Part 2: Use Latex Instead of Oil Paint.

Abe V Rotor

What kind of paint shall I use?

Well, use water-based acrylic. In hardware stores, it is called latex paint. It is multipurpose and the most popular paint today - from art and house paint.

I prefer latex paint to oil for art painting - especially for children. These are the reasons.

1. Latex is less toxic than oil paint. Both however, contain materials not good to health, like lead, hydrocarbon and dioxide compounds. By the way, there is no paint that is completely safe to health and the environment. The most hazardous is lacquer paint - the one in canister or used on automobile. It is among the CFC materials that destroy the ozone layer.

2. Latex is much cheaper and it does not entail additional costs for solvents like turpentine, linseed oil and kerosene as thinner, spreader and cleaner, and in the case of lacquer, volatile solvents.

3. Latex is easy and convenient to use. Because it is water-based, paintbrush is easy to clean and it will last longer. Stains can be easily removed, especially when paint is still fresh.
Latex paint dries in minutes, oil in hours or days.

4. Waste from latex paint is easier to dispose. Generally let the paint dry first before it is disposed just like any garbage, except of course, when dealing with large quantities. Wash paintbrush in sink, don't wash on waterways and open areas.

5. Latex is versatile and has wider application. It comes in different colors, primary or mixed. It is sold in your nearest hardware stores in different brands and sizes. You can use rollers, paintbrush or palette - or in combination, specially in art painting. It is used on any surface - canvas, wood, concrete - and even metal after a suitable primer is made.

Living with Nature 3, AVR

Christ is laid to rest on Angels' Hills

Where Have All the Faithful Gone?
Abe V Rotor

Oh, where have all your faithful gone,
Where’s truly the love for a Son?
Is death your way to change the world,
That mankind be saved by your word?

No one answers but the passing breeze
Over the carved stones under the trees;
And I stood with the icons, to pray
In vigil, looking to a new day. ~


Acknowledgment: Angels' Hills Retreat Center, Tagaytay; a detailed study by Abe V Rotor with Sony Cybershot camera.

Tagaytay Ridge

Abe V Rotor

Tell me if you are a cauldron's tomb
by a volcano in your womb;
or a scar of a visiting star
strayed from a place afar.

I would only want to visit you
to revere you, and not place a wreath to
your origin of long, long time ago,
the remnants of beauty aglow.~


Composed at Angels' Hill, Tagaytay, January 5, 2010
Living with Nature 3, AVR

Top 10 Quotes by Confucius

Abe V Rotor

Confucius is one of the most quoted personalities ever. He is "The Greatest Master"to the Chinese people, as Jesus Christ is "The Greatest Teacher" to the Christians.

Confucius, whose name literally means "Master Kong", lived 551-479 BC. He was a Chinese thinker and philosopher, whose teachings have deeply influenced not only Asian thought and life but those of the world. Many of them are universal and timeless in their beautiful and simple truth and they are as valid today as they were in his time. His main advocate is the importance of learning.

Here we take a look at 10 of the most inspiring quotes by Confucius. (From the Anaclets)

1. "Never impose on others what you would not choose for yourself."

2. "Real knowledge is to know the extent of one’s ignorance."

3. "I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand."

4. "Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it."

5. "The Superior Man is aware of Righteousness, the inferior man is aware of advantage."

6. "Wheresoever you go, go with all your heart."

7. "Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in getting up every time we do."

8. "He who learns but does not think, is lost. He who thinks but does not learn is in great danger."

9. "He that would perfect his work must first sharpen his tools."

10. "If you look into your own heart, and you find nothing wrong there, what is there to worry about? What is there to fear?"


Light from the Old Arch 2, AVR

Part 1: The Devolution of Life

Giant Ceiba pentandra tree, now an

endangered species. UP Diliman, QC.

Abe V Rotor
…………………………………………………………………………..
“Man has reversed the process of evolution and he has put into his hands the pattern and trends as he wishes, playing the role of his Creator.” - AVR
………………………………………………………………………………..
All living things, past and present, are progenies of evolution and are interconnected in one way or the other. And each one has a place in the phylogeny, the chart of evolution.

Imagine the organisms in countless numbers assigned in distinct groupings scientists call as “kingdoms,” with the ancient ones occupying the bottom, and the complex ones at the top. And each kingdom is divided into sub-groups arranged in the same pattern – from simple to complex members.

1. From the first Green Revolution – the transformation of man from hunter to farmer some 10,000 years ago – man has narrowed down the diversity of crops and animals according to his needs.

2. The loss of ecosystems all over the world as population and settlements continue to expand has not only predisposed species to extinction but caused permanent damage of these natural habitats, that it is virtually impossible to rebuild them back into their original states.

3. Global Warming is causing sea level to rise and flood low lying area. On the polar ice and ice caps are melting down. Global warming stirs climate change which is causing climatic disturbances. There is a increasing rate and intensity of typhoons, hurricanes, tornado, flooding, drought, and the like,

4. Pollution on land, water and air, in increasing levels brought about by industrialization, growing population and affluence of living, has triggered man-induced phenomena that threaten species and life itself.

5. Rapid population increase, industrialization and affluent living all lead to changing chemistry of the land, water and air. We do not only mix natural elements and compounds; we synthesize them into products foreign to nature. Plastics for example do not decompose, gases from car react to form acid rain, toxic metal run through the food chain and food web, and natural waterways are open sewers. These do not only disturb life; they maim, kill, annihilate; they turn productive areas into wastelands.

6. Man intrudes into the wildlife which continues to shrink. Gone is 80 percent of the rainforest of the world. Ninety percent of the coral reefs have been destroyed by over fishing and by reckless means. The grasslands are shrinking giving way to farming. The sea is being farmed. Islands are now owned by private persons and organizations.

7. Genetic engineering has broken the barriers that separate species by directly combining genes of different organisms, thereby destroying the identity and integrity of species, and therefore change their behavior and interrelationships.

8. Evolution it seems is no longer a natural process, but one dictated by human intelligence that continues to build from the indulgence on the fruits of the “Tree of Knowledge that makes man as powerful as God,” the very thing that vanished his first ancestors from the biblical Garden of Eden.

Where have all the rice varieties gone?

There are more than 50,000 cultivars of rice presently stored in the Gene Bank of the International Rice Research Institute at UP Los Baños, Laguna. According to IRRI scientists this number represents but a fraction of the possibly rices (the plural of rice to denote distinct genetic variations) of the world since agriculture began some 5000 years ago or so.

Similarly at the Centro Internacional de Mejoramiento del Maiz y Trigo (CIMMYT) in Mexico the gene bank for wheat and corn faces the same problem as in rice, and if this is the case, it is logical that many varieties and cultivars of field crops we know today are but the selected few that man, the farmer, has intentionally preserved. In short, what these banks as well as those conserved by other organizations, are but the remnant of the world’s naturally occurring genetic pool on the one hand, and those genetically modified by man.

A cursory examination of rice sold in the market makes a short list of about a dozen misleading varieties as sinandomeng, wigwag, intan, which are pseudonyms to attract customers for the likeness of quality with those they have been named after.

To validate this observation through field survey one is likely to find even a simpler classification as upland and lowland rice, or aromatic, glutinous, red rice and the like. This is the same observation in the former prairies of North America, now the biggest cereal granary of the world extending across the Canadian border covering the provinces of Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba. According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, there are only 10 major wheat varieties planted on the vast plains. For corn, the indigenous varieties are rare to find on the farm. Hybrid corn – a cross of two or more purified varieties – makes up the bulk of corn produced. Hybrids are unstable genetically. In the succeeding generations the lose hold on the genetic vigor of their parents, resulting in drastic decline in yield.

Continued

Take your Children to Nature this 2010

Build natural resistance in children with outdoor life by the sea

Bring out your family to picnics to build closer bonding.

Involve children in home and community gardening.

Give your children hands-on and on-site learning experiences.Develop their talents in the arts in appreciating nature.

Let your children experience life without the amenities of living.

Let your children live in the past among fossils.

Uphold tradition like kite flying with your children.

Encourage your children to participate in nature's trip
and camping. (De La Salle University System Ecology
Camp, Canlubang, 2009)

Take your children to the zoo, botanical gardens,
and nature centers

Tell your children the real story about an anthill
other than fairy tale.

Help your children look for specimens and identify them.

Camp with your children - better the whole family.

Visit the crater of a dormant volcano and let
your children experience awe and danger.
Follow Nature Trail Spendthe weekend outdoor.

Not this, please.

Nor this!

Living with Nature 3, AVR

Heroes for the Environment - Are you one of them?

Heroes for the Environment -   Are you one of them?

Dr Abe V Rotor

Scene of disaster left behind by super typhoon Yolanda 2013

You can be a hero in many ways. Consider these and rate yourself through Reflective Analysis.

1. If you live a practical life so as to build personal savings, become less dependent on burrowing, and reduce wasteful living in the process.

2. If you practice a lifestyle that favors good health and relationship, without the trapping of vices and ostentatious living, making yourself an example to others.

3. You are an effective teacher using simple tools and methods, instead of sophisticated tools and expensive means, to be able to bring functional literacy to the grassroots bypassed by formal schooling.

4. If you generate power – electricity and fuel – through direct and natural means such as biofuel, and energy from wind and water, and not depend on expensive, destructive, and non-renewable sources.

5. If you convert wastes into new and recycled materials, such as composting and biogas generation, thus reducing pollution and conserving natural resources.

6. If you produce food from your backyard and kitchen (gardening, poultry, food processing), in line with self reliance, home enterprise and clean environment.

7. If you plant trees as an avowed activity to help Nature rebuild the environment, as a means of bioremediation, erosion and flood control, and the like, while increasing the supply of food and useful materials derived from them.

8. If you build your own home that is simple and economical, comfortable and health-promoting, harmonizing it with the aesthetics and bounty of nature, thus enhancing the beauty of creation itself.

9. If your go natural - from food, medicine to personal items, promoting organically grown food, alternative medicine, non-GMO (genetically modified organisms) and the like, thus protecting the health of humans and the environment.

10. If you protect wildlife and help rebuild the natural habitat of threatened and endangered species of plants and animals in ecological sanctuaries, and by enforcing laws in protecting them.

11. If you do not stop learning, if you apply what you learn through skills, and valuing them as well, to your enhance your output, and to share them for the benefits of others.

12. If you recognize and uphold the institutions, respecting the laws of the land, and revering great men and women for their works and examples for which they lived and died, without condition of doing your part well.

13. If you make use of your time fully in work and study, and not live idly, thus living a life of example to the youth in particular - diligence, persistence, sharing, and most important, valuing of life’s purpose.

14. If you build a happy family and provide well its needs, and securing a bright future of your children - and even your children’s children.

15. If you engage in an enterprise, keeping in mind and applying it as well, through entrepreneurship that is equitable to all concerned stakeholders such as the Grameen Bank Model in Bangladesh founded by Nobel laureate M Yunus)

16. If you uphold and practice the principles of equality, fraternity and liberty, in every act and decision you make, providing room for kindness and forgiveness on one hand, and firmness and resolve on the other, even in the face of danger.

17. If you cannot quiet your mind and conscience with sin – whether it be a sin or commission or omission – until you have done your part in amending it and preventing it in harming other people, in corrupting society, and the environment.

18. If you are patient, forgiving, resilient, understanding, and such other qualities that enable you to rise above difficulties of living, particularly in times of calamities - not only for your own benefit, but more for those who are less fortunate than you are

19. If you always remember to pray to that one God for his Providence, recognizing His gifts, through expression of Goodness to yourself, to Humanity and to Mother Earth.

20. If you are aware and honestly believe that you are “passing this way but once,” thus living the life that best earns your passage to that kingdom of your Creator – however humble that life may be.

Congratulations! Live then the life of a hero for 2010.

Happy New Year! From Dr. Abe V Rotor and Family.

Living with Nature 3, AVR