Mums eat ga ac and hope for smart children in lucky year

Mums eat ga ac and hope for smart children in lucky year

The Vietnamese believe that it is auspicious to have a child born in the Year of the Golden Pig, which comes only every 60 years.This on being the lucky year, mothers are eating ga ac, a rare variety of chicken widely believed to be a tonic for pregnant women and their babies.

Ga ac has black skin, bones and viscera, with only its feathers white. They are about four to five weeks old and weigh 200g, often costing three times as much as normal chickens, according to traders at Ben Thanh Market.

The demand for ga ac in HCM City is so strong that supply is now limited. Hundreds of thousands of chickens, primarily from Dong Nai and Tien Giang provinces, have been sold so far this year.

Nutritionists said ga ac has high nutritional value and can help regulate blood circulation. "Ga ac stewed with Chinese medicinal herbs, a royal dish in the past, can reduce sugar in blood, prevent kidney failure, ageing process and osteoporosis," according to pharmacist Ho Van Nho.

"It is good for people recovering from illness and women in labour or after delivery," he added.

Hoang Lan, who works at Rong Viet Securities Co, said: "I had heard from my colleagues that eating ga ac would be good for mothers and newborns. The infant will become sound and the mother will recover quickly. Each week I usually have one to two ga ac chickens at a restaurant. Becait’s such a rare variety, it’s not always available in the market."

Transsexuals may receive official identity papers from MoH

Vietnamese transexuals could soon benefit from a draft decree written by the Ministry of Health that is now awaiting Government approval. The decree was drafted to allow transexuals to officially declare their gender on official identity papers.

Under the draft decree, the sexual identity of transexuals would be changed on their birth certificates by their local people’s committees if they can show proof of abnormalities that indicated their sex was ambiguous at birth.

The change will also be noted in household registration books, identity cards, passports and bank accounts, said Tran That, head of the Justice Ministry’s Administrative and Judicial Division.

But not all cases of gender rearrangement are eligible for the new policy. "Those people who have undergone surgery abroad will be allowed to have their personal papers changed only if test results at home and abroad prove that their sex has been changed."

Transexuals of foreign citizenship will not be included in the new regulation.

Some 7,000 people in Viet Nam say they want to have their gender changed, mostly in major cities like Ha Noi and HCM City.

Source VietnamNews