today...
Wednesday, 5 March 2008
Silver spoons
Typical Chinese conversation with my mum, translated into English - the story gets repeated every now and then when my mum wants to emphasis how fortunate we (me and my siblings) are in this day and age.
"You know ahh... back in my time we struggled to make a living. Every morning we would have to wake up early to go to school, primary school! Then straight after school we would have to go to work earning just a few dollars, then come home and help my mother cook and clean the house... and mend a few clothes..." yaddddahhhh yaddddaahhhhh yadddddaahhhhh!!!
Yeah I know my parents sacrifced a lot for our wellbeing and for that I'm eternally grateful. Anyway the point of saying that was... my parents were never silver spoon fed unlike us.
Here in Exhibit A (thanks Peter) ... we have a silver spoon...
*drum roll*
. . .
OR IS IT?
For the humble Asian, I think we all know what Exhibit A is and does. And for anyone who's not Asian, well...introducing Exhibit A. This is what we call an ear cleaner...thingymajig.
I cast myself back to the days as a child where we used to wait in line for our ears to be cleaned by our mum. Just lieing down getting our ears cleaned was such a soothing effect... and we always felt so much better after having our ears cleaned.
By the way, this is not me when I was a tiny tot. Sif I get to wear Ralph Lauren at this age! Her name is Sydney and she's from the OC in California. She's the adorable daughter of one of my favourite photographers Pete also known as Arkworld on flickr. I hope you don't mind me using your photo!
I remember one time when our cousins came over and got their ears cleaned by my mum. My cousin brother had complained of being unable to hear things clearly... so my mum had a poke around his ear with the ear cleaner...thingymajig... *dig dig dig* and out came this whopping piece of ear wax the size of the end of your pinky!!! *crikeys* .... and it was all moist and gooey!!! YUCKS!!! We were all kadoodling about it when mum was trying to get it out of his ear. We didn't know if the ear wax was going to make it out alive and kicking or if it was going to tumble back into the crevices of his ear if mum made one slight wrong hand movement! We oodled over it for about 2 minutes as it lay lifeless on the tissue paper...and then went outside to play. At least he didn't have any hearing complaints after that.
So over the years I've been accustomed to using my ear cleaner...thingymajig for cleaning my ears. Sometimes when I'm bored, I like to have a fiddle in my ears with my ear cleaner...thingymajig. Western style cotton buds just don't do the trick. They're so lousy. In fact, they say that when you use cotton buds, it pushes the ear wax further into your ear! But sometimes I use them after coming out of the shower...
But then.... I made a discovery. Well, actually, mum made a discovery back in... 1996? She discovered the EAR WAX CANDLE!!! WTH is that you ask?
Well, ear candling is a safe, simple, natural way to remove excess wax and debris from inside the ears. Long tapered candles are inserted gently into the ears, then lit. Yes! you read right... LIT... with a lighter or match stick ... or whatever you want to use to LIGHT it! The candle creates a slight vacuum effect, oxidizing, vaporing and drawing softened wax and debris from the ears.
How does it work?
The spiral of the cone causes the smoke to be pulled down in to the ear canal. This causes the ear canal to warm up and loosen the wax and any other material. As it heats it up, the candle causes a suction by creating a vacuum in the ear canal. Air is drawn up from the Eustachian tube (that's a tube in your ear) into the middle ear then through the porous membrane out into the outer ear. The heat and the vacuum draw out the wax and other materials from the ear canal into the base of the candle. As it burns down you will hear a lot of cracking and hissing which is the process of removing the wax etc. The warmth feels soothing and relaxing during the process.
I remember the first time we tried it... we thought it was so dangerous... and wondered if anything would go wrong. But by the end of the procedure which takes about 15 minutes, we cut up the candle (which is made of 100% unbleached cotton muslin fabric and a Soy/Bees wax blend) to see what wonders we would find inside. The sight was amazing.... what was left of the candle after it was burnt down was completely filled with ear wax!!! GROSS!!!! But it was a good feeling to know that all that shit came out!
So give it a try! And... if anyone can find the ear wax candles in the shops - do let me know because I've been hunting for them everywhere but haven't been able to find any!
today...
@10:55 pm
