I am a contrarian.
All of this unpopular opining of mine may look like critical thinking, heroic truth-seeking.
But don’t be fooled; it’s just knee-jerk doggerel.
My world-view is permanently controlled by the assumption that “those millions of people talking around me can’t possibly be right”. My brain rails against whatever prevails.
Remember that, especially when you catch me writing about Chinese medicine.
Remember where I am writing from. Here or there. Remember whose those surrounding millions of voices are.
If I am in my native UK, stifled by familiarity, you will find me warmly receptive to Chinese medicine. From there it is adventurous, like a charming, harmless extension of Chinese tea. How easily I lecture my parents about being brain-washed by complacent Big-Pharma. And how much less I enjoy the small pharma they actually give me; the St. John’s Wort, the Tea Tree Oil; than the aromatic concoctions from my Chinese family.
But when this is the place, not the UK, my attitude is reversed, and to an equal degree of dogmatism.
This is my longest tour by some margin, and I’m especially homesick this week because I’m sick.
I’m sick of hearing that my cold resulted from a weather fluctuation. I’m sick of the unwillingness to see that my cold resulted from the transfer of microbes from an infected person to uninfected me.
I’m tired of the implicit accusation that “someone more careful, more attuned to the local climate, probably would not be in the hot, sneezing mess you’re in”. Yes, such voices are accompanied with genuine sympathy, but the judgment is still there, lurking behind the generous [板蓝根] banlangen root beer and Vitamin-C gifts.
The stuff I’m coughing up today may be the colour of amber resin, but I’m basically getting better. And what made the difference is a pill called Baijiahei [白加黑]. It always does, though we always do the herbal thing first anyway.
These pills are basically paracetamol, developed from an understanding of the existence of microbes. The name has always reminded me of a speech made (close to here) in the ‘80s. Realpolitik is what these excellent pills are about.
Working with a cold is even worse than living with a cold, and caffeine is already an essential helper for work. So adding more tea, more caffeine, is usually what I do. This transgresses TCM principles, especially if the tea is green. I have disregarded those principles until now. But today I am about to recant.
Empirically, I just can’t say that tea helps. It doesn’t give the relief I expect it to give, nevermind the levity. Tea doesn’t taste of anything when nothing tastes of anything. If there’s ever a moment when the body needs sleep more than it needs a clever drink, this is it. And those fine tea leaves used today can now not be used on a better day.
This is why I advise against wasting tea when feeling this bad. And, if I understood the Chinese medicine concepts a little better, maybe I would be even more convinced.
So abandon your autonomy to your Chinese companions. Resign yourself to the “哎呀” (ai ya) tutting and drink it all up. Eventually, what’s offered will be something that works. And all the root beers before that won’t do any harm… except to your teeth.
