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The Songkran Festival is a traditional Thai New Year's celebration that takes place annually from April 13th to 15th. It is known for its water-throwing festivities, where people pour water on each other as a symbol of purification and the washing away of sins and bad luck.

The name Songkran comes from the Sanskrit word saṃkrānti, which means "astrological passage," and marks the end of the dry season and the beginning of the rainy season in Thailand.

During the festival, people also visit temples, offer food to Buddhist monks, and participate in cultural activities such as parades and traditional dances. The holiday is an important time for families to come together and pay respect to their elders, as well as for friends to reunite and celebrate the start of a new year.

In recent years, the water-throwing aspect of Songkran has become more of a party atmosphere, with many young people taking to the streets to splash water on each other and engage in friendly water fights. Despite this shift in tone, the festival remains an important cultural tradition in Thailand, and is recognized as a public holiday across the country.

In addition to the water-throwing festivities, Songkran also involves other traditional customs and practices. One of the most important is the pouring of scented water on Buddha images, which symbolizes the washing away of bad luck and the accumulation of merit. This practice is known as "Rod Nam Dum Hua" and is considered a way to pay respect to one's ancestors and elders.

Another important aspect of Songkran is the creation of sand pagodas. Thai people often visit the beach during the holiday to build intricate sand structures that are believed to bring good luck and blessings. These pagodas are adorned with flowers, incense, and candles, and are seen as a way to honor Buddha and the teachings of Buddhism.

Songkran is also a time for delicious food and traditional sweets, such as "kanom tom," a sweet dessert made of sticky rice and coconut milk, and "khanom krok," a small cake made from rice flour and coconut milk. Additionally, many Thai people wear traditional clothing during the festival, such as "chut thai," which consists of a long-sleeved shirt, pants, and a wrap-around skirt for women.

Overall, the Songkran Festival is a time for joy, happiness, and togetherness. It is an opportunity for Thai people to reconnect with their cultural roots, pay respect to their elders, and celebrate the start of a new year with family and friends.

The Top 7 Insider Tips For Menstrual Pain

Published on 10/27/2022
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Your period is approaching and you are getting more and more weak. Discomfort, circulatory problems, abdominal cramps and even chills – many women suffer from sometimes very severe menstrual cramps once a month. We present you our 7 insider tips against menstrual pain.

The Top 7 Insider Tips For Menstrual Pain

Sport, Exercise

Many women find the contraction of muscles to be uncomfortable or even painful. The muscle contraction reduces the blood supply to the uterus or abdomen, which causes additional pain. Studies have shown that exercise can help reduce both the intensity and duration of period pain. This applies both to light physical activity during menstruation and to regular training. Those who exercise more often can reduce their menstrual cramps. Even light physical activity during the period can help against pain. For example, try yoga, cycling, or a walk.

Change Your Diet

A study by BMC Women’s Health looked at how diet affects menstrual pain. Researchers found that eating lots of sweet and salty snacks, desserts, as well as coffee, salt, fruit juices and added fat increased your chances of moderate to severe menstrual cramps 3 to 4 times. In general, eat a healthy, balanced diet to prevent cramps. You should avoid alcohol and nicotine.

Saying No

Two weeks ago (when you were fit as a fiddle, just before you ovulated) you arranged the mega meeting with all your friends and now you are absolutely not in the mood for it? You have tickets for the super concert but the thought of it just stresses you out? Then just say no. Stress pushes menstrual problems so stay cool and say no! That’s a promise: the world keeps turning, even if you log out of everyday life during your period. By the way: In the weeks after the period, women are then three times as productive as before!

Magnesium

The muscle contractions to break down the mucous membrane consume a lot of magnesium, which we feel when our inner pig bitch always asks us the same question: “Where can I get something sweet asap?”. This is a misunderstanding: by craving something sweet, our body is simply telling us that it wants to replenish its magnesium stores. And he does this best with bananas, cashew nuts, sunflower seeds, linseed or raspberries.

Good News For Chocoholics

Chocolate is not bad per se – you should only avoid the sugar in chocolate. Cocoa itself, on the other hand, has many antioxidants and therefore has an anti-inflammatory and antispasmodic effect due to the magnesium it contains. A piece of dark chocolate is therefore highly recommended, but the cocoa content should be at least 70%.

Tea

Many herbs have antispasmodic and anti-inflammatory effects. Prepared as a tea, they can help against menstrual pain. These include, for example, teas with yarrow, cinquefoil, lady’s mantle, verbena, nettle and chaste tree (see above).

Movement and Correct Breathing

Yes, exercising during menstruation is not as impossible as it sometimes feels. Sometimes cramps and tension are caused by a lack of physical activity, which causes tension to build up. Incomplete breathing and lack of exercise prevent the body from “adjusting” itself. The resulting tension is absorbed by the ovaries, making them immobile and rigid. If the tension is too great, the body tries to compensate with unsuitable muscles and nerves. This leads to pain and cycle disorders.

Love 

Love songs are everywhere. But does anyone have a definition of love, which — people claim — makes the world go around? Sure, it’s easy to tell when you’re in love with someone. [The heart pounds and you act like an idiot.] But it’s much harder to say if you actually love someone.

Love songs are everywhere. But does anyone have a definition of love, which — people claim — makes the world go around? Sure, it’s easy to tell when you’re in love with someone. [The heart pounds and you act like an idiot.] But it’s much harder to say if you actually love someone.

Enter the mind of Harry Jenkins, as he is about to make love to Natasha,

And then he laughed at himself as he sank beneath the covers. No sane man would question such free and voluptuous pleasure, as if it could only be valued through thought. Only an idiot or a fool would try to analyze love and passion.

Nonetheless, like the fool, I seek a definition. Perhaps it is the lawyer in me. On the subject of love, Carl Jung, the Swiss psychiatrist, is a sobering read. All of us, supposedly, carry within us, an animus [if you’re female] and an anima [if you’re male], which is the idealized image of the person you love. And so, when you are in love you are projecting this idealized image on a real, live person who might be naturally quite entitled to be different.

After the honeymoon, those annoying little cracks in the image appear, which could certainly explain the high divorce rate. When you find the real person doesn’t exactly match your superimposed ideal, what do you do?

All of these thoughts led me to explore people’s ideas of all kinds of love, not just the romantic variety, in Final Paradox, the second in The Osgoode Trilogy.

Harry Jenkins is the lawyer protagonist throughout the trilogy, which contain storylines of murder and fraud. He is in the thrall of the beautiful Natasha. His aging father, who abandoned him as a child, has just asked his forgiveness. Harry can’t seem to find that in his heart. Natasha asks him—

What do you think love is?
He shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s about wanting someone as part of your life. Wanting them always with you.” He looked into her eyes. “Why? What do you think?”

“I think it’s about getting outside yourself and seeing another person’s life from their point of view. At least that’s a start,” Natasha replied.

Harry heard his father’s words. It’s all about you, is it? Would he always be the kid, he wondered?

Another character musing about love is Norma Dinnick — an elderly client of Harry’s who trips back and forth between lucidity and madness. She recollects her stew of feelings for various men.

Going back to her hotel, Norma tried to understand. She knew about affection and caring for Arthur, her husband, who kept her safe from the emptiness. But she did not understand this business of love, which David talked about. She did know that such emotions gave her a sense of power. The sheer lust she experienced in the presence of George made her feel weak and vulnerable.

Norma simply doesn’t understand about love and neither does Bronwyn — another character. An embittered soul, she has married a gay man and on her honeymoon – She wandered the narrow beach of sand and stone where the boats ferried back and forth to the grottos. No Peter. But then she saw him at a distance on the beach walking slowly with a younger man she did not know. Where had they come from? Right from the start, she had known. Of course, the bargain was unspoken but well understood. For money and security, Bronwyn had sacrificed any chance for love.

But in the end, Harry does begin to get it. In bed with the lovely Natasha, he was

…transported outside his own body, he was overcome with the desire to know the dreams, fantasies, and mysteries she held within. He would enter her world with love and understanding and never leave. The awe he felt in her closeness made his breathing slow and deepen in rhythm with hers. He watched his hand reach out of the shadows to smooth the sheet. She was at last in his bed and, fearing a mirage, he dared not wake her. In the past two weeks, his world had been shaken. His mind had become a jumble of colliding, conflicting events and consequences. Now he felt her power to draw his life together. A still peace gently settled over him like a silken web of meaning.