Buddhism in Africa, Why no penetration?

This was written before the origin of the ISIS and it is relevant even today. 

History repeats itself in unkindness not kindness (in spite of many religions).

That is why sometimes in my twilight years, I believe that world without any religion (better term Rigid Dogma) is a better place to live.


Buddhism    in    Africa,        Why    no    penetration?
 
I    am    intrigued    by    the    lack    of    penetration    of    Buddhism    in    the    South     African continent.
It    is    not difficult to comprehend.
If one looks to the East of India,    China    has    resisted    it    for    centuries.
India    is    no    exception.
China    of    course        evicted Dalai        Lama    and    killed    millions    in    the    name    of    Communism.

India    for    it    to    keep    class    and    caste    prejudice    wanted    it    out    sooner    than    late.
 
In    the    North    where    Buddhism    had    penetrated    to    Persia    which    is    currently    Iran.

Muslim    expansion    in    North    Africa    effectively    blocked    its        penetration.    

What    about the    West    Africa?
Germans    have    effectively,    the missionaries    had    no    place    for    for    indigenous    people.
 
Another    religion    which    preached    peace    had    no    valid    currency.

What    about    the    South    Africa?
It    is    again    colonization    and    sometimes    extermination    of    tribes    could    not    tolerate,    a    peaceful    religion.
 
East,    again    from    Sudan    to    Somalia    mainly    tribal    with    religious    animosities    still    simmering, could not tolerate a peaceful religion.

Buddhism    is    an    antithesis.
 
What    about    Ceylon’s    contribution?
Surprisingly    nil,    since    it    practices    a    modern    method    of    discrimination    using    religion    as    a    scapegoat.

Above    question    made    me    to    read    a    little    bit    of    the    history    of    mankind    of    the    past    five    centuries.
 
No    religion    can    cover    the    atrocities    of    war    of    the    white    man    in    full    gear.
 
Religion    was    only    a    decoy    or    a    cover    up    of    expansion    and    extermination.
 
Summary    of    it    goes    like    this.
 
1.    South    America    Total    Annihilation    by    Spanish    and    isolation    of the indigenous people to    small    pockets.
 
2.    North    America    Even    worse    and    No    Apache    was    the    goal.

3.    Africa    From    Belgium (Central)    to    West    to    South    Africa    it    was    combined    effort    of the   French,    German,    and    English.
 
How    come    when    a    peaceful        religion (in Ceylon not Burma)   and    its    present        advocates    (preach    war    in    the    name    of    religion    -now-   as    a    method,    logic    and        suppression    of    reason)    can    penetrate    Africa    when    it    cannot    tolerate    its    own    brethren.

It    is    the    sad    truth    of    20 and 21st    century        history    and    politics.

Microsoft Update (Ceylon), Misleading the Masses

Linux Etiquette

I missed a few points.

Besides, I am on "Holiday Mood" and basically very lazy to check spelling mistakes and the like.
Linux looks after your hardware for decades unlike Microsoft which burns RAM / DVD Drives and sometimes cause fire if stuck with a heavy file.

It has happened to me long time ago.

Linux call it “incremental file access”.


1. Linux Box is meant to be run 24/7 day schedule and some of house cleaning work is done at midnight or around that time, automatically.



2. One need to keep it on from 11 P.M to 1 A.M. to get best use of these utilities.



3. I do not use the computer on day time to save money on Electricity (the fans that cools the computer takes up lot of electricity).
So if you are not using it switch it off except at mid night.



4. I sleep during day time (it is a luxury for me who had been on call for 48-72 hour duty rosters) and switch on the computer after 9 P.M.

5. The added benefit is our service provider does not provide a fast service day time and looking at few emails cost lot of money BUT at night it is breezy.



6. I make sure at least one torrent file is downloading, if I am not particularly not browsing anything or doing something else (watching a film or writing a blog piece).

7. If I have a rare torrent file I leave it open at least for 3 days for others to access.

What one takes one should reciprocate.

That is an etiquette of Linux Guys/ Girls.



Do not be SELFISH.

Microsoft Update (Ceylon), Misleading the Masses

I do not want to go into detail why a Microsoft computer becomes painfully slow within three months.

It is the job of the user to choose an Operating System that suits him/her for his daily chores.

If one is not interested in Heavy Duty Work and want to play games, Yes You buy a new computer with a good graphic card and PAY Microsoft and install it without any utility and pay for every software you need including office package.

What Ceylonese do is to use pirated copies.

Of course there are lot of FREE Linux utilities including Wine (Wine is to use Microsoft packages in Linux, if one wants) for Microsoft addicts.

I believe what the Microsoft intends to do (lure) is to get the new users to use Scan Device and keep a hook on the user for eavesdropping of his activities including pirated copies.

Then they display warning signals every time you boot.

If You want to be really free what you ought to do is to use Linux.

Most of the Linux distributions have assortment of utilities prepacked with the DVD.

If an utility missing is all what you have to do is go to the software center and download it, which is breezy and automatic configuring of the computer without pressing the restart button.

Linux comes with over 44,000 utilities in Debian Software Domain alone, all free.

Only down side is there are few Heavy Duty Games.

For a Linux Fanatic or Microsoft converter, there is Linux Gamer called STEAM but one has to pay for the games.

Coming back to why a computer gets slow (never happens with Linux -one does not have to be a geek but new comers included-even if you use it continuously for 10 years), there are many reasons.

1. The primary reason is your choice of Microsoft.

Surely, Microsoft using the Scan Device-Software is accepting its own failure to give you a SOLID, Regimented Solution.

I won't say anything except, if you buy a poor product, be prepared for all the pitfalls, pit-stops and ultimate crash (racing terminology).

If you are a racing driver use Linux.

Mind you NASA use it in Spaceships and smart racing drivers use Linux in their cars.

For the last 15 years, I never had a hiccup, not a single file lost or corrupted.

I am a writer and only failure in my case is my memory.

I forget where, I had placed the file (or the name of the file).

2. Microsoft loads everything at boot time, if you do not intend to use a particular device why mount it.

Why use resources to run the DVD disk when you are only using your USB stick to mount a file?

Mount is a solid program word in Linux.

It mounts only what it needs.

3. File integrity.

In the case of Debian when it boots it reserves 90 seconds to check the file integrity.

That's all.

Microsoft takes ages to check file integrity and it never does it at boot time only afterward. 

4. Cash and history are taken care by Linux and only the oldest and not so frequently used pages are refreshed.

There is a utility to clean up.I never use it and forgets it name.

If one is a Linux fanatic one can write a script to to do these jobs at a particular time of the day or week.

In my case I do it (the cleaning) once a year. Read the note below.

Microsoft cannot do it.

Somebody else has to do it.

5. The biggest culprit that slows down your computer is not your operating system but your own browser with cookies and its redendant history and bookmraks.

Firefox/ Chrome are culprits.

Solution use a lighter browser or Opera.

I use several browsers in different workplaces and overcome this problem BUT one has to have at least 1 GiB RAM in a 32 bit computer.

Switch off the browser if you are not using it.

6. The sixth is your email provider.

Yahoo is the culprit. Yahoo is trying to load its utilities (for the last one year and making a hash of it) like Microsoft to make it superficially lively BUT failing miserably.

Microsoft and Yahoo are on the same boat trying to lift up their flagging images.

I use try to use minimal features but there is no way I can do it myself.

Instead I use Gmail for family work and AOL for critical writing work.

 I call Yahoo the JUNK mail, affectionately, though.

I cannot do without it now (addiction).

Yahoo Web site is pretty good but again very slow to browse individual items.

If your computer is slow there are three reasons.

1. Number one you are using Microsoft not Linux.

2. Your Browser is Fatty.

3. Your email is too Fatty.

Linux Update

This is the time Linux Guys/Girls go on Christmas holidays after posting their latest version of Linux distribution.

This is also the time, I update my Linux distribution to the latest.

Then I have to download all the packages I want.

It is a bit of a haste only because it takes time.

I have many distributions including Debian but my work horse is Peppermint (Debian and Ubuntu based but Light Weight and independent).

May be Peppermint 5 (it does not state).

But Debian were 8 and 8.1.

Debian did not have a rolling distro but recently according to Linux Magazine they are addressing this issue (LTS Version which Ubuntu does a pretty good work).

I have Ubuntu but I rarely use it after the Unity Version.

I am becoming lazy and I did not want to go through the rigid rigmarole of installing a new version.

What I did was to go to Software Installation and click update all packages.

It took little over half an hour and updated all the packages including the Grub File.

I was worried, if something goes wrong I had to re-do all the work.

It removed all the redundant stuff and installed the new packages.

For the first time I got thesaurus installed (I tried before and failed) in Libre Office.

Even Gimp was updated.

Only downside was that the Firefox / Chrome became bulky and slow.

I am soon going for Ducky Duck alternative browser soon.

If you have old Peppermint update option is sleek and I hope other Linux distribution copy this strategy for desktop users.

It is altogether different strategy for commercial distributions.

They need LTS version with support.

According to Linux Magazine, Debian has finally decided to offer this option for commercial users.

Thanks guys and girls of Linux (sorry for the Microsoft users), You are way ahead of Microsoft in both Desktop and Commercial Versions.

The Linux Magazine distribution with its links with Linux Voice (good strategy,joining hands) has dropped Maddock's feature article.

I miss it very much.

Linux Update-2017

Linux Update-2017

This is the time Linux Guys/Girls go on Christmas holidays after posting their latest version of Linux distribution.

This is the time hackers are waiting for Zombies.

This is also the time, I update my Linux distribution to the latest.

Then, I have to download all the packages I want.

It is a bit of a hassle, only because it takes time.

I have many distributions including Debian but my work horse is Peppermint (Debian and Ubuntu based but Light Weight and independent).

May be Peppermint 5 (it does not state).

But Debian are 8 and 8.1.

It is into the 9th version.

Debian did not have a rolling distro but recently according to Linux Magazine they are addressing this issue (LTS Version which Ubuntu does a pretty good job).

I have Ubuntu but I rarely use it after the Unity Version.

I am becoming lazy and I did not want to go through the rigid rigmarole of installing a new version.

What I did was to go to Software Installation and click update all packages.

It took little over half an hour and updated all the packages including the Grub File.

I was worried, if something goes wrong I had to re-do all the work.

It removed all the redundant stuff and installed the new packages.

For the first time I got thesaurus installed (I tried before and failed) in Libre Office.

Even Gimp was updated.

Only downside was that the Firefox / Chrome became bulky and slow.

I am soon going for Ducky Duck alternative Light Browser soon.

If you have an old Peppermint installed TRY Update option.

It is sleek and I hope other Linux distributions copy this strategy for desktop users.

It is altogether different strategy for commercial distributions.

They need LTS version with support.

According to Linux Magazine, Debian has finally decided to offer this option for commercial users.

Thanks guys and girls of Linux (sorry for the Microsoft users), You are way ahead of Microsoft in both Desktop and Commercial Versions.

The Linux Magazine distribution with its links with the Linux Voice (good strategy, joining hands) has dropped Maddock's feature article.

I miss it very much.

Bob Rankin's Work is Good

This a comment under Bob Rankin's Article.

Go and visit it.

Bob has done a good article here.
 
I raised these issues (more satire than real intent, then) about 15 years ago not realizing INTERNET becomes a Stinking Sewer.

"What happens to my email when I am gone-DEAD" was the point I pondered.
 
It took SIX months to delete my Facebook account.
That was also after a stinking email to the Administrator.
They hid the delete drop down menu but still keep my account in their server.
 
When I realized KGB, CIA and FBI are proxies for these Social Media, it was too late for me to raise a point of "Privacy Objection".
 
Simply because, I love my privacy.
 
Moment one opens an email account, even if it is "PAID and Private", the Administrator can access everything.
Fortunately, I was into Linux many moons ago, it has all the Utilities for anonymous activity, especially POLITICAL ACTIVITY under a DICTATOR.

In any case, I am winding up my FUTURE digital activity BUT leave all the previous activities (not necessarily PUBLIC) floating in the WEB.
 
I need to have my digital presence felt (Good or Bad immaterial), when I KICK the Bucket for GOOD.
 
In any case, "Good, Bad and the Ugly" (Western Film by Clint Eastwood) are all present in the WEB.
 
But the Wild West was much better than the WEB.

Will you eat it, if it is in a dish?

Will you eat it, if it is in a dish?

Posted on June 17, 2011 on asokaplus

If it has got four legs
And it is not a chair
Will you eat it?
Americans will eat it

If it has got two wings
And it flies
But is not an aeroplane,
Will you eat it?
British will eat it in full

If it swims

And it is not a submarine,
Will you eat it?
Africans will eat it

Even if not hungry

It has no legs
And wiggles
But not a stick
Or a broom stick
Will you eat it?
Yes the Chinese will eat it
Like noodles

But a poor
Cantonese
Or an Indian
Or a Bangladeshi
Cook has to cook it

Before it is dished out

In a royal plate

It looks as if

Even a modern

Buddhist of Colombo

Or a Buddhist Monk

From Anuradhapura

Would not say

No

If it is dished out

Not in royal

But

At a Presidential Buffet

In Colombo

Modified from Prince Phillip’s Visit and

His Uttering in Royal Language

Tibet, China and Human Rights

Tibet, China and Human Rights
Over one million Tibetans died due to Chinese invasion of Tibet. 
Dalai Lama was chased out and in exile now.

Tibetans does not hurt worms (any life) even.
Does peaceful means have a say in the modern World? 

U.N.O is the largest hypocrisy of the modern World.

Why they (UNO) take offensive action on smaller nation like Ceylon?

Does precise little to Tibetans?

Why smaller nation (Ceylon) ask ill-gotten wealth of Chinese for their development?

China is buying things that they cannot invade.

Why India that created the LTTE for their offensive action to influence Ceylonese politics does not react to Chinese offensive in Tibet?


Human race is selfish, India, China and USA included.

They will soon forget the atrocities of even Hitler.

That is the very reason aliens (if they do visit us) do not trust humans and may be producing hybrids to destroy the human lust.

History repeats itself in unkindness not kindness.
 
It was calculated that when India and China fought war and each country killed one opposite soldier every second, it takes more than eleven years to end the war.

This calculation would be 22 years now with population expansion.

But a nuclear bomb can do that in few seconds.

Either one Indian or one Chinese will be left.

I prefer an Indian left instead of a Chinese.



Why?

Indians have a very short memory whereas Chinese have a very grand design as shown by invading Tibet.

What is Trump going to contribute to this scenario?

No Dog for Christmas

No Dog for Christmas

I should rephrase it no “Puppy as a gift” for Christmas.

If you really love puppies please download Puppy Linux;

The creator of this Linux distribution is a real dog lover.

Not only that Puppy Linux is Puppy size (one need to have some understanding about Linux, though) but loaded with utilities.

I can have a list of reasons of more than 20 but on top are two real life stories.

This happened more than 30 years in the United Kingdom.

I was heavily involved with Neonatal Paediatric care then.

I was on weekend off and listening to some music (Terry Vogan was my favourite Irish announcer) and radio (not Terry) announced the tragic death of a baby few days old (the day the happy family brought the baby home), mauled to death by the owners pet dog. 

The police came an shot the dog but the baby did not survive.

The bottom line is the dogs can be extremely jealous of a new comer, including babies.

This happened about 10 days before Christmas and that was the only Christmas that I could not blend with the Christmas spirit.

All throughout the festive season the message was relayed "No Puppy as a pet, if one cannot care for".

Underline theme was that baby care is full time job and dog care is no different.

The bone of contention here is, the doctor/s could have visited the house and made some investigations of the suitability of the house for a newborn baby with an adult dog.

The second incident was, one of my old (80 plus) professors forearm was torn to pieces and needed over 40 stitches.

He was terrified and the dog, his own, was not killed but transferred to a suitable foster home.

He was living alone and we never investigated the reason for the attack.

So my recommendation;

One has to be 40 to 45 years (does not matter one is married or not) old, to properly care for dog who lives till the owner is 60 plus and showing all the signs of old age disabilities.

This the crisis period in life, the children are teens and won't listen to you.

The dog is an outlet to divert ones attention from growing but rebellious kids.

The paradox is the children also use the dog as a “Punching Bag” to let their frustration out.

For a single man or women (the success or failure in career is immaterial) it is good companion.

To brag about the dog (if successful in career) not the career in office.

The dog lives 15 to 20 years and for a single man /woman walking the dog (for the last 15 years of one's life) is a good antidote for intermittent exogenous depression (not for the endogenous depression,one needs proper treatment).

Besides, the dog ages fast and it is a preview of ones old age chronic illnesses, including arthritis, cataract, diabetes, obesity, gout and many more.

Mind you dog care is more expensive than medical care in USA/UK and France. 

Best advice is not have a dog at all if YOU do not have Money and Time! 

Please do not be enticed by the Christmas films involving dogs but enjoy the film instead.

Cleaning Hands

Please DO NOT Burn Your Hands, following the technique stated HERE.

This was a comment I placed below an article. 

Following is an extension of my blog activity.

One does not have to go paranoid about keeping clean hands.

Your hands are never sterile of bacteria.

Hands get colonized with bacteria every half an hour from your own "domesticated" or resident non pathogenic bacteria living on the surface and the root of the hairs.

They actually protect your hands from pathogenic bacteria invading and colonizing.

By wearing gloves one eliminates the risk of contaminating of a wound from your own possible carrier pathogens.

Ideally even a surgeon has to change gloves every half to one hour while operating.

By washing and scrubbing one gets rid of the foreign bacteria that are present in the contaminated food.

So the bottom line is to make sure one buys them from hygienic sources.

Other is to cook them before eating.

Fresh food (uncooked) is never free of bacteria one does not have to cook your hands; 

instead cook the food.

I never get involved in cooking since, with fish tanks and the dog my hands are never free of possible contamination.

I have to handle food that day is off for the fish and the dog. 

I consider the fridge-freezers are the most contaminated articles in yur house if it is jammed pack.

Minimum food in it cooked or uncooked is the safety valve.

I let my wife do the honours and bring fast food as a supplement.

Before I buy fast food I do a survey of how the food is handled and dished out and if I see any wrong practises, I never visit that place.

Food handling is a special art for the hospitality trade.

It is the job of the Public Health Inspectors to visit them regularly BUT our guys/girls visit them to take BRIBES from the vendors.

To get rid of hepatitis virus one has to boil for minimum of half an our.

HIV virus is inactivated by simple soap and water BUT kissing can transmit it apart from SEX whatever one's orientation is.

There was article stating to use HOT Water (temperature is immaterial) clean hands which is wrong.

Both hot water and very cold water can BURN your hands which is a serious injury for CHILDREN and adults.

40 years ago there wasnt a single place one could buy clean food in CEYLON.

Over the years we became immune to all the bugs.

I have no solution to this problem of "proper washing of hands (or any other article or body part").

I have to thank both Professor Barkumarakulasuriya and Professor Aluvihare for training as Medical Students and the etiquette of theatre practice.

Bar Kum wanted me to take surgical photographs of his cases, which I enjoyed very much.

APR (Athe Paya Rudawa after Surgery or Per Rectal Anjuna we renamed him no sooner he returned from UK) had SICU for his critical cases.

SICU was a new concept only Colombo General had a unit then.

Renal Unit was not established.

The technique I learned was useful when I started doing NEONATAL WORK in UK.

Then I realized I would be spending my time washing hands most of my waking life instead of sleeping like a log.

I decided to give up both surgery and Neonatology (We we the pioneers of Ventilators in UK then, starting with Baby Bellings and more sophisticated ventilators later).

Back at home under "Sirimawo and NM", I used to do postmortems with bare hands since even, if I wore two pairs of Cheap Chinese gloves, body fluids (no oozing blood but clotted blood in cadavers) would seep through them and stain my nails specially both index fingers.

I thought this was not a joke with Cholera was endemic in Jaffna then (brought from India).

I developed my own technique using surgical instruments properly sterilized under my ONLY pharmacist's scrutiny.

Nobody had ever used them before me in the District Hospital I worked all instruments coming from UK.

Hospital was known as a punishment station (unfortunately my first appointment) and was occupied by J.V.P in 1970/71.

Within a month only other medical man left to get married, (Thankfully I had a RMP who loved PP by the side which I encouraged to offload my patients) and I was all alone in three-man station.

Within five months I was the most unwanted man in the district since I was catching one by one all the Sinhala Buddhist clerk, food supplier, chief attendant, security guard and rogue nurses.

I could trust only three out of over 100 staff, the midwife, the pharmacist and the RMP, the last two were Tamil gentlemen.

I made an easy exist to the Department Pathology, University (That was intended as a punishment, since I begged the Deputy Director, never to send me to Pathology under Professor Tennakoon) from where I started climbing UP.

I had working relationship with my professor (who wanted me to do renal biopsies with only one Siverman Biopsy Needle) and one day watching me doing the dissection of the left overs (he never gave the Heart and the Kidneys) without gloves;

"What the Hell You Do, without gloves with Hepatitis B (Australia Antigen and Hepatitis B were current news then) epidemic".

I told him my reasons (Cheap Quality Chinese Gloves) and he made sure all our gloves for the department were imported from UK.

His final say was "Never Mind, you use your OWN technique BUT wear gloves in my department".

Within a year he treated me better than his sons.

The sons ONLY got distinction in English.

My sons are lazy, he used to tell me.

He had three heart attacks and the reason was heavy smoking (last two were after he quit smoking).

I stop smoking having seen him in critical care, latter stages of his life.

He wanted only books to read, that also detective ones.

He used to hit the films, the first day.

Both reading (especially critical scientific articles) and films, I am no different to him.

Thanks to him, I stopped smoking on my own volition, the day I stepped foot on United Kingdom.

I smoked only once on the day of my father's (not my mother) funeral.

Mind you he was a heavy smoker and I changed him to good cigars (he had multiple strokes) over time brought from UK.