Saturday, December 25, 2010

me and water

i was looking forward to seeing him, i was curious as to what positive changes his raw food diet was having on him, the first and last time i saw him, was in thailand, in 2006, while traveling along with mango, enjoying our fruitarian holiday in the tropics, with focus on the mighty durian.. yeah, i am talking about harley, the big 811 enthusiast.

it was at the end of the year 2009, or maybe the beginning of 2010, i am not sure, i was sitting under a huge mango tree next to the communal kitchen at fruitopia, along with, mango and our fruitarian documentary crew david and emile. we were all enjoying the beauty of a tropical summer day.. freelee, also joined us, and we were all chatting away, when her boyfriend harley, arrived.. full of energy as always, almost manic, he greeted us all with a smile and hug, and as soon as he sat down to join our small group his eyes landed on me and he said with full confidence to me: "you are dehydrated". oh, why me? why not others? i asked myself much later on.. but then i felt a bit annoyed, but i did my best not to let it get to me and i answered: "so, you really think i am dehydrated? after being, fruitarian for 24 years, eating raw fresh fruit full of water, not feeling any discomfort, including thirst?" i do not remember how our conversation exactly followed, but we ended up having a short debate about it and i stopped it after i realized that we were both too sure about correctness of our eating and drinking habits, as i am not keen on talking in circles, our ideas about drinking reached an end. i also noticed that during our conversation harley was eating at least a one kg bag full of dried bananas, followed shortly after by drinking a fair amount of water. i thought, no wonder he is thirsty, the dried fruit is deprived of it's best value, water. it is old and processed. i said so, but i am not sure any more of the answer, i am sure i would be able to remember it, had it made any sense.

in our short conversation about my dehydration, when i asked: "why should i drink water, if i am not thirsty? And why should i drink water even if i were thirsty? " then i added by way of clarification: "if i were ever thirsty i would drink or eat raw fresh fruit, i believe it would rehydrate me much better than water. harley said to me :"well, you have to drink even when you are not thirsty". "hmm, that does not make sense to me, i believe in my body's innate intelligence and were i to get thirsty i would drink just as when i am hungry i eat" said i. but harley told me: "you have to eat and drink way before you are hungry or thirsty". and i honestly forget his reasons for this belief, i admit i'm not very keen on memorizing things i can see no sense in.

honestly i didn't know what the symptoms of dehydration were, i'd not had any health problems to look into it. i am someone who enjoys eating and drinking raw fresh fruit and benefits great health from doing so, and i didn't feel i had need for such knowledge.

a little later, while talking with judith, who along with the rest of her family is a long term raw fooder, i mentioned my conversation about dehydration with harley, she looked amused and said: "if you had been dehydrated for twenty four years, you would surely be dead already." i fully agreed with her. what she said made sense to me.

well, i am truly happy with my raw fresh fruitarian diet, and am not looking for any changes in it, like starting drinking water just because someone says i should. i would do it only if i felt thirsty and only if I was unable to quench my thirst with raw fresh fruit.. So since i don't experience thirst, i can happily let go of such a notion.

Installed within my blog I have a little gadget called fedjet, a small program that shows me visitor statistics. I rarely look at the page, but a few months ago, when i was perusing it, i noticed there were a few visitors reaching my blog through 30 bananas a day, harley and freelee's forum. so i had a look to see what page of that forum the links came from and saw it was from a debate about drinking water while on a fruirarian diet.

here is the link: http://www.30bananasaday.com/profiles/blogs/fruitarianism-water-and-why?xg_source=activity&id=2684079%3ABlogPost%3A534145&page=2#comments

here is some text written by harley i've cut and copied from the thread:

Maybe you gang will become the new wave of vital 'fruitarians that dont drink water' or maybe youll join the pile of bloated, isolated, fatigued, emaciated and binge prone 'fruitarians' that we have today?

My housemate died last year from renal failure. We take hydration real serious and she used to talk just like you peeps are talk'n now. Its spooky.


the conversation on the link i've pasted here is long and it took me time to read it all, there are more words from harley and freelee as well, and i disagree with both of them. but i agree with almost everything that others had to say, i could see a lot of sense in what others had to say in the debate, but to my amazement, harley and freelee ignored it all.

i think this article is getting way too long, and i hope i've made my point and i'd like to stop here. i am going to cover in detail this important topic in my fruitarian book. yes, i am still working on it.

and whoever is curious to heear about the symptoms of dehydration, here they are:

Symptoms of Dehydration: Introduction

Often the first symptom a person with dehydration experiences is thirst. By the time thirst is experienced, dehydration is already occurring. Not all people, especially the elderly, may experience or be aware of thirst in the early stages of dehydration. Other symptoms may include dry mouth, dry lips, sunken eyes, inability to make tears and little or no urine production

In infants symptoms of dehydration may include a sunken fontanel (soft spot) on the top of the head, no tears with crying, and fewer wet diapers.

Other symptoms can include headache, rapid heartbeat, fatigue, weakness, lightheadedness, dizziness, and dry skin.

Untreated severe dehydration can lead to serious, even life-threatening complications, including postural hypotension, lethargy, kidney failure, shock, coma and death....


i've copied these symptoms of dehydration from here:

http://www.wrongdiagnosis.com/d/dehydration/symptoms.htm

dear readers of my blog, i swear that i never experience any symptoms of dehydration, and therefore i am sure harley is wrong.

with raw fresh fruit, life is clear of confusion

pineapple pawpaw and tomato in our kitchen

pineapple, pawpaw and tomatoes in our kitchen, the mighty fruit full of true water of life, hydrating successfully my body and soul.

me taking pictures of oz bush

me enjoying bush walking and taking pictures, usually i walk bare food, but when ground is way too rocky for me i wear socks, so my very sensitive feet don't get hurt

me in australian bush

yahoo, down the hill i go, still taking the pictures..

i am having good time

i am easily amused by insects, rocks etc.. this time on my way getting ready for serious sun exposure..

i am enjoying swimming

and when i had enough of relaxing in hot spring tropical sun, i jumped happily into the beautiful natural creek. i love to swim.

life is beautiful

Saturday, December 18, 2010

summer and me

the beautiful summer has arrived on time, here in hot tropical far north queensland. spring was hot, but summer didn't hesitate and showed me it's powers straight from the start. and yes, i love it. summertime is my beloved part of the year.

it is a year now since i moved up to mareeba, leaving the big city sydney behind me, and it was a great change, my life is more enjoyable. how? i don't feel comfortable when temperatures drop under 25 degrees celsius. and i love raw fresh fruit to eat and i get a bigger choice of variety and quality up here in the hot tropics.

talking about fruit, the mangoes have been in season since the beginning of december and i love to blend them and drink them. so far the mangoes on our table are free, they are lying everywhere under mighty mango trees. mango is harvesting them and i am preparing sweet yummy drinks for us.

on our weekly trip to our friend j and his family, to get fresh tomatoes, cucumbers, capsicums, and at time some other fruit as well, there are several jack fruit trees, and when we are passing them by i never forget to admire them. at times i have said: "mango, we should stop here one day and get some jack fruit, it looks like no one is harvesting them, they are always some composting away under the trees." two weeks ago, on our way from j, close to the jack fruit trees a man was on the front of his property, mango stopped our car and asked the man if we could harvest some jack fruit from his tree, the man replied: " go for it, take as many as you like". so while i was chatting with the friendly man, mango went to the huge jack fruit tree only a few meters away, i was surprised, because i never noticed it, it was a bit hidden behind other trees. the tree was blessed with abundance of huge jack fruit. mango harvested two of them, soft and ready to eat, and he joined our chat. we are welcome to harvest jack fruit at any time, so we got one yesterday. j also gave us yesterday one watermelon, eleven pineapples, some capsicum, tomatoes and lychee's for free.

i am having fruitarian fun under the hot tropical summer sun.

life is beautiful

summer fruit

nice bunch of mangoes on the tree in our garden, the beauty of summer fruit

mango in oz bush

mango is chatting with grass tree on our way to have a swim..


australian

me after several swims in davis creek, enjoying last minutes before leaving back for home.