Ervan’s Weltanschauung

Food is what us, human beings need to live. We eat to live. Well, for some, myself included, I live to eat….

Recently, the Health Ministry proposed a ban on fast food advertisements on telly. In fact, they put fast food as the one culprit for the increase of obesed Malaysians. I do agree, but, there’s more to just fast food. Our eating lifestyle surely contributed to it, and fast food is just a part of it.

We love our roti canais, which is made of ghee, plenty of oil there. How about our teh tariks? Yeaps, it is also a source of diabetics due to its sweetness. Reminds me of me spitting out my teh ais that I had near Pasar Payang in Kuala Terengganu. I kid you not, I did that, because the teh ais was too sweet for my liking. And I do have a sweet tooth!

Modern day food processing lead to these processed food, fast food, and more worrying, the higher rish of more people getting food poisoning. Malaysia had its share of food poisoning. The US, well, they are currently trying to figure out how did salmonella contaminated peanut butters. Salmonella which thrives on animal droppings contaminating peanut butters. How did it get there? But what we should worry of modern food processing, one single plant processing food can affect the whole nation.

Even if we avoid fast food altogether, I do think we still can get our share of fat from our local supermarket who sourced their food from the same source as the fast food outlets. Chickens which were grain fed and given plenty of growth hormones and antibiotics. Cows that are given carcasses of dead animals instead of eating grass. And not to forget the recent furore over illegal substances given to pigs.

And, if you think being vegetarian is safe? Hehe, allow me to remind you of the chemicals they put on the vegetables in order to make your vegetable looks clean and fresh…

Perhaps that’s why modern day humans are dying of cancer, heart attack, diabetes and others. We don’t have to look further than our eating habits, and also on how we processed our food.

But then, perhaps it is Darwin’s theory of evolution, only the strong and fittest survive….

A friend of mine, Azam invited me to a day out at the Zoo Negara with a bunch of orphans from Rawang. Spending time with the kids, and the donor’s family made me stopped and began thinking of life.

It is great to see the well to do, doing their bit for the less fortunate. And the story on how I ended up sacrificing my Sunday for the kids, is another story on its own. But I am proud of the group of volunteers who were there. Azam, for being the amazing coordinator that he is. Acat, he’s always good with the kids, together with his sister, Jannah. And Acat also managed to give me a surprise, a very shocking surprise that I nearly dropped my packed lunch.  At the end of the day, the kids had fun. The volunteers too had fun (and learned many things too that day). And I am proud to be their friend, and I seriously think that we are doing not bad at all…

On that day, the one that attracted the most attention was the lil girl who just joined the orphanage. Her mother recently passed away, and the father could not afford to take care of his huge family. So she was sent to the orphanage. Makes you wonder why God choose to take away her mother from her. In fact, I do wonder if she realises it or not. She can be so adorable at times, walking together with the rest of the kids, and not realising that her slipper slipped away and she was walking barefooted.

The Ustazah who take cares of the orphans, know about her responsibilities, and never forget to remind the kids to always remember Allah. Sometimes, you do need someone, be it a close friend, or even God, to help you through rough times. The kids might lack the actual family, but, they do have their own "family".

The young and innocent, sometimes you wonder why do they have to face the hardest hurdle in life….