Lifestyle - The Korea Times

Oriental Medicine Tips for Staying Healthy in Summer

By Dr. Park Chan-joo Even though the summer vacation season is coming to an end, the hot weather may not go away until we’re totally exhausted. Many of you are probably suffering from the heat. Symptoms can include an overall lack of energy, thirst, loss of appetite, a summer cold, diarrhea and food poisoning. In spite of the heat, there are people who are catching catch summer colds due to the excessive exposure to air conditioning. In general, it’s recommended to keep the room temperature between 25 and 28 degrees Celsius and the temperature gap between outdoors and indoors should be within 5 degrees. However, if the temperature of your working environment feels too low, taking a long-sleeve shirt to work or having some tea, such as ginseng, cinnamon and citron tea can prove helpful. The summer months will have you sweating a great deal, causing extreme thirst. This can eventually lead to a lack of ``ki’’ or energy. There’s an old prescription called ``saengmaeksan (which means a powdered medicine to recover your pulse)’’ from ``Tonguibogam,’’ a prestigious book dealing w

Aug 19, 2007

Lesson 109: Brilliant Self-Atari (2)

By Nam Chi-hyung Just as there is an instinctive dislike against an empty triangle shape; putting the friendly stones in atari is naturally abhorred by players. Therefore, maybe the main difficulty of finding the answer of the following problems is not your reading skill, but your prejudice about the shapes. Diagram 1 You have to save either the white stones in the corner or the two stones on the left. Since the two ▲-marked white stones don’t have many liberties, White needs a very smart move. Diagram 2 White 1 may be a natural move, but White 3 will be pretty hard to find, even if you already know what to look for. White 3 doesn’t directly help either the three stones on the right or the two stones on the left, but only adds another weak stone. However, it is a really brilliant move which puts Black in a dilemma. If Black tries to capture any of the white stones with either A or B, White will capture either the three black stones on the right or the two black stones on the left with C. Diagram 3 White’s goal is to kill the entire black group on the side

Aug 16, 2007

Things We Should Know About Constipation

By Bae Ji-sook Staff Reporter For some going to the toilet in the morning is their worst experience of the day, with their constipation causing them great distress. They may spend more than 5 minutes on the toilet seat but even that may not be long enough. There are many factors causing constipation but most commonly its a result of severe stress, poor eating habits and a lack of exercise. Here are several common beliefs about constipation. Are they true? 1. You have constipation when you your bowel movements are less than three times a week: False. It is quite natural for people to have few bowel movements according to conditions or environment. Unless stools are extremely hard, three times a week can be considered normal. 2. Pushing too hard can lead to constipation: False. Pushing too hard might cause hemorrhoids, but not constipation. 3. Skipping breakfast causes constipation: True. Some people think having breakfast before a bowel movement is not good. However, putting food into the body can assist in getting the bowels to work. Also, skipping meals can sl

Aug 12, 2007

Lesson 108: Brilliant Self-Atari (1)

By Nam Chi-hyung The technique of self-atari is used usually in a negative way. Let’s look at Dia.1. Diagram 1 White 1 and 3 are smart moves that capture the three △-marked black stones. White 1, which has nothing to do with the capturing of the black stones, is actually a move to put Black in a self atari situation. Diagram 2 The value of White 1 of Dia.1 shows up here more clearly. After the capturing race up to White 4, Black wants to play at x but cannot. Owing to the exchange of the ▲-marked black and white stones, to play at x would be a self-atari for Black. As shown above, the majority of the life-and-death problems which call for self-atari as the answer are about putting the opponent in a position unable to play a certain move because playing it sets himself in atari. However, there are cases where placing oneself in self-atari can be a brilliant move. Perhaps this doesn’t sound very different from the self-sacrificing tactics, but while sacrifice is focused on giving a part of your stones up in order to gain another profit, self-atari is about lesse

Aug 9, 2007

Lesson 107: Brilliant Empty Triangle (2)

By Nam Chi-hyung Even though we’ve seen several examples where an empty triangle did a brilliant job, you may still think that they are extremely rare cases. However, we can easily find empty triangles in famous games of professional players. Let me introduce some of them here.

Aug 2, 2007

Too Much Sleep Can Affect Concentration

By Park Chung-a Staff Reporter One of the reasons why students or working people look forward to the weekend is to catch up on sleep. Overwhelmed by a busy schedule, it is often difficult to get seven hours sleep a day, the ideal for grownups. And so come the weekend many find themselves still in bed well into the late afternoon. However, even though you get lots of rest during the daytime on weekends, you may still feel tired, even more so the next day. Experts say that making up for lost sleep during weekdays over the weekend will simply have you feeling excessively tired, just as you would feel when adjusting to different time zones. Our internal clock, which is located in the hypothalamus, controls the body's balance of sleep and alertness. If human's ``override'' their normal sleep times, it can offset their internal time clock, having a negative impact on their next day. ``If you sleep too much and wake up much later than usual during the day, your body's time clock will take it as your new sleep pattern and your time for sleep or awakening can

Jul 29, 2007

Dieting vs. Exercise

By Dr. Park Chan-Joo Every year, at around this very time, many people knock on the doors of oriental medical clinics looking for professional help in their quest to lose weight. However, some of the people seem to believe that they don't have to do anything themselves once they sign up for weight loss programs. No matter how effective the program is, you can't benefit from it without continuous individual effort. The effort must be in the form of dedication to dieting and regular exercise. Which one is more important in losing weight? If you concentrate only on reducing your total calorie intake without exercising, you might be able to lose weight as a result of reduction in muscles, fat and other body materials. But when you return to your previous eating habits, you'll easily regain the weight. In some studies, for example, among dieters who manage to lose 10 percent or more of their body mass, 80 to 95 percent will regain that weight within two to five years. On the other hand, the calories that you lose through exercise alone are not as significant as many expect. F

Jul 27, 2007

Lesson 106: Brilliant Empty Triangle (1)

By Nam Chi-hyung An empty triangle is a most notorious shape for its inefficiency. Therefore, most strong Baduk players avoid making an empty triangle and don’t even think about the possibility of using it in their games. The repugnance against an empty triangle becomes something of an acquired instinct. However, in certain local battles or the life-and-death of stones, this instinctive detestation for a certain shape or move, an empty triangle in this case, can become a serious obstacle for finding the best move. It is true that you need intuition to read even a small situation, or else there would be tons of variations you would have to think through; however, it is also true that you have to control your intuition not to interrupt a thorough and forthright reading. It is not easy, of course, to shift between using your intuition in one situation and not using it in another. Frankly speaking, I don’t know how I do it myself, but I have an idea. I’m going to show you some cases where an empty triangle is the best move. They look so beautiful, maybe because it is so hard to

Jul 26, 2007

Tips for Atopic Dermatitis in Summer

By Park Chung-a Staff Reporter Summer is a happy time for those who have travel plans to mountains and rivers. However, there are some people who hesitate to plunge themselves into the cool sea or a river. They are sufferers of atopic dermatitis. Atopic dermatitis, or eczema, is a common problem in infants and children, usually beginning between two and six months of age with very dry and sensitive skin that will then become red and extremely itchy. It often starts on the forehead, cheeks and scalp and spreads to the trunk, creases of the elbows, knees, and wrists. With scratching the rash may become raw, crusted and weepy. While many parents do not find a specific cause for their child's eczema, it is sometimes worse in the summer, when kids swim and are outside in the heat sweating. Han Seong-ho, an atopy expert and head of Atomi, a hospital specializing in allergies and atopic dermatitis, said that unless one is allergic to disinfectant contained in water in pools or salt in sea water, swimming is not harmful. However, Han said that it is important to moisturize t

Jul 22, 2007

Staying Blemish Free During Hot Summer

By Cathy Rose A. Garcia Staff Reporter Skin blemishes, such as pimples and blackheads, are always a concern among women who desire clear, smooth skin. It takes a lot of effort to keep the skin clear and blemish-free during the hot summer months, when pollution and the sun's harsh rays can wreak havoc. Clinique, an international cosmetics brand, said that nearly 103 million people suffer from skin blemishes around the world. In a ``Global Truth in Beauty'' survey conducted by Clinique last year, women in Korea, China and Japan cited blemishes as their top skin care challenge. The survey asked 10,000 women in 12 countries about their beauty habits and concerns. In particular, 40 percent of Korean women surveyed expressed concern about pimples, acne and other skin blemishes. Korean, Chinese and Japanese women also emphasized the importance of beautiful, clear skin rather than pretty facial features. Blemishes arise when the skin's sebaceous glands produce excess oil and clog the pores _ clogged pores become unsightly breakouts. To address these concerns, Clinique has