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KICK THE WORRY HABIT

Most of us WORRY.

Some people will even tell you that you SHOULD worry!

But worrying is worse than USELESS!

Firstly, it attracts misfortune.

Secondly, it is bad for your health!

So what should you do about worry?

POSTPONE it!

TAKE ACTION first – and postpone worry indefinitely.

That’s what effective people do.

Here is your mission for the next 24 hours:

Whenever you want to worry, ask yourself, “What is the problem RIGHT NOW?”

Guess what you’ll find …

Unless you are in a life threatening situation, you DON’T have a problem.

Look at your life.

Has there ever been a situation you didn’t survive?

There hasn’t!

You can HANDLE the present.

It is just the FUTURE that gives you trouble!

So your mission is to focus on the present.

Your mind will want to drift into the future.

Your mind will want to ask questions like: “What happens if …?”

Drag it back to the PRESENT.

Tell yourself:

“If there is SOMETHING I can do now, I will do it.”

“If there is NOTHING I can do right now, I refuse to worry.”

Make this your motto:

“I take whatever action I can now – and I postpone worry!”

“I deal with problems MOMENT BY MOMENT.”

In a 5 points article Greg Soltis give the 5 keys to happiness.

If you’re not happy and you know it read along.

You’ve watched “Seinfeld” re-runs, splurged on yourself and downed pints of Ben and Jerry’s. Nothing’s helping. Maybe you’re one of the 20 million Americans diagnosed with depression, you’re bottoming out or you just want something to improve your day.

Here are five ways — some admittedly challenging — to help you get that much-needed mood boost:

1. 1. Pick good parents
2. 2. Give it away
3. 3. Ponder this
4. 4. Work out
5. 5. Live long

In spite of the literature that are published there on, I am of opinion that there is only one way to achieve happiness: just be Happy

The question will then be: How?

Andrew Matthews who I cited earlier, have 7 lessons to guide you in the’ How’:

Lesson 2: SUPPORT YOURSELF!

Some people constantly CRITICISE themselves.

They say things like:

“I’m FAT.”

“I’m BORING.”

“Watch me SCREW THIS UP!”

There are two problems with criticizing yourself:

Firstly:

You BECOME what you think about.

So when you criticize your own performance, it gets worse!

Secondly:

Criticizing yourself IRRITATES other people.

Eventually, even your friends will want to smack you in the mouth!

Self criticism is not humility, it’s stupidity.

So this is your job for the next 24 hours:

Notice what you say about yourself.

Starting today, say ONLY GOOD THINGS about you!

If you have nothing good to say, say nothing!

And the result?

1. You’ll feel better.

2. You won’t irritate other people.

3. Your performance will improve.

Just today, support yourself!

You may choose to make it a lifelong habit!

This morning I am so full of blogging items.

I wanted to blog on the Eiffel tower which celebrated its 120^th anniversary and the X^th adieu concert of Johnny Halladay in Paris whilst the remnant of my last night reading of Kishore Mahbubani of the unconscious pressure that the Americans have placed on the Islamic world prior to 9/11, still occupied my mind and I am having all my wits in the preparation of Christian Monjou’s arrival for his seminar.

Who is Christian Monjou?

Professor of ‘Ecole Normale Superieure’, he will be discussing Power, Legitimacy and Authority in organisation with a group of CEO’s.

As defined by William Oncken

What is Authority?

I define authority as follows: “Authority is whatever you possess at the moment that causes someone else to do what you want him to do at the moment.”

If you as a supervisor, manager, or executive have enough authority, as defined above, to get done what you want done, you have all the authority you need at the moment.

The authority you need is made up of four components:

First, Competence. Authority of competence has to be acquired. It evokes confidence. The more competent the other person knows you are, the more confident he will be that you know what you are talking about and the more likely he will be to follow your orders, requests, or suggestions. He will think of you as an authority in the matter under consideration and will feel it risky to ignore your wishes. If he does not have this confidence, he will, at best, give you lip service or, at worst, ignore you or sabotage you.

Second, Position. Authority of position has to be delegated. It evokes deference. This component gives you the right to tell someone, “Do it or else.” It has teeth. “The boss wants it” is a bugle call that can snap many an office or shop into action. His position carries authority that demands deference. Only the “gambler” will capriciously ignore it.

Third, Personality. Authority of personality has to be developed. It evokes rapport. The easier it is for the other fellow to talk to you, to listen to you, or to work with you, the easier he will find it to respond to your wishes. The harder you are to do business with, the harder it will be for him to find satisfaction in doing what you want him to do.

He already has one full-time problem—to succeed in his own job. If, in addition, he finds you difficult to talk to, listen to, or work with, he has two full-time problems. If both combined are too much for him, he will not solve either problem well. At worst, he may fail at solving the first problem because he is too preoccupied with the second. In that event he certainly will not be doing what you want him to do. If, on the other hand, he has no “second problem,” he may do more than you expected. It takes a lot of effort to say “no” to someone with whom it is easy to do business.

Fourth, Character. Authority of character has to be cultivated. It evokes respect. This component is your “credit rating” with other people as to your integrity, reliability, honesty, loyalty, sincerity, personal morals, and ethics. Obviously you will get more and better action from a man who has respect for you character than from one who hasn’t. He acquires this respect (or lack of it) from the trail you leave behind you of promises kept or broken, expectations fulfilled or forgotten, statements corroborated or shown to be false.

You get no credit for being honest when it costs you nothing to be honest, for being dependable when it costs you nothing to be dependable. The measure other people place upon your character is how far you have been willing to put yourself out to maintain your record of honesty and dependability. This tells them at once how far they will want to put themselves out for you when the chips are down. The greater their respect, the farther they’ll go, and the greater is the component of character in your overall authority.

Why doesn’t higher management usually delegate complete authority of position to do the job? It’s simply a matter of risk.

How much authority will you, yourself, delegate to a man for whose character you do not have complete respect, or with whose personality you do not have complete rapport, or in whose competence you do not have complete confidence? Less than complete authority. And this will be less than he needs to do the job for which he is responsible!

However, as he earns more respect, rapport, and confidence from others, you will delegate to him correspondingly more authority. Eventually he may acquire from you all the authority of position he needs. I say “may” because he will, no doubt, be promoted before that happens and will have to start all over again with his new boss. This is one of the frustrations of success!

Three Immutable Laws

In getting others to do what you what them to do when you want them to do it, follow three immutable laws. First, lead from that component of your authority appropriate to what you want done, whom you want to do it, and the situation within which it must be done.

For example, let us say that you are drawing up your budget requirements for the upcoming fiscal year. Your aim is to get your boss to approve your budget estimate and make it stick when the budget committee finally meets to put the overall company budget together.

From which of the four components of your authority will you lead? Obviously not from position, as this is effective only on the men under you. So you decide for the moment you’d better lead from competence. You begin your presentation at “A” with every sign of not stopping until you get to “Z,” which appears to be an hour away at least. Realizing that he won’t be able to take it much longer, he interrupts you:

“This looks fine, Joe. A lot of work behind it. Characteristic of your approach to everything you do. Give me the ‘approval form.’ After all, you’ve never let me down in the past on these matters so I’ll be happy to sign it now.”

Caught unprepared for this immediate approval, you insist that he hear your argument to the bitter end. As you plod your pedantic way through your charts and tables, he becomes inwardly more and more annoyed. Finally he decides to beat you at your own game. Rising from his chair he purposely mistakes a flyspeck for a decimal point and asks why you take up his time with material that hasn’t even been proofread. With that he unceremoniously leaves for the club and a long weekend.

You had all the authority you needed to get his approval the moment after you entered the office. You won it on character but then lost it because you insisted on winning it on competence.

You did the right thing in coming fully armed with facts and figures. You did the wrong thing in not being willing to sense the man’s mood, the timing, and the situation—and in not switching immediately from one component of your authority to another.

The professional manager is both willing and able to make the required shift on the spot and takes pride and satisfaction in being able to do so. This way he usually has enough of the right kind of authority on tap to get his boss to do what he wants him to do when he wants him to do it. Second, be careful not to lead from one component to camouflage a weakness in another.

Suppose, for example, you are in a conference where a matter of policy is being debated. Before long you find yourself a one-man minority fighting with your back to the wall. Your one reply to the pleadings and the arguments of the others is that you are against the proposition “as a matter of principle.” This only aggravates them more, but you remain adamant. Eventually communication between you and them breaks down completely and the meeting is recessed. You console yourself by laying the entire impasse to your own strength of character, identifying yourself with the early Christian martyrs.

Without realizing it, you may have feigned strength of character to cover up a deficiency in personality. There need be no conflict between gaining the other man’s respect and, at the same time, maintaining rapport with him. The man who cannot conquer this conflict within himself, loses much of the authority his character may already have provided him. Moral: “Learn to disagree agreeably.” Third, do not lead from one component of your authority in such a way as to create a false impression about another component.

A person who is easy to listen to, easy to talk with, and easy to do business with (strong on personality) may be creating the impression that he is strong in competence. By picking up a few technical terms and borrowing a few statistics, he can double as a Ph.D. in economics to the point of fooling even the pros—for a while—but he loses his authority over the long run.

From time to time every supervisor, manager, and executive has to choose between being liked and being respected. The choice, then, is between leading from personality or from character. Lose a man’s respect, and it’s a long uphill pull to regain it if it can be regained at all. Lose a man’s liking for you, and it is a relatively easy matter to win him back. This is particularly important in management. The manager who is out to win a popularity contest will lose his authority in the quicksand of the compromise. If he is out primarily to win their respect, he can then go as far as he wishes in winning their friendship through effective human relations.

While you have not knowingly committed these errors, you may have been erroneously perceived by others as having committed them. This is just as damaging to your career as having intended to commit them. This is why it is so necessary to develop a sensitivity to choose the right component of your authority to use on the right person at the right time. It pays off in your ability to get the person to do what you want him to do when you want him to do it. It is this ability that constitutes your authority to manage.

Character Never Faileth

I have listed these four components of authority—competence, position, personality, and character—intentionally in a particular order. From the top down they follow the order in which they are critical to success in our careers.

When we apply for our first job we are asked, “What can you do?” Thus competence is the earliest component of success. We also get our first raise on this basis, if not our first promotion. Having demonstrated our competence, we are eventually selected for promotion to a supervisory position. Having demonstrated success as a supervisor, we are selected for promotion to middle management in the hope that we can succeed in a situation where personality carries more authority than position. Having achieved success as a middle manager, we are now considered for an executive position. At this level, the trail we have left behind us both inside and outside the company is the critical factor. In short, what is being looked for is a person of integrity who has the authority of character—in the eyes of scores, if not hundreds, of people.

At this point, it is of little importance how honest and full of integrity we and our colleagues think we are. Many an honest man has seemed to be dishonest merely because of a careless, though possibly well-intentioned, act. He suffers just as much as if he had been dishonest. The trail he has left behind him has already been interpreted by others as they have seen fit.

The most valuable component of your authority is documented in the trail you leave behind you—your character. Happy is the person who makes certain that his trail does not have confusing or misleading patterns which may look crooked to others, regardless of how they may appear to him. His own opinion about this doesn’t count at this crucial juncture. The Board wants a person in whom others respect the authority of character. His or her trail must already have spoken “loud and clear” to all whom he or she will be expected to lead and influence.

Hence, if we are selected for an executive post, we will want to continue to cultivate breadth and depth of character while being careful also to continue striving for excellence in competence and personality in the position.

The latest I found interesting on the web on Christian Monjou

Christian Monjou : « Barack Obama a mis l’accent sur le renouveau du pacte démocratique »

Propos recueillis par Marie-Amélie Fauchier-Magnan

21 janvier 2009

Christian Monjou, agrégé d’anglais et professeur à l’École normale supérieure a accompagné l’équipe de Ségolène Royal, présente hier à Washington lors de l’investiture du 44ème président des États-Unis. Il revient pour France- Amérique sur les moments forts du discours.

Certains présidents sont passés à la postérité, notamment grâce à leur discours d’investiture. Qu’avez-vous particulièrement retenu de celui de Barack Obama ?

Ce que j’ai trouvé remarquable dans le discours d’Obama, c’est la précision clinique du diagnostique qu’il a établi sur la situation des États-Unis, à la fois à l’intérieur et à l’extérieur de leurs frontières.

À Berkeley, les étudiants qui assistaient à la retransmission de la cérémonie, ont sifflé le nom de l’ancien président, George W. Bush, que Barack Obama a remercié au début de son discours. Qu’en pensez-vous ?

Barack Obama a bien fait de rendre hommage à George W.Bush. Il a reconnu que ce dernier avait au moins créé des conditions favorables à la transition présidentielle. (…) Mais il a également critiqué certains échecs de l’administration Bush : par exemple lorsqu’il a parlé des habitants de la Nouvelle-Orléans qui avaient recueilli ceux dont les maisons avaient été inondées au moment de l’ouragan Katrina (« La gentillesse d’accueillir un étranger quand les digues s’effondrent »). C’était une manière subtile de rappeler la très mauvaise gestion de la crise par le gouvernement précédent. Obama a voulu montrer que les 8 ans de républicanisme conservateur de l’administration Bush n’étaient qu’une parenthèse dans l’Histoire des États-Unis.

Barack Obama a beaucoup insisté sur les notions de responsabilité et de sacrifice.

Oui, selon lui, face aux défis qui attendent l’Amérique, les citoyens vont devoir retrousser leurs manches. Il a donc fait appel au retour de la démocratie traditionnelle faite d’individualités fortes. Obama a mis l’accent sur le renouveau du pacte démocratique, à savoir que l’État soutiendrait ces responsabilités individuelles mais ne pourrait jamais agir à la place des individus. Obama est remonté aux origines de la démocratie américaine telle qu’Abraham Lincoln l’avait définie dans son discours de Gettysburg, le gouvernement « du peuple, par le peuple et pour le peuple. »

Sur le plan de la politique extérieure, Barack Obama semble s’être très clairement démarqué de son prédécesseur.

Obama a en effet totalement redéfini la politique étrangère des États-Unis. À plusieurs reprises, il a employé le mot « humble ». Il a appelé au retour du dialogue avec les amis traditionnels des États-Unis mais il a également parlé de renouer des liens avec le monde musulman.

Ce discours d’investiture a été moins lyrique que celui qu’Obama avait prononcé le soir des élections, pourquoi ?

Obama a tout de même fait allusion à son histoire personnelle à plusieurs reprises. Il a cité son père de façon très émouvante à la fin du discours (« C’est le sens de notre liberté et notre credo (…) la raison pour laquelle un homme dont le père, il y a moins de 60 ans, n’aurait peut-être pas été servi dans un restaurant local, se tient devant vous, pour prêter le serment le plus sacré. ») Il a ainsi voulu rappeler qu’il était l’incarnation du rêve américain.

Victor Bout

I recently saw yesterday on TV, the development of the case of Victor Bout. I believe that he is still in Thailand waiting for extradition. The extradition process has been more complicated than forecasted it would seemed. He will appear in court in Thailand on the 11 August 2009 following his arrest on March 6, 2008.

You will recall that I blogged on this case earlier in mid March.

More than a James Bond thriller, the story of Victor A Bout arrest which I saw on TV and fully described by BBC seemed to me unreal.

I am keen to see the unwinding of this story which later might be taken as a base story for a thriller or a big screen film.

a latest blog written on Bout:

Those who do not know are

“New Technologies, New Relationships”

VATICAN CITY, JAN. 23, 2009 (Zenit.org).- Here is the message Benedict XVI released today for the 43rd World Communications Day, which will be observed May 24.

The message is titled “New Technologies, New Relationships. Promoting a culture of Respect, Dialogue and Friendship.”

* * *

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

In anticipation of the forthcoming World Communications Day, I would like to address to you some reflections on the theme chosen for this year — “New Technologies, New Relationships: Promoting a culture of Respect, Dialogue and Friendship.” The new digital technologies are, indeed, bringing about fundamental shifts in patterns of communication and human relationships. These changes are particularly evident among those young people who have grown up with the new technologies and are at home in a digital world that often seems quite foreign to those of us who, as adults, have had to learn to understand and appreciate the opportunities it has to offer for communications. In this year’s message, I am conscious of those who constitute the so-called digital generation and I would like to share with them, in particular, some ideas concerning the extraordinary potential of the new technologies, if they are used to promote human understanding and solidarity. These technologies are truly a gift to humanity and we must endeavour to ensure that the benefits they offer are put at the service of all human individuals and communities, especially those who are most disadvantaged and vulnerable.

The accessibility of mobile telephones and computers, combined with the global reach and penetration of the internet, has opened up a range of means of communication that permit the almost instantaneous communication of words and images across enormous distances and to some of the most isolated corners of the world; something that would have been unthinkable for previous generations. Young people, in particular, have grasped the enormous capacity of the new media to foster connectedness, communication and understanding between individuals and communities, and they are turning to them as means of communicating with existing friends, of meeting new friends, of forming communities and networks, of seeking information and news, and of sharing their ideas and opinions. Many benefits flow from this new culture of communication: families are able to maintain contact across great distances; students and researchers have more immediate and easier access to documents, sources and scientific discoveries, hence they can work collaboratively from different locations; moreover, the interactive nature of many of the new media facilitates more dynamic forms of learning and communication, thereby contributing to social progress.

While the speed with which the new technologies have evolved in terms of their efficiency and reliability is rightly a source of wonder, their popularity with users should not surprise us, as they respond to a fundamental desire of people to communicate and to relate to each other. This desire for communication and friendship is rooted in our very nature as human beings and cannot be adequately understood as a response to technical innovations. In the light of the biblical message, it should be seen primarily as a reflection of our participation in the communicative and unifying Love of God, who desires to make of all humanity one family. When we find ourselves drawn towards other people, when we want to know more about them and make ourselves known to them, we are responding to God’s call – a call that is imprinted in our nature as beings created in the image and likeness of God, the God of communication and communion.

The desire for connectedness and the instinct for communication that are so obvious in contemporary culture are best understood as modern manifestations of the basic and enduring propensity of humans to reach beyond themselves and to seek communion with others. In reality, when we open ourselves to others, we are fulfilling our deepest need and becoming more fully human. Loving is, in fact, what we are designed for by our Creator. Naturally, I am not talking about fleeting, shallow relationships, I am talking about the real love that is at the very heart of Jesus’ moral teaching: “You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength” and “You must love your neighbour as yourself” (cf. Mk 12:30-31). In this light, reflecting on the significance of the new technologies, it is important to focus not just on their undoubted capacity to foster contact between people, but on the quality of the content that is put into circulation using these means. I would encourage all people of good will who are active in the emerging environment of digital communication to commit themselves to promoting a culture of respect, dialogue and friendship.

Those who are active in the production and dissemination of new media content, therefore, should strive to respect the dignity and worth of the human person. If the new technologies are to serve the good of individuals and of society, all users will avoid the sharing of words and images that are degrading of human beings, that promote hatred and intolerance, that debase the goodness and intimacy of human sexuality or that exploit the weak and vulnerable.

The new technologies have also opened the way for dialogue between people from different countries, cultures and religions. The new digital arena, the so-called cyberspace, allows them to encounter and to know each other’s traditions and values. Such encounters, if they are to be fruitful, require honest and appropriate forms of expression together with attentive and respectful listening. The dialogue must be rooted in a genuine and mutual searching for truth if it is to realize its potential to promote growth in understanding and tolerance. Life is not just a succession of events or experiences: it is a search for the true, the good and the beautiful. It is to this end that we make our choices; it is for this that we exercise our freedom; it is in this – in truth, in goodness, and in beauty – that we find happiness and joy. We must not allow ourselves to be deceived by those who see us merely as consumers in a market of undifferentiated possibilities, where choice itself becomes the good, novelty usurps beauty, and subjective experience displaces truth.

The concept of friendship has enjoyed a renewed prominence in the vocabulary of the new digital social networks that have emerged in the last few years. The concept is one of the noblest achievements of human culture. It is in and through our friendships that we grow and develop as humans. For this reason, true friendship has always been seen as one of the greatest goods any human person can experience. We should be careful, therefore, never to trivialize the concept or the experience of friendship. It would be sad if our desire to sustain and develop on-line friendships were to be at the cost of our availability to engage with our families, our neighbours and those we meet in the daily reality of our places of work, education and recreation. If the desire for virtual connectedness becomes obsessive, it may in fact function to isolate individuals from real social interaction while also disrupting the patterns of rest, silence and reflection that are necessary for healthy human development.

Friendship is a great human good, but it would be emptied of its ultimate value if it were to be understood as an end in itself. Friends should support and encourage each other in developing their gifts and talents and in putting them at the service of the human community. In this context, it is gratifying to note the emergence of new digital networks that seek to promote human solidarity, peace and justice, human rights and respect for human life and the good of creation. These networks can facilitate forms of co-operation between people from different geographical and cultural contexts that enable them to deepen their common humanity and their sense of shared responsibility for the good of all. We must, therefore, strive to ensure that the digital world, where such networks can be established, is a world that is truly open to all. It would be a tragedy for the future of humanity if the new instruments of communication, which permit the sharing of knowledge and information in a more rapid and effective manner, were not made accessible to those who are already economically and socially marginalized, or if it should contribute only to increasing the gap separating the poor from the new networks that are developing at the service of human socialization and information.

I would like to conclude this message by addressing myself, in particular, to young Catholic believers: to encourage them to bring the witness of their faith to the digital world. Dear Brothers and Sisters, I ask you to introduce into the culture of this new environment of communications and information technology the values on which you have built your lives. In the early life of the Church, the great Apostles and their disciples brought the Good News of Jesus to the Greek and Roman world. Just as, at that time, a fruitful evangelization required that careful attention be given to understanding the culture and customs of those pagan peoples so that the truth of the gospel would touch their hearts and minds, so also today, the proclamation of Christ in the world of new technologies requires a profound knowledge of this world if the technologies are to serve our mission adequately. It falls, in particular, to young people, who have an almost spontaneous affinity for the new means of communication, to take on the responsibility for the evangelization of this “digital continent”. Be sure to announce the Gospel to your contemporaries with enthusiasm. You know their fears and their hopes, their aspirations and their disappointments: the greatest gift you can give to them is to share with them the “Good News” of a God who became man, who suffered, died and rose again to save all people. Human hearts are yearning for a world where love endures, where gifts are shared, where unity is built, where freedom finds meaning in truth, and where identity is found in respectful communion. Our faith can respond to these expectations: may you become its heralds! The Pope accompanies you with his prayers and his blessing.

From the Vatican, 24 January 2009

Koung Koung  gave me great lessons. My dad had acquired in the early 60’s the property of the Chan Kwan Tong at la Paix Street almost facing the residence of Ah Mee Koo and uncle Wong On Wing. Grandpa took charge to build garages for the vehicles of the cigarette department and to refurbish the house for renting out.

There I landed to be the apprentice under the wing of Grandpa to help him in his tasks. I guess that I might be around 14 years old. Grandpa always had a measuring meter with him, a beautiful leather case one which would roll out 30 or 40 meters. It was always stored in the last bottom drawer of this desk. First, we went on measuring the proposed site to erect the garages. Then he drew out a sketch of the proposed garage which will be able to hold three vans in a row. Together with a foreman, if I am not mistaken his name was Gaston, they worked out the materials required for the building. The concrete blocks, iron bars, sand and cement were ordered and delivered on site. The works started. I joined grandpa almost every afternoon on site, after the departure of the workers to work out the stock on materials used during the day. He told me that he had to be present for the departure time of the workers to make sure that they have accomplished their daily task and to make sure that they do not take away materials from the site. He held a close account of the materials as well as the number of workers that attended work daily. It was great observing the methodical way he noted every item. Every night after dinner he would work out at his desk the expenditure incurred and account for it in his book written in Chinese.

After the building of the garage, he undertook the repair of the house which required the replacement of some rotten wood planks and some pillars.

The greatest learning came when we proceeded to the painting of the house. He first negotiated the daily pay rate with the painter Antoine. Antoine was then instructed to remove the old paint using a paint stripper that would burn off the old paint. Together with the driver I went to take delivery of the tins of putty which was required to even out the wooden planks.

In those days, ready to use paint was not common. From uncle Yee Chin Koon’s hardware store; he bought tins of paint paste that had to be mixed oil and a thinner to make up the paint. Dyes were then added to the white paint to obtain the color required. Grandpa told me to stay and watch over Antoine for the day to make sure that he was working the whole day. I was  also asked to take note of the break time he took for lunch and pauses. Then in the afternoon after Antoine’s departure Grandpa asked me to measure the surface area he had painted during the day. He worked out the amount of paint paste used as well as the quantity of oil used. We did that for two consecutive days. Thereafter he told me that now we know how much paint is required for the area painted and how much area is painted by day there will be no need for you to watch over Antoine any more.

A smart Koung Koung I had isn’t it?

Facebook President?

Have you voted yet?

On the French television, this morning, they presented the French candidate. I learn to know more about him so I voted for him. Would you like to do the same thing?

Would anyone dare to be the Mauritius candidate for the president of Facebook? It would be good publicity for Mauritius I guess.

Cancer seems to be nibbling away the health of a number of people close to me. Last Saturday, my dear friend, a co-founder of Toastmasters in Mauritius told me that his wife Suzanne has relapsed in her illness; they are rushing to Singapore for help. My wife mahjong’s mate’s husband is suffering from cancer. A second degree cousin Nicole married to my university mate is undergoing treatment for cancer in Singapore. Nicole & Maurice being away in Singapore keep a blog to log in their experience. A friend broke the news to me yesterday: Philippe Chan Tin, a primary school mate may be dying soon of this dreadful and painful cancer. Is it because of my age period that the occurrence is getting closer to my entourage? Or is it the style of living the cause? Is it the polluting environment we are living in? What ever it may be, it is worthwhile taking advices to run away from this disease. Prevention should be the name of the game. I take this opportunity to salute the wonderful work done by a group of volunteers to alleviate the pains of Cancer suffers in setting up a palliative care center which operates at couvent de Belle rose.

There is a hoax email circulating the internet. As is the case very often all is not hoax, all is not true. I do believe that a more healthy living style should help. Nicole is undergoing an alternative cancer treatment in conjunction with the traditional chemotherapy.

What ever may be the case, when faced with an incurable disease, anybody would attempt any available cure. For us who are apparently free from cancer what should we do to save us from catching the evil?

See the official sites JHU

The hoax mail

*** Cancer Up-date ***

AFTER YEARS OF TELLING PEOPLE CHEMOTHERAPY IS THE ONLY WAY TO TRY (TRY THE KEY WORD) AND ELIMINATE CANCER, JOHN HOPKINS IS FINALLY STARTING TO TELL YOU THERE IS AN ALTERNATIVE WAY.

Cancer Update from John Hopkins

1. Every person has cancer cells in the body. These cancer cells do not show up in the standard tests until they have multiplied to a few billion. When doctors tell cancer patients that there are no more cancer cells in their bodies after treatment, it just means the tests are unable to detect the cancer cells because they have not reached the detectable size.

2. Cancer cells occur between 6 to more than 10 times in a person’s lifetime.

3. When the person’s immune system is strong the cancer cells will be destroyed and prevented from multiplying and forming tumours.

4. When a person has cancer it indicates the person has multiple nutritional deficiencies. These could be due to genetic, environmental, food and lifestyle factors.

5. To overcome the multiple nutritional deficiencies, changing diet and including supplements will strengthen the immune system.

6. Chemotherapy involves poisoning the rapidly-growing cancer cells and also destroys rapidly-growing healthy cells in the bone marrow, gastro-intestinal tract etc, and can cause organ damage , like liver, kidneys, heart, lungs etc.

7. Radiation while destroying cancer cells also burns, scars and damages healthy cells , tissues and organs.

8. Initial treatment with chemotherapy and radiation will often reduce tumor size .

However prolonged use of chemotherapy and radiation do not result in more tumor destruction.

9. When the body has too much toxic burden from chemotherapy and radiation the immune system is either compromised or destroyed, hence the person can succumb to various kinds of infections and complications.

10. Chemotherapy and radiation can cause cancer cells to mutate and become resistant and difficult to destroy. Surgery can also cause cancer cells to spread to other sites.

11. An effective way to battle cancer is to starve the cancer cells by not feeding it with the foods it needs to multiply

CANCER CELLS FEED ON:

a. Sugar is a cancer-feeder. By cutting off sugar it cuts off one important food supply to the cancer cells . Sugar substitutes like Nutrasweet, Equal, Spoonful, etc are made with Aspartame and it is harmful. A better natural substitute would be Manuka honey or molasses but only in very small amounts.

Table salt has a chemical

added to make it white in colour. Better alternative is Bragg’s aminos or sea salt.

b. Milk causes the body to produce mucus, especially in the gastro-intestinal tract. Cancer feeds on mucus. By cutting off milk and substituting with unsweetened soya milk cancer cells are being starved.

c. Cancer cells thrive in an acid environment. A meat-based diet is acidic and it is best to eat fish, and a little chicken rather than beef or pork.

Meat also contains livestock antibiotics, growth hormones and parasites, which are all harmful, especially to people with cancer.

d. A diet made of 80% fresh vegetables and juice, whole grains, seeds, nuts and a little fruits help put the body into an alkaline environment. About 20% can be from cooked food including beans. Fresh vegetable juices provide live enzymes that are easily absorbed and reach down to cellular levels within 15 minutes to nourish and enhance growth of healthy cells. To obtain live enzymes for building healthy cells try and drink fresh vegetable juice (most vegetables including bean sprouts) and eat some raw vegetables 2 or 3 times a day.

Enzymes are destroyed at temperatures of 104 degrees F (40 degrees C).

e. Avoid coffee, tea, and chocolate, which have high caffeine. Green tea is a better alternative and has cancer-fighting properties. Water- best to drink purified water, or filtered, to avoid known toxins and heavy metals in tap water. Distilled water is acidic, avoid it.

12. Meat protein is difficult to digest and requires a lot of digestive enzymes. Undigested meat remaining in the intestines become purified and leads to more toxic build-up.

13. Cancer cell walls have a tough protein covering. By refraining from or eating less meat it frees more enzymes to attack the protein walls of cancer cells and allows the body’s killer cells to destroy the cancer cells.

14. Some supplements build up the immune system (IP6, Flor ssence, Essiac, anti-oxidants, vitamins, minerals, EFAs etc.) to enable the body’s own killer cells to destroy cancer cells.

Other supplements like vitamin E are known to cause apoptosis, or programmed cell death, the body’s normal method of disposing of damaged, unwanted, or unneeded cells.

15. Cancer is a disease of the mind, body, and spirit. A proactive and positive spirit will help the cancer warrior be a survivor. Anger, unforgiveness and bitterness put the body into a stressful and acidic environment. Learn to have a loving and forgiving spirit. Learn to relax and enjoy life.

16. Cancer cells cannot thrive in an oxygenated environment. Exercising daily, and deep breathing help to get more oxygen down to the cellular level. Oxygen therapy is another means employed to destroy cancer cells.

(PLEASE FORWARD THIS TO PEOPLE YOU CARE ABOUT) CANCER UPDATE FROM JOHN HOPKINS HOSPITAL, U. S)

L’UNIVERSITÉ POPULAIRE c’est :

• Des cours gratuits
• Ouverts à tous
• Sans condition d’âge ni de diplôme
• Des professeurs bénévoles
• Pas d’examen à passer
• Juste pour le plaisir d’apprendre et de réfléchir

L’UNIVERSITÉ POPULAIRE DONNE SES COURS
À LA SALLE DU CONSEIL DE LA MAIRIE DE PORT-LOUIS

« Ouvrir la connaissance à tout le monde, démocratiser la culture et développer l’esprit critique. »

Pourquoi pas ? Je suis émerveillé de cette initiative de créer un lieu ou la connaissance s’adresse a tous, sans condition d’age, ni de diplôme et ce gratuitement. Saurions nous d’entrevoir le paradis sur terre à travers une fissure de bonne volonté et de générosité ? Est ce une coïncidence que le sponsor du projet soit le groupe CIEL ? Enfin une bonne nouvelle et de quoi s’en réjouir. Je remercie le ciel.

Ainsi donc à partir de ce mois d’octobre, le plaisir d’apprendre et de réfléchir est à la portee de tous. Bravo pour l’idée et surtout bravo pour la mise en place. Mes plus vives félicitations a l’initiateur du projet Joseph Cardella.

«La réflexion et l’esprit critique sont donc essentiels, car ils (me) permettent d’envisager les problèmes sous différents angles, angles qui sont constitutifs de la réalité. Il n’y a pas une réalité. Mais la réalité est ce qui est perçu sous un angle particulier. C’est donc l’angle de vision qui fait la réalité, et il est donc important de savoir qu’il existe différents angles de vision, ce qui permet de ne pas s’enfermer. »

La réussite du projet ne pourra se mesurer d’abord par l’affluence au cours. Ce n’est que par la communication que nous attirerons les gens. Ainsi je me fais un devoir d’en parler sur mon blog et à toutes les personnes que ce rencontre. Cher lecteur, veuillez donc parler autour de vous.

Some of you may be wondering what has happened to me and my blog. Silence Radio! Turned sour since the last blog? True! I have been silent since the 22^nd September. I even got a call from Nazlee a regular reader of my blog, who inquired about my absence on the web and my blog. As a matter of fact, the sourness mellowed as prior to my departure I had an apology from the person mentioned in my last posting. Great it was a good omen for my holiday.

I have been on holiday, may be. I have been through a period of‘re-creation’ as we use to call similar break period during my primary school days. “Recreation” is a lovely word. Indeed all the homosapiens of this world need breaks to recreate themselves. We do indeed recreate ourselves each time we go back to sleep, our nightly break. Our medical FRCP doctor could explain to us: ‘How much our body needs to repair itself during our daily sleep of some 6-8 hours of apparently inactive period.’ Our brain specialist would tell you how important this apparent inactive period of our body is active to our brain and allows us, so to say in computer language, to reset the programmes and sort out the memory files to get ourselves ready for the next reboot.

Viva my recreation period! I had a span of physical regeneration with sessions of laser poncture @ La Chapelle Montlinard. For a week we were in a French gite in company of my wife, daughter Stephane and grandson Jake who both flew from Montreal for our family reunion holiday and my wife’s brother, Clement and his son Nicolas. With the gathering it was Fiesta.We had excellent weather, Indian summer, every meal mouth watering french food, and tasty French wine of the region, Pouilly Fume. I gave a break to my usual fat controlled diet, Ahoy charcuterie! Ahoy fromage de chevre!Oh la la Crotin de Chavinol from the region of Cher! We collected fresh walnuts and enjoyed their freshness. I basked in bliss.

The second week was an intellectual regeneration week. First I met with one of the official of ‘La Caisse des depots et des consignations’ who was involved with studies of “La Prospective des entreprises”. We spent time discussing about the future of entreprises and the world. Pure joy! One of my favorite topics! He gave me his working document. I was again basking in bliss. The week carried on with a conference with Alain Comte Sponville: “Le Sens du Travail” with my friends from APM Reunion and Mauritius. The crowning of the week was the 20^th celebration of APM at a cocktail to meet all the friends of APM and a convention of the clubs of APM with an attendance of 2200 entrepreneurs magnificently organised at Le Palais des Congres. The speeches and forums were music to my ears. I basked in bliss.