Once Again?

It's a closed loop(a closed loop supply chain in the view point of manufacturers, creating new out of dated)

"Who knows? There may be a time sooner when this changes too! What do you say?"

might be possible, lets hope

 

Very True Sir.

Those things which we used earlier ( like the toothpaste which you mentioned) we considered as obsolete ideas by the foreigners who introduced flashy colors and toothpaste to us which we accepted gracefully with both hands.
Now with increasing dental problems we realized, Oopsssssssssss our forefathers were correct and now we are moving back to Neem and salt.
We can go on giving examples to these like organic fertilizers, drinking water in copper vessels, using coconut oil, ghee, more use of ragi in our food etc. When foreigners knew only cakes and baking, we were wondered and start eating them forgetting our valuable food. Later now biscuits, oats, ragi, pearl barley sell more in Carrefour and other American shopping malls. What they learned from us , they are giving back to us.
We are accepting them again gracefully as we always believe " they know better than us". We should do back to our roots, if we need good health and better thinking. Our foods are medicines and some of us being vegetarians never had any vitamin issues too . We were happy with curry rice and Idly sambar.
Our grandparents did not know how to provide protein oriented diet and remove excessive starch coz they used to cook rice and remove the excess water and not make them in an oven to save time. Our grandparents did not count vitamins and minerals but included all available seasonal fruits and vegetables to avoid diabetes, obesity and all other diseases which we now call as " LIFESTYLE DISEASES".
So I would say, Once again-- Go back to your roots and dig out your family recipes. They will give the medicines for all your present health issues.

 

hmm so true....

 

Dear Sir,

It was nice to read you post.

My dad who is 84 posted about tooth paste and dental care on Facebook recently. I am pasting this here. Hope you enjoy reading it.

DENTAL CARE THEN AND NOW
MY PUDUKKOTTAI DAYS
The year was 1940 or 1941. I was a boy of 8 years old. One afternoon, I walked into kitchen of my house. I saw my mother in the kitchen adding a large quantity of salt in a pan with boiling water. The pan was on top of a wooden stove. I did not know what she was making with only salt in the boiling water. I asked her; she said that she is making some thing for my father. I stood there watching the whole process. The water was allowed to evaporate. The residue, small salt crystals were then taken out from the pan, dried and then sieved. This looked like Table salt we buy today. Table salt was not known in those days. I learned that this is the one that my father used daily to brush the teeth. I tried it the next morning, but it irritated my gums, I had to give up.
Today I see a large number advertisement in TV , telling us about the advantages of salt in their tooth paste. How some of the old things are coming back, with higher costs.
We were using a powder made out of a tree bark. The barks used to be brought from the nearby jungles, dried and powdered in a mill (Panduranga mills, Pudukkottai). This was the common tooth powder for all out house hold. I forgot the name of the tree or powder. It used to start with “KARU”.
In my earlier days, most of us did not know that tooth paste exists. We were used in earlier days with some herbal made tooth powder. Then came PYORROHEA 1451, GOPAL and Nanjankoodu palpudi. I am surprised that most of them still exist. I don’t know who the buyers are. I also remember the advertisement in local paper with a slogan “NAMATHU NANMAIYAM NADUM NANJANKOODU PALPUDI”.
(Tooth pastes began to appear in the rural market in 1942 or so. Until after 1945, toothpastes contained soap. After that time, soap was replaced by other ingredients to make the paste into a smooth paste or emulsion - such as sodium lauryl sulphate, a common ingredient in present-day toothpaste.)
The market then was getting with what they called, Dentifrice which appeared like a shaving round soap. We have to rub our fingers into the item to brush out our teeth. I think these have disappeared! It was considered to be a luxury to us in the olden days.
Most of the other people, mainly the village folk used Neem sticks to brush their teeth. No additive was required. It was nice watching them to cut a small twig from a neem tree; flatten one edge to make it appear as a tooth brush and vigorously brushing their teeth near a river or well. I still see a large number of people using these in some parts of Tamilnadu. I think this was a prelude to the number and varieties of tooth brushes we use today at a high cost. It should be noted that dental problems were very uncommon even with old people.
My father, mother and my elderly relations had no dental problems till their ripe age. No dental cleaning by a dentist, no floss and no tooth paste!.
My home town Pudukkottai had only one Japanese private dentist Dr. Azuma . He was interred into a prison during the world war days, suspecting he will pass on our national dental secrets to the enemy!.
Now looking into Numerous advertisements in TV and news papers, and the amount of money people spend on Teeth care, I wonder, how our simple way of living in the olden days with minimum needs are deteriorating. Consider the different types of tooth pastes, mouth washes and dental floss and the amount of money that is being spent on dental treatments.(I was told that Eskimos never brush their teeth-fact or fiction- I don’t know). HOW WERE WE TAKING CARE OF OURSELVES WITHOUT ALL THESE???
( a note: The first toothbrush of a more modern design was made by William Addis in England around 1780 – the handle was carved from cattle bone and the brush portion was still made from swine bristles. In 1844, the first 3-row bristle brush was designed.
Natural bristles were the only source of bristles until Du Pont invented nylon. The invention of nylon started the development of the truly modern toothbrush in 1938, and by the 1950s softer nylon bristles were being made, as people preferred these. The first electric toothbrush was made in 1939 and the first electric toothbrush in the US was the Broxodent in 1960.)
S.Venkataraman
August 2015.

 

Dear rgs,
During our childhood we used nanjankoodu tooth powder pinkish in colour and sweet. Later years we used monkey brand tooth powder black in colour and it used to freshen our mouth. Later we started using tooth paste.
Whatever our older generation used were time tested and really beneficial.
PS

 

We are so proud about our culture, but in fact, we have zero respect about our culture.
We blindly defend our culture with any random outsider, as we are so sensitive about it. But when it comes to accepting or following, we simply don't bother about it.

Sad, but that is the truth.

We are proud about our local languages, and say ours is the most oldest and perfect language. We fight with strangers about this.
But at home, we speak in English. We educate our kids in English medium. If someone takes the challenge to raise their kids in local language, we condemn them.

We are proud about our local food. But we are ashamed to pack our traditional food to the office. We are even ashamed to say loud that we ate X or Y, as we think people might put us down knowing this. So, we pretend as if we eat, bread, butter and jam as if they were the most nutritional food on earth.

We are proud about our tradition; hence traditional cloths. But we only wear them during weddings. If a man wears only traditional cloths, then we judge him. We judge his quality, confidence and value based on this.
Same applies for women. Thats why we fight with in laws to wear jeans and pants at the cost of risking our marriage.

It is all because we have no confidence about our tradition. Although ours is a golden tradition, which is now being respected and followed by many others.

Just because the so called white people have accepted some bits and pieces of our culture, we started believing it, hence accepting.

That's how coal and neem toothpaste has a market here. Don't misjudge this as if we have started respecting our roots. Because we need some white skin person's acceptance even to understand our roots. Sad, but truth.