Music: Robots- Dan Mangan
There is a difference between the countries in Asia that I went to and the ‘Western World’ that I can’t help but feel stands out the most to me. (When I say Western world or culture, I am referring to places in the world that are influenced by the Industrial Revolution, the growth of Christianity and have some sort of status as a settler colony from European Empires, ie. Europe, North America, and Australia. Japan kind of sits on the fence with me. Even though they are very industrial, and have certain economic ties to the ‘western world‘ they have –in my opinion– remained slightly uninfluenced by the ‘western world’ concerning the topic I am going to discuss and remain true to their Japanese traditions; on the other hand, they loooove their bakeries and convinis! I am also not including South America; mostly because I have never been there and don’t hold a strong opinion and also because of their economic standing compared to their neighbors north.)
The difference is food, diet, and nutrition.
I have always been quite health conscious. I have my parents to thank for this. Thank you parents for monitoring how much ’snack food’ (ie, things that come in packages and are highly processed) my brothers and I were allowed to consume, always having a well balanced serving of proteins, carbs, fruits, vegetables and dairy and for allowing me to be a vegetarian from a young age. (Sometimes I lie … my mother did not fully support me being a vegetarian, but to be fair, this was because she figured as a growing girl I needed more protein). Thank you for ensuring that we were always physically active and were only allowed to watch a certain number of hours of television and/or play video games.
As you age you eventually find out that (most of us) can not continue to eat ‘what we want’, everyone know that motabolisms slow down, certain places begin to expand and that bowl of ice cream will show up in the worst places. That’s fine too, all part of the healthy ageing process.
Nato!!!
I’m not overweight and I’m not super thin, so I find it hard to notice weight gain since I don’t fluctuate too much. I did notice that when I moved to Japan it felt as though I lost a layer of body fat. Nothing crazy significant, but just lighter, in a way. It did happen right away though. My diet obviously changed: some super fresh fish, lots of oranges and fresh juices, loooots of cabbage and daikon (raddish), heaps of tofu, seaweed and the miracle food: nato!
As Nat and I travelled South East Asia we ate the usual foods that the locals ate. When I lived in the north east of Thailand for a month I definitely only ate traditional Thai food. This included lots of Papaya salad (loooaded with chillies), cucumber salad (also loaded with chillies), fresh fish stewed in clay pots marinating in chillies, tomatoes and other spices and tonnes of eggs, spinach, mangoes and guavas and (obviously) rice. Sooo delicious.
I’m not gonna lie. I got back to the western world and into a supermarket and I was like:
Cheeeeeese!!! Yogurt!!!! Crackers!!! Pizza!!! Those delicious sesame snaps!!! Peanut Butter!!! Juice!!! Other preservatives!!!!
Now I’m not saying I gained weight, but I definitely feel the food. It’s hard to explain. I feel like I’m trying to be healthy when I eat, but it’s like the preservatives that I haven’t been used to are seeping out my pores. In Asia, you didn’t really have a choice… you had to seek out treats and pay a hefty price for them. Here, I’m staying at Nats parents house, and we all know how parents keep their pantrys when they have school age children. Toast and peanut butter (or vegemite!) for breakfast! Cheese and crackers! Cans of beans (what is that red sauce anyways?)!! Popcycles! Moms desserts!! Preservatives, preservatives, PRESERVATIVES!!!
(no preservatives added? see: http://www.inspection.gc.ca/english/fssa/labeti/decisions/preserve.shtml )
Yah, I can definitely feel them… in my skin, my face looks not as fresh as before, my eczema has come back, making me scratch at my skin and moisturize like crazy, I’ve got this crazy phlegmy cough (even though I’m not sick and don’t smoke), I’m getting more tension headaches and my back is aching, also, I do not recover well from a night of drinking. It’s just interesting to me how much I can feel the difference these foods make. There are other differences… but now isn’t appropriate.
I am thankfully someone who is observant and notices these changes in my body and blames them on my own actions. Food change. No, I don’t ever use scales, so I’m not freaking out over that. I actually don’t care how much people weigh; I truly believe you can’t always see health in a scale. So I’m making instant changes. No more dairy (sometimes yogurt! and sometimes a nice piece of old cheddar 
); sorry fish, but god knows where you came from, how long it took you to get here, and what the state of the water where you came from was; none of the crazy stuff we call bread and definitely no crackers; also, even though I love them, no cans of baked beans, the sauce has too many ingredients that I’m not fully aware of. I’m not trying to diet or anything, I just felt sooo much better when I was eating asian. I even miss rice!!!
Again, this is not a diet. I’d say I’ve been influenced by a few things and people:
1. We’re Number One! We’re Number One!
Move over America, looks like you aren’t best at everything. Australia has gone ahead and taken the crown. It’s a big crown. Not one to be super proud of. It’s not even a good competition. Do we really live in a world where countries are outweighing each other? Where children are fat and at risk for diabetes?! Where three year olds in the Western World could kill a six year old in a Asian country (just commenting on the size differences).
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/article4171160.ece
2. What’s in That?!
Let’s ask ourselves that more. Also where does it come from? And where are you when you eat it? What does it do to your body and our environment? Please take a few minutes to watch this! (No worries, he isn’t a vegetarian and he is a chef).
http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/mark_bittman_on_what_s_wrong_with_what_we_eat.html
3. Collapse-by Jared Diamond
I read this book while travelling and it opened my eyes a lot. Jared Diamond offers a great point of view, writes well and makes you feel a little guilty. Hence, why I stopped eating fish again. (I can’t promise I won’t eat it again when I go back to Japan…). Here’s a shorter article by him (Collapse is pretty hefty, but worth the read!!):
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/02/opinion/02diamond.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1
Also, I have been influenced lately by the number of people that have to ask why I’m a vegetarian (or don’t eat meat). Don’t they know? Don’t they know the effects of eating animals? Don’t they know what goes on?
Furthermore, I started looking into the way we eat and how it impacts our environment. Some of my friends, after years of being vegetarians, started eating meat again. Now, I will never tell someone to stop eating meat (I would suggest reducing your intake) , but, if you were a vegetarian, and you stood up for your beliefs for so long, just to decide one day to eat a big fat hamburger and not stop there, I gotta say, I am not impressed. You know better!!! I felt I had to convince these people to continue with their beliefs.
I started with learning on how we can increase our iron intake without eating animals. I went through a period of low iron in Japan and started getting mono like effects and losing hair. No, I did not start eating chicken to get the iron back up, I just did some research on why this was happening. Why was I fine for almost ten years untill now? There are a few important reasons that I won’t bore you with now, but I’ll have you know I got my iron right back up there, au natural. Furthermore, I didn’t even have to go to a doctor! Google, people!!! We have all this information available at our fingertips!!! There is no excuse for taking the easy way out!
This brought me to other reasons, environmental reasons, why we should lower our meat and crap food intake (or 
cut it out entirely!). Everyone is green obsessed these days!! It’s becoming ever so fashionable to carry around cute reusable grocery bags, drive small cars, be into David Sazuki and focusing your university education on the environment. Why is McDonalds still so popular?!?!! I’m honestly shocked at the amount of people that still eat fast food. Really?! Couldn’t you pick something better? What can you do? People love fast cheap and easy.
Hopefully this post will encourage you to do some research on how to avoid becoming the fatest nation, avoid diabetes and heart disease and look for healthy alternatives AND feel better about your body . Hint: The links above are a good start!
***this (other than the links above) is all just my opinion, I am not a scientist (or very smart!)!
