Cape Town: Is it time to lean on the fat?

How addiction hobbles our chances

Walking through a cancer hospital to the department where you are receiving treatment reveals a world of great suffering, the unerring will of humanity to survive, the purveyance of hope for which the only currency of purchase is faith that could waver depending on prognosis, pain, confidence, or despair; it is a teaching and humbling moment.

How I have wanted to walk out of that hospital and snatch a cigarette from the lips of a young smoker totally oblivious of what cancer does to the body and how the odds one faces with cancer depends of what it is, where is has been found, if it has spread and if there is a body of knowledge and expertise available to give you a chance to survive.

Then, I do not have to walk far to realise how much of a hold tobacco and nicotine has over people. As at a designated area near the entrance of the same cancer hospital, you will find patients undergoing cancer treatment huddling in corners for another drag of the poison already killing them. They give themselves no chances at all, and if they come through, good for them.

This is obese in plain sight

In Cape Town, there was something we could not unsee, when we stay in Cape Town, we try as much as possible to walk everywhere and everything is within walking distance. Even on days I did not seem to have the strength or the capacity, I made my daily 10,000 steps.

Walking alongside us or coming into view from our vantage point of observation was someone carrying just that extra extra bit of weight on their hips, their bellies, and usually both, then arms and thighs; sights to make you catch your breath.

What you cannot deny is there is an obesity problem which should be registering somewhere in the South African healthcare system. There cannot be any aesthetic value to wanting to tip the scales until the springs broke.

How you address this obvious health crisis will no doubt require tact, wisdom, and some innovative policy initiatives, it should not be ignored. You could see people who could barely move, some were panting every few steps and I cannot put a statistical value on those who might have already acquired diseases of the heart, the kidneys, the pancreas, the liver, and other related serious health problems because of this excess weight.

The fast in fast-food is weight

One other observation we made when we were in Muizenberg, some 25 kilometres from Cape Town, with long stretches of beautiful beaches that more deserted than walked, was the number of delivery bikes that attended our estate at all hours, as if most did no home cooking, but relied on fast food. We do most of our cooking, from quick preparations like stir fries to slow cooking activities, it is about the willingness and timing.

In town, the fast-food outlets are full, taking orders for tables and takeaways for patrons and the ubiquitous delivery bikers, God forfend we dignify those places with the moniker of restaurant. They offer you something to masticate and swallow, but none of it is of value to your body and if you do not work it off, it sits somewhere in your body and accumulates in fatty tissue.

Maybe the new miracle weight-loss drugs might bring respite to the South Africans we saw and give them a fighting chance, but it also must include some desire and the will to do something about it.

While everyone is free to celebrate their bodies and love who they are, while not being shamed for what they have become, we need to square the circle between feeling good and being healthy. That will not come by lying to be nice.

Trading away health

Are we aware of the harms?

Attending a cancer hospital is a revelation of how medical science is progressing in the treatment of cancer, and none of what I have witnessed or experienced suggests the treatments are cosmetic salves that soothe you.

The treatments are radical, irreversible, usually impactful, and could be life-changing on the completion of treatment. Early in my treatment cycle, one of the nurses who gave me advice and support had a voice box. I do not intend here to introduce the fear of cancer but to provide a perspective on why we should actively avoid harmful practices.

Every time I see someone light up a cigarette, I wonder whether they might end up in a cancer hospital and hopefully, they might have a favourable prognosis. The discovery of the cigarette-lung cancer link was evident from the 1950s, but the conspiracy of capitalism put tobacco conglomerate profits above global health. [National Library of Medicine: Historical Perspectives of the Causation of Lung Cancer] [World Health Organization: Tobacco industry interference with tobacco control]

As we ignore the warnings

Warnings on tobacco product packaging including grotesque pictures of cancers have hardly served as a scary premonition to smokers, it is not like I could be effective in accosting a smoker on any of our streets and hoarsely tell them I am undergoing cancer treatment, and it is not a pleasant experience, considering it is neither indicative of errors commission nor omission.

The prospect of the suffering and life-threatening effects of avoidable cancer should be informative and cautionary enough, but human behaviour cannot be curtailed even in the best interests of the person. As a species, the quest to survive is equally matched by the inexplicable tendency to self-destruct.

Now, I had a wild adolescence, I smoked from the age of fourteen to eighteen, my preference was for menthol cigarettes, and I did consider at one time getting a tobacco pipe. My cousins had unfortunate parental guidance and adopted snuff, it shows how example creates followers and adherents, quite unwittingly.

When I stopped smoking just over 40 years ago, I simply lost the desire for smoking once I became a Christian. The only time I smoked anything again was 15 years ago when my live-in partner being both a cheese head and a pothead, got pre-rolled marijuana cigarettes and I had a puff or two thinking it might be a palliative for cancer pain. I am however glad smoking never became a long-term habit with the inability to wean myself off nicotine addiction.

Issues of fitness and weight

One other thing I have noticed at the hospital is how unfit we are as a country, there are too many morbidly obese people, with some needing wheelchairs to get around. Even when I consider my weight and how certain aspects of my body do not conform to an aesthetic aspect ratio, I have sworn that once my treatment is over and I get my strength back, I will indulge in rigorous exercise to get fit again.

15 years ago, one of the effects of cancer was emaciation, I lost 25% of my body weight and though doctors then suggested I should carry a weight close to what I am now, I would rather be below 80 kg than find the scales show numbers that have horrifyingly shot up to 89 kg at one time. This event of cancer has hardly shown physiological symptoms, I could even be gaining rather than losing weight.

Dropping the excess baggage

Looking at metric measurements, I do a basic calculation that for your height in centimetres you should ideally not exceed that height minus a hundred for your weight. If you do not have the requisite height in the two-metre plus getting to seven feet category, you must ask why your weight exceeds 100 kg.

There are things we can do in terms of diet, exercise, rest, and checkups to keep healthy and hopefully not need a visit to a hospital or a cancer-related one. If warnings cannot do it, we should have some apprehension about the future and what harm we are doing now.

Illness can easily rob one of our sense of youthful invincibility that usually tends to delusions of immortality, some consideration and I aver, care for our bodies can give some of us assurance and a fighting chance that we won't be plagued by something destructively harmful out of what we are doing or what we have failed to do.

Coronavirus streets at canine trot - LVIII

Beware of dog

Deciding on an early start rather than taking a nap after work, I launched into my walking exercise with the aim of catching up on my daily average, if not for the week, at least for the month. My balaclava face mask worn like a neckerchief to be pulled up when approaching crowds, for the pandemic is not over by a long stretch.

The dusk was closing in quickly, that at 5:00 PM, it was as good as dark and so I needed to reconsider how my route would go. As I came off the second crossing of River Irwell, I took a turn that left me with the foreboding of an unfettered dog barking at the sense of any movement around its territory, but it appeared the dog was already out on walks with its owner that was chatting to their neighbour as passed by, the dog literally ignoring me, I was quite surprised.

Beware of person

Back on my typical route, one pedestrian path had been closed off for road maintenance which left me in an awkward dalliance with danger and car oblivious of other road users. I survived to make it onto Peel Park where I found that quite a few dog owners had attached lights to their dogs so they could be sighted in the dark.

Another two encounters with dogs well-behaved almost had me wondering whether the dogs had been pacified and mollified with substances, only to almost walk into another dog that the owner did not care to control. Meanwhile, the cover of darkness allowed for a dog to foul the undergrowth without having to clean up after their dog.

Beware of plumes

When I came out to the students’ halls of residence, I was accosted for a lighter which would be rather strange as I would have never really expected someone exercising to be a smoker, the lady who asked had me thinking, I stopped flicking a lighter long before you were born. I stopped smoking in 1988.

Back on the macadamised path between River Irwell and Peel Park, I had a second encounter with that control that appeared to be out of control whilst on the leash and now much better behaved when allowed to roam free, you can only wonder whether the temperament is on the owner or the dog.

Beware of fools

My last canine encounter was at New Islington, two dogs with two owners, the leads left loose that they covered the whole pathway such that anyone wanting to go by needed the owners to tug the leads or call the dogs.

Why that is so necessary when it was obvious, they were in a busy area, escapes me, but you have to agree that dogs either imitate the good behaviour of their owners or the owners simply copy the wildness of their potentially housetrained and domesticated dogs, the potential left unexploited from my observation.

It was a good workout and for all the dogs I saw, none barked or growled, it was just a case of the control or absence of the same.

Teargas and smoke in pandemic times

The root of public unrest

I do wonder if the right questions are asked that try to determine why people protest and those protests sometimes lead to the destruction of life and property in the aftermath of what the people consider is police brutality as the wheels of justice roll with lethargy and inertia if they do ever turn at all.

If there were a sense of justice that law enforcement was fully accountable for their actions in their call to duty without a seeming blanket of exculpation built into the system to exonerate working from the premise the police are infallible and the victim can never be innocent, maybe, just maybe, the frustrations of the people won't be pouring out onto the streets, they would allow the system of justice to run its course.

Weed out the rotten cops

The police forces know the bad eggs amongst their lot, sworn allegiances and unquestioned support amongst the ranks leaving the institutions operating beneath the standards of probity and integrity and they harbour the undesirables always stores up trouble for the future when for each infraction by the irresponsible crew they are assured immunity to go out to act with more impunity.

They should stop shielding the worst amongst their ranks, punish them and kick them out before they kindle the tinder of societal unrest and set in trail irreparable damage.

America is imperfect, grossly flawed, and has constantly been in a pressure cooker tensioned situation since its birth. The more we think things are improving there are many examples of where things are no better. To then be cursed with a leadership that has no facility or capacity to unify the people in a common purpose for the good is like Ichabod is enthroned on One Nation unto God.

Teargassing, smoking, and respiratory pandemics

There is much difficulty controlling violent protests, angry mobs, and riotous crowds in ordinary times. Crowd dispersal with tear gas during a global pandemic exacerbated by a possibly airborne virus that could cause respiratory distress and grave illness as we are instructed to keep safe distances between each other computes on the side of the unbelievably incredulous like no one is using their senses.

One other thing, I would hope the pandemic addresses with some determination is smoking on the streets either from cigarettes or vaping. For if the social-distancing requirement is to prevent contracting COVID-19, what should not be happening is people walking into the clouds of smoke or vapour expelled from the lungs of possibly infected people.

Ban it, treat it

I do not think it would be safe to have people trying to dodge smoke trails too as they walk the streets. It would call for designated smoking areas along with radical programmes to get people off tobacco because it would not augur well for pavement rage to develop from people taking umbrage to others who in their carefree use of tobacco products visibly pollute the air we breathe as we incidentally, walk into their smoky slipstream.

For the purposes of full disclosure, I started smoking at 14 and gave it up at 18. I cannot remember what inspired it, I just stopped, I did not enjoy it anymore. I used to smoke menthol cigarettes then. Now, my doctor considers having dropped smoking over 3 decades ago as being a non-smoker.

Hotel life: In the mastery of charlatanry

For I looked for a hook

For a man shall endure many tribulations and suffer indignities too numerous to mention for the shame of having lived through those experiences, but none of this is the sum of a life that is a journey of amazing discovery that puts dreamland into the shade.

Down in Berkshire on the recent sojourns that have taken me far away from home in search of professional expression, I took lodgings in a budget hotel that provided not as much a hook to hang my coat or jacket that hangers would be a luxury.

Yet, with a fridge, cooker and microwave oven you find some home comforts in the midst of the inconvenience. The bathrobe hook on the inside of the bathroom door has found a new purpose, one finds the means to improvise.

Smokers of weed run riot

On returning from work this evening, I found a scruffy note snuck under my door which I thought was offering to clean my room at a later time because I left a ‘Do not disturb’ sign on the doorknob.

The speed at which disgust and rage cross my visage cannot be measured by the eye when on reading the note, there was the suggestion I had been smoking in my room.

Staying in a budget hotel does not mean I have the temperament for provincial budget behaviour borne of the mastery of charlatanry that informed whoever came to that conclusion on matters in my accommodation. The smoke alarm did not go off, no one should have entered my room in my absence and the window was closed, so you do wonder how they ever knew that I was smoking.

No suffering this gladly

I was smoking for four years until 33 years ago and that is by no means yesterday. There is a time I would have in a fit of pique moved out of that hotel without delay, something I have done many times before, but I calmed myself down, tried to find a funny side to it, fired off an email to the hotel proprietor demanding an apology and then sat to write this blog.

One does suffer silently the inflictions of ignorance and stupidly in many places, yet, none of it must be suffered too gladly. They have beyond my stay lost custom and a customer out of either incompetence or ineptitude, I did not leave the comfort of my home to be heaped upon with a travesty.

Nigeria takes Big Tobacco to court about kids

Why kids smoke

Sometimes one can wonder how kids get into smoking and eventually get hooked on the thing for life.

Growing up in Nigeria, there was a bit of a rascal in me and I remember times with my cousins we had a puff at strips of matting (sleeping mats) which had the look and feel of real cigarettes but their potency and efficacy was not known apart from the fact that they were unsmokable.

I had a puff or two before I was a teen but only really started when I was 14, however, it was a secret act of rebellion and quest for adulthood – however, kids caught smoking exacted the highest penalties of corporal punishment and serious ostracism from older members of society along with status amongst peers.

Resisting peer pressure

I always drew the line about what I would try and I remember one episode when I was in company of people more wayward and off the rails than I was, who were smoking pot, I refused to participate whilst others did – a few days after, one of the tough girls in that group leapt out of a first-floor window to escape many things I cannot recount.

She spent a few weeks in hospital and returned to her ways and people usually do.

I did have an inclination to start smoking pipes, but never got that far with the threat that someone at polytechnic was going to inform my parents of my smoking; one had to be more discrete about these vices.

Quitting by religion

At 18, I got religion and it just stopped, the desire, the craving and wanting and I did not have another puff till 17 years later and none since.

Whilst religion seemed a good thing, one must say that there is nothing that preaches against smoking as one can find preaching against alcohol. Basically, smoking is just a “social vice” which has been promoted into a sin because basically, it is what adults do rather than kids.

If however, one sees smoking as an addiction and hence a type of bondage from which one would want to be delivered then there is scope for belief systems to help.

There is also the matter of stewardship of your body in such a way as not to bring it into harm’s way – though not many take the body as seriously as they show even though it is the only shell of representation we have to interact in this world.

Those rotten companies

I am quite interested in the move by Nigeria of suing international cigarette companies on the matter of childhood smoking. They probably have a cause, I am not sure if they have a case.

Indeed, there should be serious educational material that talks about the dangers of smoking and the consequences of the same beyond threats and housewife tales.

When I was a kid, the most glamorous adverts were the smoking ones which showcased Marlboro Man and made every kid want to live their lives like him.

Tobacco companies would want to present a responsible corporate image to the West whilst they aggressively ply their trade in developing and emerging economies because that is where the growth for their market is, until some smart head shows to replace fossil fuels with tobacco.

Intoxicating Africa for Western profits

These emerging economies would usually not have addiction mitigating services or disease amelioration systems to handle cancers and other smoking-related disorders such that once people are hooked, they are truly hooked as they dig their graves with each long draw of the puff.

It is a welcome move and if does not get the companies doing something positive about eliminating access to the toxic weed to children they would know that the times of dumping poisons in Africa to keep their profits in the West are coming to an end.

In general, smoking is becoming less a social statement with smoking bans in New York, London and many other cities, smokers are finding ways of a healthier outlook to life; there are some who see a human-rights element to the freedom to puff, hopefully the quest of a healthier life would outweigh any temporary benefits that lead to long-term terminal illness.

References

Illicit tobacco trade contributes to global disease burden

Smoking curbs: The Global Picture

The African tobacco conundrum

Taking the World Up in Smoke

Tips to stop smoking

Chew your butts

Blink for the litter

Being a pedestrian, cyclist or user of public transport, it is amazing the amount litter one sees on the pavements, the bike paths and at the transport stops.

Usually, it is not the usual crisps or chocolate wrappers or cans of fizzy drink but patches of discarded chewing gum and cigarette butts of various lengths depending on the finished state of the cigarette as the bus or tram approaches.

Even with the no-smoking areas in stations and specially designated areas for smoking we still have those butts on the ground despite the fact that stubbing bins and sand dishes are provided at those locations.

I find that I frown at people who just discard their litter no matter how close they are to a proper discarding container known to many as a rubbish bin, but it appears that many are oblivious of its function.

A menace, a real menace

Cigarette butts and chewing gun are usually surreptitiously cast off either with a flick for the cigarette or some hand-mouth contact then hand-furniture contact as the chewed gum finds a home after the mastication.

By comparison, it probably no worse than picking ones nose and flicking the rotten greenish yellow grime or using ones hand to transfer spittle from mouth to desired destination.

The chewing gum problem is so bad that one dares not touch the undersides of seats or table as there is the possibility that an “Oink woz here” gum marker has been a stuck there.

With DNA testing and so on, by the time we all have biometric passports and databases full of information that the computers would puke at their content, it might be possible to decipher the marker and fine the culprit for vandalising public places or littering the street.

Stuck with it, annoyingly

The humongous machines needed to remove the gum makes one appreciate the intolerance of chewing gum inSingapore. That ban has since been relaxed but it shows just how much this littering can be the bane of a permissive and free society.

If you have had to scrap chewing gum off your shoe soles, you will understand, but worse still having to get it off your clothes because some asocial twerp has stuck it on a seat or rest then you only have recourse; be livid with rage as you surf the Internet for ideas.

I do wonder if properly policed and enforced fines for littering can help change attitudes to stop this eye-sore.

I have nothing against smoking but I am having serious problems with accompanying poor social graces that allows for the disregard of non-smokers and the littering of our streets. It is like being allowed to relieve oneself in any place one might choose rather than the conveniences.

The cleaning up of the butts is easier and is done either by street sweepers or vagrants looking for unfinished cigarettes.

New edibles – science and nature collide

Starting with chewing cum, I would suggest that it be reconstituted that after enjoying the satisfaction of chewing the gum it can be swallowed.

Better still, once the gum is put in the mouth, it should have some genetic affinity material that makes it want to slither down towards the tonsils that it becomes impossible not to swallow it.

Moving on to cigarettes; tobacco companies can have a major money making new lease of life by making those butts, stubs or filters edible.

Once the smoker and drawn in all the nicotine they can through smoking, they get the final nicotine fix by being able to chew what is left of the un-smoked cigarette having flicked off the ashened part with the possibility of flavouring the bit with a flavour applicator that doubles as a lighter.

Something like a vanilla lighter or strawberry lighter if not chilli or curry lighter comes to mind.

Anybody would quit smoking after a few of these.

Gum profiling and butt identity

Just as our liberties, freedoms and secrets are being sold down the line of outrageous anti-terrorism laws masquerading as patriotism, Big-Brother can analyse discarded cigarette butts to and send notices to the homes of the culprits.

The global market-place is rejuvenated for the food and flavours industry, the tobacco companies can move into health flavours, the DNA profiling and instant identification business would be rife.

Imagine wireless computer terminals at every lamp-post with finger-print and retina scanning sign-on and a biometric analysis rod which can assess DNA material from all sorts of litter, mine databases and send off the notices.

You get a gift voucher for your civic duties and the culprit lives in a world that would soon be too real to forget you first read about it here.

References

Commercial cleaning supplies - Chewing Gum Removal - Gum-Out

Cigarette Butt Litter- Two Billion Littered Butts a Day

CigaretteLitter.Org - The Facts About Cigarette Butts and Litter - Cigarette Litter