Kuya is at the farm trying to get the rice harvest in: there have been low pressure areas and rain, meaning it is hard to cut and dry it before it starts to rain in the afternoon.
The cook's latest great grandchildren, a set of twins, just celebrated their first birthday, so we got given Filipino style spaghetti to eat from the party. (sweet tomato sauce, and hot dogs and processed cheese on top).
Like a lot of twins, one was smaller and hospitalized twice for diarrhea/ fever/ failure to thrive. Mom's milk didn't agree with her (probably the real problem was not enough mom's milk for two kids, and the stronger one sucked her dry)...The doctor finally found an organic formula that worked, and since then she has done well. The problem? It's expensive, (a week's worth of forumla is 800 pesos, but mom and grandmom are out of work due to the virus) so I've been paying for the milk, and since then she has done okay and now is almost as big as her sister.
........
The maid just asked for extra money so her son could buy a smart phone for classes. She has one, but he has been sharing it with her and cousins so has been doing most of his classes with paper modules, which is stressful.
The maid brought up the suicide of a high school student in Manila, who fell behind and was reprimanded for this, so came home and his mom found him dead in his bedroom. This story is all over the papers and social media because adjusting to the new version of school is causing a lot of stress for middle class and lower middle class families who see education as the way out of poverty.
For example, The cook's youngest son went to college thanks to a scholarship from Japan and help from Lolo...but several of her grandkids are attendind post high school education too, with help from extended family.
In the meanwhile, the BBC ignores all of this and has a report of a " political prisoner" jailed for hiding weapons who had a baby in prison, but the authorities sent the kid home so it died after 3 months with diarrhea and pneumonia...and of course is blaming Duterte. The article claims everyone here is upset, but I didnt read about it. My take, as a doc who saw these problems in Africa?
Grandmom fed her formula mixed with dirty water, and maybe even watered down the formula because she couldn't afford to buy it.... or maybe the diarrhea came from dirty bottles. Alas, these deaths from babies on formula is why they encourage only breast feeding here, and most moms do breast feed.
. In other words,and maybe if all the horrified SJW had helped out with paying for bottled water and a good formula the kid would have lived. And maybe even help the kids of other women who cant breatfeed, live too...Ah, but demonstrating is so ego gratifying, and actual hands on helping people cope means getting your hands dirty.
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