Betel and Fun Vehicles

Betel is a vine in the peppercorn family.  It’s sometimes also called paan or quid. People chew betel.  That’s yucky.  But betel is also used for many other interesting things.

Betel leaves are used to wrap wedding invitations, as good luck decoration during a child’s first meal of rice, and offered to the headmaster when a child first goes to school.  At funerals, betel leaves are kept in the house upside down and leaves are offered to guests.  When people are possessed, betel leaves are added to a tray of flowers, rice, coconut and red flowers, for the devil dancing ceremony.   And on New Years Eve, offering betel is meant to build/rebuild friendship.

  

But betel is also used for chewing, like chewing tobacco.  For this, the betel leaves are combined with the betel nut, lime (calcium hydroxide), and sometimes spices and tobacco.  The result is very yucky.  It makes your mouth and teeth red.  Not like fun Kool Aid red.  More like I’m a vampire bat with bad teeth and I just ate a big meal.  Yucky!

The health effects of betel might be yucky too.  The Interweb says some conflicting things….

Some say the leaves on their own contain vitamin C, thiamine, carotene and calcium.  They help treat diabetes by reducing blood sugar, heal wounds, cure headaches, and help lose weight.  Also chewing the leaves increases the ascorbic acid in saliva which prevents oral cancer.  Others say the tannin in the leaves is bad for the mouth. 

Our charming Air B&B host in Colombo, Channa, said that chewing betel with lime was helpful for tea pickers in days gone by.  The base in the lime  would reduce the acidity in their stomachs, and let them work very long days unbothered by their hunger.  That seems possible. Though I couldn’t find anything on the internet about this.

But it seems pretty clear that chewing the betel nut is mostly bad.  It can cause tooth decay and irritate gums.  And the WHO classifies it as carcinogenic.   Especially when chewed with tobacco.  Did I mention it’s yucky????

Pictures

1-This is betel for chewing. You can see the leaf, nut all chopped up, and the pink lime.  It's usually sold as a bundle all wrapped up in the leaf.  Apparently, it's a bit of an art to get just the right amount of lime in a chew.  The lime is sticky. So in days gone by, when more people chewed betel, you could see streaks of lime on telephone/power poles. People getting rid of residue on their fingers.  You don't see the lime streaks anymore.  But you can still see the red spit on the cement from chewing betel.

2-5- I love the old trucks here!  They look like they belong in a vintage circus!  Toby says they're likely the same trucks that were in use when he was a kid!
6-7 -  Some tuktuks are decorated in such fun ways!
8-10  Some of the more colourful buses!  I think the super decked out ones are rental coach buses.  But some of the city buses are pretty fun looking too!  We took the city bus once.  Scary!  They drive fast!  Honk. Swerve in and out of their lane to pass tuktuks and motorcycles.  Accelerate and stop fast too.  I definitely prefer the train!