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INTERVIEWS VIEWS
letter
letters@thesundaily.com
And men
pause, too
LAST week I attended a dialogue session organ-
ised by the Women, Family and Community De-
velopment Ministry, for the NGOs. I was looking
for a seat when a stranger invited me to a vacant
one beside him. I gladly accepted his offer.
Soon we started chatting. He promptly asked
me which society I was representing. Without
hesitation, I politely and with a straight face told
him, with a smirk, that I was from MMS, the
Malaysian Menopause Society. He laughed out
aloud.
You see, he enjoyed laughing the moment
he heard the word menopause. Later when he
was composed, I asked him which society he
came from and he said that he was from the
“Society belum menopause”. And, this time I
couldn’t stop laughing at his sense of humour.
He continued laughing again.
And laughing hysterically, he announced
officially to his other friends in that room that I
was from the menopause society and instantly
like magic they all simultaneously joined in the
hilarious laughter. It was so infectious that they
couldn’t stop laughing. Was I embarrassed? You
might as well imagine! I responded, “Hey! Don’t
be so happy; men also have it lah ... but we call
it andropause – “and ... men pause too”.
And, this is why I have been motivated to
write this article – so that you won’t be caught
unawares one day when you suddenly find
yourself edgy, moody, temperamental and start
blaming the beloved in your life for some of
your inadequacies (you know, don’t you that
human beings dry and leak too?) and unwanted
changes. Yes, no one escapes this passing phase
in life – so my dear friend who sat beside me
and offered me the seat so graciously, what’s
so funny about the word “menopause” – both
genders experience almost similar changes in
our human body. The unwelcome truth is well,
we all will be experiencing hormonal changes
as we reach our mid-years in life. Women suf-
fer from estrogen deficiency while men suffer
from testosterone deficiency; the truth is: we all
suffer from some deficiency whether we like it
or not! But oh, it is a fun time indeed not to be
dreaded if you know what we know from the
menopause and andropause talks organised by
my executive council.
Remember, menopause doesn’t occur in
women only; it also occurs in men – in every
man, we all age ... that’s life’s fact albeit you can
retard it for a while but not for long; only men
get it in a more subtle way and the symptoms
are almost the same.
Dr Ho Choon Moy
Cheras
theSun | THURSDAY AUGUST 20 2009
Alex Delilkan unmasked
PROF EMERITUS DATUK DR ALEX DELILKAN WOULD NEVER HAVE
BEEN RECOGNISED BY HIS PATIENTS. HE WAS THE MAN IN THE MASK
WHO HOVERED OVER PATIENTS BEFORE SURGERY SAYING, “AFTER I
GIVE YOU THIS INJECTION, START COUNTING TILL 10.”
JOSEPH MASILAMANY UNVEILS THE MAN BEHIND THE MASK.
ONCE while talking to me over the phone, Delilkan
said: “I have no money now but I also have no skel- Delilkan with his book
etons in the cupboard.” In the background, I overheard
his daughter Shyleja Ann correcting the good doctor’s
English: “Skeletons in the closet, not cupboard!”
Delilkan, blessed with a congenitally-acquired
sense of humour, shot back in his usual no-holds-
barred banter: “Aaah, shut up lah you!”
Delilkan has a problem. Not with his English
but with the four women closest to him – his wife
and three daughters –who are all sticklers for good
English.
Shyleja is a professor of linguistics while another
daughter, Sharu, is a journalism major, and another
Melani – a double major in journalism/advertising-
broadcasting. His wife Prabha holds a BA Honours
in English.
The impressive credentials of these four women
puts Delilkan in a spot. But the old hand at cricket
bats off the bawling over his sloppy English which
all of us are also guilty of, saying: “I am not an Eng-
lishman, but a Singaporean-Malaysian of Singhalese
parentage. Sorry, I use the English language in my
own inimitable way.”
For a man who is more at home with jargon such
as thiopentone, epidurals, hypoxia or oro-pharyngeal
route, using English idioms wrongly is the least of his
worries.
Having spent 50 years in three of medicine’s
toughest combat zones – anaesthesiology (surgery),
critical care and trauma medicine, Delilkan is not
quite ready to fossilise into a footnote, but still walks
the corridors of academia.
He is critical care consultant to the University Ma-
laya Medical Centre, coordinator of the medical ethics
section with Physicians for Peace and Social Responsi-
bility and academic contributor to the establishment of
teaching programmes/undergraduate curriculum on
medical ethics and medical jurisprudence, Universiti
Teknologi Mara.
In an age where sophisticated patient-monitoring
machines beep, bleep and blink for attention, those
who are familiar with the 75-year-old Delilkan “up-
front” would have expected him to write a book of
cricket jokes instead – but his Medical Dilemmas In the
Evolution of Critical Care has just rolled off the press.
Save you, save me
by Yap Mun Ching no visible change in on less politically-aware persons image of an Africa that refuses to
the situation on the who buy into the idea that by help itself.
“BONO single-handedly ground, Bob’s and attending a few concerts, buying Thus, young economists such as
made sure that half Bono’s campaign some T-shirts or rubber wristbands, Moyo increasingly call for politics-
of Africa does not live began to attract they are doing their part to solve free trade and investment policies
in poverty anymore,” controversy. complex problems such as poverty such as those undertaken by China
said the die-hard U2 Right at the top of and underdevelopment. investors which, curiously, are sub-
fan seated next to the list of questions While these campaigns are ject to much criticism in the West.
me. On hearing these is the real agenda drummed up, performers gain At the Wembley concert last
words, I felt a strong behind these activ- almost messiah-like following. Sev- weekend playing to a record audi-
urge to smack him, ist-celebrities. As eral years ago, Time magazine came ence of 88,000 concert-goers, U2’s
partly for his ignorance
and naivety, but also
Freespace wealthy rock stars
mime tears in public
up with this embarrassing cover
story: Can Bono Save the World? A
show included a tribute to Burmese
political prisoner Aung San Suu
for ruining my attempt Where young views rule over the plight of the lead article went on to name Bono Kyi whose detention term was
to keep politics out of poor, they cannot but as the “Right Man, Right Time” to recently extended by the military
my evening’s entertainment. But I provoke scepticism. To cynics like spruce up the debate on global government by 18 months. “This is
should have known better. Politics myself, “artistes” like Geldof would poverty with “a bit of glamour”. a woman whose only crime is that
is inevitable when the performing have faced career death decades One sharp critic of these rock she would win an election if she is
band, or its lead singer to be more ago if not for his self-propagated star campaigns is Zambian econo- allowed to contest,” said Bono.
exact, has courted more press cov- image as Africa’s saviour. In a 2005 mist Dambisa Moyo who is known My final take on this is that
erage of late for his campaigning report, the BBC reported criticism in development circles as the Anti- celebrity campaigning should high-
on African debt relief than for the of Geldof’s Live 8 concerts as “an Bono. Moyo, who once worked with light issues and encourage people
band’s music. unsavoury gathering of white mil- the World Bank and investment to read up about them and make
My inner debate about U2’s lionaire pop stars saving Africa’s house Goldman Sachs, decries their own conclusions, rather than
politics began when Bono joined helpless”. The terrible thing in all the endless aid and debt relief push dogmatic lines that obscure
perennial Africa campaigner Bob of this is that it is impossible to campaigns, labelling them Africa’s the many dilemmas and contradic-
Geldof as the face of the West’s banish the suspicion that many crutches. The problem with this tions of intractable world problems.
Jubilee 2000 campaign which get involved because supporting kind of politics, says Moyo, is that Fortunately, I left Saturday’s concert
called for more aid to Africa and the a cause is “cool” and because it increases Africa’s dependency feeling fairly satisfied that on this
writing off of crippling debts. It all it is a great public relations ploy on aid rather than addressing the occasion, Bono did much more of
sounded rather laudable but as the to target new fan base among need to develop local capacities. the former than the latter.
years passed and the message was politically-conscious youth. More Activities by celebrities like Bono Comments: letters@thesundaily.
recycled over and over again with damaging, however, is its effect and Geldof also help perpetuate the com.