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How to Live to 100!

floating market by kalandrakas.

Photo by  kalandrakas

Ay! Ay! Ay! Check it out, this was swiped from Yahoo. It’s all about sharing. I read this article, and I realized that it is common sense. Not to say that this was an article not needed. It seems like we constantly need to be reminded about things that may seem like common sense. Everyone knows that we need to drink more water, we need to sleep, we need to eat more vegetables…but we seem to forget or get lazy or don’t care. Anywho, here is some good common sense…

Healthy habits to live long
It takes 14 to 21 days of repetitive behavior to form a new pattern in your brain. Once the pattern is formed, it becomes an automatic behavioral response. As you develop new healthy habits, they will begin to replace bad habits. Here are some of the most transformative longevity habits:

1. Drink more water
Drink 8 glasses of fresh, filtered water every day. Water is very important for proper lymphatic drainage and hydrating the cells to prevent buildup of toxic waste products. Your safest bet is filtered water. The best kind of filtration processes for removing contaminants use activated charcoal, which removes the impurities but leaves the water-soluble minerals. Avoid water softeners, which take away essential minerals. To learn about a high-performance filtration system that I recommend, click here.

2. Eat like a centenarian
The rural community of Rugao, four hours north of Shanghai, enjoys the reputation as the “longevity county of China” because there are over 200 centenarians in the small region — the highest number per 1,000 residents anywhere in China. Rugao residents eat mostly fish, vegetables, mushrooms, seaweed, corn and buckwheat. There was virtually no meat or poultry present in the majority of their diet. Scientists have confirmed the health benefits of a diet high in fish and vegetables and low in animal products.

Know what foods to enjoy and what to avoid:

• The very best thing you can do for your health is to eat a wide array of colorful fruits and vegetables every day.

• Eat fish and cut back on meat and poultry.

• Choose the right fats. Cut back on saturated fats like butter and avoid all trans fats. Instead, choose mono-saturated fats: olive, sesame, canola, flax, and fish oils.

• Avoid all refined sugars.

3. Restore with regular rest
Get 7 to 8 hours of quality sleep every night.

4. Take the stairs!
Take a walk. Go for a swim. Join the gym. Find an exercise activity that works for you and stick to it, practicing at least four times a week for thirty minutes a session. Regular exercise can strengthen your immune system, uplift your mood, maintain joint mobility, increase energy - the list goes on and on!

5. Manage your stress.
Stress is the root cause of most of the diseases that shorten our life span. Meditation is a powerful way to manage your stress level. For the best results, meditate every day. Start with five minutes and work your way up to fifteen or twenty minutes. (See 3 Easy Beginner Mediation Techniques.) For a guided CD that is filled with meditations for living to 100, click here. Another option? Get your exercise and stress-management all in one by beginning a tai chi practice.

6. Detoxify your surroundings.
With environmental factors causing ever more damage to our well-being, it is important to know what to look out for and avoid. For starters, you can avoid many dangerous chemical compounds if you buy organic foods and use glass and recycled paper products. In addition, it is beneficial to undergo periodic detoxification treatments with special dietary and herbal regimens to lower your body’s toxic load. An herbal blend that is specially formulated for helping your body detoxify is Internal Cleanse. Also learn how to eliminate the toxins with this 5-Step Detox to Revitalize You.

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If you were a student at one of our nation’s school, which lunch would you rather eat? http://bit.ly/33foWN

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10 ways you can make a difference in changing our food system. This was taken via the food inc website. Please visit this site for more info NOW!

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Fruit Aesthetics

While frequenting another blog, I found the above pictures of fruit post-it notes! I just love these. I want to buy some! These were created by the following Japanese design company D-Bros

Check more photos below!

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D-Bros. Japanese Design.

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Obesogens: Some Cases of Childhood obesity may be linked to exposure to chemicals, not McDonald’s…

 

…some of these chemicals include pesticides. If only everybody went organic. I have a dream.

Read the entire article here.

Highlights of the article.

 “In 2005 scientists in Spain reported that the more pesticides children were exposed to as fetuses, the greater their risk of being overweight as toddlers. And last January scientists in Belgium found that children exposed to higher levels of PCBs and DDE (the breakdown product of the pesticide DDT) before birth were fatter than those exposed to lower levels. Neither study proves causation, but they “support the findings in experimental animals,” says Newbold. They “show a link between exposure to environmental chemicals … and the development  of obesity.”

 “This fall, scientists from NIH, the Food and Drug Administration, the Environmental Protection Agency, and academia will discuss obesogens at the largest-ever government-sponsored meeting on the topic. “The main message is that obesogens are a factor that we hadn’t thought about at all before this,” says Blumberg. But they’re one that could clear up at least some of the mystery of why so many of us put on pounds that refuse to come off.”

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*FOOD, INC.*

I saw Food Inc. back in June, and I thought Robert Kenner did a great job.

Food Inc, directed by Robert Kenner, is a great movie created in efforts to solve the mystery of where our food comes from and what is in our food. You’ll be surprised at some of the answers. Watch the Trailer.

My extended review is coming soon. Visit the site for the movie Here

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A Devastating Drought Sweeps Across Kenya

Photo by, Jehad Nga, see the slide show here or scroll down below.

I peeped this article on the New York Times website today. Article was written by Jeffrey Gettleman, see it here or scroll down below.

Some highlights:

“The twin hearts of Kenya’s economy, agriculture and tourism, are imperiled by a devastating drought sweeping across Kenya, killing livestock, crops, and children. The arid lands of northern Kenya have been the hardest hit. In some villages it has not rained in years. Women with a bag of distributed food.”

 

“Turkana children, dressed in little more than a sheet, are hiking 20 miles for a gallon of water. Turkana men are abandoning families, simply vanishing into the desert because they cannot face the shame of being unable to feed their children. Many people here now have nothing to eat but the chalky, bitter fruits that grow wild in the desert. They smash them open with rocks to get at the barely edible part inside.” 

September 8, 2009

Lush Land Dries Up, Withering Kenya’s Hopes

LOKORI, Kenya — The sun somehow feels closer here, more intense, more personal. As Philip Lolua waits under a tree for a scoop of food, heat waves dance up from the desert floor, blurring the dead animal carcasses sprawled in front of him.

So much of his green pasture land has turned to dust. His once mighty herd of goats, sheep and camels have died of thirst. He says his 3-year-old son recently died of hunger. And Mr. Lolua does not look to be far from death himself.

“If nobody comes to help us, I will die here, right here,” he said, emphatically patting the earth with a cracked, ancient-looking hand.

A devastating drought is sweeping across Kenya, killing livestock, crops and children. It is stirring up tensions in the ramshackle slums where the water taps have run dry, and spawning ethnic conflict in the hinterland as communities fight over the last remaining pieces of fertile grazing land.

The twin hearts of Kenya’s economy, agriculture and tourism, are especially imperiled. The fabled game animals that safari-goers fly thousands of miles to see are keeling over from hunger and the picturesque savanna is now littered with an unusually large number of sun-bleached bones.

Ethiopia. Sudan. Somalia. Maybe even Niger and Chad. These countries have become almost synonymous with drought and famine. But Kenya? This nation is one of the most developed in Africa, home to a typically robust economy, countless United Nations offices and thousands of aid workers.

The aid community here has been predicting a disaster for months, saying that the rains had failed once again and that this could be the worst drought in more than a decade. But the Kenyan government, paralyzed by infighting and political maneuvering, seemed to shrug off the warnings.

Some government officials have even been implicated in a scandal to illegally sell off thousands of tons of the nation’s grain reserves as a famine was looming.

So far, a huge, international aid operation to avert mass hunger has not kicked in, or at least not to the degree needed. The United Nations World Food Program recently said that nearly four million Kenyans — about a tenth of the population — urgently needed food.

“Red lights are flashing across the country,” the agency said.

But donor nations have been slow to respond, and a United Nations-led emergency appeal for $576 million is less than half financed.

Part of the reason may be the growing disappointment with Kenya’s leaders. They have been poked and prodded by Western ambassadors — and their own citizens — to overhaul the justice system, the police force and the electoral commission. The outcry followed a widely discredited election in 2007 that set off a wave of violence, claiming more than 1,000 lives.

But Kenyan politicians seem more preoccupied with positioning themselves for the next election in 2012 than with cleaning up the mess from the last one. Few reforms have been accomplished and corruption continues to flourish, as the grain scandal currently under investigation has made painfully clear.

“At a time like this, we need donor confidence,” said Nicholas Wasunna, a humanitarian adviser for the aid group World Vision. But he said that donors might be put off by “the politics of what’s happening in the country.”

The arid lands of northern Kenya have been the hardest hit. In some villages, it has not rained in years. But the drought has become a problem nationwide.

In Baringo, in the Rift Valley, people are eating cactus because corn and wheat have gotten so expensive. In Nyeri, in central Kenya, some have turned to pig feed. In Nairobi, the capital, even the fanciest neighborhoods often go without running water for a week. And it is dark too. Kenya relies on hydropower for electricity, so less rainfall means less power.

The Kenyan government has begun to respond, organizing some highly publicized food deliveries to famine-prone areas. But many Kenyan officials almost seem in denial.

Chaunga Mwachaunga is the acting district officer in Lokori, an especially parched town in northern Kenya. He bristled when presented with reports that dozens of children in his area had recently died of hunger.

“Hunger? How do we know they died of hunger?” he said. “I know there’s not enough food for people, but we can be sure that nobody will die of hunger while the Kenyan government is here. Show me the death certificates.”

It is hard to find any death certificates when there are few hospitals. Entering this area is like stepping back in time.

Lokori is home to the Turkana, who cling tightly to their traditions. The women wear wreaths of beads and shave their hair into Mohawks. The men scar their backs in puffy patterns and wear disc-like bracelets that double as razors. They live in gumdrop-shaped huts scattered across the sandy plateau and herd animals to survive.

Even in a good year, life here is extremely precarious. But this year malnutrition rates among the Turkana have soared way past emergency thresholds.

Turkana children, dressed in little more than a sheet, are hiking 20 miles for a gallon of water. Turkana men are abandoning families, simply vanishing into the desert because they cannot face the shame of being unable to feed their children. Many people here now have nothing to eat but the chalky, bitter fruits that grow wild in the desert. They smash them open with rocks to get at the barely edible part inside.

World Vision is distributing emergency rations to the worst-off areas. The other day, Mr. Lolua, who said he lost his 3-year-old son in June, waited with a group of men under a thorn tree for a scoop of porridge.

Another whisper of a man named Ekitela was so skinny and his hands shook so much he could barely hold the cup he had been given.

“I’m not as old as I look,” he said. “It’s just I don’t have any food.”

He then started choking on the porridge, which was the color and texture of sand, and was rescued by a capful of water from his granddaughter.

Perhaps equally worrisome is the rising ethnic conflict. The Turkana call their neighbors, the Pokot, ”the enemy” and said intense clashes recently broke out because of the shrinking amount of grazing land. One Turkana woman said “the enemy” had killed her son, stolen all her animals and driven her off her land.

Meteorologists predict rains will be coming by October, and they may even bring the other extreme from present conditions. Another El Niño cycle is forecast, which after years of drought and earth baked to a rock-hard crust could bring the opposite problem: floods.

 
A VIDEO

Slide show by Jehad Nga, see it here.

“The twin hearts of Kenya’s economy, agriculture and tourism, are imperiled by a devastating drought sweeping across Kenya, killing livestock, crops, and children. The arid lands of northern Kenya have been the hardest hit. In some villages it has not rained in years. Women with a bag of distributed food.”