‘Then the dog threw up on the carpet.’ : Monkeys Among the Mabaans

It is said that coronary heart disease and hypertension are unknown among the Mabaans, a primitive tribe in northeast Africa, and that at age 75 their hearing is still acute.

The reason is that the loudest sound they hear is the screech of a monkey in heat which, while it may be unnerving to a non-monkey, does not assume the level of noise made by, say, a jet plane, a rock band or the wild laughter of a Texas woman who has had too much to drink.

And when the chaos becomes unbearable, the Mabaans simply kill the monkey.

I was thinking about this the other day as I sat on the veranda of a restaurant at the edge of the Van Nuys Airport watching private jets climb into a smoggy sky.

My mind often drifts to quieter places when I am surrounded by clamor, although my wife is certain I am thinking of broads. She will not buy that I am simply dreaming of life among the Mabaans where, I am certain, they do not have broads.

I was surprised at the number of aircraft that took off from Van Nuys during the course of two martinis and a Cobb salad. I counted 15, although I admit to losing count midway through the salad.

But since the martini-salad form of decibel measurement has not yet been officially accepted by the American Acoustical Society, it is a moot point anyhow.

I discovered later that Van Nuys is the busiest general airport in the nation in terms of takeoffs and landings, and I began to wonder how its noise affected the people who live around it.

I discussed this with Don and Prudy Schultz. They not only run an organization called Ban Airport Noise, but live under the flight path of 63 helicopters based at the airport.

The helicopters, to paraphrase their complaint, are driving them crazy, especially at night; and they are working to stop night flights completely except for emergency aircraft.

Current regulations prohibit noise above 74 decibels during the night at Van Nuys, but Don Schultz says that’s still too high.

“I’ve heard,” he says, “that 100 decibels are like a locomotive train going through your backyard, and 74 isn’t that much less.”

“It’s just too damned noisy,” Prudy adds without the frills of scientific definition.

I can appreciate their displeasure, but I don’t know what to do about it.

We are surrounded by noise, not the least of which is made by jet planes and helicopters; but they are not the only offenders.

Rock music played in bars where singles gather to arrange their water bed weekends is somewhere around 115 decibels, a loud power mower is 109 decibels and even a food blender is 95 decibels.

I get this from the Encyclopedia Americana, which also reports that simple conversation has been recorded at 60 decibels.

The noise-range dangerous to health and hearing is from 85 to 90 decibels, and, although this does not include conversation, it should.

I, for instance, regard any discussion about cars, whales or bowel disease as in the dangerous range, but that, of course, is an emotional evaluation and has nothing to do with sound.

I’m funny that way.

For example, at the veranda restaurant in Van Nuys my hearing was not only assaulted by aircraft noise but also by the loud talking of a woman nearby addressing a companion at her table.

She was speaking loudly, I suppose, because her friend was either hearing-impaired or foreign. It is well known that if you speak loudly to those unfamiliar with English, they are likely to understand you better.

I was attracted to the conversation in the first place because I heard the loud woman say, “Then the dog threw up on the carpet!”

That would have been bad enough, but because she wasn’t sure her companion had heard or had understood, she said it again, even louder, “The dog threw up on the carpet!”

The other woman only nodded. Either she still didn’t hear the comment or didn’t understand about dogs vomiting on carpets.

I suppose it is even possible that she didn’t give a damn, but I don’t think so.

For a terrible moment I thought Woman Number One would repeat the phrase yet again, but she didn’t. That alone may have saved her from a terrible beating.

Later that same day, we attended a reception in a home not far from the Burbank Airport, which also manages to get noisier than hell.

Fortunately, however, I was among a group of men whose intellectual level of conversation ranged up to baseball’s designated hitter rule, so the occasional roar of a jet taking off was almost a relief.

While I sympathize with Don and Prudy Schultz, we are assaulted not only by noise in today’s frenzied world but also by the vacuity of endless babble. One can always move from under a flight path, but how does one escape inanity?

The Mabaans, those simple souls, may have the answer. When life becomes too tedious, they simply kill the monkey.

I suppose that could apply to the dog too, but only if he threw up on the carpet.