Christmas in May

It's poinsetta season here in Madagascar.  This photo was taken at a birthday party yesterday in the backyard where the party was taking place.  These trees are blooming everywhere here, though.  The Malagasy are very surprised when I tell them that for us, the poinsetta is a Christmas plant.

The Bambina shows no amazement whatsoever at these kinds of plants.  I think she's become to used to it all. 

Organic, homeopathic products, dirt cheap?

Do you like to buy beauty products that don't contain parabens, phenoxethanol or other nasty stuff?  Do you find that these products can sometimes be expensive?  What if I told you that you could get all natural, organic beauty products for dirt cheap? 

I've recently discovered Homeopharma.  Homeopharma is a Malagasy company that specializes in homeopathic medicines as well as organic body care products.  And now they are exporting, at least to Europe.  I don't think their products have hit North American or Asian shores just yet.  I have just bought their children's shampoo (see photo at left).  The shampoo contains no preservatives.  The ingredients are mostly plants, although there is some sodium laureth sulfate in it.

I do have a couple of concerns with their products.  The labelling is not top.  Their website says that all their products have been certified as organic by Ecocert, yet the Ecocert label is absent from their beauty products' packaging.  The list of ingredients on the children's shampoo that I bought includes "parfum" (fragrance), with no indication that this fragrance is natural rather than a synthetic one containing phthalates, a harmful chemical known to disrupt the body's endoctrine system.  The label on the product does say "produit 100% naturel" (100% natural product), yet this cannot be true given that at least one of the ingredients is sodium laureth sulfate, a synthetic chemical.

Needless to say, this company needs a little more sophistication.  But it's an interesting start and their products are cheap!  The shampoo cost the equivalent of US$ 3.50.  The homeopathic medicines (a smattering of which you can see in the photo) cost about the equivalent of US$1 each.  That's here in Madagascar - the prices are probably a bit higher in Europe. 

Colours where we live

Sunset over Tana

A store at the marché artisanal

This plant has red leaves - all year round.

The beach at Nosy Bé

Buying at the Source - Factory outlets in Madagascar

You can buy this princess constume in Europe for about 30 euro.  It was made here in Madagascar.  We visited the factory recently and bought it for the equivalent of about five euro. 

There are other factories here as well.  There is a factory that makes clothes for Jacadi.  Take a look at this dress.  Jacadi is selling them at 69 euro a piece in Europe.  It's made here in Madagascar.  We bought one at the factory for a friends of ours back in Paris, for 15000 ariary - the equivalent of about 7 euro.  Actually, we bought another one too because at that price, why not? 

Here's another gorgeous one, also for 69 euro.  It cost us 7 euro, once again. 

While at the factory, I took a peek at the actual factory floor.  I wanted to know what the working conditions of these people were like.  The workers were mostly women - about 200 of them sitting down in chairs at sewing machines.  The factory floor was well-lit and the chairs looked decent.  Unfortunately, I was not allowed to take a photo.  They work about 45 hours per week.  And they probably make about 150 euro per month.
 
Should we feel guilty that we are exploiting people in a third world country when we buy these clothes?  My university friends would say that we should abstain from buying things from any of these places.  My thinking, having witnessed the conditions here as well, is that people would be far worse off if these factories didn't exist.  No, the working conditions are not perfect, but they are not what I would call Dickensian either - they get overtime, weekends, statutory holidays, and a ways that allows them to feed their children and buy school supplies.  They are unionized.  Do conditions need to improve for the workers?  Yes.  They need better wages and a shorter workday for starters.  As the economy of the country evolves, so will working conditions and wages.

Of course, as wages and working conditions in Madagascar improve, their products will become more expensive and the people in the developed world will, in turn, have to pay even more for them than now.

Adventures in Baby-Led Weaning

It's been five months since the Bambino has been eating solids regularly.  This time around, we didn't bother with preparing any purées or buying special baby food.  We didn't bother doing anything, really.  We just handed him the softest morsels of the food we were eating - pears, bananas, plums (when each of these has been in season here in Madagascar), potatoes, beans (I do smash the red kidney beans a bit with a fork because I don't want them to get stuck in his throat, chicken (cut into small pieces), red meat if I can get it tender enough, well-cooked broccoli, cauliflower and carrots.

The advantages of this method:

(1) Far less work in preparation  - in fact no extra preparation at all - baby just eats whatever you're eating.  We have been taking some small precautions in preparing our own meals - no salt added during meal preparation (we just add it at the table) and no egg white in the meals until now.

(2) No texture issues and no long-term addiction to purées.  The Bambino does not appear to have any of the texture issues that the Bambina had and still has - he will eat mashed potates and cut up whole potatoes.  He will eat food mixed together or separated.   And he loves anything with sauce on it.  Compare this with the Bambina, who has an aversion to any liquid food - so no sauce on pasta, no gravy on meat, vegetables cannot touch meat, rice must be plain.  Apparently, if you let them explore the food themselves from the beginning, kids are less likely to develop these kinds of food hang-ups.  I have friends whose three and even four year old won't eat solid food - only purées - because that's what the child was fed as an infant and he or she never got used to anything else.

(3) You are respecting your child as a separate human being who can feed him or herself at his or her own pace rather than treating your child as an oriface into which you shovel food.  A lot of children have food issues later precisely because they resent "being fed".

(4) Your child gets used to being an automous earlier on - with hands mind you, not utensils (at least not yet for the Bambino).

The disadvantages - it's extremely messy.  Lots of food ends up on the floor, especially in the beginning (age 6 months) when baby is really more interested in exploring than actually eating anything. 
And, contrary to what the Gill Rapley says in her book on Baby-Led Weaning, this method does not necessarily make for a less picky eater in terms of taste preferences.  The Bambino will not eat plain vegetables.  He doesn't have a texture issue with them - he won't touch them if they're puréed either!.  He just doesn't like the taste.  But then, neither do I.   If I am honest, most vegetables have to be sautéed in lots of butter (or olive oil) and garlic, salted, and / or covered in a lovely sauce and mixed with noodles or rice or potatoes for me to eat them.  The Bambino seems to take after his mom in this regard (but I do try to avoid putting salt in his food).

Here on Gill Rapley's Baby-Led Weaning guidelines if you're interested.

The BCG Vaccine - is it worth getting?

I found this box of unused vaccines against Tuburculosis (aka the BCG vaccine) sitting in our refrigerator yesterday.  In the days prior to leaving for Madagascar, the Frenchman, being French, was intent on getting the Bambino jabbed with the BCG vaccine.  I think that France is the only country that actually even recommends this vaccine anymore.  You certainly never hear about it in the UK, Canada, the States or Australia.  (Oh yeah, I think they maybe still recommend it in Romania.  And Mexico).

I managed to convince the Frenchman to give a pass on this vaccine for the Bambino, for a few reasons.  Yes, there is tuberculosis in Madagascar.  But the BCG vaccine is not known for being that effective in preventing transmission of tuberculosis. Clinical trials in the UK have shown an efficacy of about 60 to 80 percent (which is already not great for a vaccine).  The efficacy rate falls as you get closer to the equator, sometimes to zero percent effectiveness.  No one really knows why.  But according to the World Health Organization, the BCG vaccines currently in use are produced at several sites around the world and are not identical to one another.   And it is not known whether the vaccines produced at one site are more effective than the vaccines produced at other sites. 

Since 2007, a new and apparently improved BCG vaccine is being used.  I haven't seen any data to suggest that it is, indeed, any more effective than the old vaccine.  And lookie here, The World Health Organization questions the safety of the current BCG vaccine.  From the WHO site:

BCG is widely used and the safety of this vaccine has not been a serious issue until recently.  There is concern that the use of the vaccine in persons who are immune-compromised may result in an infection caused by the BCG itself.  Also, even among immune competent persons, local reactions, including ulceration at the site of vaccination may result in shedding of live organisms which could infect others who may be immune-compromised.

The other thing that bothers me about the BCG vaccine is it can result in false positives on future tubuculin skin tests - which means that if your child ever wants to, say, work in the health care industry one day, he will have to get an X-ray to prove that he or she does not have TB!  The skin test won't suffice.

And then there is the post-vaccine bump, puss and permanent scar left on your child's arm.

My cousin Wolfgang, who happens to be a microbiologist and a travel doctor in Berlin, doesn't have a problem with the BCG vaccine per se but he does recognize its lack of effectiveness.  When I talked to him about whether to have the Bambino vaccinated, he recommended testing the Bambino for TB once a year, instead, using the tuburculin skin test.  If the test result is negative, no TB.  If the test result is positive, the child then gets an x-ray to ensure that he has simply developed immunity to TB (this is what usually happens when you are exposed to TB) and does not actually have TB.  If the child has developed TB, then the TB gets treated.   Most of the American parents that I have met here have chosen this route for their children.

Since arriving in Madagascar last July, I have surveyed lots of families of a few different nationalities about the BCG vaccine.  So far, all of the French parents that I have met have had their children vaccinated with the BCG vaccine and all but one of the non-French families have refused the BCG vaccine for their children (the one non-French vaccinated child I know was born in Mexico, where they give the BCG vaccine routinely at birth) -yet more evidence that the way you parent really is a cultural thing, even when it comes to vaccines!

Circumcision and HIV/AIDS - Is the link really that relevant?

If I see one more article suggesting that all infant boys should be circumcised so as to reduce their chances of getting HIV/AIDS, I am going to scream.  Honestly, think about this one people.  Circumcision is an excruciatingly painful procedure for most babies who undergo it (no, the EMLA cream does not work and most parents don't bother asking for the penile block).  Moreover, the procedure removes a tissue containing something like ten thousand nerve endings, reducing sexual pleasure by thirty to fifty percent. 

As for those studies that conclude that it reduces transmission of STDs such as HIV, I urge you to read more about them.  Their conclusions are of questionable value, both in terms of the sample size of the men who did end up getting HIV and in terms of their applicability to North America and Europe.

But let's just say that circumcision really will reduce your boy's chances of getting HIV in the future.  Please ask yourself this before you have anyone mutilate his penis:

Would you have your baby girl circumcised for the same reason? 

Seriously, if it could be shown that circumcising your baby daughter would reduce of her chances of getting or transmitting HIV in the future, would you have her circumcised?  Because the pain is the same or worse for a boy and, as with female circumcision, removing your son's foreskin will deprive him of a great source of pleasure in the future.