Bananas

There is a question that I have found perpelxing recently, so I conducted some research so you don't have to have restless nights pondering the same thing. The question - 'How do bananas reproduce?'

I know the answer to this will not chnage my world - I just wanted to know.

Anyway, my study has led me into a complex and sometimes contradictory web of half answers. I will attempt to give hyou the best explanation about our friend the banana.

There are close to 1,000 species of banana today. Most of them are inedible - they carry hard pea-sized seeds, and have only a small amount of bad-tasting flesh. Botanists think that 1000's of years ago, probably in South-East Asia, a random mutation produced a sterile banana with no seeds and lots of flesh that could be eaten uncooked. The internal dark lines and spots inside today's banana are the vestigial remnant of these seeds.

But the edible farmed banana has no seeds. So how do we get new bananas? They are grown from the cuttings of an existing banana plant. New banana "trees" are "born" in a new location when the shoots of cuttings are planted in the ground, and take root successfully.

Bananas are definitely a fruit, even though the fruit is sterile and has no seeds. And the banana does not grow on a tree. It grows on a plant. But it's not a tree, because it's made from leaves, not true woody tissue. So our poor banana is a sterile and mutant fruit that has not had sex for 1000's of years.

Check out Great Moments in Science for more info.

Yeah

I drove past this amended Tui billboard yesterday on the Southern motorway.

Charity:Water

More than 1 billion people living in the world are without something as basic as clean drinking water. Scott Harrison decided to do something about it and founded Charity:Water. Have a look at what they do, particularly the videos.

Justice (cont.)

Here are a couple of quotes from Relevant Magazine on this issue:

Brian McLaren: I believe these days it’s the economy, not the nation-state, that is driving the world. It would be good for people to consider the ways capitalism can become a form of idolatry, where markets are given godlike powers and people have an unwritten creed of salvation by consumption alone.One of the most powerful things the next generation of emerging Christians can do is be at the heart of a new global movement for ethical buying and fair trade. We can use the power of markets for good, just as they have been used for evil in so many ways—environmentally, socially and politically. It’s a question of the Kingdom of God—how would we expect economics to work in the Kingdom of God, as opposed to the systems of this world?



Cindy Jacobs: God has worked in this generation a desire to make the world a better place for all. This means grappling with issues of eliminating systemic poverty, taking care of the environment and living with each other in a kinder, more relational way.For this reason, I believe the question is, How much is enough? We need to make wealth to steward it to create jobs, help single moms, the elderly and find ways to deal with the AIDS crisis. Our lifestyle should not be “me” centric, but “Kingdom of God” centric.