I'm so sorry I've been away from here for long; can't explain why. It's the weather, maybe.
Meanwhile, people have been stopping over - like Sally Cutting, below, an illustrator of books for children. She sent me an email that raises a good many salient issues:
Hi Adeleke, Congratulations for your blog! Clear and informative, easy to read. We don’t have enough news from sub-Saharan Africa, though a Spanish scientist made the news here when he found a partial treatment for malaria in children, only 40% effective I seem to remember, but his point was that 40% would be a huge number of children saved.This was to follow:Hi, Adeleke,The doctor who was (and most probably still is) working on a vaccine for malaria is Dr Pedro L Alonso of the Hospital Clinic of Barcelona, Spain. The project was in collaboration with the Centro de Investigación de la Salud de Manhica, Mozambique.This is now old news, but there was an article in “The Lancet” in October 2004 and I think more recently also. They were conducting trials which I imagine are still under way. Here are some links that may be of interest:-www.manhica.orgwww.malariavaccine.orgwww.thelancet.com/journals
Thursday, May 22, 2008
Monday, February 18, 2008
Now We Can Get To Salvage Some More Stories for Mankind
"It is unacceptable to people here in Africa, who see their families devastated and economies crippled. It is unacceptable to people in the United States, who believe every human life has value, and that the power to save lives comes with the moral obligation to use it." - U.S. President Bush in rural Tanzania
Things are certainly heating up to signal the end for Malaria! Please go to the link below to savour a victory for humankind on a battle-front deep inside Africa. Then join in the victory chant: Kataa Malaria! (Swahili: 'Reject Malaria!')
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080218/ap_on_re_af/bush_africa;_ylt=AkQnmrT.DtnUUMw2ylVM69ys0NUE
Excerpts: "The disease keeps sick workers home, schoolyards quiet, communities in mourning. The suffering caused by malaria is needless and every death caused by malaria is unacceptable."
Sunday, February 17, 2008
Re: “Malaria - The Final Solution?” Response from Leading Malaria Researcher
N.B. Foremost malaria diagnosis researcher, Prof Paul Wiseman, has kindly responded to my Malaria write-up, first published in leading Nigerian monthly, TIMELESS:
Re: “Malaria - The Final Solution?”
Dear Adeleke,
I just finished your article and greatly enjoyed it.
Thank you for your interest in our recent research. I would be happy to do an online chat sometime.
I should point out that our research has shown a window into detection of malaria by the hemozoin pigment that the parasites all produce. So the next stage in this research is securing support to build a prototype device. I have been contacted by several researchers in the malaria field who are hopeful about this, so I am hoping we can take this to the next stage.
I must admit that I did not know much about malaria one year ago...the scale of this disease is indeed staggering.
It is early in the process, but I would be most pleased if our research made some impact on accurate and early diagnosis. So I am learning and encouraged that this little project appears to be exciting researchers and others directly affected by the disease. (I have received e-mails from doctors and nurses in the Cameroon and the Philippines as well.)
I would be more than happy if you wanted to visit our lab…
Regards,
Prof. Paul Wiseman
McGill University, Montreal Canada
“There is a silent tsunami under way all the time in rural Africa. Every month, as many children die of malaria in Africa as died in the tsunami – about 150,000 children dying every month.” – Dr. Jeffery Sachs, director of the U.N. Millennium Project, Columbia University Economist
Re: “Malaria - The Final Solution?”
Dear Adeleke,
I just finished your article and greatly enjoyed it.
Thank you for your interest in our recent research. I would be happy to do an online chat sometime.
I should point out that our research has shown a window into detection of malaria by the hemozoin pigment that the parasites all produce. So the next stage in this research is securing support to build a prototype device. I have been contacted by several researchers in the malaria field who are hopeful about this, so I am hoping we can take this to the next stage.
I must admit that I did not know much about malaria one year ago...the scale of this disease is indeed staggering.
It is early in the process, but I would be most pleased if our research made some impact on accurate and early diagnosis. So I am learning and encouraged that this little project appears to be exciting researchers and others directly affected by the disease. (I have received e-mails from doctors and nurses in the Cameroon and the Philippines as well.)
I would be more than happy if you wanted to visit our lab…
Regards,
Prof. Paul Wiseman
McGill University, Montreal Canada
“There is a silent tsunami under way all the time in rural Africa. Every month, as many children die of malaria in Africa as died in the tsunami – about 150,000 children dying every month.” – Dr. Jeffery Sachs, director of the U.N. Millennium Project, Columbia University Economist
Thursday, February 14, 2008
Spare A Love-Thot For The 43,200 Tots Who Will Die Today - From Malaria (N.B.Pls google for the reseachers' contacts to hail them: 'Well done!'
Malaria: The Final Solution?
With advances in the science of medicine escalating by leaps and bounds, we are truly at a unique point in human history. Diseases and other medical issues that have run rampant wait to be dealt the deathblow they deserve, thanks to breathtaking breakthroughs in scientific research. These seem to be by only a few dedicated people who think outside the box, in the true tradition of the scientist and other intellectual entrepreneurs who have, over time, changed the course of our world for the better.
As Science takes on the menace of malaria with a resolve that promises to yield a final solution, there is a take we must note on the state of research infrastructure and scientific undertakings on our shores. It is significant that the twin breakthroughs about to be celebrated by the world at large also serve to underscore the glaring entrenched dearth of research and scientific enterprise here. This state of affairs, in the final analysis, simply means that our education, especially at the critical university level, has ceased to be universal and functional; the system is no longer amenable to problem-solving.
Instead, it has become stuck in a rut of rote learning, one from which students (as much clueless as their handlers) simply strive to scamper off ‘certificated’ – not necessarily the same thing as being educated.
Thankfully, there is now in place an initiative for bringing about a culture of relevant scientific inquiry into all things boggling in the land. This is the Nigeria Liquefied Natural Gas NLNG-endowed Nigeria Prize for Science (there is a second for Literature). Regretfully, even this glimmer of hope for catalysing a badly needed revolution has had cause to blink in perturbation as the Prize has not been awarded half of the time since its inception. Ever inventive, the organisers have gone a step ahead to put the ‘unclaimed’ cumulative prize money - $20, 000 the first time; $ 30, 000 the next time – into a fund for upgrading laboratory facilities in select institutions across the country. Let’s leave government out of this, please.
Whether for gain or fame, there is no gainsaying the fact that once again, well before the initiative above catches up, the North, already with a well established culture of scientific research, is reaching down to our half of the world (the Southern hemisphere) with sorely needed help: a line of attack to eradicate – completely – the scourge of malaria. Most common in tropical and subtropical regions, malaria is a universal curse that strikes to leave in its trail 350 to 500 million (reported) new cases annually. According to UNICEF, an African child is lost to it every 30 seconds.
While preventative measures such as sleeping under a mosquito net, flitting sleeping quarters or the use of preventive medication, have proven to reduce the risk of coming down with malaria, it has however been difficult to discover a truly long-lasting solution to the spread of the disease.
Though not a new idea, gene modification is what scientists believe will be the hero to millions of individuals who remain at risk of the debilitating disease. The science has been in use in plants to eliminate certain characteristics from strains of some species in order to help farmers end up with better crops. Now, the focus of the technology has shifted to one of Man’s giants that would not be so easily slain: the mosquito.
The idea is to create a genetically altered mosquito with a resistant gene that kills the parasite causing malaria (plasmodium, extant as many strains) without harming the mosquito. This bug would then be introduced into the population of mosquitoes carrying the malaria parasite. When the mosquito produces offspring, the resistant gene would be passed on to the new generation of mosquitoes, which would then pass it on to the next generation, and so on. Eventually, the parasites causing the disease would be weeded out of their vector organism – the mosquito – completely. The theory is robust.
Scientists at the Johns Hopkins Malaria Research Institute in Baltimore, Maryland in the United States are toying with the idea of creating such a mosquito. It’s looking more and more a possibility. It remains one of the more promising ideas out there for bidding good riddance to a really bad disease.
Monster no more
In the meantime, while we keep our fingers crossed waiting for this final solution, coming still from the sides of the North is an optical laser technique that will soon eliminate the need for slides, staining and microscopes, the standard laboratory set-up in testing people for the disease.
A research team led by Dr. Paul Wiseman of the Departments of Physics and Chemistry at McGill University in Montreal, Canada, has developed a radically new technique that uses lasers and non-linear optical effects to detect malaria infection in human blood. The researchers say the new technique holds the promise of simpler, faster and far less labour-intensive detection of the malaria parasite in blood samples. This rapid malaria detection breakthrough is set to glide out from the Northern Hemisphere, to take on the world of Plasmodium in the South, where the parasite holds patent sway, shortly. The resources and trained personnel required to accurately diagnose the disease are spread the thinnest in sub-Saharan Africa, where most of the fatalities are concentrated.
Current detection techniques require trained technicians to stain slides, look for the parasite’s DNA signature under the microscope, and then manually count all the visible infected cells, a laborious process dependent on the skill and availability of trained analysts. In contrast, the proposed new technique relies on a known optical effect called third harmonic generation (THG), which causes hemozoin – a crystalline substance secreted by the parasite – to glow blue when irradiated by an infrared laser.
“People who are familiar with music know about acoustic harmonics,” explained Dr. Wiseman. “Everybody has a fundamental sound frequency and then multiples of that frequency. Non-linear optical effects are similar: if you shine an intense laser beam of a specific frequency on certain types of materials, you generate multiples of [their] frequency. Hemozoin has a huge, non-linear optical response for the third harmonic, which causes the blue glow.”
According to Mark Shainblum of the Media Relations Office at McGill, Dr. Wiseman and his colleagues hope to co-opt existing well-established technologies like fibre-optic communications lasers and fluorescent cell sorters into their groundbreaking technique to quickly move it out of the laboratory and into the field.
“We’re imagining a self-contained unit that could be used in clinics in endemic countries,” said Dr. Wiseman. “The operator could inject the cell sample directly into the device, and then it would come up with a count of the total number of existing infected cells without manual intervention.”
Hopefully, the relevant authorities in Africa and all other regions of the world where malaria is endemic will lend moral support towards accelerating the dividends from these researches to get them home to their grassroots, thereby achieving the shortest possible lab-to-town transit. Malaria has maligned efforts at development in these places much and for far too long for it to be spared a moment longer.
Can we move on to the next disease on the agenda, please?
Did You Know?
‘Malaria’ is a Latin word. It was coined to describe the condition based on the thinking that the disease is caused by inhaling or exposure to bad (‘mal’) air (‘aria’).
With advances in the science of medicine escalating by leaps and bounds, we are truly at a unique point in human history. Diseases and other medical issues that have run rampant wait to be dealt the deathblow they deserve, thanks to breathtaking breakthroughs in scientific research. These seem to be by only a few dedicated people who think outside the box, in the true tradition of the scientist and other intellectual entrepreneurs who have, over time, changed the course of our world for the better.
As Science takes on the menace of malaria with a resolve that promises to yield a final solution, there is a take we must note on the state of research infrastructure and scientific undertakings on our shores. It is significant that the twin breakthroughs about to be celebrated by the world at large also serve to underscore the glaring entrenched dearth of research and scientific enterprise here. This state of affairs, in the final analysis, simply means that our education, especially at the critical university level, has ceased to be universal and functional; the system is no longer amenable to problem-solving.
Instead, it has become stuck in a rut of rote learning, one from which students (as much clueless as their handlers) simply strive to scamper off ‘certificated’ – not necessarily the same thing as being educated.
Thankfully, there is now in place an initiative for bringing about a culture of relevant scientific inquiry into all things boggling in the land. This is the Nigeria Liquefied Natural Gas NLNG-endowed Nigeria Prize for Science (there is a second for Literature). Regretfully, even this glimmer of hope for catalysing a badly needed revolution has had cause to blink in perturbation as the Prize has not been awarded half of the time since its inception. Ever inventive, the organisers have gone a step ahead to put the ‘unclaimed’ cumulative prize money - $20, 000 the first time; $ 30, 000 the next time – into a fund for upgrading laboratory facilities in select institutions across the country. Let’s leave government out of this, please.
Whether for gain or fame, there is no gainsaying the fact that once again, well before the initiative above catches up, the North, already with a well established culture of scientific research, is reaching down to our half of the world (the Southern hemisphere) with sorely needed help: a line of attack to eradicate – completely – the scourge of malaria. Most common in tropical and subtropical regions, malaria is a universal curse that strikes to leave in its trail 350 to 500 million (reported) new cases annually. According to UNICEF, an African child is lost to it every 30 seconds.
While preventative measures such as sleeping under a mosquito net, flitting sleeping quarters or the use of preventive medication, have proven to reduce the risk of coming down with malaria, it has however been difficult to discover a truly long-lasting solution to the spread of the disease.
Though not a new idea, gene modification is what scientists believe will be the hero to millions of individuals who remain at risk of the debilitating disease. The science has been in use in plants to eliminate certain characteristics from strains of some species in order to help farmers end up with better crops. Now, the focus of the technology has shifted to one of Man’s giants that would not be so easily slain: the mosquito.
The idea is to create a genetically altered mosquito with a resistant gene that kills the parasite causing malaria (plasmodium, extant as many strains) without harming the mosquito. This bug would then be introduced into the population of mosquitoes carrying the malaria parasite. When the mosquito produces offspring, the resistant gene would be passed on to the new generation of mosquitoes, which would then pass it on to the next generation, and so on. Eventually, the parasites causing the disease would be weeded out of their vector organism – the mosquito – completely. The theory is robust.
Scientists at the Johns Hopkins Malaria Research Institute in Baltimore, Maryland in the United States are toying with the idea of creating such a mosquito. It’s looking more and more a possibility. It remains one of the more promising ideas out there for bidding good riddance to a really bad disease.
Monster no more
In the meantime, while we keep our fingers crossed waiting for this final solution, coming still from the sides of the North is an optical laser technique that will soon eliminate the need for slides, staining and microscopes, the standard laboratory set-up in testing people for the disease.
A research team led by Dr. Paul Wiseman of the Departments of Physics and Chemistry at McGill University in Montreal, Canada, has developed a radically new technique that uses lasers and non-linear optical effects to detect malaria infection in human blood. The researchers say the new technique holds the promise of simpler, faster and far less labour-intensive detection of the malaria parasite in blood samples. This rapid malaria detection breakthrough is set to glide out from the Northern Hemisphere, to take on the world of Plasmodium in the South, where the parasite holds patent sway, shortly. The resources and trained personnel required to accurately diagnose the disease are spread the thinnest in sub-Saharan Africa, where most of the fatalities are concentrated.
Current detection techniques require trained technicians to stain slides, look for the parasite’s DNA signature under the microscope, and then manually count all the visible infected cells, a laborious process dependent on the skill and availability of trained analysts. In contrast, the proposed new technique relies on a known optical effect called third harmonic generation (THG), which causes hemozoin – a crystalline substance secreted by the parasite – to glow blue when irradiated by an infrared laser.
“People who are familiar with music know about acoustic harmonics,” explained Dr. Wiseman. “Everybody has a fundamental sound frequency and then multiples of that frequency. Non-linear optical effects are similar: if you shine an intense laser beam of a specific frequency on certain types of materials, you generate multiples of [their] frequency. Hemozoin has a huge, non-linear optical response for the third harmonic, which causes the blue glow.”
According to Mark Shainblum of the Media Relations Office at McGill, Dr. Wiseman and his colleagues hope to co-opt existing well-established technologies like fibre-optic communications lasers and fluorescent cell sorters into their groundbreaking technique to quickly move it out of the laboratory and into the field.
“We’re imagining a self-contained unit that could be used in clinics in endemic countries,” said Dr. Wiseman. “The operator could inject the cell sample directly into the device, and then it would come up with a count of the total number of existing infected cells without manual intervention.”
Hopefully, the relevant authorities in Africa and all other regions of the world where malaria is endemic will lend moral support towards accelerating the dividends from these researches to get them home to their grassroots, thereby achieving the shortest possible lab-to-town transit. Malaria has maligned efforts at development in these places much and for far too long for it to be spared a moment longer.
Can we move on to the next disease on the agenda, please?
Did You Know?
‘Malaria’ is a Latin word. It was coined to describe the condition based on the thinking that the disease is caused by inhaling or exposure to bad (‘mal’) air (‘aria’).
On This St. Valentine's Day: Can You Relate To This?
Breast Feeding: A Labour of Love
“...although it is not the norm in most industrial cultures, UNICEF and the WHO both advise breast-feeding to ‘two years and beyond’” - Jack Newman, M.D., in Scientific American
Mother knows best!
“Breastfeeding is the best thing a mother can give to her child. Though a rigorous task for a mother to breastfeed for six months exclusively and still keep on breastfeeding for up to or even longer, it’s a much easier task at day’s end. It is also the cleanest, safest feed your child can have. There is no need to sterilize, or measure, anything. Further, it has all a baby needs. What more can Mother – and Child – ask for?
“Babies breastfed develop a very strong bond to their mothers and ultimately turn out more compassionate and kind when they become grown-ups, it makes them have a very strong conscience too.
“I have also noticed that the baby teeth without much difficulty may be a little warm, nothing a little Paracetamol will not do the trick to calm! Breastfed babies start teething between 5 months and 8 months, compare that with baby fed formula or mixed (both breast milk and formula) you will have to use all sorts of baby teething drugs to see them through.
“Moreover, breast milk gives babies the immunity they need in the first 6 months of life: it contains all necessary vitamins, minerals and so on as well. Rarely do breastfed babies develop coughs, colds and do not fall ill often, no going to see doctors. Well actually for me have not taken my son to the hospital to be treated for being sick because he has never fallen ill and he is now 10 months old.
“I can also state as a matter of fact that breastfed babies find it easy to start on solids. My son, Funsho, started showing avid interest from 4 months, but I didn’t start him on solids till he turned 6months old, though giving him tit bits from 5 months helped stimulate his appetite. Now he has a very strong and large appetite and he digests easily too.
“Oh, yes, [‘exclusive’] can be done! It’s a sacrifice a mother should consider making for her child ungrudgingly – a labour of love with rewards that money just cannot buy!” (Testimony by Mrs. Moji Lala.)
Colostrum Calling
Also known as lactation and nursing, breastfeeding offers many benefits to the baby. The very first mix that drips after birth – know as colostrums cocktail – is the best welcome party to give a newly-born.
Breast milk contains the right balance of nutrients to help your infant grow into a strong and healthy toddler. Some of the nutrients in breast milk also help protect your infant against common childhood illnesses and infections. It also holds benefits for mother’s health, too! Certain types of cancer seem to occur less often in mothers who have breastfed their babies. Breastfeeding has been shown to be superior in every way for mother and baby. There is no longer any denying the God-be-blessed fact.
Long gone are the days when doctors and health practitioners of any type actively promote bottle feeding as a ‘better alternative’. Even health facilities have come to be compliant: There is now incumbent on them to brand themselves as “baby-friendly”. Watch out for the signage. Time and again, Research goes with Nature: Breast is best!
Touch the future…
Breast-milk is more easily digested than formula. It is ideally suited for your baby’s immature digestive system. For instance, 50% of iron in breast-milk is absorbed compared to 4% in iron-fortified formulas.
Breastfed babies have a lower incidence of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS).
Breastfeeding reduces allergies. (Allergies are 7 times more prevalent in formula-fed babies.)
Some studies have shown that breastfed babies have a higher I.Q.
Breast-milk is a living substance that changes with gestational age of baby, stage of lactation, time of day, and growth needs of the infant. No formula can do that!
Breastfed babies get sick less often and when they become ill, it’s less severe; they have a lower risk of diarrhoeal disease, gastrointestinal illness, respiratory disease and lower incidence of otitis media (ear infections)
Breastfed babies have fewer learning and behaviour difficulties
Breastfeeding promotes optimal growth and neurological development
Breastfeeding helps prevent malocclusion and leads to better teeth and jaw development
Breastfeeding enhances visual development in baby.
It’s in Mom’s best interest, too!
Breastfeeding promotes closeness and bonding between Mother and Child.
Breast-milk is free! Even if you include the cost of renting or purchasing a breast pump and dietary supplements, breastfeeding is still much less expensive.
Breastfeeding returns your uterus to non-pregnant size quickly and reduces your risk of haemorrhage and postpartum blood loss.
Breastfeeding is more restful. You have frequent rest periods while nursing; night feeding is easier. You can sleep while nursing; the prolactin in breast milk is a natural tranquilizer.
You don’t have to worry about breast-milk being contaminated at the factory!
You don’t have to worry about improperly mixing your breast-milk.
When you are breastfeeding, your breast-milk is always at the right temperature: no warming, or worrying about it being too hot.
When you breastfeed, your baby’s poop doesn’t stink!
Breast-feeding helps you lose your pregnancy weight faster!
Breastfeeding provides the mother with a hormone-induced contentment
Breastfeeding is protective against cancerous growths (breast, ovarian, cervical)
The crucial role of breast milk with its loads of immunological agents for protecting the newborn infant against an armada of diseases and illnesses is well known, as is its essential role in promoting the development of the infant’s own immune system. But it is less well known that the infant’s immune system does not reach maturity until about 5-6 years of age. This developmental immaturity of the infant’s immune system can serve as a guide to appreciating the developmental immaturity of the infant’s brain with its various structural, neurochemical and electrophysiological processes that extend in development well beyond the 5-6 years of maturity for the immune system.
As has been well said,’ to predict the future, invent (i.e. invest in) it today.’ An African folklore holds that children who are never suckled go on to become brazen, heartless and callous citizens in life. Therefore, in the interest of human love and peace, will all of us who suckled and so have flowing in us the milk of human kindness rise up to toast to human milk for human babies everywhere, every time…Go on, say it: Thanks, Mom. I love you… it’s Valentine!
Please note: There are some cases when it’s better not to breast feed. If you have HIV or active tuberculosis, you should not breast feed because you could give the infection to your baby. Certain medicines, illegal drugs, and alcohol can also pass through the breast milk and cause harm to your baby.
Some women choose not to breastfeed, maybe as a lifestyle choice or through choosing to return to work. There are others who are simply physically unable to do so due to an existing physical condition which may prevent them, even if they wanted to.
Mother knows best…I know!
“...although it is not the norm in most industrial cultures, UNICEF and the WHO both advise breast-feeding to ‘two years and beyond’” - Jack Newman, M.D., in Scientific American
Mother knows best!
“Breastfeeding is the best thing a mother can give to her child. Though a rigorous task for a mother to breastfeed for six months exclusively and still keep on breastfeeding for up to or even longer, it’s a much easier task at day’s end. It is also the cleanest, safest feed your child can have. There is no need to sterilize, or measure, anything. Further, it has all a baby needs. What more can Mother – and Child – ask for?
“Babies breastfed develop a very strong bond to their mothers and ultimately turn out more compassionate and kind when they become grown-ups, it makes them have a very strong conscience too.
“I have also noticed that the baby teeth without much difficulty may be a little warm, nothing a little Paracetamol will not do the trick to calm! Breastfed babies start teething between 5 months and 8 months, compare that with baby fed formula or mixed (both breast milk and formula) you will have to use all sorts of baby teething drugs to see them through.
“Moreover, breast milk gives babies the immunity they need in the first 6 months of life: it contains all necessary vitamins, minerals and so on as well. Rarely do breastfed babies develop coughs, colds and do not fall ill often, no going to see doctors. Well actually for me have not taken my son to the hospital to be treated for being sick because he has never fallen ill and he is now 10 months old.
“I can also state as a matter of fact that breastfed babies find it easy to start on solids. My son, Funsho, started showing avid interest from 4 months, but I didn’t start him on solids till he turned 6months old, though giving him tit bits from 5 months helped stimulate his appetite. Now he has a very strong and large appetite and he digests easily too.
“Oh, yes, [‘exclusive’] can be done! It’s a sacrifice a mother should consider making for her child ungrudgingly – a labour of love with rewards that money just cannot buy!” (Testimony by Mrs. Moji Lala.)
Colostrum Calling
Also known as lactation and nursing, breastfeeding offers many benefits to the baby. The very first mix that drips after birth – know as colostrums cocktail – is the best welcome party to give a newly-born.
Breast milk contains the right balance of nutrients to help your infant grow into a strong and healthy toddler. Some of the nutrients in breast milk also help protect your infant against common childhood illnesses and infections. It also holds benefits for mother’s health, too! Certain types of cancer seem to occur less often in mothers who have breastfed their babies. Breastfeeding has been shown to be superior in every way for mother and baby. There is no longer any denying the God-be-blessed fact.
Long gone are the days when doctors and health practitioners of any type actively promote bottle feeding as a ‘better alternative’. Even health facilities have come to be compliant: There is now incumbent on them to brand themselves as “baby-friendly”. Watch out for the signage. Time and again, Research goes with Nature: Breast is best!
Touch the future…
Breast-milk is more easily digested than formula. It is ideally suited for your baby’s immature digestive system. For instance, 50% of iron in breast-milk is absorbed compared to 4% in iron-fortified formulas.
Breastfed babies have a lower incidence of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS).
Breastfeeding reduces allergies. (Allergies are 7 times more prevalent in formula-fed babies.)
Some studies have shown that breastfed babies have a higher I.Q.
Breast-milk is a living substance that changes with gestational age of baby, stage of lactation, time of day, and growth needs of the infant. No formula can do that!
Breastfed babies get sick less often and when they become ill, it’s less severe; they have a lower risk of diarrhoeal disease, gastrointestinal illness, respiratory disease and lower incidence of otitis media (ear infections)
Breastfed babies have fewer learning and behaviour difficulties
Breastfeeding promotes optimal growth and neurological development
Breastfeeding helps prevent malocclusion and leads to better teeth and jaw development
Breastfeeding enhances visual development in baby.
It’s in Mom’s best interest, too!
Breastfeeding promotes closeness and bonding between Mother and Child.
Breast-milk is free! Even if you include the cost of renting or purchasing a breast pump and dietary supplements, breastfeeding is still much less expensive.
Breastfeeding returns your uterus to non-pregnant size quickly and reduces your risk of haemorrhage and postpartum blood loss.
Breastfeeding is more restful. You have frequent rest periods while nursing; night feeding is easier. You can sleep while nursing; the prolactin in breast milk is a natural tranquilizer.
You don’t have to worry about breast-milk being contaminated at the factory!
You don’t have to worry about improperly mixing your breast-milk.
When you are breastfeeding, your breast-milk is always at the right temperature: no warming, or worrying about it being too hot.
When you breastfeed, your baby’s poop doesn’t stink!
Breast-feeding helps you lose your pregnancy weight faster!
Breastfeeding provides the mother with a hormone-induced contentment
Breastfeeding is protective against cancerous growths (breast, ovarian, cervical)
The crucial role of breast milk with its loads of immunological agents for protecting the newborn infant against an armada of diseases and illnesses is well known, as is its essential role in promoting the development of the infant’s own immune system. But it is less well known that the infant’s immune system does not reach maturity until about 5-6 years of age. This developmental immaturity of the infant’s immune system can serve as a guide to appreciating the developmental immaturity of the infant’s brain with its various structural, neurochemical and electrophysiological processes that extend in development well beyond the 5-6 years of maturity for the immune system.
As has been well said,’ to predict the future, invent (i.e. invest in) it today.’ An African folklore holds that children who are never suckled go on to become brazen, heartless and callous citizens in life. Therefore, in the interest of human love and peace, will all of us who suckled and so have flowing in us the milk of human kindness rise up to toast to human milk for human babies everywhere, every time…Go on, say it: Thanks, Mom. I love you… it’s Valentine!
Please note: There are some cases when it’s better not to breast feed. If you have HIV or active tuberculosis, you should not breast feed because you could give the infection to your baby. Certain medicines, illegal drugs, and alcohol can also pass through the breast milk and cause harm to your baby.
Some women choose not to breastfeed, maybe as a lifestyle choice or through choosing to return to work. There are others who are simply physically unable to do so due to an existing physical condition which may prevent them, even if they wanted to.
Mother knows best…I know!
On This St. Valentine's Day: Can You Relate To This?
Breast Feeding: A Labour of Love
“...although it is not the norm in most industrial cultures, UNICEF and the WHO both advise breast-feeding to ‘two years and beyond’” - Jack Newman, M.D., in Scientific American
Mother knows best!
“Breastfeeding is the best thing a mother can give to her child. Though a rigorous task for a mother to breastfeed for six months exclusively and still keep on breastfeeding for up to or even longer, it’s a much easier task at day’s end. It is also the cleanest, safest feed your child can have. There is no need to sterilize, or measure, anything. Further, it has all a baby needs. What more can Mother – and Child – ask for?
“Babies breastfed develop a very strong bond to their mothers and ultimately turn out more compassionate and kind when they become grown-ups, it makes them have a very strong conscience too.
“I have also noticed that the baby teeth without much difficulty may be a little warm, nothing a little Paracetamol will not do the trick to calm! Breastfed babies start teething between 5 months and 8 months, compare that with baby fed formula or mixed (both breast milk and formula) you will have to use all sorts of baby teething drugs to see them through.
“Moreover, breast milk gives babies the immunity they need in the first 6 months of life: it contains all necessary vitamins, minerals and so on as well. Rarely do breastfed babies develop coughs, colds and do not fall ill often, no going to see doctors. Well actually for me have not taken my son to the hospital to be treated for being sick because he has never fallen ill and he is now 10 months old.
“I can also state as a matter of fact that breastfed babies find it easy to start on solids. My son, Funsho, started showing avid interest from 4 months, but I didn’t start him on solids till he turned 6months old, though giving him tit bits from 5 months helped stimulate his appetite. Now he has a very strong and large appetite and he digests easily too.
“Oh, yes, [‘exclusive’] can be done! It’s a sacrifice a mother should consider making for her child ungrudgingly – a labour of love with rewards that money just cannot buy!” (Testimony by Mrs. Moji Lala.)
Colostrum Calling
Also known as lactation and nursing, breastfeeding offers many benefits to the baby. The very first mix that drips after birth – know as colostrums cocktail – is the best welcome party to give a newly-born.
Breast milk contains the right balance of nutrients to help your infant grow into a strong and healthy toddler. Some of the nutrients in breast milk also help protect your infant against common childhood illnesses and infections. It also holds benefits for mother’s health, too! Certain types of cancer seem to occur less often in mothers who have breastfed their babies. Breastfeeding has been shown to be superior in every way for mother and baby. There is no longer any denying the God-be-blessed fact.
Long gone are the days when doctors and health practitioners of any type actively promote bottle feeding as a ‘better alternative’. Even health facilities have come to be compliant: There is now incumbent on them to brand themselves as “baby-friendly”. Watch out for the signage. Time and again, Research goes with Nature: Breast is best!
Touch the future…
Breast-milk is more easily digested than formula. It is ideally suited for your baby’s immature digestive system. For instance, 50% of iron in breast-milk is absorbed compared to 4% in iron-fortified formulas.
Breastfed babies have a lower incidence of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS).
Breastfeeding reduces allergies. (Allergies are 7 times more prevalent in formula-fed babies.)
Some studies have shown that breastfed babies have a higher I.Q.
Breast-milk is a living substance that changes with gestational age of baby, stage of lactation, time of day, and growth needs of the infant. No formula can do that!
Breastfed babies get sick less often and when they become ill, it’s less severe; they have a lower risk of diarrhoeal disease, gastrointestinal illness, respiratory disease and lower incidence of otitis media (ear infections)
Breastfed babies have fewer learning and behaviour difficulties
Breastfeeding promotes optimal growth and neurological development
Breastfeeding helps prevent malocclusion and leads to better teeth and jaw development
Breastfeeding enhances visual development in baby.
It’s in Mom’s best interest, too!
Breastfeeding promotes closeness and bonding between Mother and Child.
Breast-milk is free! Even if you include the cost of renting or purchasing a breast pump and dietary supplements, breastfeeding is still much less expensive.
Breastfeeding returns your uterus to non-pregnant size quickly and reduces your risk of haemorrhage and postpartum blood loss.
Breastfeeding is more restful. You have frequent rest periods while nursing; night feeding is easier. You can sleep while nursing; the prolactin in breast milk is a natural tranquilizer.
You don’t have to worry about breast-milk being contaminated at the factory!
You don’t have to worry about improperly mixing your breast-milk.
When you are breastfeeding, your breast-milk is always at the right temperature: no warming, or worrying about it being too hot.
When you breastfeed, your baby’s poop doesn’t stink!
Breast-feeding helps you lose your pregnancy weight faster!
Breastfeeding provides the mother with a hormone-induced contentment
Breastfeeding is protective against cancerous growths (breast, ovarian, cervical)
The crucial role of breast milk with its loads of immunological agents for protecting the newborn infant against an armada of diseases and illnesses is well known, as is its essential role in promoting the development of the infant’s own immune system. But it is less well known that the infant’s immune system does not reach maturity until about 5-6 years of age. This developmental immaturity of the infant’s immune system can serve as a guide to appreciating the developmental immaturity of the infant’s brain with its various structural, neurochemical and electrophysiological processes that extend in development well beyond the 5-6 years of maturity for the immune system.
As has been well said,’ to predict the future, invent (i.e. invest in) it today.’ An African folklore holds that children who are never suckled go on to become brazen, heartless and callous citizens in life. Therefore, in the interest of human love and peace, will all of us who suckled and so have flowing in us the milk of human kindness rise up to toast to human milk for human babies everywhere, every time…Go on, say it: Thanks, Mom. I love you… it’s Valentine!
Please note: There are some cases when it’s better not to breast feed. If you have HIV or active tuberculosis, you should not breast feed because you could give the infection to your baby. Certain medicines, illegal drugs, and alcohol can also pass through the breast milk and cause harm to your baby.
Some women choose not to breastfeed, maybe as a lifestyle choice or through choosing to return to work. There are others who are simply physically unable to do so due to an existing physical condition which may prevent them, even if they wanted to.
Funsho and Mom: Mother knows best…I know!
“...although it is not the norm in most industrial cultures, UNICEF and the WHO both advise breast-feeding to ‘two years and beyond’” - Jack Newman, M.D., in Scientific American
Mother knows best!
“Breastfeeding is the best thing a mother can give to her child. Though a rigorous task for a mother to breastfeed for six months exclusively and still keep on breastfeeding for up to or even longer, it’s a much easier task at day’s end. It is also the cleanest, safest feed your child can have. There is no need to sterilize, or measure, anything. Further, it has all a baby needs. What more can Mother – and Child – ask for?
“Babies breastfed develop a very strong bond to their mothers and ultimately turn out more compassionate and kind when they become grown-ups, it makes them have a very strong conscience too.
“I have also noticed that the baby teeth without much difficulty may be a little warm, nothing a little Paracetamol will not do the trick to calm! Breastfed babies start teething between 5 months and 8 months, compare that with baby fed formula or mixed (both breast milk and formula) you will have to use all sorts of baby teething drugs to see them through.
“Moreover, breast milk gives babies the immunity they need in the first 6 months of life: it contains all necessary vitamins, minerals and so on as well. Rarely do breastfed babies develop coughs, colds and do not fall ill often, no going to see doctors. Well actually for me have not taken my son to the hospital to be treated for being sick because he has never fallen ill and he is now 10 months old.
“I can also state as a matter of fact that breastfed babies find it easy to start on solids. My son, Funsho, started showing avid interest from 4 months, but I didn’t start him on solids till he turned 6months old, though giving him tit bits from 5 months helped stimulate his appetite. Now he has a very strong and large appetite and he digests easily too.
“Oh, yes, [‘exclusive’] can be done! It’s a sacrifice a mother should consider making for her child ungrudgingly – a labour of love with rewards that money just cannot buy!” (Testimony by Mrs. Moji Lala.)
Colostrum Calling
Also known as lactation and nursing, breastfeeding offers many benefits to the baby. The very first mix that drips after birth – know as colostrums cocktail – is the best welcome party to give a newly-born.
Breast milk contains the right balance of nutrients to help your infant grow into a strong and healthy toddler. Some of the nutrients in breast milk also help protect your infant against common childhood illnesses and infections. It also holds benefits for mother’s health, too! Certain types of cancer seem to occur less often in mothers who have breastfed their babies. Breastfeeding has been shown to be superior in every way for mother and baby. There is no longer any denying the God-be-blessed fact.
Long gone are the days when doctors and health practitioners of any type actively promote bottle feeding as a ‘better alternative’. Even health facilities have come to be compliant: There is now incumbent on them to brand themselves as “baby-friendly”. Watch out for the signage. Time and again, Research goes with Nature: Breast is best!
Touch the future…
Breast-milk is more easily digested than formula. It is ideally suited for your baby’s immature digestive system. For instance, 50% of iron in breast-milk is absorbed compared to 4% in iron-fortified formulas.
Breastfed babies have a lower incidence of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS).
Breastfeeding reduces allergies. (Allergies are 7 times more prevalent in formula-fed babies.)
Some studies have shown that breastfed babies have a higher I.Q.
Breast-milk is a living substance that changes with gestational age of baby, stage of lactation, time of day, and growth needs of the infant. No formula can do that!
Breastfed babies get sick less often and when they become ill, it’s less severe; they have a lower risk of diarrhoeal disease, gastrointestinal illness, respiratory disease and lower incidence of otitis media (ear infections)
Breastfed babies have fewer learning and behaviour difficulties
Breastfeeding promotes optimal growth and neurological development
Breastfeeding helps prevent malocclusion and leads to better teeth and jaw development
Breastfeeding enhances visual development in baby.
It’s in Mom’s best interest, too!
Breastfeeding promotes closeness and bonding between Mother and Child.
Breast-milk is free! Even if you include the cost of renting or purchasing a breast pump and dietary supplements, breastfeeding is still much less expensive.
Breastfeeding returns your uterus to non-pregnant size quickly and reduces your risk of haemorrhage and postpartum blood loss.
Breastfeeding is more restful. You have frequent rest periods while nursing; night feeding is easier. You can sleep while nursing; the prolactin in breast milk is a natural tranquilizer.
You don’t have to worry about breast-milk being contaminated at the factory!
You don’t have to worry about improperly mixing your breast-milk.
When you are breastfeeding, your breast-milk is always at the right temperature: no warming, or worrying about it being too hot.
When you breastfeed, your baby’s poop doesn’t stink!
Breast-feeding helps you lose your pregnancy weight faster!
Breastfeeding provides the mother with a hormone-induced contentment
Breastfeeding is protective against cancerous growths (breast, ovarian, cervical)
The crucial role of breast milk with its loads of immunological agents for protecting the newborn infant against an armada of diseases and illnesses is well known, as is its essential role in promoting the development of the infant’s own immune system. But it is less well known that the infant’s immune system does not reach maturity until about 5-6 years of age. This developmental immaturity of the infant’s immune system can serve as a guide to appreciating the developmental immaturity of the infant’s brain with its various structural, neurochemical and electrophysiological processes that extend in development well beyond the 5-6 years of maturity for the immune system.
As has been well said,’ to predict the future, invent (i.e. invest in) it today.’ An African folklore holds that children who are never suckled go on to become brazen, heartless and callous citizens in life. Therefore, in the interest of human love and peace, will all of us who suckled and so have flowing in us the milk of human kindness rise up to toast to human milk for human babies everywhere, every time…Go on, say it: Thanks, Mom. I love you… it’s Valentine!
Please note: There are some cases when it’s better not to breast feed. If you have HIV or active tuberculosis, you should not breast feed because you could give the infection to your baby. Certain medicines, illegal drugs, and alcohol can also pass through the breast milk and cause harm to your baby.
Some women choose not to breastfeed, maybe as a lifestyle choice or through choosing to return to work. There are others who are simply physically unable to do so due to an existing physical condition which may prevent them, even if they wanted to.
Funsho and Mom: Mother knows best…I know!
Saturday, July 21, 2007
For starters...
GATANANKU:
THE STORYTELLER’S DISPENSARY
“The stories people tell/ have a way/ of taking care of them” (Barry Lopez)
“Stories are not /just meant to make us smile; /our lives depend on them” (Chinua Achebe)
Hi, I’m the new Kid-on-the-Blog. I deal in words in all their various concoctions: Stories, Poems, Plays, Puzzles, and as more categories as get invented.
Here is your warranty on stuff from the Story Dispensary: if you do not go away with a take on life (and other such matters) any time you alight at my corner-kiosk on your cruise round Cyberspace that portends care for ay number of your cares, I’d have failed. You may blot me out from your Blogosphere.
Gatananku is the Storyteller’s opening salve in Hausa, the de facto lingua franca of West Africa (it’s also spoken as far as the Sudan and the Congo). As a formula, Gatananku is, arguably, more potent than its English equivalent – Once upon a time.
I’m Hausa by nurture. My Linnaean nomenclature in that regard is Mainasara Na’Mai-iko. More on that very important matter later on, I promise.
Gatananku is really a contraction (it seems to me we all have signed a contract with Language to contract it across tongues, where’er and when’er we may). The full Gatananku formula is:
Storyteller: Gatanan, gatanan ku - /
Audience: Ta zo mu ji ta!
This Storyteller’s opening gambit, literally, means: ‘She’s here! She’s here for you!’ /’Well she’s come – we’ll hear her tale!’ It presents Story as a woman – to capture the grace of the garb and the felicitous fecundity that the womb(man) so powerfully captures in a nutshell, so to speak.
This probably explains why the girl-child is far more highly prized by the Hausa then her male counterpart. She is it who gives all many a reason for mirth and madness, for the woman will always have a cause to celebrate or else remonstrate! And, as you probably know already, a woman sets pulses racing! Oh, what a bait! NOTE: To be handled with care.
As the old Wazir (vizier) in “Arabian Nights” posited to a – female – story apprentice,
“Sometimes, people need stories more than food [better prepared by you-know-who] to stay alive. Stories tell us how to live, and why.”
TAKE 1: The stories people tell become either nexuses – to connect them to further destinations and realities to relish in life. Or then excuses – keeping them from what they are capable of becoming in life. In arriving at the above catch to life, I have been influenced by the Hispanic-American, Barry L. Lopez (presumably no relation of a rather very well-known woman, Jennifer Lopez.
Get your free PDF copy of the essay teeming with insight on the theme: The Stories People Tell – Nexuses Or Excuses? Simply email: mainasara@gmail.com. I’ve got more stuff to dispense – not unlike one Asa Chandler of the Coca-Cola archetype that keeps giving and giving, century after century. You will do well to treat yourself to the care these stories have to give. Take!
I’ve baked a cake of a take on my country of primary domicile, Nigeria. She just tagged on a subplot to the unfolding story of her nationhood, with the recently concluded first slapdash of a civilian-to-civilian transfer of power from one government to another. To mark its momentousness, I am releasing to the reading public at large my monumental play-for-radio that attempts to dam the flash floods that carried away age-long political debris to make for a new butterfly order. To guard against fulfilling political philosopher George Santayana’s prophecy – “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it” – the world must consider with us the signification of this uniquely African turning point: “CODENAME JUNE 12: MANDATE AND MAYHEM: The Greatest Threat to Nigeria’s Ruling Mafia and How It Was Checked.”
You may get a PDF copy of the Script FREE at www.lulu.com/ Then await the Audio Drama Production! It promises to be an aural experience of, well, the moment… Already, I have entered into talks with a Production Studio for its creation. Details later! A highly artistic form of the Drama, the Play for Radio (long regarded as the ‘theatre of the mind’) is truly most congruent with the fabric of life today, with its pervasive unobtrusive immediacy. It may well be the off-sight ‘edutainment’ medium of choice in the Mobile Age. No wonder, Internet Radio is now a big hit. CODENAME JUNE 12 will be available as a full downloadable real-audio file.
This Nigerian political watershed is now her true rallying-point. CODENAME JUNE 12 will help counter Voter apathy, voter intimidation and voter compromise, while fostering voter confidence for a robust enlightened electorate: Towards a saner polity across what I call ‘Democrasia’. Following Nigeria’s freest and truly representative Presidential Election of June 12, 1993, much water, indeed, passed under the Niger Bridge!
CODENAME JUNE 12 tells the entwined story of the quintessential Nigerian, Moshood MKO Abiola, and his romance with Nigeria. MKO transcended every cultural barrier – tribal, religious, economic, social, etc – placed on his path to blaze a new political trail. It was to be stillborn. The military junta – presided over by an orthodontically-challenged general, I. Badamasi Babangida – truncated it without any humanly comprehensible reason, something the Establishment was in dire short supply of.
O, THE YEARS
How the years have grown on me!
So like some tea.
Now, grim of mien,
All I do is lisp, ‘Do rien!*’
How the years have groaned on me!
Just now I teed
(My grip was mean!)
All I did was beam and lean.
How the years have groped for me!
Lost on some Sea,
Found it like Earth:
All to do is hog a heart.
© MAINASARA N., 2006
* French: meaning “It’s nothing!”
Article on the 40th anniversary of the life of "A Man of the People" was published on the ocassion in the press in Nigeria (THISDAY, MONITOR) and on the 'Net - to raise salient points, not to daze but to trace the intellectual impoverishment of a race and their place in the world:
African ‘talking books’: For the people, it’s sound to turn full cycle
It has been 40 deafeningly silent years since Heinemann Publishers first released Chinua Achebe’s very political novel on post-colonial Nigeria: A Man of the People. But then it aroused immense interest at its birth – because of its uncanny ending.
There, in black and white, was a prediction of the coup d’état set to rock the Nigerian polity only weeks later. The book had come out under that frontline publishing outfit’s African Writers Series, AWS, of which Chinua Achebe was Founding Editor.
I have often wondered if Nora Ephron didn’t speak truth after all to the ‘men of timber and caliber’ (apologies to the late Ozumba Mbadiwe), who were swallowed up in that precedent-setting political earthquake, when he said: "I always read the last page of a book first, so that IF I die before I finish I'll know how it turned out!" Had they but read – and taken to heart A Man of the People – it would have taken care of them! For we mustn’t ever forget that “the stories people tell have a way of taking care of them” (Barry Lopez).
But I’m jumping way ahead of my thesis. Back in secondary school when I first ‘did’ it – like I did books of every sort with my peers: oh yes – we did books! – I waved aside A Man of the People as ‘the hilarious Achebe.’ No doubt about it: the book still sets one rollicking in wave after wave of girth-racking mirth. There’s simply no let-up to the fun it packs!
Grown up (which isn’t always the same thing as aging), rereading it now sets alarms clanging in my head. What the Mahatma MK Gandhi said is really true: ‘Politics is too important to be left in the hands of politicians’! My thesis: To get things right, who better than the writer to take them up to pursue right to their logical end, for the benefit of all?
I think Achebe is uncanny, simply put. All right, it’s his writing that is. But recall his ‘Too Dangerous for Silence’ speech just before the crisis in his home state Anambra came to a full head? Now, that’s what I call uncanny! If only people would read, they’d be ready…
A Man of the People even has talk of why a headcount around here (another is due in late March) may turn out to be guesswork, and a calculated one at that! In a wry aside that has direct bearing on political permutations in the realm, the writer has the people’s thinking–represented by the narrator’s father–cast in the following microstory from this political odyssey:
…I know some foreigners think we are funny with figures. One day when I was in the university, an old District Officer with whom my father had worked long ago came to our house…[for] a call on his old interpreter. As they talked in the parlour my younger half-brothers and sisters kept up an endless procession in front of the strange visitor until he was constrained to ask my father how many children he had.
‘About fifteen,’ said my father.
‘About? Surely you must know.’
My father grinned and talked about other things. Of course he knew how many children he had but people don’t go counting their children as they do animals and yams. And the same I fear goes for our country’s population. [Pg. 111]
The political party in power in A Man of the People is ‘Peoples Organisational Party’, P.O.P. Now try ‘drawing out’ the difference between ‘O’ and ‘D’! Its main opponent (apposite, actually) is ‘Progressive Alliance Party’, P.A.P, described in the book as ‘weak and disorganised’. You know I know what that one is harbinger of! There’s yet a 3rd – a mélange of hotheaded eggheads to which the hero of A Man of the People is drawn: principally for vendetta over the loss of his girlfriend – to a minister in whose house he’d been an invited guest! This party is simply interested in securing a beachhead for times to come. But it seems its leadership can only speak from both sides of the mouth. Not so for our hero, who becomes indifferent with the whole scheme of things at the end.
Who then is ‘A Man of the People’? Is he the one who ‘performs’ in private for pockets? [Let the reader understand.] And further in bed for – or with; I do not have the details – people’s daughters-at-large, peers of his own daughters?
Now, just when will it be the turn of ‘the man for the people’, one who will truly PERFORM: especially to make power generation and distribution the norm in the land – and damn the bludgeoning generator sets and diesel-vending mafias ravaging the land? Personally, the noise-and-slick from that twosome is getting to me: Help, somebody!
Maybe that’s why I’m shouting and thrashing about to get this out. But I’m told the people like it so! So, people, I’m afraid the verdict is in: ‘A people get the leadership they deserve.’ Or is it: ‘A people deserve the leadership they get’? Nna, I suppose it’s all of the above bo.
Right now Nigeria stands at a crossroads, a make-or-mar socio-political transition. But maybe that’s too drastically hilarious a conclusion to reach…yet. But again, time will tell. It did in ’66.
My work of late is to help engender a culture of reading in the land. Believe me, it’s its own reward. And this reading culture must be, I always insist, principally of stories. ‘Stories,’ said Chinua Achebe, ‘are not just meant to make us smile [or, smirk]… Our life depends on them.’
According to art critic Kenneth Burke: ‘Stories are equipment for living’ – the spells that compel us to go on. These make up the infrastructure of our ‘belief system’ with which, says Forbes publisher Rich Karlgaard – if it’s the right one – ‘we can predict the future.’ A Man of the People is right on cue here for predicting Nigeria’s future, I submit.
From my recent reading of the book, I’m now really desperate to get its story into the consciousness of the people it speaks so squarely to, to their Ego. For, according to Freudian psychology, this is the part of the mind with which we think and take action. From there it should percolate into the Id: the part of the mind that is completely unconscious but has hidden needs and desires. Desires for change…
I’m convinced the required solution lies in dramatizing the story professionally to yield an audio book. ‘Talking book’, I think, will be more telling a term for the African! Thus would the cycle be complete: Oral (its proto-state) to Written (its present form) to Aural (the projected format). See? On the archetypical ‘Israelite journey’ model – a national odyssey precipitated by crippling unbelief and dreadful nonchalance, much like ours – perhaps then there’ll be a ‘settling in’.
Big time publishers Random House has done it for even the most staid writing in their stable to bestseller writing, like Michael Crichton’s. And I’ve enjoyed quite a few Left Behind Series by Tyndale House in that format. The art has been ‘finished’ – no reservations as to ‘publishing sense’ whatsoever. I hope powers that be here get the point enough to act on it!
People are naturally curious. If they like the ‘talking book’, they’ll want to see it in print as well. Much like people go all out to secure the lyrics to songs they’re taken with, which they then refer to over and over again. At least until the next rave release!
Having proposed a toast to A Man of the People on its 40th, the other aspect of my present work is to move for its induction into the Channels Outstanding Books – COB – List. I hope you will come to agree with me that the story is both succulent and serious enough to sink ones mental teeth into again and again. As for what’s in it for the writer, I’ll advise that his literary agent begin pursuing a deal with publishing houses with a history of making a success of audio books – in time for the author’s 76th birthday come November 19th.
‘Faith comes by hearing’, states the Good Book (the same way fear makes its entrance into the human heart, mind you). Karlgaard writes: ‘Beliefs have consequences, which are sometimes harsh’ – but there are some others that are enabling. The people can be made conscious of what’s really up (for grabs?) when any zealous lot shows up, panting to romp with their polity, claiming to have elixirs for her teething and other growing up pains, etc, etc.
With George Santayana clanging in their ear – ‘those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it’ – the people will then wag this book in the face of the political lot to say, Caveat actor: ‘Let the doer beware.’ For, now: We are aware!
Meantime, 3 happy cheers to A Man of the People at 40, when a new life will begin!
SMS or email your endorsements or reservations on A Man of the People for its inclusion on the COB List.
(Indicate Name, Location & Gender)
GSM: +234(0) 8023920443
Email: mainasara@gmail.com
‘Deleke Adeyemi Host of The Book Club on Channels TV will be doing an appreciation of A Man of the People on-air during March.
Come & Load Up!
BOOKATERIA®tv Chef: ‘Deleke
Reading maketh a FULL man… – Sir Francis Bacon
THE STORYTELLER’S DISPENSARY
“The stories people tell/ have a way/ of taking care of them” (Barry Lopez)
“Stories are not /just meant to make us smile; /our lives depend on them” (Chinua Achebe)
Hi, I’m the new Kid-on-the-Blog. I deal in words in all their various concoctions: Stories, Poems, Plays, Puzzles, and as more categories as get invented.
Here is your warranty on stuff from the Story Dispensary: if you do not go away with a take on life (and other such matters) any time you alight at my corner-kiosk on your cruise round Cyberspace that portends care for ay number of your cares, I’d have failed. You may blot me out from your Blogosphere.
Gatananku is the Storyteller’s opening salve in Hausa, the de facto lingua franca of West Africa (it’s also spoken as far as the Sudan and the Congo). As a formula, Gatananku is, arguably, more potent than its English equivalent – Once upon a time.
I’m Hausa by nurture. My Linnaean nomenclature in that regard is Mainasara Na’Mai-iko. More on that very important matter later on, I promise.
Gatananku is really a contraction (it seems to me we all have signed a contract with Language to contract it across tongues, where’er and when’er we may). The full Gatananku formula is:
Storyteller: Gatanan, gatanan ku - /
Audience: Ta zo mu ji ta!
This Storyteller’s opening gambit, literally, means: ‘She’s here! She’s here for you!’ /’Well she’s come – we’ll hear her tale!’ It presents Story as a woman – to capture the grace of the garb and the felicitous fecundity that the womb(man) so powerfully captures in a nutshell, so to speak.
This probably explains why the girl-child is far more highly prized by the Hausa then her male counterpart. She is it who gives all many a reason for mirth and madness, for the woman will always have a cause to celebrate or else remonstrate! And, as you probably know already, a woman sets pulses racing! Oh, what a bait! NOTE: To be handled with care.
As the old Wazir (vizier) in “Arabian Nights” posited to a – female – story apprentice,
“Sometimes, people need stories more than food [better prepared by you-know-who] to stay alive. Stories tell us how to live, and why.”
TAKE 1: The stories people tell become either nexuses – to connect them to further destinations and realities to relish in life. Or then excuses – keeping them from what they are capable of becoming in life. In arriving at the above catch to life, I have been influenced by the Hispanic-American, Barry L. Lopez (presumably no relation of a rather very well-known woman, Jennifer Lopez.
Get your free PDF copy of the essay teeming with insight on the theme: The Stories People Tell – Nexuses Or Excuses? Simply email: mainasara@gmail.com. I’ve got more stuff to dispense – not unlike one Asa Chandler of the Coca-Cola archetype that keeps giving and giving, century after century. You will do well to treat yourself to the care these stories have to give. Take!
I’ve baked a cake of a take on my country of primary domicile, Nigeria. She just tagged on a subplot to the unfolding story of her nationhood, with the recently concluded first slapdash of a civilian-to-civilian transfer of power from one government to another. To mark its momentousness, I am releasing to the reading public at large my monumental play-for-radio that attempts to dam the flash floods that carried away age-long political debris to make for a new butterfly order. To guard against fulfilling political philosopher George Santayana’s prophecy – “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it” – the world must consider with us the signification of this uniquely African turning point: “CODENAME JUNE 12: MANDATE AND MAYHEM: The Greatest Threat to Nigeria’s Ruling Mafia and How It Was Checked.”
You may get a PDF copy of the Script FREE at www.lulu.com/ Then await the Audio Drama Production! It promises to be an aural experience of, well, the moment… Already, I have entered into talks with a Production Studio for its creation. Details later! A highly artistic form of the Drama, the Play for Radio (long regarded as the ‘theatre of the mind’) is truly most congruent with the fabric of life today, with its pervasive unobtrusive immediacy. It may well be the off-sight ‘edutainment’ medium of choice in the Mobile Age. No wonder, Internet Radio is now a big hit. CODENAME JUNE 12 will be available as a full downloadable real-audio file.
This Nigerian political watershed is now her true rallying-point. CODENAME JUNE 12 will help counter Voter apathy, voter intimidation and voter compromise, while fostering voter confidence for a robust enlightened electorate: Towards a saner polity across what I call ‘Democrasia’. Following Nigeria’s freest and truly representative Presidential Election of June 12, 1993, much water, indeed, passed under the Niger Bridge!
CODENAME JUNE 12 tells the entwined story of the quintessential Nigerian, Moshood MKO Abiola, and his romance with Nigeria. MKO transcended every cultural barrier – tribal, religious, economic, social, etc – placed on his path to blaze a new political trail. It was to be stillborn. The military junta – presided over by an orthodontically-challenged general, I. Badamasi Babangida – truncated it without any humanly comprehensible reason, something the Establishment was in dire short supply of.
O, THE YEARS
How the years have grown on me!
So like some tea.
Now, grim of mien,
All I do is lisp, ‘Do rien!*’
How the years have groaned on me!
Just now I teed
(My grip was mean!)
All I did was beam and lean.
How the years have groped for me!
Lost on some Sea,
Found it like Earth:
All to do is hog a heart.
© MAINASARA N., 2006
* French: meaning “It’s nothing!”
Article on the 40th anniversary of the life of "A Man of the People" was published on the ocassion in the press in Nigeria (THISDAY, MONITOR) and on the 'Net - to raise salient points, not to daze but to trace the intellectual impoverishment of a race and their place in the world:
African ‘talking books’: For the people, it’s sound to turn full cycle
It has been 40 deafeningly silent years since Heinemann Publishers first released Chinua Achebe’s very political novel on post-colonial Nigeria: A Man of the People. But then it aroused immense interest at its birth – because of its uncanny ending.
There, in black and white, was a prediction of the coup d’état set to rock the Nigerian polity only weeks later. The book had come out under that frontline publishing outfit’s African Writers Series, AWS, of which Chinua Achebe was Founding Editor.
I have often wondered if Nora Ephron didn’t speak truth after all to the ‘men of timber and caliber’ (apologies to the late Ozumba Mbadiwe), who were swallowed up in that precedent-setting political earthquake, when he said: "I always read the last page of a book first, so that IF I die before I finish I'll know how it turned out!" Had they but read – and taken to heart A Man of the People – it would have taken care of them! For we mustn’t ever forget that “the stories people tell have a way of taking care of them” (Barry Lopez).
But I’m jumping way ahead of my thesis. Back in secondary school when I first ‘did’ it – like I did books of every sort with my peers: oh yes – we did books! – I waved aside A Man of the People as ‘the hilarious Achebe.’ No doubt about it: the book still sets one rollicking in wave after wave of girth-racking mirth. There’s simply no let-up to the fun it packs!
Grown up (which isn’t always the same thing as aging), rereading it now sets alarms clanging in my head. What the Mahatma MK Gandhi said is really true: ‘Politics is too important to be left in the hands of politicians’! My thesis: To get things right, who better than the writer to take them up to pursue right to their logical end, for the benefit of all?
I think Achebe is uncanny, simply put. All right, it’s his writing that is. But recall his ‘Too Dangerous for Silence’ speech just before the crisis in his home state Anambra came to a full head? Now, that’s what I call uncanny! If only people would read, they’d be ready…
A Man of the People even has talk of why a headcount around here (another is due in late March) may turn out to be guesswork, and a calculated one at that! In a wry aside that has direct bearing on political permutations in the realm, the writer has the people’s thinking–represented by the narrator’s father–cast in the following microstory from this political odyssey:
…I know some foreigners think we are funny with figures. One day when I was in the university, an old District Officer with whom my father had worked long ago came to our house…[for] a call on his old interpreter. As they talked in the parlour my younger half-brothers and sisters kept up an endless procession in front of the strange visitor until he was constrained to ask my father how many children he had.
‘About fifteen,’ said my father.
‘About? Surely you must know.’
My father grinned and talked about other things. Of course he knew how many children he had but people don’t go counting their children as they do animals and yams. And the same I fear goes for our country’s population. [Pg. 111]
The political party in power in A Man of the People is ‘Peoples Organisational Party’, P.O.P. Now try ‘drawing out’ the difference between ‘O’ and ‘D’! Its main opponent (apposite, actually) is ‘Progressive Alliance Party’, P.A.P, described in the book as ‘weak and disorganised’. You know I know what that one is harbinger of! There’s yet a 3rd – a mélange of hotheaded eggheads to which the hero of A Man of the People is drawn: principally for vendetta over the loss of his girlfriend – to a minister in whose house he’d been an invited guest! This party is simply interested in securing a beachhead for times to come. But it seems its leadership can only speak from both sides of the mouth. Not so for our hero, who becomes indifferent with the whole scheme of things at the end.
Who then is ‘A Man of the People’? Is he the one who ‘performs’ in private for pockets? [Let the reader understand.] And further in bed for – or with; I do not have the details – people’s daughters-at-large, peers of his own daughters?
Now, just when will it be the turn of ‘the man for the people’, one who will truly PERFORM: especially to make power generation and distribution the norm in the land – and damn the bludgeoning generator sets and diesel-vending mafias ravaging the land? Personally, the noise-and-slick from that twosome is getting to me: Help, somebody!
Maybe that’s why I’m shouting and thrashing about to get this out. But I’m told the people like it so! So, people, I’m afraid the verdict is in: ‘A people get the leadership they deserve.’ Or is it: ‘A people deserve the leadership they get’? Nna, I suppose it’s all of the above bo.
Right now Nigeria stands at a crossroads, a make-or-mar socio-political transition. But maybe that’s too drastically hilarious a conclusion to reach…yet. But again, time will tell. It did in ’66.
My work of late is to help engender a culture of reading in the land. Believe me, it’s its own reward. And this reading culture must be, I always insist, principally of stories. ‘Stories,’ said Chinua Achebe, ‘are not just meant to make us smile [or, smirk]… Our life depends on them.’
According to art critic Kenneth Burke: ‘Stories are equipment for living’ – the spells that compel us to go on. These make up the infrastructure of our ‘belief system’ with which, says Forbes publisher Rich Karlgaard – if it’s the right one – ‘we can predict the future.’ A Man of the People is right on cue here for predicting Nigeria’s future, I submit.
From my recent reading of the book, I’m now really desperate to get its story into the consciousness of the people it speaks so squarely to, to their Ego. For, according to Freudian psychology, this is the part of the mind with which we think and take action. From there it should percolate into the Id: the part of the mind that is completely unconscious but has hidden needs and desires. Desires for change…
I’m convinced the required solution lies in dramatizing the story professionally to yield an audio book. ‘Talking book’, I think, will be more telling a term for the African! Thus would the cycle be complete: Oral (its proto-state) to Written (its present form) to Aural (the projected format). See? On the archetypical ‘Israelite journey’ model – a national odyssey precipitated by crippling unbelief and dreadful nonchalance, much like ours – perhaps then there’ll be a ‘settling in’.
Big time publishers Random House has done it for even the most staid writing in their stable to bestseller writing, like Michael Crichton’s. And I’ve enjoyed quite a few Left Behind Series by Tyndale House in that format. The art has been ‘finished’ – no reservations as to ‘publishing sense’ whatsoever. I hope powers that be here get the point enough to act on it!
People are naturally curious. If they like the ‘talking book’, they’ll want to see it in print as well. Much like people go all out to secure the lyrics to songs they’re taken with, which they then refer to over and over again. At least until the next rave release!
Having proposed a toast to A Man of the People on its 40th, the other aspect of my present work is to move for its induction into the Channels Outstanding Books – COB – List. I hope you will come to agree with me that the story is both succulent and serious enough to sink ones mental teeth into again and again. As for what’s in it for the writer, I’ll advise that his literary agent begin pursuing a deal with publishing houses with a history of making a success of audio books – in time for the author’s 76th birthday come November 19th.
‘Faith comes by hearing’, states the Good Book (the same way fear makes its entrance into the human heart, mind you). Karlgaard writes: ‘Beliefs have consequences, which are sometimes harsh’ – but there are some others that are enabling. The people can be made conscious of what’s really up (for grabs?) when any zealous lot shows up, panting to romp with their polity, claiming to have elixirs for her teething and other growing up pains, etc, etc.
With George Santayana clanging in their ear – ‘those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it’ – the people will then wag this book in the face of the political lot to say, Caveat actor: ‘Let the doer beware.’ For, now: We are aware!
Meantime, 3 happy cheers to A Man of the People at 40, when a new life will begin!
SMS or email your endorsements or reservations on A Man of the People for its inclusion on the COB List.
(Indicate Name, Location & Gender)
GSM: +234(0) 8023920443
Email: mainasara@gmail.com
‘Deleke Adeyemi Host of The Book Club on Channels TV will be doing an appreciation of A Man of the People on-air during March.
Come & Load Up!
BOOKATERIA®tv Chef: ‘Deleke
Reading maketh a FULL man… – Sir Francis Bacon
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