Fasting, health and the stomach

The human stomach is an adjust­able compartment of elastic quality. It expands and contrasts depending on factors, natural or arti­ficial. For example, it is natural for a middle-aged man to develop pot-belly, but artificial for a three-year-old to develop same.

In the case of the three-year kid, such wonderful stomach may contain a thousand and one worms, each of them vying for alimentary superiority. Or, it may be a product of a disease that has gained official and unofficial recognition in Third World countries – Kwashiokor.

All things being equal, however, a person’s stomach may grow either pos­itively or negatively depending on his political ambitions, economic circum­stances, alcoholic potential or religious inclination.

The reader will agree with me that the year 1990 has brought about a coincidence of religious events. While Muslims were engaged in their religious exercise of prayer and fasting, Chris­tians on the other hand were seriously engrossed in eating and drinking to celebrate the Easter.

Anyhow, there is nothing of con­sequence since both Christians and Muslims fast at one time or the other. Fasting as a religious practice is a gateway towards spiritual growth and development, and most religions con­sider it as such. It is supposed to draw one nearer to God; in fact, to make it possible for one to spiritually wine and dine with the Lord at the Royal table. After such divine buffet dinner, the diner’s soul becomes pure, free from sin, and eligible for a passport to heav­en without a visa.

Fasting, however, does more than merely making the spirit a visa-free sojourner in God’s abode. Fasting has good effects on the human being since it has excellent physiological tonic on a body which eats, digests and assimi­lates every kind of food without going on annual leave.

In a rather feeble attempt to become a born-again sometime in the 1980s, I had occasion to taste of the sweetness and bitterness of fasting. I was to fast for three days during which I was supposed to pray for my sins. Before I began the fast, I had to weigh a considerable number of factors under the guise of a feasibility study in order to forecast whether I would faint mid-way, develop hernia alongside, or woefully fail the test of a religious hun­ger-strike.

As such, I had to consider the durability of my will-power, the threshold of my appetite and whether I had enough blood and vitamins in my system to see me through three days of stomach palaver.

I began on a Friday morning in high spirits. By noon I was

already tired and gustatorily sane to continue this self-persecution but I керt reading Bible verses and got lost in the aura of their power, as the Holy Spirit urged me on.

However, at three o’clock (stan­dard time) I was dead hungry. Fact is that, for over 20 good years I’d never fasted for even half a day. During every single day of these years, I constantly digested breast milk, lactogen koko, ice-cream, koose, banku and okro soup, yoke gari, waakye with diarrhoea pepper and whatever.

And just overnight, I was compelled to suspend this useful biological con­tinuity and go without food for three days.

The first day came to pass quite fine except for a rather sleepless night. On the second day I felt no hunger till 2.00 pm when I encountered the real test. A woman was carrying her waakye and stew to the market when like a radar, my nose tracked down the delicious aroma coming from the stew, I salivat­ed like a hungry Royal dog but began reciting the Lord’s Prayer immediately.

Had it not been for the Lord’s Prayer, I would have shouted for the waakye seller to trot to my end. I would have ordered her: “Maame, tear me waakye 80, meat 70, all mak­ing 150. Add more pepper because my uncle Kofi Jogolo says pepper is good for the acts on waist. “

The third day was quite eventful. I had reduced in weight and found it prudent to stay in the bedroom to avoid unnecessary questions about my almost disjointed frame. I was so light that if there had been a hurricane, I would have been carried away to Vene­zuela without travelling documents.

On this third day, I was tempt­ed, perhaps more than Jesus Christ was after 40 days of fast­ing. Immediately I came out of my study room to sit under a shady tree, a banana seller to whom I was a long faithful custom­er materialised before me with fresh, juicy lobes of her ware.

“How much should I give you,” she asked me as usual “I’ve already eaten,” replied tersely, “But you look hungry, and your lips are dry. If you don’t have money, no problem. I’ll come for it tomorrow, how much groundnuts should I add?” “Fact is that, Madam, I’ve eaten, Come tomorrow and I’ll buy everything for you,” I said, for it is a religious impro­priety to reveal that you are fasting.

She looked at me carefully and shrugged. Before I realised it, she had hobbled away.

Not long thereafter, sellers came perambulating my territory, I now be­gan reciting Psalm 23 as they enticed me with jollof rice, sugar-bread, boiled eggs, goat-khebab, and apapransa, among others. By 5:30pm, I decided to sign an accord with the devil to relieve my stomach of its palaver. For, the final lapse of 30 minutes was more than a century to me. Eventually, the ‘centu­ry’ came to pass as the devil beat its wings and soared away after losing the battle. That ended my ordeal.

Then I thought I could break the fast with a hundred oranges and five kilos of banana, but I was disappoint­ed. I could take two oranges only and no banana at all. I hear someone broke a two- week fast with fufu and thick palmnut soup with crabs and doctor-fish, and was immediately allocated some space at the nearest cemetery.

Dear reader, the three-day fast did me a lot of good than harm. When I resumed my normal course of eating, I felt very healthy and I was energetic, walked with springy steps and was al­most ready to train to become a boxer. I was full of energy and experienced free bowels. Quite expectantly, my girlfriend said I looked more handsome.

Truth is, fasting has more than mere spiritual value. The body needs to be rejuvenated by exercise, continence and self-denial. Over indulgence short­ens your life.

Every medical authority will advise a full-day fasting once a month for buoyant health. Some illnesses can be cured by a period of fasting. The hu­man system is cleansed by fasting, and the most healthy-individuals are those who endeavour to do without food at periodic intervals. Fasting needn’t be only a religious duty.

And it is always healthful to be disciplined in one way or the other to ensure a healthy body. For your HEALTH is your WEALTH

This article was first published on Saturday April 28, 1990

Merari Alomele’s

Merari Alomele’s

Your Weekend Companion

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