About 1 month ago, my old friend Dr Chakri Negara checked my blood pressure and I was pleasantly surprised to know that my blood pressure was 120/70. Since I am 86.5 years old, I think I am qualified to write this article to benefit all my readers.
I inherited hypercholesterolaemia
My mother inherited a blood disease called hypercholesterolaemia and she died at 38 years old. All my siblings who had inherited the same blood disease also died before the age of 60 years old.
The bodies of the people with hypercholesterolaemia will produce a lot more cholesterol than ordinary people.
I have also inherited hypercholesterolaemia and I had a heart by-pass surgery when I was 50 years old in 1983 in London. At that time, Mayor Clinic, USA had just invented the heart/lung machine and only Mayor Clinic and Harley Street Clinic London could carry out heat by-pass surgery. Currently, heart by-pass surgery can be done in almost every hospital.
After my heart by-pass surgery, my cardiologist told me that my life expectancy would be very short due to my inherited blood disease and soon my heart would be blocked again and I would die. Unless I change my life style to prolong my life, I would soon die. The following is how I can prolong my life:
My diet:
When I wake up in the morning, I drink 2 glasses of water and eat about half a pineapple. All humans have about 27 feet of intestine. I drink water and eat pineapple is similar to sending water and brushes to clean my 27 feet of digestive canal.
I do not eat anything until lunch time. My diet consists of vegetables, fish, chickens, very little red meat and very small amount of rice. I do not take sugar. I drink a lot more water than I require. As a result, I have no constipation and I urinate quite frequently.
Physical exercise:
At my age, I cannot do vigorous exercise. I just walk about for about 10 minutes, swing my hands and do deep breathing exercise. I do this routine quite frequently throughout the day.
Mental exercise:
I watch the stock market during trading hours. Besides this, I write articles to criticise the corrupted BN Government. Since Pakatan Haprapan (PH) has won control of the government, I write more on share investment and useful pieces to benefit all my readers. I am writing this piece is a good example.
Mental Attitude:
Now I have covered diet, physical and mental exercise to improve my health. Even if I have good health and a lot of money and anxiously wanting to make more and more money every day, I will not be happy. I must have the right mental attitude. I must not forget that when I die, I cannot take any money along with me. So, I must use my money to help poor people especially poor students. Un to date I have given more than 300 scholarships to help poor students to complete their tertiary education. All my scholarships recipients do not require to return the money I spent on them. But they must remember that when they were poor, I helped them and when they are financially solvent and have some money, they should help other poor students. By this way, I believe I am creating more and more charity workers as the years go by.
This philosophy that I espouse is not merely in the way of words. I have backed it up with a record of charity and philanthropy which goes back many years and which has earned me recognition from Forbes, one of the world’s leading business magazines, as one of the four heroes of Malaysian philanthropy in 2011.
According to the Forbes citation
Koon Yew Yin, 78, Co-founded one of the country’s biggest construction companies, IJM Corp. Donates roughly $300,000 a year to various causes. Funds scholarships for needy students, 80 so far, at Tunku Abdul Rahman University. Learned the value of education in escaping poverty after growing up in a poor family of 12.
The citation took into account my innovative method of creating charity workers from his scholarship scheme targeted at poor but bright students unable to afford university education with their own resources.
How MCA lost almost all their seats in the last 2 GE.
What the citation did not mention was my battle to provide a donation of RM30 million to Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman (UTAR) to build residential hostels for the students living in expensive off-campus housing. UTAR is controlled by MCA and they rejected my Rm 30 million donation offer because they owned all the land outside the university campus and they did not want my proposed student hostels within the university campus to disrupt their lucrative property development business. As a result, MCA lost almost all their seats in the last 2 General Election.
Right attitude:
Every morning when I wake up, I should feel happy because I did not die the night before. I am lucky to be alive to do good things and enjoy my life.
I must forget all my difficulties in the past, I must enjoy the present and look forward to enjoy my remaining days.
I believe education and wealth alone cannot make me a better person. I must have the right attitude to enable me to live a happy and useful long life.
Studies have shown that education, wealth, right attitude and happiness can prolong life.