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Thread: weight loss & traveling

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  1. #27
    Exits, pursued by a bear. Animal's Avatar
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    TIM
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    By raw numbers, it is cheaper to eat healthily in the U.S. than anywhere else in the world. We spend less of our income on food than just about any other nation. I remember in college we had a student from Australia who was vegan. He was amazed how much cheaper and easier it was to maintain his diet here than back at home: fruits and vegetables were several times cheaper here, and the array of vegetarian and vegan ready-made foods was much better. In Australia, even the ubiquitous banana was expensive.

    Unfortunately, it's even cheaper (and more convenient) to eat poorly. As has been pointed out ITT, we are horribly sedentary because our country is unwalkable and passive entertainment has usurped physical activity, but we're also overworked compared to other industrialized nations. Then we have another issue: Americans don't really have a cuisine or cooking culture that long pre-dates the rise of convenience foods, as in Asia or Europe. As such, what most people prepare at home in this country (when they even do prepare meals at home, because home-cooking is a dying art) revolves around pre-packaged, chemical-laden convenience items. The most popular shows on Food Network were bastions of convenience cooking: Semi-Homemade Cooking ("describe[d] as using 70 percent pre-packaged products and 30 percent fresh items") and 30-Minute Meals.

    To be fair, the U.S. is huge, and different regions have vastly different food prices and restaurant options, as well as median incomes which can obviously affect what you can (and are willing to) buy. If you're REALLY poor or live in a food desert, then eating healthy (or feeding a family) can be quite difficult. But everywhere I've gone in the U.S. has food prices relatively low compared to other parts of the world.

    EDIT: I just realized that this thread originated from anti-gym/exercise sentiments. Fuck that noise. I love the gym. And women should lift weights, too, since they have a higher risk of osteoporosis, which can be somewhat ameliorated by resistance exercise.
    Last edited by Animal; 10-25-2015 at 10:51 PM.
    "How could we forget those ancient myths that stand at the beginning of all races, the myths about dragons that at the last moment are transformed into princesses? Perhaps all the dragons in our lives are princesses who are only waiting to see us act, just once, with beauty and courage. Perhaps everything that frightens us is, in its deepest essence, something helpless that wants our love."
    -- Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

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