Kareem was surprised: "How do you
mean?' he asked, "When we eat these
plums, are we really eating the Sun?"
Grandpa Hassan smiled: "Actually we
are eating the Sun, but indirectly. We all know
that the main source of energy on Earth is the
Sun. But human beings and animals do not use
this energy directly, because we don't have the right
systems. Do you know how we use it? Human beings and
animals can only get usable energy from the nutrients produced in
plants. The energy we use is really the Sun's energy given to us by
plants. For example, when we sip tea we are actually sipping en-
ergy from the Sun; when we chew a piece of bread, there is actu-
ally a piece of the Sun's energy between our teeth. The strength in
our muscles is really an altered state of the Sun's energy. Because
of this energy, you can run and play. So, how do plants manage
this? Plants perform some complicated operations in order to store
the Sun's energy for us. What allows plants to produce their own
food and separates them from other living
things is that their cells are different from
the cells of human beings and animals;
they have structures in their cells that
allow them to use the Sun's energy di-
rectly. With the help of these structures,
they transform the Sun's energy into a
form that human beings and animals
can use for food, and
they store this en-
ergy in food using
a special hidden
formula."
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