dietgrrl
New member
Hokay, here we go...
Yesterday, I accompanied my mom to this city, where she would take a flight back home. This meant a flight for me too, a hotel stay and a flight back today. I didn't mind the extra costs because it meant a peace of mind that my mom made it home safely (she doesn't speak any Indonesian and she'd have to do an over-nighter to catch her next flight). Plus, it meant spending another day with my mom.
For the first time since Jan, I did not prepare my lunch. I repeat, I did NOT prepare my lunch. We had already arrived in the city, and I thought since it was my last day with my mom, I could finally enjoy a meal in a restaurant with her (and not shame her by bringing my own food - hahah). We decided on a Japanese restaurant because it felt like the healthier choice out of the rest (Pizza hut, A&W, KFC,...) little did I know that it was just as bad!!
I ordered a tofu steak and a salad. The salad was thinly sliced cucumber, crab and noodles and was liberally doused with fish eggs. I just wanted my leafy greens! The tofu steak was even worse. I suspect that they had coated the tofu with corn starch. It was so incredibly oily, and the veggies that it was serve on was even more oily. So disgusting.
If I were by myself, I would have gotten up, paid, and left. But I was with my mom, and my mom's old school - to not finish your food is like a sin. So I had to suck it up and eat the tofu. I tried to take off the skin (corn starch) but the tofu was in small pieces thus making it pretty impossible to eat without the skin. What to do - I had to just eat it.
Arrghhh.. My tummy felt so ill after that and yup, I had diarrhea. It was pretty bad (sorry TMI). The rest of the day was spent running to the toilet.
I'm not surprised because for three months, I pretty much detox all the junk out of my body. So no wonder that my body decided to rebel when I reintroduced junk into my system.
Then I found out that they had yogurt - some Canadian brand, I forget what it's called but it was advertised as 'no fat, no sugar'. Considering that it felt that my entire lunch was flushed away, I thought that I might as well get back some protein into me and why not do it the fun way? So I had yogurt. And it was yummy, I won't deny it..
However, now that I know what less than 2% fat yogurt taste like - it felt so suspect that my 'no fat, no sugar' yogurt was rather tasty!! Of course they put artificial sweetener in it and probably lots of it. I love this programme (here I go again...) because seriously, if it weren't for it, I'd be fooled for this type of advertising, thinking that I was eating so healthy but wasn't.
But I won't deny it, I really enjoyed eating it...
For dinner, I contemplated just eating in the hotel - I've had their steak before and it was decent, but certainly not for the price that they charge for. I also know that my mom worries too much about money (even if it's my own) and she opted for eating back at the mall. This time, we decided to try a sandwich place. They didn't have any decent sandwiches, only processed meat and cheese (the kraft kind - gross!!). So I had the chicken mushroom soup.
Oh! After the yogurt, and repeat trips to the toilet, my stomach felt bit better but empty. So I ate two wholewheat bread slices to calm it down and it felt better.
But after the chicken mushroom soup - I was running to the loo again. It was ok but I've gotten so sensitive to extra salt and the thing about Indonesian food is that they are much too liberal with salt and MSG. I was sooooo irritated over the dining experience because it was my last night with my mom and I wanted somewhere nice.
Not only that the soup gave me problems, but (my PET PEEVE about Indonesia) I hate how people smoke indoors. So all these men were puffing away in the restaurant! I couldn't breathe. It was not a nice atmosphere to have dinner at all.
As well, the lettuce salad that I ordered, after giving strict specifications to not add any dressing to the salad - they served it up with an overdose of spicy vinagerette. I should have just complained and returned it. Their only concession was putting the mayo (WHO EATS MAYO WITH THEIR SALAD) on the side. They couldn't even leave the cucumber and tomatoes alone and put a heavy dose of mayo on it. I couldn't eat the salad and my mom (hates leaving food to waste) ate it all even though she didn't like it.
Anyway, the whole experience was educational because it got me thinking....
My staff, younger than me, have a lot of health problems. I highly suspect that it's because of their poor diet than anything else. I see what they eat, and drink and it's not healthy. They don't eat vegetables or drink water. Everything is greasy fried, with huge amounts of rice. These days, most Asians live very sedentary lives - we sit in offices all day - so how can we account for all the food that we eat? My staff has high blood pressure for gosh sakes, among other health issues.
Looking around the mall - there are more junk food places than healthy options. It's the same in most Asian cities really. My mom talks about how the poor in Manila are actually getting larger, fatter - because the abundance of cheap, junk food that is proliferating around the city. Go to any mall and you'd see that any time of the day, the fast food court is packed. People are eating, eating eating and getting fatter, fatter, fatter.
We can't say that only America has an obesity problem when it's happening to the rest of us. Goddamn globalization and Macdonald's, KFC, etc....
My mom says that perhaps people are eating the unhealthy foods because they can't afford 'healthier foods' and I say that's RUBBISH. Look what I've been eating for the last couple of months. I eat a ton of veggies and they are cheap. I shop at the same market but the difference is how I prepare it. I don't add tons of salt, or MSG, or sauces with preservatives, etc... I don't deep-fry my foods. And really, the argument should be - spend a little more on your food, to ensure that you are not paying for medical bills in the future! Sure, when I travel, I pay extra for eating canned tuna. But considering that I haven't been sick for months since I started this programme, whereas my staff runs to the doctor and gets dozens of pills for whatever ailment she's got this time... who pays more in the end??
AArrrggh sorry for the long rant, but I've recently gotten passionate about healthy eating and living!!!!
Ok, back to a proper Cohen-y post:
today for breakfast, we were at the hotel so I decided to try muesli - very yummy but rather sweet for my taste. Had that with papaya. Also had one wheat toast with some butter. Yup, the muesli made me run for the loo again.
When I finally arrived home (sad to be on the plane by myself), and weighed myself - I clocked in at 54.4kg - same as yesterday's.
I'm relieved that I haven't gained any weight considering all that junk that I had put into my system. I did however lost a lot of fluids yesterday so I think that I may have gained, and then lost via fluids. Tomorrow, I'd have a better idea where my weight lies..
BUT!!!! Lesson learnt from this adventure??? EATING OUT IS NOT WORTH IT. It's expensive, and annoying! As long as I can help it, I don't want to ever eat out in Indonesia again. Sorry if this makes me sound like an ass but I just don't believe that I can find healthy choices here unless I'm in Bali or Jakarta - but certainly not in the smaller cities.
Ok, I gotta go and cook a nice, sane omelette for lunch!
Yesterday, I accompanied my mom to this city, where she would take a flight back home. This meant a flight for me too, a hotel stay and a flight back today. I didn't mind the extra costs because it meant a peace of mind that my mom made it home safely (she doesn't speak any Indonesian and she'd have to do an over-nighter to catch her next flight). Plus, it meant spending another day with my mom.
For the first time since Jan, I did not prepare my lunch. I repeat, I did NOT prepare my lunch. We had already arrived in the city, and I thought since it was my last day with my mom, I could finally enjoy a meal in a restaurant with her (and not shame her by bringing my own food - hahah). We decided on a Japanese restaurant because it felt like the healthier choice out of the rest (Pizza hut, A&W, KFC,...) little did I know that it was just as bad!!
I ordered a tofu steak and a salad. The salad was thinly sliced cucumber, crab and noodles and was liberally doused with fish eggs. I just wanted my leafy greens! The tofu steak was even worse. I suspect that they had coated the tofu with corn starch. It was so incredibly oily, and the veggies that it was serve on was even more oily. So disgusting.
If I were by myself, I would have gotten up, paid, and left. But I was with my mom, and my mom's old school - to not finish your food is like a sin. So I had to suck it up and eat the tofu. I tried to take off the skin (corn starch) but the tofu was in small pieces thus making it pretty impossible to eat without the skin. What to do - I had to just eat it.
Arrghhh.. My tummy felt so ill after that and yup, I had diarrhea. It was pretty bad (sorry TMI). The rest of the day was spent running to the toilet.
I'm not surprised because for three months, I pretty much detox all the junk out of my body. So no wonder that my body decided to rebel when I reintroduced junk into my system.
Then I found out that they had yogurt - some Canadian brand, I forget what it's called but it was advertised as 'no fat, no sugar'. Considering that it felt that my entire lunch was flushed away, I thought that I might as well get back some protein into me and why not do it the fun way? So I had yogurt. And it was yummy, I won't deny it..
However, now that I know what less than 2% fat yogurt taste like - it felt so suspect that my 'no fat, no sugar' yogurt was rather tasty!! Of course they put artificial sweetener in it and probably lots of it. I love this programme (here I go again...) because seriously, if it weren't for it, I'd be fooled for this type of advertising, thinking that I was eating so healthy but wasn't.
But I won't deny it, I really enjoyed eating it...
For dinner, I contemplated just eating in the hotel - I've had their steak before and it was decent, but certainly not for the price that they charge for. I also know that my mom worries too much about money (even if it's my own) and she opted for eating back at the mall. This time, we decided to try a sandwich place. They didn't have any decent sandwiches, only processed meat and cheese (the kraft kind - gross!!). So I had the chicken mushroom soup.
Oh! After the yogurt, and repeat trips to the toilet, my stomach felt bit better but empty. So I ate two wholewheat bread slices to calm it down and it felt better.
But after the chicken mushroom soup - I was running to the loo again. It was ok but I've gotten so sensitive to extra salt and the thing about Indonesian food is that they are much too liberal with salt and MSG. I was sooooo irritated over the dining experience because it was my last night with my mom and I wanted somewhere nice.
Not only that the soup gave me problems, but (my PET PEEVE about Indonesia) I hate how people smoke indoors. So all these men were puffing away in the restaurant! I couldn't breathe. It was not a nice atmosphere to have dinner at all.
As well, the lettuce salad that I ordered, after giving strict specifications to not add any dressing to the salad - they served it up with an overdose of spicy vinagerette. I should have just complained and returned it. Their only concession was putting the mayo (WHO EATS MAYO WITH THEIR SALAD) on the side. They couldn't even leave the cucumber and tomatoes alone and put a heavy dose of mayo on it. I couldn't eat the salad and my mom (hates leaving food to waste) ate it all even though she didn't like it.
Anyway, the whole experience was educational because it got me thinking....
My staff, younger than me, have a lot of health problems. I highly suspect that it's because of their poor diet than anything else. I see what they eat, and drink and it's not healthy. They don't eat vegetables or drink water. Everything is greasy fried, with huge amounts of rice. These days, most Asians live very sedentary lives - we sit in offices all day - so how can we account for all the food that we eat? My staff has high blood pressure for gosh sakes, among other health issues.
Looking around the mall - there are more junk food places than healthy options. It's the same in most Asian cities really. My mom talks about how the poor in Manila are actually getting larger, fatter - because the abundance of cheap, junk food that is proliferating around the city. Go to any mall and you'd see that any time of the day, the fast food court is packed. People are eating, eating eating and getting fatter, fatter, fatter.
We can't say that only America has an obesity problem when it's happening to the rest of us. Goddamn globalization and Macdonald's, KFC, etc....
My mom says that perhaps people are eating the unhealthy foods because they can't afford 'healthier foods' and I say that's RUBBISH. Look what I've been eating for the last couple of months. I eat a ton of veggies and they are cheap. I shop at the same market but the difference is how I prepare it. I don't add tons of salt, or MSG, or sauces with preservatives, etc... I don't deep-fry my foods. And really, the argument should be - spend a little more on your food, to ensure that you are not paying for medical bills in the future! Sure, when I travel, I pay extra for eating canned tuna. But considering that I haven't been sick for months since I started this programme, whereas my staff runs to the doctor and gets dozens of pills for whatever ailment she's got this time... who pays more in the end??
AArrrggh sorry for the long rant, but I've recently gotten passionate about healthy eating and living!!!!
Ok, back to a proper Cohen-y post:
today for breakfast, we were at the hotel so I decided to try muesli - very yummy but rather sweet for my taste. Had that with papaya. Also had one wheat toast with some butter. Yup, the muesli made me run for the loo again.
When I finally arrived home (sad to be on the plane by myself), and weighed myself - I clocked in at 54.4kg - same as yesterday's.
I'm relieved that I haven't gained any weight considering all that junk that I had put into my system. I did however lost a lot of fluids yesterday so I think that I may have gained, and then lost via fluids. Tomorrow, I'd have a better idea where my weight lies..
BUT!!!! Lesson learnt from this adventure??? EATING OUT IS NOT WORTH IT. It's expensive, and annoying! As long as I can help it, I don't want to ever eat out in Indonesia again. Sorry if this makes me sound like an ass but I just don't believe that I can find healthy choices here unless I'm in Bali or Jakarta - but certainly not in the smaller cities.
Ok, I gotta go and cook a nice, sane omelette for lunch!
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In some ways, I think I'm slowly influencing them but ultimately it's up to them to make the change. 
