Tuesday, July 1, 2014

Carney, Grylls, Desai and Whitlam



For the last couple of days for people in Sydney it has been impossible to avoid the current hoo haa in Sydney about Rugby League bad boy Todd Carney (above) having been sacked by the Cronulla Sharks. Carney, sacked by 2 previous clubs, was pictured on social media “bubbling”, apparently an internet fad where one urinates into one’s own mouth. Ewwww!!!

Drinking one’s own urine is not as freaky as one might imagine, and not just as a Bear Grylls survival tool. 

Bear Grylls

The consumption of urine is known as urophagia and its use extends to health, healing and cosmetic purposes, referred to as urine therapy.

Even the Bible has a verse about it:
"Drink waters from thy own cistern, flowing water from thy own well."
- Proverbs 5:15

The term “amaroli” refers to the ancient yoga practice of drinking one’s own morning urine to promote meditation. Ancient Hindu and yoga texts that mention auto-urine drinking require it be done before sunrise and that only the mid-stream sample be used.

According to author Paul Beck at:

Contrary to popular perception, urine is not a by-product of the body's waste disposal system but of blood filtration. Nutrient-filled blood passes through the liver, where toxins are removed and excreted as solid waste. The purified blood then goes through another filtering process via the kidneys, where components for which the body has no immediate use are collected in a sterile, watery solution. For that reason, it is highly sterile, consisting of 95 per cent water and five per cent nutrients, including vitamins, minerals, proteins, antibodies and other beneficial ingredients. 
Advocates of auto-urine therapy believe that this combination can help cure everything from the common cold to cancer, boosting energy levels and sexual performance along the way. While the practice has always been popular in China, India and South-east Asia, a small but growing band of Western fans are also downing a daily dose.

One long time practitioner of urine therapy was the Prime Minister of India, Morarji Desai, who famously told Dan Rather of 60 Minutes that urine therapy was the perfect medical solution for the millions of Indians who could not afford medical treatment. Desai drank a glass of his own urine every morning for breakfast and lived to the age of 99 (1896-1995) so perhaps he had it right after all.

Morarji Desai

Which is all by way of introduction to a comment from Australian Prime Minister Gough Whitlam at a CHOGM regional meeting.

Gough Whitlam

CHOGM stands for Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting, a biennial summit meeting of the heads of government from all Commonwealth nations. Every two years the meeting is held in a different member state and is chaired by that nation's respective Prime Minister or President.

At a CHOGM reception for Prime Minister Desai, who was Indian PM from 1977 to 1979, an Australian Jewish politician said that he didn’t want to stay too long. Whitlam replied “Oh, yes, that'd be right. A good temperate Jew like you would want to get away before all these Indians get on the piss.”

According to Barry Cohen in Life With Gough:

“Later he was to say that there were many questions he had wanted to ask Desai, such as: ‘How did he keep it? In a refrigerator? At room temperature? At blood heat? How did he serve it? With lemon? On the rocks? With a touch of bitters?’ Tempted as he was, however, he managed to contain his natural ‘curiosity’."

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