Frank Georgalis – Writer

Longevity: The Secret of Living Longer. Part III

The enlightment of a long lifespan

Longevity PART III

Secrets for a long lifespan

New scientific discovery

I don’t think that are many of us who have heard of Sirtuins. It is an unfamiliar word to most of us. Sirtuins is not a simple word that should be known to everybody, they are a number of related proteins found in organisms ranging from bacteria and plants to humans.

Many studies have been made on animals particularly rats by placing them on restricted sirtuin diets and the results were not only surprising but amazingly favorable. Those animals live longer and healthier lives. Many things we don’t understand but they show fewer signs of age than those fed normal diets. It appears that sit-ins are the basic ingredients of the diet that contributes to this new health phenomenon. For some unknown reason the research and study has been made on animals and it all shows that sirtuins may slow the pace of aging by delaying cell death, which leads to longevity.

The up to date research is hopefully favorable but it’s unknown whether these restricted diets have the same effects on humans as on fruit flies and rats. I actually believe that, according to primary research, these related proteins are found in what we eat; therefore we do not need to starve ourselves to get sirtuins in our body. The researchers must look to find in what foods this protein is consecrated .A Research Company called Sirtris demonstrated that resveratrol, an antioxidant, which is a substance that restrains the destructive effects of oxidation or corrosion in the body or in foodstuffs or plastics. The most notable consecration of that has been found in the skin of red grapes. Mice placed on high doses of resveratrol improved insulin resistance, prevented weight gain and increased lifespan by 20 percent. When put on a treadmill, the mice were also able to run twice as far and twice as fast as those not given resveratrol. This information has come to me out of an episode of 60 Minutes (Check it out to learn more). Of course this is not the end of the story about sirtuins it is only the beginning.

Of course, beauty companies are anxious t profit from sirtuins. Already, Avon has launched its anti-aging Anew line, which has ingredients that up-regulate sirtuin expression, and German and Spanish companies recently joined forces to develop a red wine powder that can be used in topical creams or added to food and beverages. Just remember in the red wine, the color of red comes from the red skin. Therefore, according to the recent discovery sirtuins are found in the red skin grapes, drinking some red wine is not a myth or false tale.

While we’re excited about discoveries that show sirtuins can slow the pace of aging in an experimental setting, I don’t understand why the researching institutions have not jumped on the band wagon to go and find more about the sirtuins? Here, we are speaking of the lifespan to be increased by 20%. Here we are again, look at the wrong thing with the wrong eye. The cigarette smoking may decrease the lifespan by less than 5% and the whole world is chasing smokers down the street with pitch forks and it is overlooking the 20% lifespan increase by the consumption of sirtuins. Are these so called experts, inventors and chemists, playing with a full deck? Then we might as well pick up pitch forks and go after them to go to work. This is not something like Dr. Mao’s five secrets to live 100 years. This is a serious sober stuff. Incidentally Dr. Mao’s five secrets to live to be 100 were known to me since I was in the second grade. Dr. Mao I have secret for you. An apple a day will keep the doctor away, garlic a day will keep everybody away.

The fact remains to be seen what sirtuins can do for humans, in the meantime get your pitch fork ready to g after the experts to get to work and you keep on drinking a glass or two of the red wine, it can’t hurt you.

What is it with HOPE

Lady Luck and lady Hope

are always together

I have said before that Longevity is one of the most complicated subjects to write about, but knowing that every big thing in life is made of many small ones, I will try to open up this huge and complicated subject and look inside of it. I am not a chemist or an inventor or a nutritionist or an explorer of the unknown; I am a writer, who digs into rumors, theories and facts which have been written or told or showed to the world and I bring to my readers the discoveries that I made around the subject, which I think it’s worth reading.

The pursue to find something which can make us look beautiful, smart, healthy and live longer is as old as the stone age. One of our natural basic instincts is to complain about anything that makes us uncomfortable, mentally or physically and the reason is that our creator wants us to find some one who can help us. Can anyone imagine a world with people who don’t possess the instinct of looking to be helped? The other basic instinct is to help one another.

Complaining about their aches and pains has prompted others to find a cure for what was ailing their fellow man. That is when the hunting for medicine began. One of the first and notable leaders of medicine is the Ancient Greek medicine man Hypocrites who is also referred to as the father of medicine. He is the one who put the house of medicine in some order. He believed and said that “Food is medicine and medicine is food” That to me means that in the foods we eat, from pork chops to dill and oregano is some type of healing sauce. But I don’t agree with him 100%. Medicine comes in different shapes and forms. One is hope. According to the Ancient Greek Mythology, which to me is not a mythology it’s a religion, Zeus filled Pandora’s Box with all the bad things and ills of the world but he put in “HOPE” The last passion that leaves a man’s breast is Hope

My grandfather, Hercules Georgalis was convicted for a crime he hadn’t committed and was sentenced to die by the falling of the guillotine on his neck. He remained in the dungeon with only five feet high ceiling for two and half years, and he was over six feet tall. Awaiting the death to come, he remained healthy, because he never lost hope and his sense of humor while others cursed with the same fate, lingered away and eventually died without having the guillotine to kill them.

My father told me that my grandfather resented his father for being a great pretender and a showoff man. While he was in prison he learned how to read and write and learned to play the Bouzouki (musical instrument similar to mandolin) and made certain that my uncle Thanasis, who was the only visitor my grandfather had while in prison, was ordered by grandfather to tell the world of his accomplishments in reading writing and learning music.

My grandfather having spent 2 1/2 years in prison he was released and came home. My father said, seeing his father coming home holding the bouzouki in one hand and a book in the other filled his bag of bad feelings for his father. He said nothing to his father. He only walked away from him.

According to what I understood from father’s story my grandfather did everything within his power to give hope to the people he was leaving behind and he received hope for himself. In the Holy Bible “An eye for  an Eye and Tooth for a Tooth,” it simply means, eye being a symbol of hope, coming from the Hindu religion and tooth being the first currency in the world, means something of value, coming from Mosaic religion.

According to my uncle who was the only one who visited my grandfather he was instructed to keep his death a secret. “Your mother and three sisters are not to find out that I am dead, because I want them to live with the hope that some day I will be returning, give them hope, without hope they will die. By the time they find out that I am not coming home I will behalf forgotten.”

Jesus gave us hope by telling us that there is life after death.