The goodness of honey...

(Published on 30 January 2007 in 'Women at Work' - W @ W - a supplement of the Daily Mirror, Colombo, Sri Lanka)

Insomnia is something that many live with. A friend of mine was dousing herself with pills to keep from staying awake all night… but with not much relief. “Believe in grandmother's remedies?” I asked her on one of the many occasions when she seemed exhausted and frayed. I could have suggested just about anything – for she was ready to try whatever it would take to catch some shut eye. Old fashioned cures have been proven effective by modern medical research. The physicians of Rome, prescribed honey to their patients who had trouble sleeping. Even to this day, a glass of warm milk sweetened with honey is believed to help ensure a restful night. Honey acts as a sedative and is also very useful in bed wetting disorders.

Various ingredients of honey have helped it to become a natural product with high nutritional and medicinal value. Honey is composed of sugars like glucose and fructose and minerals like magnesium, potassium, calcium, sodium chlorine, sulphur, iron and phosphate. It contains vitamins B1, B2, C, B6, B5 and B3 as well as small quantities of copper, iodine, and zinc. Several kinds of hormones are also present.

The medicinal quality, taste, colour and aroma of honey differs according to the geographical area and the species of plants from which it has been collected. As per Ayurveda there are eight types of honey depending on the type of bee which collects it. ‘Makshika,’ is honey collected by small honey bees and is considered as the best with immense medicinal properties. From time immemorial, honey has always played an important role in the pursuit of health and vitality. It is said that Hippocrates, the father of modern medicine, realised the healing power of honey way back in the 1st century BC and prescribed it regularly to his patients. Honey has various therapeutic uses and is known to have the following qualities:

– Healing quality
The most ancient use of honey is as a healing agent for wounds, burns and cuts. During the First World War, honey was mixed with cod liver oil to dress soldier’s wounds. Even today, medical professionals from Eastern European countries continue to dress wounds with honey. Honey prevents further infection of wounds and burns. Modern science acknowledges honey as an anti-microbial agent. This property enables it to arrest infection.

– Remedy for sore throat and cold
Since honey arrests infection it is the best natural remedy for sore throats, coughs and general cold. Honey has long been used in various natural sore throat remedies. Even today many cough syrups and preparations for sore throats are honey based.

– Contains antioxidants that support good health
Honey contains antioxidants that help to eliminate the free radicals in our bodies that contribute towards many chronic diseases. Antioxidants are non-nutritive agents that can decrease the activity of cell-damaging free radicals. The darker varieties of honey contain large quantities of a particular antioxidant called flavonoids. ‘Pinocembrin,’ a unique antioxidant is only found in honey.

– Acts as a preservative
Honey does not spoil and is a preservative. Honey slows chemical reactions that cause foods to get rancid. This beneficial characteristic of honey is due to its antioxidant agents.

– Energy provider
As honey contains sugars which are quickly absorbed by our digestive system and converted into energy, it can be used as an instant energiser. Honey is more energy-packed and sweeter than sugar. However it has a low calorie level. Honey rapidly diffuses through the blood. Its free sugar molecules make the brain function better since the brain is the largest consumer of sugar. Honey thus reduces mental fatigue.

– Supports blood formation
Honey provides energy needed by the body for blood formation. In addition, it helps in cleansing the blood. It has some positive effects in regulating and facilitating blood circulation.

– Enhances Skin
Honey is a wonderful beauty aid that nourishes the skin and the hair. Antioxidant-rich honey plays an important role in skin care and is used to produce alpha hydroxy acids, a vital ingredient in skin creams and moisturisers. These acids are said to help skin shed dead surface cells and increase the rate of cell renewal. Honey also helps the skin retain its moisture.

Honey restores the damaged skin and gives soft, young looks. Here are some great beauty tips from the desk of Miss Know-All. Now don’t complain that I did not share my beauty secrets with you my ‘dahlings.’

þ Honey mixed with ground almonds makes an excellent facial cleansing scrub.
þ Mix 1 teaspoon of honey, with 1 teaspoon of olive oil and a 1/2 teaspoon of lemon juice to treat dry patches of skin.
þ Honey is good for chapped lips as well as for acne because it has antibacterial properties.
þ A tablespoon of honey whisked together with an egg white, 1 teaspoon of glycerine and 1/4 cup of flour makes a brilliant firming mask.
þ Mix 2 tablespoons of honey with 2 teaspoons of whole milk to create an effective moisturising pack.
þ For lustrous and shiny hair, mix 1 teaspoon of honey into 4 cups of warm water and use as hair rinse.

Ever doubted the goodness of honey?
To quote Martin Elkort: "Nobody disputes the role of the dog as man’s best friend, but a convincing argument can be also made for the honeybee."

Miss Know-All
miss.know.all@gmail.com

Know your sunscreen - SPF and more!

(Published on 16 January 2007 in 'Women at Work' - W @ W - a supplement of the Daily Mirror, Colombo, Sri Lanka)

There is one thing we people living in this part of the world love – smothering ourselves with a whole lot of creams and lotions that promise to make us… “fair and lovely.” Donning layers of foundation to camouflage ourselves is another obsession. My Aunt has been using a whitening cream for years. I hesitate to tell her that it has made little or no difference. I bought her a bottle of a sunscreen lotion the last time I went overseas. She looked at the jar with great suspicion and it lay on her dresser for months. What she failed to realise is that what is more important than the bleaching cream is the regular use of a sunscreen lotion.

A sunscreen, also known as sun block is a substance that helps protect the skin from the sun's harmful rays. It reflects and absorbs ultraviolet radiation. Lotions or creams that contain sunscreens are used not just to protect the skin from tanning but to help protect the skin from premature aging and damage that may lead to skin cancer. The best sunscreens protect against both UVB (ultraviolet radiation with wavelength between 290 and 320 nanometres), which can cause sunburn, and UVA (between 320 and 400 nanometres), which damages the skin with more long-term effects, such as premature skin aging.

But does one go to a supermarket and pick up the sunscreen lotion that promises the world – or does one pick up something as per one’s complexion and requirements? Sun screen lotions are graded as per their SPF value. SPF or - sun protection factor is a number representing the amount of sun that the lotion has the ability to block. That is SPF is a scale for rating the level of sunburn protection that a sunscreen product can provide. The higher the SPF, the more sunburn protection it gives. A sunscreen with an SPF of 15 filters 92% of the UVB. In other words the SPF 15 sunscreen allows a person to stay out in the sun 15 times longer. Sunscreens with an SPF value of 2 - 11 give minimal protection against sunburns. While, sunscreens with an SPF of 12 - 29 give moderate protection. And those with an SPF of 30 or higher give maximum protection against sunburn.

This brings us to the next question. How would one choose the best suited sunscreen for oneself? The answer lies in the colour of your skin as well as the nature of your work. Other factors to be considered are the skin type (sensitive skin), the amount of sunscreen applied and frequency of re-application as well as activities in which one engages for example, swimming. If your work requires you to be out in the sun for longer periods - the best sunscreen would be one that blocks enough UV radiation to protect your skin for the longest possible time. The chart below can be used as a guideline to obtain the proper protection:

.SPF 30 – 50: Fair; blonde, light brown hair; unexposed skin is white; freckles. Tans lightly and usually develops a painful burn quickly.

.SPF 15 – 20: Average Caucasian; unexposed skin is white. Develops an average tan and moderately burns.

.SPF 6 - 15: Medium complexion; unexposed skin is light brown; usually with dark hair and dark eyes. Tans easily and burns minimally.

.SPF 2 – 10: Dark, unexposed skin is brown. Tans easily and rarely burns.

Most sunscreens work by containing either an organic chemical compound that absorbs ultraviolet light or an opaque material that reflects light, or a combination of both. Absorptive materials are referred to as chemical blocks, whereas opaque materials that reflect are called physical blocks. Research has shown that the best protection is achieved by application 15–30 minutes before exposure to the sun, followed by reapplication 15–30 minutes after the exposure begins. Further reapplication is only necessary after activities such as swimming or excessive sweating. However it is advisable to consult a skin specialist when choosing a proper sunscreen especially if you have sensitive skin and are prone to photosensitivity.

Interestingly, clothing also provides protection from the sun. The ‘protectiveness’ of clothing can also be measured by SPF. The following are SPF's of various types of clothing:
Stockings - SPF 2
Caps / Hats / Shade - SPF 3-6
Light summer clothing - SPF 6.5
Thick cottons/ sun-protective clothing - up to SPF 30

And to my Aunt who has just consumed yet another jar of whitening cream…
“Its beauty that captures your attention; personality which captures your heart.”
You need to start focussing more on enhancing your personality!

Miss Know-All
miss.know.all@gmail.com

Netizen Speak

(Published on 9 January 2007 in 'Women at Work' - W @ W - a supplement of the Daily Mirror, Colombo, Sri Lanka)

Netizens, referring to citizens belonging to the world of Internet come from a different planet for not only do they speak a strange language, they are also governed by their own set of rules and regulations. While we the citizens of mother earth are still coming to terms with what we call disputes, quarrels, clashes and battles, the netizens are fighting what they call a Flame War. While the rest of us think that Archie was a comic book, the Netizens believe that Archie is a tool (software) for finding files stored on anonymous FTP sites. While we, the ordinary are still trying to cope with cockroaches and mosquitoes, our netizen friends speak of spiders that they also call worms or crawlers.

Eddy Peters could not have been more correct when he said that: “Not only does the English Language borrow words from other languages; it sometimes chases them down dark alleys, hits them over the head, and goes through their pockets.” This holds true for the Netizen language as well. Except, that this time around, - it’s the English Language that’s at the receiving end.

If you by now are already fidgeting in your seat wondering what this is all about – here’s an opportunity for you to bring yourself up to speed on the various terms that are used online by the netizens.

Backbone: A high-speed line or series of connections, that forms a major pathway within a network.

Bandwidth: How much stuff you can send through a connection. Usually measured in bits-per-second.

Bit (Binary DigIT): The smallest unit of computerised data.

Browser: A software that is used to look at various kinds of Internet resources.

Byte: A set of Bits that represent a single character. Usually there are 8 Bits in a Byte.

Cookie: Refers to a piece of information sent by a Web Server to a Web Browser that the Browser software is expected to save and to send back to the Server whenever the browser makes additional requests from the Server.

Cyberpunk: Cyberpunk was originally a cultural sub-genre of science fiction taking place in a not-so-distant, dystopian, over-industrialized society. The term grew out of the work of William Gibson and Bruce Sterling and has evolved into a cultural label encompassing many different kinds of human, machine, and punk attitudes.

Cyberspace: Term originated by author William Gibson in his novel Neuromancer the word Cyberspace is currently used to describe the whole range of information resources available through computer networks.

Finger: An Internet software tool for locating people on other Internet sites. Finger is also sometimes used to give access to non-personal information, but the most common use is to see if a person has an account at a particular Internet site.

Fire Wall: A Fire Wall is a combination of hardware and software that separates a LAN into two or more parts for security purposes.

Flame War: A Flame War is when an online discussion degenerates into a series of personal attacks against the debaters, rather than discussion of their positions. A heated exchange.

HTML (HyperText Markup Language): The coding language used to create Hypertext documents for use on the World Wide Web.

IP Number: (Internet Protocol Number): Sometimes called a dotted quad. A unique number consisting of 4 parts separated by dots, e.g. 176.143.248.2. Every machine that is on the Internet has a unique IP number.

ISP (Internet Service Provider): An institution that provides access to the Internet in some form, usually for money.

Modem (MOdulator, DEModulator): A device that you connect to your computer and to a phone line that allows the computer to talk to other computers through the phone system.

Port: First and most generally, a port is a place where information goes into or out of a computer. A port also refers to a number that is part of a URL, appearing after a colon (:) right after the domain name. And finally, a port refers to translating a piece of software to bring it from one type of computer system to another.

Spam: An inappropriate attempt to use a mailing list, or other networked communications facility as if it was a broadcast medium by sending the same message to a large number of people who didn’t ask for it.

Spider: A software robot that serves a search engine by exploring the net, collecting web page addresses and page contents, and following links from them to other addresses to collect still more web information. Also known as a worm or crawler.

URL (Uniform Resource Locator): The standard way to give the address of any resource on the Internet that is part of the World Wide Web (WWW).

Words and terms from the Netizen language are now being embraced by the English language as they are now in common use. In the words of John French:

“Words are the leaves of the tree of language, of which, if some fall away, a new succession takes their place.”


Miss Know-All
miss.know.all@gmail.com

The significance of the Christmas Tree

(Published on 2 January 2007 in 'Women at Work' - W @ W - a supplement of the Daily Mirror, Colombo, Sri Lanka)

Just attended a lovely Christmas party - an occasion that holds a special place in my heart right from when I was a child. The spirit was one of festive cheer and bonhomie. The MC on the mike asked the children if they knew the significance of the Christmas Tree. Surprisingly none of the kids had any idea. Then the question was put forward to the adults. Everyone shuffled uncomfortably in their chairs. A Christmas Tree is such an integral part of Christmas – but sadly nobody was really sure of its significance. Has it become just a decorative addition to the celebration?

The Master of Ceremony asked everyone to look at the Christmas Tree again with an open heart and listen to what it told us. He said the triangle shape denoted the trinity. Further the tree pointed upwards towards God. Being an evergreen the tree indicated that life was eternal. The needles grew upwards like hands praising God. The lights on the tree represented heaven and the gifts around it represented charity, love and compassion. This was truly beautiful – and suddenly the Christmas Tree came to life and had a truly different meaning.

A tree is known to represent the tree of life and the tree of knowledge of good and evil. It is believed that the Christmas tree originated in Germany. The earliest record of an evergreen tree being used and decorated for Christmas is 1521 in the German region of Alsace. In the fourteenth century, churches held plays to tell the people in villages and towns stories from the Bible. The play that was held every December 24 was about the Garden of Eden and showed how Eve was tempted by the serpent and how she picked the apple from the forbidden tree. A major problem was to find an apple tree with needles on it in the middle of winter. A solution was found by cutting down an evergreen tree, probably a spruce or pine, and tying apples onto it. The tree was also decorated with round white wafers to remind that even though Adam and Eve were expelled from Paradise, the birth of baby Jesus would bring redemption. The idea of a Christmas tree decorated with apples enchanted people so much that before long many families were setting up Paradise trees, in their own homes. The custom persisted long after the plays were no longer performed.

Ever since, red and green, the colours of apples hanging on the tree have been the main colours of the festive season. History records that the first person who decorated an indoor Christmas tree was Martin Luther. The first Christmas tree in Windsor Castle was brought by Prince Albert, the husband of Queen Victoria, in the year 1834.

As the years passed the trees were decorated by hanging gilded nuts, gingerbread cookies and marzipan candies, shaped like fruits and vegetables from the boughs. Brightly decorated eggshells, cut in half and filled with candies, were set in the tree. The wafers that once hung on the Paradise tree were replaced with cookies in the form of hearts, bells, angels and stars. With time, the cookies were replaced with decorations made out of thin, painted metal. When people combined the decorations with candles, they created the Christmas tree that we know of today.

Decorating the tree is a special task that is shared by everyone in the family and is supposed to bring about a special bonding between family members. These days sparkling ornaments, electric lights, and shining tinsel are used as decorations. Glittering with colour and light and topped with a star or an angel, the green Christmas tree symbolises that life is eternal. The presents below the tree are reminders of the love and close ties that are shared by families and friends.

"O Tannenbaum" – a German folk song says:
Not only in summer's glow,
But 'mid the winters frost and snow
O faithful pine, O faithful pine,
You're true and green forever.

Season’s greetings to all the readers of W@W. May the beauty of this joyous season fill your heart and home with peace and happiness.

Miss Know-All
miss.know.all@gmail.com