering," Is the wet season over, and is it to be dry from now on presaging a long dry winter period, quite distinct from last year where we experienced rain for most of the year?" And as we all know, only time will tell.

The last month or so has been quite busy with guests keeping us on our toes with their various conditions, with the last week bringing us two delightful couples from the UK wishing to learn as much as they possibly can in the relatively short time they could afford, on how to apply the principles by which we live at the farm, to their daily lives.






It has been a real joy and blessing to have the opportunity to share the experience of many years with such enthusiastic people. And I sincerely thank them for giving me that opportunity.



Whilst they were at the farm we took the opportunity also of building another igloo on which to grow our passion fruit vines, which mainly fruit in the summer months. And in the winter months we hope to be able to grow cucumbers and beans, in fact anything which requires a trellis upon which to grow.

Our igloos, or trellis', are built with star pickets and poly piping for the main structure, and bamboo for the supporting cross beams. This is then covered with open mesh wire to support the vines and through which the passion fruit, cucumbers,beans etc., may then hang.



Over the last month or so we ahve been harvesting our first crop of guavas. We firstly had the strawberry guavas, followed by the pine-apple guavas, and are now picking the last of the Thai guavas, which are the largest of all three with the smallest being the strawberry guavas. Each has their own distinctive flavour, so that we are able to enjoy them as separate taste experiences. Also at this time the fruit of the strawberry tree is ripening. These are a rather tiny berry like fruit, very sweet in flavour, the flavour of which has been likened to the strawberry, and a most delicious addition to our daily fare.