In the beginning of the year, one of our very first assignments was to create a video showing what is meaningful in my life or what makes my life meaningful. My art was, still is, and will always be one of the most important aspects of my life that adds to the meaning of my life. Over the past few months, we have touched upon several different units, all-relating to living a more meaningful life. I have to say when we first started this course I was not sure what to think about living a good and meaningful life. I felt lost at times because I had never taken the time to think about how I am either living a good and meaningful life or not. I felt the video assignment was creative and was a good way for me to think about something important to my life and who I am as a human being, an animal, etc.
Later on, I learned that people base the meaning of a good and meaningful life on their personal experiences and what they view around them. The media runs our society by setting standards of acceptability to abide by in order to live a good and meaningful life. We are no longer the driving force of our decisions because there are many influences us in our daily lives. It is harder to be "original” because someone out in the world has already come up with that same idea floating around in your head. Most often, you think you have come up with a great idea but instead it is Corporate Culture and the Dominant message of how to live a good and meaningful marginal message etc, folk culture
In the beginning, my definition of a good and meaningful life was whatever corporate and folk culture had told about the ways of the world. I was and still am influenced by the media and corporate and folk culture but now I know when I see the media trying to persuade me into buying something new or to try a "new and improved" diet, and when to stay away from this type of advertisement. I can spot the propaganda and follow my own knowledge about what I now know about living a good and meaningful life.
Two of my most favorite units were the health and the animal units because these two units have a lot to do with each other. Health was a big unit; there is physical, mental, and moral health.
The animal unit really opened my eyes to how related we are to other animals, we are animals and we act like animals. This unit was a chance to explore what living like an animal like; following our natural instincts and doing thing that are natural to the human body. We talked about the relationship between humans and other animals and the differences.
At first, I was a bit skeptical about the health unit; I did not understand what it had to do with me living a good and meaningful life. But as we discussed how understanding our physical, mental and moral health played a part in making my life more meaningful I began to want to know more. Learning how to describe your emotions in words will help you understand more about yourself, why you feel the way you do, and how to make yourself better.
We participated in different physical exercises for example we laid out a mat on the floor and all of us would lie down, then one person would lie on top of everyone else and we would work together to roll our bodies simultaneously to roll the one person across the room. Rolling people on the mat was a lot of fun and a great way to exercise your mind, strategically. We also went to the park and played tag as a class, this was an exercise to see how the physical can also affect the mental state. We found that running around in the park, like free animals, we were having fun; we felt carefree and did not have to worry about school and work. We were living in the moment. Running and chasing each other, enjoying the nice weather and feeling energized. The exercise made us feel relieved of everything in the world. The physical affects the mental. I have to say, as childish as some may think this sounds, this unit was some of the most fun I have had in any of my classes all year long.
Being healthy also has to do with what you eat. America's food culture is a complete mess.The major industries that run our country have taken over and converted most natural agricultural farming into a process where products are becoming "mass produced" items and must be grown faster, fatter, bigger, and cheaper, which we now call, industrial farming. Natural, agricultural farming much like, "home grown" produce, is dying out. "If you can grow a chicken in 49 days, why would you one you can grow in 3 months?" Everything about our food culture is so automatic and all about speed and money. The faster the better.
Jared Diamond discusses in The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race he goes on to explain that the adoption of agriculture was in many was a "catastrophe from which we have never recovered." Agriculture has destroyed the land and with it came social and sexual inequality, epidemic disease, that "curse our existence." Before agriculture was adapted by humans our race consisted of hunters and gatherers. We fed on wild plants and hunted for other wildlife. But most of us would not go back to those ways of living lives because we have have become so attached to this new and better way of living. Where "we enjoy the most abundant and varied foods, the best tools and material goods, some of the longest and healthiest lives, in history." And we get "our energy from oil and machines, not from our sweat." Life seems too good to change, why would we want to work more for the food we can get so easily from industrial farms? or at least that is what a majority of people think. Agriculture is an efficient way to get more food for less work, that is why hunters and gatherers adopted this method of living. Not that that is a good thing.
In our last unit we discussed the Collapse of our society, I believe our society will and is (semi) experiencing collapse but slowly. We will gradually over time realize that our way of life is coming to an end. But we won't do anything about it until the last minute because we do not think the collapse is too important today. It doesn't scream to us: IMPORTANT PAY ATTENTION, THIS COULD BE YOUR LAST CHANCE! So we ignore it. Like Global warming, everyone says they are "going green" but what are they actually doing to prevent Global Warming?
Our society is so dependent on oil that we extract and use an enormous amount of it to make most things in the US, for example plastics and used as heat to melt metals. The US does not think about the consequences of abusing the existence of oil. All we care about is that it is there for the time being and we will use as much as we want.
We touched upon the Oil Peak Theory: Our society is based upon a constant growth and oil, the constant growth of oil. We have already found the most oil in many years, so the amount of oil being produced has already peaked and is now declining. Meaning there is less oil being produced and the cost of oil is rising. This can become dangerous because oil production will be volatile during the decline and there may not be a constant source of energy needed to keep a society going.
Entire financial system based on a growing economy, constant growth, our entire society based on oil and fossil fuels, everything is made from oil or oil and fossil fuels must be used to make a product. Ever increasing use of ever decreasing resources will lead to our collapse. (along with many other reasons, which we did not touch upon)
Now that I have been giving all of this information on how food, health, and the effects the economy has on me, I am more aware than when I started in this course. I know have a stronger idea of how to live a meaningful life. You have to learn how to take control of what you do. Make your own decisions based on the information at hand to choose what you feel is right. Make yourself happy, you should also experience other feelings and understand your feelings. Understanding yourself, the world around you, the world you live in, helps to make a meaningful life because once you know the situation you are in, you can then make the decisions that make you happy it is completely up to you, and you must also learn to understand other people.
Jun 11, 2009
Jun 8, 2009
Final Essay June 2009
In the beginning of the year, one of our very first assignments was to create a video showing what is meaningful in my life or what makes my life meaningful. My art was, still is, and will always be one of the most important aspects of my life that adds to the meaning of my life. Over the past few months we have touched upon several different units, all-relating to living a more meaningful life. I have to say when we first started this course I was not sure what to think about living a good and meaningful life. I felt lost at times because I had never taken the time to think about how I am either living a good and meaningful life or not. I felt the video assignment was really creative and was a good way for me to think about something important to my life and who I am as a human being, an animal, etc.
Later on I learned that people base the meaning of a good and meaningful life on their personal experiences and what they view around them. The media runs our society by setting standards as to what is acceptable in order to live a good and meaningful life. We are no longer the driving force of our decisions because there is too much to be influenced by in our daily lives. Its harder to be "original." Corporate Culture, Dominant, marginal message etc, folk culture
In the beginning my definition of a good and meaningful life was whatever corporate and folk culture had told about the ways of the world. I was and still am influenced by the media and corporate and folk culture but now I know when I see the media trying to persuade me into buying something new or to try a "new and improved" diet, and when to stay away from this type of advertisement. I can spot the propaganda and follow my own knowledge about what I now know about living a good and meaningful life.
Two of my most favorite units were the health and the animal units because these two units have a lot to do with each other. Health was a big unit, there is physical, mental, and moral health.
The animal unit really opened my eyes to how related we are to other animals, we are animals and we act like animals. This unit was a chance to explore what living like an animal like, following our natural instincts and doing thing that are natural to the human body. We talked about the relationship between humans and other animals and also the differences.
At first I was a bit skeptical about the health unit, I didn't understand what it had to do with me living a good and meaningful life. But as we discussed how understanding our physical, mental, and moral health played a part in making my life more meaningful I began to want to know more. Learning how to describe your emotions in words will help you understand more about yourself, why you feel the way you do, and how to make yourself better.
We participated in different physical exercises for example we laid out a mat on the floor and all of us would lie down, then one person would lie on top of everyone else and we would work together to roll our bodies ___ to roll the one person across the room. I have to say, as childish as one may think this sound, it was the most fun I have had in any of my classes all year long.
Later on I learned that people base the meaning of a good and meaningful life on their personal experiences and what they view around them. The media runs our society by setting standards as to what is acceptable in order to live a good and meaningful life. We are no longer the driving force of our decisions because there is too much to be influenced by in our daily lives. Its harder to be "original." Corporate Culture, Dominant, marginal message etc, folk culture
In the beginning my definition of a good and meaningful life was whatever corporate and folk culture had told about the ways of the world. I was and still am influenced by the media and corporate and folk culture but now I know when I see the media trying to persuade me into buying something new or to try a "new and improved" diet, and when to stay away from this type of advertisement. I can spot the propaganda and follow my own knowledge about what I now know about living a good and meaningful life.
Two of my most favorite units were the health and the animal units because these two units have a lot to do with each other. Health was a big unit, there is physical, mental, and moral health.
The animal unit really opened my eyes to how related we are to other animals, we are animals and we act like animals. This unit was a chance to explore what living like an animal like, following our natural instincts and doing thing that are natural to the human body. We talked about the relationship between humans and other animals and also the differences.
At first I was a bit skeptical about the health unit, I didn't understand what it had to do with me living a good and meaningful life. But as we discussed how understanding our physical, mental, and moral health played a part in making my life more meaningful I began to want to know more. Learning how to describe your emotions in words will help you understand more about yourself, why you feel the way you do, and how to make yourself better.
We participated in different physical exercises for example we laid out a mat on the floor and all of us would lie down, then one person would lie on top of everyone else and we would work together to roll our bodies ___ to roll the one person across the room. I have to say, as childish as one may think this sound, it was the most fun I have had in any of my classes all year long.
Collapse Assignment 2
"Civilization as we know it is coming to an end soon." As this now seems to be the popular thing to say, it is not at all false or a joke, the United States is on its way toward collapse. Whether the collapse is slow and seemingly unnoticeable or a crash and burn effect, which I highly doubt people will just die in the streets, but a collapse is on its way. Our country as a certain energy level it must maintain in order to function properly and not spiral into a meltdown. To maintain constant energy the US must gain the same amount of energy lost. The source of all energy that keeps us from falling apart is fossil fuels and oil.
Entropy-the tendency for everything to chill.
Our society is so dependent on oil that we extract and use an enormous amount of it to make most things in the US, for example plastics and used as heat to melt metals. The US does not think about the consequences of abusing the existence of oil. All we care about is that it is there for the time being and we will use as much as we want.
Oil Peak Theory: Our society is based upon a constant growth and oil, the constant growth of oil. We have already found the most oil in many years, so the amount of oil being produced has already peaked and is now declining. Meaning there is less oil being produced and the cost of oil is rising. This can become dangerous because oil production will be volatile during the decline and there may not be a constant source of energy needed to keep a society going.
Entire financial system based on a growing economy, constant growth
Entire society based on oil, everything is made from oil
Easter Island
Jared Diamond
Life After the Oil Crash
http://www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net/
Entropy-the tendency for everything to chill.
Our society is so dependent on oil that we extract and use an enormous amount of it to make most things in the US, for example plastics and used as heat to melt metals. The US does not think about the consequences of abusing the existence of oil. All we care about is that it is there for the time being and we will use as much as we want.
Oil Peak Theory: Our society is based upon a constant growth and oil, the constant growth of oil. We have already found the most oil in many years, so the amount of oil being produced has already peaked and is now declining. Meaning there is less oil being produced and the cost of oil is rising. This can become dangerous because oil production will be volatile during the decline and there may not be a constant source of energy needed to keep a society going.
Entire financial system based on a growing economy, constant growth
Entire society based on oil, everything is made from oil
Easter Island
Jared Diamond
Life After the Oil Crash
http://www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net/
Collapse Assignment 1
Easter Island history is a huge mystery I don't even know how else to describe it. The fact that we only have assumptions of what actually happened and who the Polynesians were, frustrates me because they built such amazing statues with no real evidence of how they pulled it off.
The mystery of the statues (carving erecting, etc.) brings up all of these important/interesting questions: Who were the Polynesians? How, based on the studies of these people and their environment were they abel to move and erect these enormous statues weighing an average of 55-88 tons? How did they grow as a society? and How did they manage to sustain a way of life when they had scattered resources and had a lack of a variety of food? How was any of this possible?
I think the most important part of their history is learning about their environment and how they lived. It tells you a lot about the Polynesian islanders. They didn't have any trees to make other tools for example a form of crane or machinery to lift the statues or a way to relocate and erect them. There is a logical assumption to explain what happened to all of the trees that previously existed in the area but I don't fully believe it answers the entire mystery. "Organizing the carving, transport, and erection of the statues required a complex populous society living in an environment rich enough to support it." So if there were much more than a few thousand people living on the island before the arrival of the Europeans. The Polynesian islanders must have used all of the resources, the trees, to survive for as long as they could. But something must have gone wrong because the population decreased soon after. I believe they Easter Islanders mis-used/over-used their natural resources until they stopped growing back. The soil that the trees grew in may have been over worked, if they islanders continuously chopped down trees for their own benefit and tried to grow more trees in the same area it may not have worked. The soil may have dried up and lost most of its nutrients needed to grow a tree. Which reminds me of what they US is doing over seas. We depend on oil so much and use an enormous amount of it to make most things in the US. The US does not think about the consequences of abusing the existence of oil. All we care about is that it is there for the time being and we will use as much as we want. Which is stupid because the oil will not always be there. We will run into some major problems that could lead to an economic collapse. For example the Theory of Peak Oil, our society is based upon a constant growth and oil, the constant growth of oil. We have already found the most oil in many years, so the oil has already peaked and is now declining. This can become dangerous because oil production will be volatile during the decline and constant sources of energy are needed to keep a society going.
This lack of natural resources could have led to a collapse or at least a decrease in Easter Island's population because there was no environment to support such a large number of people. The Polynesian islanders had a poor environment where most food sources were widely spread apart. The islanders depended mostly on the few crops they grew and their domestic animal: the chicken. They didn't even have fresh water so they would drink sugarcane juice instead. They had very little variety in what they ate, more carbohydrates than sources of protein. The Polynesians were also into the idea of Agricultural Intensification: They had deep composting pits to grow their crops and vegetable fermentation pits. I was impressed that the Islanders were able to come up with such a way to grow crops. They also had stone chicken houses (hare mod) about 20 feet long and some up to 70 feet long. Kind of like industrial agriculture, trying to produce food as quickly as possible. They keep control over the chickens.
Classes and Clans may had a large contribution to the collapse the islanders experienced, leading to a decrease in population and then a crash and burn collapse of their society: There were difference of power among the classes, the chiefs would tell the commoners that they had relations to the Gods and would make promises of better crops and such. But those promises were never kept. Commoners would rebel against the elite chiefs. Then there were clans with different chief leaders and of different ranking. The statues also were a symbol of power among the chiefs, the bigger, the more powerful. Arguments came up and there was fighting between the clans.
The mystery of the statues (carving erecting, etc.) brings up all of these important/interesting questions: Who were the Polynesians? How, based on the studies of these people and their environment were they abel to move and erect these enormous statues weighing an average of 55-88 tons? How did they grow as a society? and How did they manage to sustain a way of life when they had scattered resources and had a lack of a variety of food? How was any of this possible?
I think the most important part of their history is learning about their environment and how they lived. It tells you a lot about the Polynesian islanders. They didn't have any trees to make other tools for example a form of crane or machinery to lift the statues or a way to relocate and erect them. There is a logical assumption to explain what happened to all of the trees that previously existed in the area but I don't fully believe it answers the entire mystery. "Organizing the carving, transport, and erection of the statues required a complex populous society living in an environment rich enough to support it." So if there were much more than a few thousand people living on the island before the arrival of the Europeans. The Polynesian islanders must have used all of the resources, the trees, to survive for as long as they could. But something must have gone wrong because the population decreased soon after. I believe they Easter Islanders mis-used/over-used their natural resources until they stopped growing back. The soil that the trees grew in may have been over worked, if they islanders continuously chopped down trees for their own benefit and tried to grow more trees in the same area it may not have worked. The soil may have dried up and lost most of its nutrients needed to grow a tree. Which reminds me of what they US is doing over seas. We depend on oil so much and use an enormous amount of it to make most things in the US. The US does not think about the consequences of abusing the existence of oil. All we care about is that it is there for the time being and we will use as much as we want. Which is stupid because the oil will not always be there. We will run into some major problems that could lead to an economic collapse. For example the Theory of Peak Oil, our society is based upon a constant growth and oil, the constant growth of oil. We have already found the most oil in many years, so the oil has already peaked and is now declining. This can become dangerous because oil production will be volatile during the decline and constant sources of energy are needed to keep a society going.
This lack of natural resources could have led to a collapse or at least a decrease in Easter Island's population because there was no environment to support such a large number of people. The Polynesian islanders had a poor environment where most food sources were widely spread apart. The islanders depended mostly on the few crops they grew and their domestic animal: the chicken. They didn't even have fresh water so they would drink sugarcane juice instead. They had very little variety in what they ate, more carbohydrates than sources of protein. The Polynesians were also into the idea of Agricultural Intensification: They had deep composting pits to grow their crops and vegetable fermentation pits. I was impressed that the Islanders were able to come up with such a way to grow crops. They also had stone chicken houses (hare mod) about 20 feet long and some up to 70 feet long. Kind of like industrial agriculture, trying to produce food as quickly as possible. They keep control over the chickens.
Classes and Clans may had a large contribution to the collapse the islanders experienced, leading to a decrease in population and then a crash and burn collapse of their society: There were difference of power among the classes, the chiefs would tell the commoners that they had relations to the Gods and would make promises of better crops and such. But those promises were never kept. Commoners would rebel against the elite chiefs. Then there were clans with different chief leaders and of different ranking. The statues also were a symbol of power among the chiefs, the bigger, the more powerful. Arguments came up and there was fighting between the clans.
Jun 7, 2009
This message is for Andy:
I apologize, there was something wrong with the computer at school and I did not realize until now that my final food assignment: Big Food Paper was not posted, even though I posted it at school on WEDNESDAY, JUNE 3, 2009.
Anyway its posted now.
Anyway its posted now.
Jun 1, 2009
Final Food Assignment
The major industries that run our country have taken over and converted most natural agricultural farming into a process where products are becoming "mass produced" items and must be grown faster, fatter, bigger, and cheaper, which we now call, industrial farming. Natural, agricultural farming much like, "home grown" produce, is dying out. "If you can grow a chicken in 49 days, why would you one you can grow in 3 months?" Everything about our food culture is so automatic and all about speed and money. The faster the better.
In Jared Diamond's The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race he goes on to explain that the adoption of agriculture was in many was a "catastrophe from which we have never recovered." Agriculture has destroyed the land and with it came social and sexual inequality, epidemic disease, that "curse our existence." Before agriculture was adapted by humans our race consisted of hunters and gatherers. We fed on wild plants and hunted for other wildlife. But most of us would not go back to those ways of living lives because we have have become so attached to this new and better way of living. Where "we enjoy the most abundant and varied foods, the best tools and material goods, some of the longest and healthiest lives, in history." And we get "our energy from oil and machines, not from our sweat." Life seems too good to change, why would we want to work more for the food we can get so easily from industrial farms? or at least that is what a majority of people think. Agriculture is an efficient way to get more food for less work, that is why hunters and gatherers adopted this method of living. Not that that is a good thing.
People started to domesticate plants and animals because it was an easier way to control them and then the animals were at a close reach when needed. Then this agricultural revolution began to spread and the hunters and gatherers who continued their original way of living began to die off. Agriculture still continues to spread today. I think now more than ever it is becoming even more apparent that industrial farming is a huge problem and creates many concerns: animal cruelty, sanitation, overdose of hormones, the spread of disease, etc. How is this affecting the food we eat? How is it or will it affect us short-term and long-term?
The life styles of Hunter-Gatherers vs. Farmers: Hunter-gatherers were better off because they had a wide variety of food to choose from, they gathered fresh plants, berries, and nuts everyday. While farmers grew fast growing crops that were high-carbohydrates like wheat and corn. Not a nutritious variety like the diet of Hunter-Gatherers, whose monthly intake of calories was approximately 2,140 and about 93 grams of protein. They also eat about 75 wild plants. Rather than a diet which contained mostly rice and potatoes. [If most of our food is derived from corn, where is the variety and nutrients in that?]
Much like Diamond's argument about Hunter-Gatherers adopting agriculture not by choice but because there was no alternative to surviving...
There are two films which show the effects of industrial agriculture and what it has been doing to the food we eat. In the movie Vrrrooomm! Farming for Kids, an introduction to industrial farming the man in the film tries to convince little kids that "industrial farming is cool!" You get to use big machinery and you don't have to do much work at all. The film has an underlining message that industrial farming is good and helpful to harvest crops. A similar sort of message is implied in a German film, Our Daily Bread, were the entire film takes place in the industrial farms of Europe. Their industries are immensely large and very clean (compared to the industrial farms of the United States). Whatever cattle they have they grow in numbers and most everything is machine automated, like a factory. The people in the film show no emotion, they are just there and they do their jobs.
One thing that surprised me the most was the job one woman had that was to use an air-pressurized clipper and when the pig carcass would swing by her on a hanging conveyer belt, she would just snip off the the pig hooves and let them fall into a bucket by her feet. She did this task with ease and senselessness. It bugged me because she did it so causally, without a care. Maybe she had no emotional attachment to the dead pig so it did not bother her to disembody the ligaments heedless and absentminded.
http://www.mnforsustain.org/food_ag_worst_mistake_diamond_j.htm
In Jared Diamond's The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race he goes on to explain that the adoption of agriculture was in many was a "catastrophe from which we have never recovered." Agriculture has destroyed the land and with it came social and sexual inequality, epidemic disease, that "curse our existence." Before agriculture was adapted by humans our race consisted of hunters and gatherers. We fed on wild plants and hunted for other wildlife. But most of us would not go back to those ways of living lives because we have have become so attached to this new and better way of living. Where "we enjoy the most abundant and varied foods, the best tools and material goods, some of the longest and healthiest lives, in history." And we get "our energy from oil and machines, not from our sweat." Life seems too good to change, why would we want to work more for the food we can get so easily from industrial farms? or at least that is what a majority of people think. Agriculture is an efficient way to get more food for less work, that is why hunters and gatherers adopted this method of living. Not that that is a good thing.
People started to domesticate plants and animals because it was an easier way to control them and then the animals were at a close reach when needed. Then this agricultural revolution began to spread and the hunters and gatherers who continued their original way of living began to die off. Agriculture still continues to spread today. I think now more than ever it is becoming even more apparent that industrial farming is a huge problem and creates many concerns: animal cruelty, sanitation, overdose of hormones, the spread of disease, etc. How is this affecting the food we eat? How is it or will it affect us short-term and long-term?
The life styles of Hunter-Gatherers vs. Farmers: Hunter-gatherers were better off because they had a wide variety of food to choose from, they gathered fresh plants, berries, and nuts everyday. While farmers grew fast growing crops that were high-carbohydrates like wheat and corn. Not a nutritious variety like the diet of Hunter-Gatherers, whose monthly intake of calories was approximately 2,140 and about 93 grams of protein. They also eat about 75 wild plants. Rather than a diet which contained mostly rice and potatoes. [If most of our food is derived from corn, where is the variety and nutrients in that?]
Much like Diamond's argument about Hunter-Gatherers adopting agriculture not by choice but because there was no alternative to surviving...
There are two films which show the effects of industrial agriculture and what it has been doing to the food we eat. In the movie Vrrrooomm! Farming for Kids, an introduction to industrial farming the man in the film tries to convince little kids that "industrial farming is cool!" You get to use big machinery and you don't have to do much work at all. The film has an underlining message that industrial farming is good and helpful to harvest crops. A similar sort of message is implied in a German film, Our Daily Bread, were the entire film takes place in the industrial farms of Europe. Their industries are immensely large and very clean (compared to the industrial farms of the United States). Whatever cattle they have they grow in numbers and most everything is machine automated, like a factory. The people in the film show no emotion, they are just there and they do their jobs.
One thing that surprised me the most was the job one woman had that was to use an air-pressurized clipper and when the pig carcass would swing by her on a hanging conveyer belt, she would just snip off the the pig hooves and let them fall into a bucket by her feet. She did this task with ease and senselessness. It bugged me because she did it so causally, without a care. Maybe she had no emotional attachment to the dead pig so it did not bother her to disembody the ligaments heedless and absentminded.
http://www.mnforsustain.org/food_ag_worst_mistake_diamond_j.htm
Food #8 Industrial Food (revised)
The Meatrix-
I found this example to be a bit corny but informative. As soon as I read the name of the movie I got the gist of what the clip would be about. The Matrix but in a form relating to industrial farming. To show the real world, the truth about the farms we get our food from. The scene where the pigs are in a spacious pen and then are pushed in a smaller and more cramped pen to make room for 3 other pens of similar size, just to make in increase the amount of pigs on the farm, made me sick. I felt disgusted by the fact that in real life pigs are put into these situations and we gone on supporting industrial farming because we don't see it happening around us. We haven't been to an industrial farm to know what the animals go through in order to produce milk and meat for us. All we care about is that we buy our foods from the supermarket where everything is well kept and clean, foods are neatly packed and are in fun colors, so we are attracted to the industrialized food without knowing where it came from or how the animals were treated. We live in the Meatrix, blinded by the world we live in and the lies fed to us.
I thought about why I continue to eat meat while I know what happens to the animals on the farms: it is because I am not on the farm to see these animals up close and personal. I have not created a relationship of some sort with these animals so I have not connection with them whatsoever and feel no sympathy towards them in their poor living conditions, I just don't care. But once when I was in Japan, my great grandparents owned an eel house in the mountains, and Jin and I were able to spend the day there. We go to see eels in the pond and then one of the chefs came out with a bucket and picked out several eels. Then went back into the kitchen, our dad brought us into the kitchen and pointed at the deep sink. Inside were the eels from the pond. My dad said we could put our hands in the sink and touch the eel. When I stuck my hand in the water I could feel the eel sliding though my fingers and hands has I tried to hold them. The feeling was unfamiliar but nice and since I was little, of course it was the most amazing thing in the world! But then dinner was ready and what was in my rice bowl was a bunch of sliced broiled eel. Pop said that they were the ones in the deep sink in the kitchen, the ones I was touching in my hands. I didn't finish my dinner that night.
A food post related to: Michael Pollan on the Colbert Report
Food, Inc: How Industrial Food is Making Us Sicker, Fatter & Poorer
"Food, Inc, a new documentary by Robert Kenner lifts the veil on our nation’s food industry, exposing many of the shocking truths about what we eat, how it’s produced and who is calling the shots. It takes an indepth look at how this industrialized food system effects our environment, our health, the economy and workers’ rights."
After watching the trailer from the documentary, Food, Inc.
"Faster, fatter, bigger, cheaper." Industrial farming is always trying to expand and increase the amount of product they produce in as little time as possible. The more food they can produce the more money they can make and the larger they are able to grow their industry. "The industry doesn't want you to know the truth about what you eat because if you knew, you might not want to eat it." This I believe, when I found out what were in the main contents of hot dogs, there was no way I would ever try a hot dog, ever.
A modern supermarket now sells about 47,000 products and gives the illusion of diversity. Many of the products we buy are just rearrangements of corn, for example ketchup, cheese, twinkies, batteries, and peanut butter. As for the types of foods offered in your average supermarket: While on a "field trip" to the local supermarket near school, I found that there were 9-11 types of humus and from different brands, but all were labeled as Humus. There were 12 companies of ice cream that all sold their version of chocolate ice cream. 7 brands of whitening toothpaste which all claimed to have the same effect on teeth, and 22 companies which sold bottled water.
The movie trailer also showed a family who has trouble buying healthier foods because of the prices, the mother said, "Sometimes you look at a vegetable and say 'okay, we can get two hamburgers for the same price.'" So you usually choose the better deal.
http://greenupgrader.com/7734/food-inc-how-industrial-food-is-making-us-sicker-fatter-poorer/
I found this example to be a bit corny but informative. As soon as I read the name of the movie I got the gist of what the clip would be about. The Matrix but in a form relating to industrial farming. To show the real world, the truth about the farms we get our food from. The scene where the pigs are in a spacious pen and then are pushed in a smaller and more cramped pen to make room for 3 other pens of similar size, just to make in increase the amount of pigs on the farm, made me sick. I felt disgusted by the fact that in real life pigs are put into these situations and we gone on supporting industrial farming because we don't see it happening around us. We haven't been to an industrial farm to know what the animals go through in order to produce milk and meat for us. All we care about is that we buy our foods from the supermarket where everything is well kept and clean, foods are neatly packed and are in fun colors, so we are attracted to the industrialized food without knowing where it came from or how the animals were treated. We live in the Meatrix, blinded by the world we live in and the lies fed to us.
I thought about why I continue to eat meat while I know what happens to the animals on the farms: it is because I am not on the farm to see these animals up close and personal. I have not created a relationship of some sort with these animals so I have not connection with them whatsoever and feel no sympathy towards them in their poor living conditions, I just don't care. But once when I was in Japan, my great grandparents owned an eel house in the mountains, and Jin and I were able to spend the day there. We go to see eels in the pond and then one of the chefs came out with a bucket and picked out several eels. Then went back into the kitchen, our dad brought us into the kitchen and pointed at the deep sink. Inside were the eels from the pond. My dad said we could put our hands in the sink and touch the eel. When I stuck my hand in the water I could feel the eel sliding though my fingers and hands has I tried to hold them. The feeling was unfamiliar but nice and since I was little, of course it was the most amazing thing in the world! But then dinner was ready and what was in my rice bowl was a bunch of sliced broiled eel. Pop said that they were the ones in the deep sink in the kitchen, the ones I was touching in my hands. I didn't finish my dinner that night.
A food post related to: Michael Pollan on the Colbert Report
Food, Inc: How Industrial Food is Making Us Sicker, Fatter & Poorer
"Food, Inc, a new documentary by Robert Kenner lifts the veil on our nation’s food industry, exposing many of the shocking truths about what we eat, how it’s produced and who is calling the shots. It takes an indepth look at how this industrialized food system effects our environment, our health, the economy and workers’ rights."
After watching the trailer from the documentary, Food, Inc.
"Faster, fatter, bigger, cheaper." Industrial farming is always trying to expand and increase the amount of product they produce in as little time as possible. The more food they can produce the more money they can make and the larger they are able to grow their industry. "The industry doesn't want you to know the truth about what you eat because if you knew, you might not want to eat it." This I believe, when I found out what were in the main contents of hot dogs, there was no way I would ever try a hot dog, ever.
A modern supermarket now sells about 47,000 products and gives the illusion of diversity. Many of the products we buy are just rearrangements of corn, for example ketchup, cheese, twinkies, batteries, and peanut butter. As for the types of foods offered in your average supermarket: While on a "field trip" to the local supermarket near school, I found that there were 9-11 types of humus and from different brands, but all were labeled as Humus. There were 12 companies of ice cream that all sold their version of chocolate ice cream. 7 brands of whitening toothpaste which all claimed to have the same effect on teeth, and 22 companies which sold bottled water.
The movie trailer also showed a family who has trouble buying healthier foods because of the prices, the mother said, "Sometimes you look at a vegetable and say 'okay, we can get two hamburgers for the same price.'" So you usually choose the better deal.
http://greenupgrader.com/7734/food-inc-how-industrial-food-is-making-us-sicker-fatter-poorer/
Food #8 Industrial Food
The Meatrix-
I found this example to be a bit corny but informative. As soon as I read the name of the movie I got the gist of what the clip would be about. The Matrix but in a form relating to industrial farming. To show the real world, the truth about the farms we get our food from. The scene where the pigs are in a spacious pen and then are pushed in a smaller and more cramped pen to make room for 3 other pens of similar size, just to make in increase the amount of pigs on the farm, made me sick. I felt disgusted by the fact that in real life pigs are put into these situations and we gone on supporting industrial farming because we don't see it happening around us. We haven't been to an industrial farm to know what the animals go through in order to produce milk and meat for us. All we care about is that we buy our foods from the supermarket where everything is well kept and clean, foods are neatly packed and are in fun colors, so we are attracted to the industrialized food without knowing where it came from or how the animals were treated. We live in the Meatrix, blinded by the world we live in and the lies fed to us.
I found this example to be a bit corny but informative. As soon as I read the name of the movie I got the gist of what the clip would be about. The Matrix but in a form relating to industrial farming. To show the real world, the truth about the farms we get our food from. The scene where the pigs are in a spacious pen and then are pushed in a smaller and more cramped pen to make room for 3 other pens of similar size, just to make in increase the amount of pigs on the farm, made me sick. I felt disgusted by the fact that in real life pigs are put into these situations and we gone on supporting industrial farming because we don't see it happening around us. We haven't been to an industrial farm to know what the animals go through in order to produce milk and meat for us. All we care about is that we buy our foods from the supermarket where everything is well kept and clean, foods are neatly packed and are in fun colors, so we are attracted to the industrialized food without knowing where it came from or how the animals were treated. We live in the Meatrix, blinded by the world we live in and the lies fed to us.
May 16, 2009
Recipe: Fresh Blueberry Pie
One of my favorite foods are fresh blueberries, although I love to eat them frozen in the summer time, but I also really enjoy fresh blueberries in PIE!
Joy of Cooking
Rombauer/Becker:
About Berry and Other Fruit Pies
If you dont find the fruit combination you are looking for in our fruit pie recipes, perhaps you would like to experiment with fillings for yourself. A 9-inch fruit or berry pie needs about 4 cups of fresh fruit or 3 cups of cooked fruit. Each fruit will require its own quota of sweetening, depending on acidity and your personal taste. Four cups of gooseberries, for example, need about 1 3/4 cups of sugar, while the same amount of blueberries may need no more than 1/2 cup - plus lemon juice to heighten the flavor.
As to thickening for pie fruit: technically, each batch would require a different amount of thickener, depending on the variety of fruit, degree of ripeness, etc. For practical purposes, an often suggested formula for 4 cups of fruit is:
1/4 cup all purpose flour
However, acid fruits should be thickened with tapioca, cornstarch or arrowroot starch because the acidity of the fruit may neutralize the thickening power of the flour. So for 4 cups of fruit, mix:
2 2/3 tablespoons quick-cooking tapioca
2/3 to 1 cup sugar
or mix:
2 tablespoons cornstarch or arrowroot starch with:
1/4 cup water or fruit juice, until very smooth then blend with:
2/3 to 1 cup sugar
Whether you use tapioca or cornstarch, let the mixture stand for 15 minutes after blending it gently into the fresh fruit. Correct the sweetening, then proceed as directed in Berry Pies, below.
Some suggested proportions are:
1/2 apple and 1/2 pear
1/2 apple and 1/2 green tomato
1/2 rhubarb and 1/2 strawberry
1/3 gooseberry and 2/3 strawberry
1/2 cherry and 1/2 rhubarb
1/3 cranberry and 2/3 apple
1/2 mincemeat, 1/4 applesauce and 1/4 crushed pineapple
1/2 fresh strawberries and 1/2 bananas
2/3 raspberries and 1/3 currants
Fruit pies freeze well, but do not freeze those with a custard base.
Berry Pie with Fresh Fruit - A 9 -inch Double-Crust Pie
Please read About Berry Pies, above. Use:
Gooseberry, currant, blackberry, raspberry, strawberry, blueberry, huckleberry or loganberry
Line a pie pan with:
A pie dough
Prepare by picking over and hulling:
4 cups of fresh berries
Combine:
2/3 to 1 cup or more sugar
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
(1 1/2 tablespoons lemon juice or 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon)
If the fruit is juicy, add:
(2 teaspoons quick-cooking tapioca)
Sprinkle these ingredients over the berries and stir gently until well blended. Let stand for 15 minutes.
Preheat oven to 450˚.
Turn the fruit into the pie shell. Dot with
1 to 2 tablespoons butter
Cover the pie with a well-pricked top or with a lattice. Bake the pie in a 450˚ oven 10 minutes. Reduce the heat to 350˚ and bake 35 to 40 minutes or until golden brown.
Joy of Cooking
Rombauer/Becker:
About Berry and Other Fruit Pies
If you dont find the fruit combination you are looking for in our fruit pie recipes, perhaps you would like to experiment with fillings for yourself. A 9-inch fruit or berry pie needs about 4 cups of fresh fruit or 3 cups of cooked fruit. Each fruit will require its own quota of sweetening, depending on acidity and your personal taste. Four cups of gooseberries, for example, need about 1 3/4 cups of sugar, while the same amount of blueberries may need no more than 1/2 cup - plus lemon juice to heighten the flavor.
As to thickening for pie fruit: technically, each batch would require a different amount of thickener, depending on the variety of fruit, degree of ripeness, etc. For practical purposes, an often suggested formula for 4 cups of fruit is:
1/4 cup all purpose flour
However, acid fruits should be thickened with tapioca, cornstarch or arrowroot starch because the acidity of the fruit may neutralize the thickening power of the flour. So for 4 cups of fruit, mix:
2 2/3 tablespoons quick-cooking tapioca
2/3 to 1 cup sugar
or mix:
2 tablespoons cornstarch or arrowroot starch with:
1/4 cup water or fruit juice, until very smooth then blend with:
2/3 to 1 cup sugar
Whether you use tapioca or cornstarch, let the mixture stand for 15 minutes after blending it gently into the fresh fruit. Correct the sweetening, then proceed as directed in Berry Pies, below.
Some suggested proportions are:
1/2 apple and 1/2 pear
1/2 apple and 1/2 green tomato
1/2 rhubarb and 1/2 strawberry
1/3 gooseberry and 2/3 strawberry
1/2 cherry and 1/2 rhubarb
1/3 cranberry and 2/3 apple
1/2 mincemeat, 1/4 applesauce and 1/4 crushed pineapple
1/2 fresh strawberries and 1/2 bananas
2/3 raspberries and 1/3 currants
Fruit pies freeze well, but do not freeze those with a custard base.
Berry Pie with Fresh Fruit - A 9 -inch Double-Crust Pie
Please read About Berry Pies, above. Use:
Gooseberry, currant, blackberry, raspberry, strawberry, blueberry, huckleberry or loganberry
Line a pie pan with:
A pie dough
Prepare by picking over and hulling:
4 cups of fresh berries
Combine:
2/3 to 1 cup or more sugar
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
(1 1/2 tablespoons lemon juice or 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon)
If the fruit is juicy, add:
(2 teaspoons quick-cooking tapioca)
Sprinkle these ingredients over the berries and stir gently until well blended. Let stand for 15 minutes.
Preheat oven to 450˚.
Turn the fruit into the pie shell. Dot with
1 to 2 tablespoons butter
Cover the pie with a well-pricked top or with a lattice. Bake the pie in a 450˚ oven 10 minutes. Reduce the heat to 350˚ and bake 35 to 40 minutes or until golden brown.
May 13, 2009
Commenting on blogs
Hi John,
I like that you wrote about your eating habits, for example, you eat 6 meals a day. While most of America has 3 meals a day (some only lunch and dinner) breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Having more small meals a day rather than 3 large does seem like a healthy way to eat.
I looked it up:
"eating every three hours would certainly help some people control appetite and feel more energized... if we feed the body at regular intervals we send a signal to the body that it doesn't have to store calories and when we skip meals, we affect the metabolism negatively."
http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=56254
I like that you wrote about your eating habits, for example, you eat 6 meals a day. While most of America has 3 meals a day (some only lunch and dinner) breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Having more small meals a day rather than 3 large does seem like a healthy way to eat.
I looked it up:
"eating every three hours would certainly help some people control appetite and feel more energized... if we feed the body at regular intervals we send a signal to the body that it doesn't have to store calories and when we skip meals, we affect the metabolism negatively."
http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=56254
May 9, 2009
Response to Michael Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma Food #6
Michael Pollan's argument about the way Americans eat made me realize how caught up everyone is in fads about dieting, losing weight, and getting skinnier. Which none of these "goals" ever happen. I completely agree with the idea/argument that Americans basically eat unhealthy foods, an excessive amount, or little to no food at all. They, we, do not have a healthy eating habit.
The American Paradox perfectly describes the ways of the Americans: for example, diets such as the Atkins Diet, people think going on a diet and not eating certain foods will make them healthier and slimmer. They are trying to lose weight my dieting, not eating carbs. Meanwhile people are thinking they are living and eating in a healthy manner when in actuality the diet is making them less healthy. Instead we 'Americans' should be eating all types of food in moderation of course. Beneficial foods should also be eaten as well and not so much the pure sugar types. Americans have no food culture, no tradition. America has a National Eating Disorder, there is a violent change in this cultures eating habits and it has become extremely unhealthy.
Another Paradox I enjoyed reading about was the French Paradox: I have been to France and for dinner my host family would make all kinds of food and eat of a lot of it. Usually all very traditional food, lots of cheese, bread, and salad. A type of meat and a side dish, all very rich in salt and butter. Their food was delicious but at the same time, I felt like I was either eating too much of it or the food itself felt fatty and not too healthy to eat. But my host family seemed okay with everything they had on the table for dinner, whether it looked or tasted like it had been cooked in a lot of butter they still ate it and did not care. It was food and they were hungry, they food tasted good and they ate it. So when I read the Pollan's argument stating the French Paradox: eat unhealthy and happier and be healthier. It make a lot of sense, the French ate whatever they felt like eating and because they were happy with themselves and with whatever they were eating, they in turn may be healthier. Although there is the other part that makes this situation a paradox, if you eat all you want, you may feel happy and comfortable with yourself but it does not mean that you are nutritionally healthy. It all depends on what and how much you eat. Think in moderation, small portions and eat a balanced meal, not just protein, and don't skip out on the carbs. They are good for you too.
My family and I pay a lot of attention to articles in health magazines. We tare out recopies from the magazines and replicate them in our own kitchen. We try to make new dishes, to try new things and to try to eat healthier meals. Although my brother and I both watch a fare share of television neither of us are remotely interested in any of the diet plans offered on tv. Then look fake and not too appetizing. I would not want to go on a diet like that because you never know how you body may react to only eating the pre-packaged food from a company. Being on a diet change make positive and negative changes appear on your body. We do however watch the Food Network Channel a lot. We like to watch people cook and come up with different ways of eating foods that don't always seem tasty to us, it is a creative way to eat healthier foods. We learn from the chefs on Food Network, how to make meals in our own home that are affordable, taste good, and are healthy, well-balanced.
The American Paradox perfectly describes the ways of the Americans: for example, diets such as the Atkins Diet, people think going on a diet and not eating certain foods will make them healthier and slimmer. They are trying to lose weight my dieting, not eating carbs. Meanwhile people are thinking they are living and eating in a healthy manner when in actuality the diet is making them less healthy. Instead we 'Americans' should be eating all types of food in moderation of course. Beneficial foods should also be eaten as well and not so much the pure sugar types. Americans have no food culture, no tradition. America has a National Eating Disorder, there is a violent change in this cultures eating habits and it has become extremely unhealthy.
Another Paradox I enjoyed reading about was the French Paradox: I have been to France and for dinner my host family would make all kinds of food and eat of a lot of it. Usually all very traditional food, lots of cheese, bread, and salad. A type of meat and a side dish, all very rich in salt and butter. Their food was delicious but at the same time, I felt like I was either eating too much of it or the food itself felt fatty and not too healthy to eat. But my host family seemed okay with everything they had on the table for dinner, whether it looked or tasted like it had been cooked in a lot of butter they still ate it and did not care. It was food and they were hungry, they food tasted good and they ate it. So when I read the Pollan's argument stating the French Paradox: eat unhealthy and happier and be healthier. It make a lot of sense, the French ate whatever they felt like eating and because they were happy with themselves and with whatever they were eating, they in turn may be healthier. Although there is the other part that makes this situation a paradox, if you eat all you want, you may feel happy and comfortable with yourself but it does not mean that you are nutritionally healthy. It all depends on what and how much you eat. Think in moderation, small portions and eat a balanced meal, not just protein, and don't skip out on the carbs. They are good for you too.
My family and I pay a lot of attention to articles in health magazines. We tare out recopies from the magazines and replicate them in our own kitchen. We try to make new dishes, to try new things and to try to eat healthier meals. Although my brother and I both watch a fare share of television neither of us are remotely interested in any of the diet plans offered on tv. Then look fake and not too appetizing. I would not want to go on a diet like that because you never know how you body may react to only eating the pre-packaged food from a company. Being on a diet change make positive and negative changes appear on your body. We do however watch the Food Network Channel a lot. We like to watch people cook and come up with different ways of eating foods that don't always seem tasty to us, it is a creative way to eat healthier foods. We learn from the chefs on Food Network, how to make meals in our own home that are affordable, taste good, and are healthy, well-balanced.
May 6, 2009
Habitual Food
Please write a post about how your family uses grocery stores and the variety of vegetables, fruits, roots, grains, and nuts that you eat in a typical week.
From the class list I came up with 30 items including fruits, vegetables, and grains that my family consumes in a typical week:
Fruits: apple, pear, apple/pear [Japanese pear (I forgot its real name)], avocado, papaya, cucumber, banana, dates, figs, pepper, tomato (11 fruits)
Vegetables: spinach, celery, potato, carrot, cabbage, lettuce, garlic, asparagus, bean sprouts, edamame [boiled soy beans, in pod]. (10 vegetables)
Beans/Grains/Roots: fresh ginger root, walnut, peanuts, rice, potato, kidney beans, onions, lima beans, lentils, chickpeas. (10 Beans/Grains/Roots)
With all of these foods my family usually cooks a homemade meal and also includes meat or fish in a main dish. For example we eat white rice from Nishiki Rice (Japanese white rice) almost everyday. We have a rice cooker so there is always fresh rice to eat. Sometimes we wrap seaweed around the rice and eat it in little bites. Besides dried seaweed we also eat Hijiki. Hijiki is a brown sea vegetable growing wild on rocky coastlines around Japan, Korea, and China. It is a traditional food and has been freely sold and used as part of a balanced diet in Japan for centuries. Hijiki is known to be rich in dietary fibre and essential minerals such as calcium(1400 mg/100g),iron(55.0 mg/100g) and magnesium(620 mg/100g). (wikipedia definition)
Just for clarification my mother usually cooks dinner unless, I am home by myself, then I make my own dinner. Not a fish stew or anything but I have hummus on sun-dried tomato and basil wraps (although I don't really care for the taste of the wraps alone, the hummus over powers the wrap, so I don't notice it) with slices of fresh tomato on top.
When we go grocery shopping, we usually go to the Met Food in our neighborhood. They have pretty much everything we like to eat, including all 30 food items I listed above. My family goes food shopping because most of the time we prefer to make our own meals instead of going out to eat. My mom loves fish so when she has the chance she makes a very spicy fish stew, usually with salmon or a white fish like tilapia. The base is a chicken broth with tons of cabbage, carrots, beans, and plenty of hot peppers. She lets it simmer all day long and it is excellent on rice as well as eating it as a soup.
From my list of fruits eaten in a typical week: my family and I eat the fruits as they are, we do not mix them or make anything with them. Just eat them. From the list of vegetables I eat, they are eaten as they are but most of them are cooked in a certain way before eaten. For example: fresh ginger root is put into a stir fry for extra flavor or a fish dish. Walnuts, peanuts, and other nuts are eaten as they are as snacks. Rice eaten as a base in most meals, sometimes I put rice in a bowl, then put fish or meat on top. Rice is like my pasta. Potatoes are either boiled then made into mashed potatoes or boiled cut up and put into a curry (which also has meat and carrots). Chickpeas are eaten in a salad or in the form of hummus. Other beans are put into soups or made in a chicken dish.
Favorite Meal: Sakedon (Salmon-don) which is salmon, sliced sashimi style, on a bed of seasoned rice. I could eat that meal any day. It is delicious! As for homemade food, my mom's fish soup is my favorite.
From the class list I came up with 30 items including fruits, vegetables, and grains that my family consumes in a typical week:
Fruits: apple, pear, apple/pear [Japanese pear (I forgot its real name)], avocado, papaya, cucumber, banana, dates, figs, pepper, tomato (11 fruits)
Vegetables: spinach, celery, potato, carrot, cabbage, lettuce, garlic, asparagus, bean sprouts, edamame [boiled soy beans, in pod]. (10 vegetables)
Beans/Grains/Roots: fresh ginger root, walnut, peanuts, rice, potato, kidney beans, onions, lima beans, lentils, chickpeas. (10 Beans/Grains/Roots)
With all of these foods my family usually cooks a homemade meal and also includes meat or fish in a main dish. For example we eat white rice from Nishiki Rice (Japanese white rice) almost everyday. We have a rice cooker so there is always fresh rice to eat. Sometimes we wrap seaweed around the rice and eat it in little bites. Besides dried seaweed we also eat Hijiki. Hijiki is a brown sea vegetable growing wild on rocky coastlines around Japan, Korea, and China. It is a traditional food and has been freely sold and used as part of a balanced diet in Japan for centuries. Hijiki is known to be rich in dietary fibre and essential minerals such as calcium(1400 mg/100g),iron(55.0 mg/100g) and magnesium(620 mg/100g). (wikipedia definition)
Just for clarification my mother usually cooks dinner unless, I am home by myself, then I make my own dinner. Not a fish stew or anything but I have hummus on sun-dried tomato and basil wraps (although I don't really care for the taste of the wraps alone, the hummus over powers the wrap, so I don't notice it) with slices of fresh tomato on top.
When we go grocery shopping, we usually go to the Met Food in our neighborhood. They have pretty much everything we like to eat, including all 30 food items I listed above. My family goes food shopping because most of the time we prefer to make our own meals instead of going out to eat. My mom loves fish so when she has the chance she makes a very spicy fish stew, usually with salmon or a white fish like tilapia. The base is a chicken broth with tons of cabbage, carrots, beans, and plenty of hot peppers. She lets it simmer all day long and it is excellent on rice as well as eating it as a soup.
From my list of fruits eaten in a typical week: my family and I eat the fruits as they are, we do not mix them or make anything with them. Just eat them. From the list of vegetables I eat, they are eaten as they are but most of them are cooked in a certain way before eaten. For example: fresh ginger root is put into a stir fry for extra flavor or a fish dish. Walnuts, peanuts, and other nuts are eaten as they are as snacks. Rice eaten as a base in most meals, sometimes I put rice in a bowl, then put fish or meat on top. Rice is like my pasta. Potatoes are either boiled then made into mashed potatoes or boiled cut up and put into a curry (which also has meat and carrots). Chickpeas are eaten in a salad or in the form of hummus. Other beans are put into soups or made in a chicken dish.
Favorite Meal: Sakedon (Salmon-don) which is salmon, sliced sashimi style, on a bed of seasoned rice. I could eat that meal any day. It is delicious! As for homemade food, my mom's fish soup is my favorite.
May 5, 2009
Food in a Typical Week: The Omae Household
Please write a post about how your family uses grocery stores and the variety of vegetables, fruits, roots, grains, and nuts that you eat in a typical week.
From the class list I came up with 30 items including fruits, vegetables, and grains that my family consumes in a typical week:
Fruits: apple, pear, apple/pear [Japanese pear (I forgot its real name)], avocado, papaya, cucumber, banana, dates, figs, pepper, tomato (11 fruits)
Vegetables: spinach, celery, potato, carrot, cabbage, lettuce, garlic, asparagus, bean sprouts, edamame [boiled soy beans, in pod]. (10 vegetables)
Beans/Grains/Roots: fresh ginger root, walnut, peanuts, rice, potato, kidney beans, onions, lima beans, lentils. (9 Beans/Grains/Roots)
With all of these foods my family usually cooks a homemade meal and also includes meat or fish in a main dish. For example we eat white rice from Nishiki Rice (Japanese white rice) almost everyday. We have a rice cooker so there is always fresh rice to eat. Sometimes we wrap seaweed around the rice and eat it in little bites. Besides dried seaweed we also eat Hijiki. Hijiki is a brown sea vegetable growing wild on rocky coastlines around Japan, Korea, and China. It is a traditional food and has been freely sold and used as part of a balanced diet in Japan for centuries. Hijiki is known to be rich in dietary fibre and essential minerals such as calcium(1400 mg/100g),iron(55.0 mg/100g) and magnesium(620 mg/100g). (wikipedia definition)
When we go grocery shopping, we usually go to the Met Food in our neighborhood. They have pretty much everything we like to eat, including all 30 food items I listed above. My family goes food shopping because most of the time we prefer to make our own meals instead of going out to eat. My mom loves fish so when she has the chance she makes a very spicy fish stew, usually with salmon or a white fish like tilapia. The base is a chicken broth with tons of cabbage, carrots, beans, and plenty of hot peppers. She lets it simmer all day long and it is excellent on rice as well as eating it as a soup.
Favorite Meal: Sakedon (Salmon-don) which is salmon, sliced sashimi style, on a bed of seasoned rice. I could eat that meal any day. It is delicious! As for homemade food, my mom's fish soup is my favorite.
From the class list I came up with 30 items including fruits, vegetables, and grains that my family consumes in a typical week:
Fruits: apple, pear, apple/pear [Japanese pear (I forgot its real name)], avocado, papaya, cucumber, banana, dates, figs, pepper, tomato (11 fruits)
Vegetables: spinach, celery, potato, carrot, cabbage, lettuce, garlic, asparagus, bean sprouts, edamame [boiled soy beans, in pod]. (10 vegetables)
Beans/Grains/Roots: fresh ginger root, walnut, peanuts, rice, potato, kidney beans, onions, lima beans, lentils. (9 Beans/Grains/Roots)
With all of these foods my family usually cooks a homemade meal and also includes meat or fish in a main dish. For example we eat white rice from Nishiki Rice (Japanese white rice) almost everyday. We have a rice cooker so there is always fresh rice to eat. Sometimes we wrap seaweed around the rice and eat it in little bites. Besides dried seaweed we also eat Hijiki. Hijiki is a brown sea vegetable growing wild on rocky coastlines around Japan, Korea, and China. It is a traditional food and has been freely sold and used as part of a balanced diet in Japan for centuries. Hijiki is known to be rich in dietary fibre and essential minerals such as calcium(1400 mg/100g),iron(55.0 mg/100g) and magnesium(620 mg/100g). (wikipedia definition)
When we go grocery shopping, we usually go to the Met Food in our neighborhood. They have pretty much everything we like to eat, including all 30 food items I listed above. My family goes food shopping because most of the time we prefer to make our own meals instead of going out to eat. My mom loves fish so when she has the chance she makes a very spicy fish stew, usually with salmon or a white fish like tilapia. The base is a chicken broth with tons of cabbage, carrots, beans, and plenty of hot peppers. She lets it simmer all day long and it is excellent on rice as well as eating it as a soup.
Favorite Meal: Sakedon (Salmon-don) which is salmon, sliced sashimi style, on a bed of seasoned rice. I could eat that meal any day. It is delicious! As for homemade food, my mom's fish soup is my favorite.
May 4, 2009
May Day II
May Day, May 1st, usually refers to the International Workers' Day or Labour Day. (wikipedia/May_Day)
Initial Thoughts:
When I first heard someone mention May Day, I had not idea what they were talking about. As I started thinking about it and where I had heard it from I realized I did not know what May Day was/is what it stands for or how it is connected to my life.
Is a sense of history - or past struggles - necessary to live a good and meaningful life?
When May Day was first organized in Australia it was meant to be a one day celebration only in the year of 1856 but the workers liked the day of "stoppage of work" that they decided to celebrate May Day every year. The workers would meet and celebrate their favor of an eight-hour work day. After Australia created the idea of May Day the Americans workers were the next to demonstrated it and in 1886 the workers decided the universal MayDay date should be celebrated on May 1 of every year. After the organization of workers grew they decided their first demand should be the eight-hour work day.
"When the working class of the world has won its deliverance then too humanity will probably celebrate May Day in honor of the bitter struggles and the many sufferings of the past." (Rosa Luxemburg) I don't necessarily agree with this statement because it reminds me of all the other holidays we Americans celebrate. For example Labour Day, is supposed to be celebrated in memory of the Workers Union but instead Americans use the holiday to hang out with each other and have a barbeque and show fireworks. We don't even think about all the time and effort that the working class put in to earn their rights. That thought is not even spoken about in school or with each other. Some Americans probably don't even know the real meaning behind the celebration of Labour Day. Another holiday that is "mis-celebrated" is the 4th of July.
Americans misuse holidays and instead celebrate whatever they want on that specific day.
Having a sense of history or past struggles is can be both necessary and unnecessary to live a good and meaningful life because knowing from past experiences how not to suffer and struggle can change how we live our lives. Which may lead to living a good and meaningful life because we are not going to make the same mistakes made a hundred years ago. or you can look at this situation like some people do: having a sense of history or past struggles is not necessary to live a good and meaningful life because it doesn't matter what we have done in the past, all that matters is what we do now. Even holidays made a long time ago are now losing their true meaning and purpose in life.
Holidays are not "properly" celebrated. Most things in life lose their meaning.
Is there a way to bring meaning back to a holiday? Will celebrating the true meaning/purpose of a holiday make my life good and meaningful? Is this idea of "renewing a purpose" possible?
Initial Thoughts:
When I first heard someone mention May Day, I had not idea what they were talking about. As I started thinking about it and where I had heard it from I realized I did not know what May Day was/is what it stands for or how it is connected to my life.
Is a sense of history - or past struggles - necessary to live a good and meaningful life?
When May Day was first organized in Australia it was meant to be a one day celebration only in the year of 1856 but the workers liked the day of "stoppage of work" that they decided to celebrate May Day every year. The workers would meet and celebrate their favor of an eight-hour work day. After Australia created the idea of May Day the Americans workers were the next to demonstrated it and in 1886 the workers decided the universal MayDay date should be celebrated on May 1 of every year. After the organization of workers grew they decided their first demand should be the eight-hour work day.
"When the working class of the world has won its deliverance then too humanity will probably celebrate May Day in honor of the bitter struggles and the many sufferings of the past." (Rosa Luxemburg) I don't necessarily agree with this statement because it reminds me of all the other holidays we Americans celebrate. For example Labour Day, is supposed to be celebrated in memory of the Workers Union but instead Americans use the holiday to hang out with each other and have a barbeque and show fireworks. We don't even think about all the time and effort that the working class put in to earn their rights. That thought is not even spoken about in school or with each other. Some Americans probably don't even know the real meaning behind the celebration of Labour Day. Another holiday that is "mis-celebrated" is the 4th of July.
Americans misuse holidays and instead celebrate whatever they want on that specific day.
Having a sense of history or past struggles is can be both necessary and unnecessary to live a good and meaningful life because knowing from past experiences how not to suffer and struggle can change how we live our lives. Which may lead to living a good and meaningful life because we are not going to make the same mistakes made a hundred years ago. or you can look at this situation like some people do: having a sense of history or past struggles is not necessary to live a good and meaningful life because it doesn't matter what we have done in the past, all that matters is what we do now. Even holidays made a long time ago are now losing their true meaning and purpose in life.
Holidays are not "properly" celebrated. Most things in life lose their meaning.
Is there a way to bring meaning back to a holiday? Will celebrating the true meaning/purpose of a holiday make my life good and meaningful? Is this idea of "renewing a purpose" possible?
May 2, 2009
May Day
May Day, May 1st, usually refers to the International Workers' Day or Labour Day.
When I first heard someone mention May Day, I had not idea what they were talking about. As I started thinking about it and where I had heard it from I realized I did not know what May Day was/is what it stands for or how it is connected to my life.
Is a sense of history - or past struggles - necessary to live a good and meaningful life?
When May Day was first organized in Australia it was meant to be a one day celebration only in the year of 1856 but the workers liked the day of "stoppage of work" that they decided to celebrate May Day every year. The workers would meet and celebrate their favor of an eight-hour work day. After Australia created the idea of May Day the Americans workers were the next to demonstrated it and in 1886 the workers decided the universal MayDay date should be celebrated on May 1 of every year. After the organization of workers grew they decided their first demand should be the eight-hour work day.
"when the working class of the world has won its deliverance then too humanity will probably celebrate May Day in honor of the bitter struggles and the many sufferings of the past." I don't necessarily agree with this statement because it reminds me of all the other holidays we Americans celebrate. For example Labour Day, is supposed to be celebrated in memory of the Workers Union but instead Americans use the holiday to hang out with each other and have a barbeque and show fireworks. We don't even think about all the time and effort that the working class put in to earn their rights. That thought is not even spoken about in school or with each other. Some Americans probably don't even know the real meaning behind the celebration of Labour Day.
When I first heard someone mention May Day, I had not idea what they were talking about. As I started thinking about it and where I had heard it from I realized I did not know what May Day was/is what it stands for or how it is connected to my life.
Is a sense of history - or past struggles - necessary to live a good and meaningful life?
When May Day was first organized in Australia it was meant to be a one day celebration only in the year of 1856 but the workers liked the day of "stoppage of work" that they decided to celebrate May Day every year. The workers would meet and celebrate their favor of an eight-hour work day. After Australia created the idea of May Day the Americans workers were the next to demonstrated it and in 1886 the workers decided the universal MayDay date should be celebrated on May 1 of every year. After the organization of workers grew they decided their first demand should be the eight-hour work day.
"when the working class of the world has won its deliverance then too humanity will probably celebrate May Day in honor of the bitter struggles and the many sufferings of the past." I don't necessarily agree with this statement because it reminds me of all the other holidays we Americans celebrate. For example Labour Day, is supposed to be celebrated in memory of the Workers Union but instead Americans use the holiday to hang out with each other and have a barbeque and show fireworks. We don't even think about all the time and effort that the working class put in to earn their rights. That thought is not even spoken about in school or with each other. Some Americans probably don't even know the real meaning behind the celebration of Labour Day.
Foodways
At home my family cooks dinner using fish, meat, and vegetables. We also use a lot of olive oil in the dishes we made. Although I don't do most of the cooking I help out sometimes. On the weekdays my mom usually cooks the meals. She enjoys making dishes with fish and spices. My younger brother enjoys making japanese chicken curry. He likes to cook with vegetables and chicken. I enjoy baking mostly because it involves being exact with measurements and ingredients. Rather than estimating everything and putting it all together.
Most US mainstream people eat fastfood or eat at home. But even at home they don't always make the food, for example when I lived in the mid-west, Berkely, Michigan, my friend's house was always filled with snacks and frozen dinners. They also had a lot of canned foods and not too many vegetables. Sometimes they had fruit lying around but that was about all they had for fresh produce. There was also an abundance of boxed food, like Craft's Mac n' Cheese, which even my family had then as well. I believe the reason for all of this "pre-made" or "boxed" in many of the homes in the mid-west was because it was more efficient to come home and pop a frozen dinner in the microwave or a pre-made pizza in the oven.
The location: where people live plays a large roll in where and what they eat. In the city there are thousands of restaurants to go to and hundreds of different cusines to choose from. Some healthier than others. There are also many fruit and vegetable stands and stores, like Fairway and other supermarkets that cell fresh produce. But in the mid-west there are no fruit and vegetable stands on the sidewalks and if you want to go out to eat there are only a select few restaurants. There are less choices.
Since you have to drive to the supermarkets and grocery stores in the mid-west, it is not as simple and easy as it is in the city to go to the store, where some people can just walk a few blocks to shop. In the city it is easy for people to buy fresh food everyday and have a healthy meal, while in the mid-west it would be a hassle to drive to the store everyday for fresh food so they buy more non-perishable foods once a week, to avoid having to travel all the way to the grocery store several times a week. Hence the presence of pre-made, frozen, canned, and boxed foods in many of the homes in the mid-west (mainstream US).
Most US mainstream people eat fastfood or eat at home. But even at home they don't always make the food, for example when I lived in the mid-west, Berkely, Michigan, my friend's house was always filled with snacks and frozen dinners. They also had a lot of canned foods and not too many vegetables. Sometimes they had fruit lying around but that was about all they had for fresh produce. There was also an abundance of boxed food, like Craft's Mac n' Cheese, which even my family had then as well. I believe the reason for all of this "pre-made" or "boxed" in many of the homes in the mid-west was because it was more efficient to come home and pop a frozen dinner in the microwave or a pre-made pizza in the oven.
The location: where people live plays a large roll in where and what they eat. In the city there are thousands of restaurants to go to and hundreds of different cusines to choose from. Some healthier than others. There are also many fruit and vegetable stands and stores, like Fairway and other supermarkets that cell fresh produce. But in the mid-west there are no fruit and vegetable stands on the sidewalks and if you want to go out to eat there are only a select few restaurants. There are less choices.
Since you have to drive to the supermarkets and grocery stores in the mid-west, it is not as simple and easy as it is in the city to go to the store, where some people can just walk a few blocks to shop. In the city it is easy for people to buy fresh food everyday and have a healthy meal, while in the mid-west it would be a hassle to drive to the store everyday for fresh food so they buy more non-perishable foods once a week, to avoid having to travel all the way to the grocery store several times a week. Hence the presence of pre-made, frozen, canned, and boxed foods in many of the homes in the mid-west (mainstream US).
Apr 29, 2009
Food Journal: 24 Hour Period 4/28-4/29/09
4/28/09 Dinner: Jin made a cabbage/salmon dish in marsala wine with carrots and white beans. I had about two bowls of that, only one on rice. After that I felt rather full but sill had 2 homemade popsicles in dixie cups from Gatorade. The popsicle made me feel cooler because my apartment was still hot from earlier that today. At first I was not too excited about having the salmon dish because it is served hot and today was extremely hot so I was hoping for a meal that would make me more comfortable. But I ate it anyway since I was so hungry.
4/29/09 Breakfast: I usually don't eat breakfast but today I decided to have some left overs from dinner, the salmon dish is good cold as well, I also had it on hot rice which warmed it up a bit. I had one small bowl and only ate until my stomach felt satisfied. I hate going to school feeling stuffed. It is really uncomfortable sitting in class when I feel like I should be at home sleeping after a meal. Lately I have been buying a small or medium hot (or iced) coffee from the stand on Park Ave. and 22nd street, right as I come out of the subway. The caffeine in the coffee helps me to feel a little more awake but I usually still feel extremely sleepy even after I have had the coffee. I sometimes get a French Curler (donut) with my coffee but today I did not buy one. Instead I went to Duane Reade and bought a bar of dark chocolate by Ghirardelli Chocolate, it was 60% cacao. Although I prefer 72% cacao because the more bitter the chocolate is the less likely I feel inclined to buy and eat sweets during the day. While in the drug store I also bought a Special K strawberry "meal bar," which contained approximately *10g of protein (or so it claimed). After I ate that with my coffee I felt good because it is slightly healthier than having a donut because the bar had protein which made me feel full enough, not to snack during the day. I also had a small piece of the dark chocolate bar and saved the rest for later.
4/29/09 Lunch: Today I did not have lunch, the Special K meal bar really filled me up so I didnt feel hungry. I went to a deli and bought a bottle of Aloe Juice and a small bag of Cheese Its. I also bought and ate a banana on the way to the movie theatre.
4/29/09 Dinner: Tonight I had a small appetizer because Jin and I were hungry, he decided to make something to eat. I had two small bite size bread crisps with smoked salmon and cream cheese on top. For the main dinner I ate a feta and chicken sausage pita pizza (homemade, by my mom and brother, while I was in the shower). I ate about 4-5 slices (each about the size of two fingers put together, very small and thin). I had a glass of milk and wanted more but we were out. So I poured a glass of gatorade. After dinner I had a few small pieces of dark chocolate (60% cacao).
4/29/09 Breakfast: I usually don't eat breakfast but today I decided to have some left overs from dinner, the salmon dish is good cold as well, I also had it on hot rice which warmed it up a bit. I had one small bowl and only ate until my stomach felt satisfied. I hate going to school feeling stuffed. It is really uncomfortable sitting in class when I feel like I should be at home sleeping after a meal. Lately I have been buying a small or medium hot (or iced) coffee from the stand on Park Ave. and 22nd street, right as I come out of the subway. The caffeine in the coffee helps me to feel a little more awake but I usually still feel extremely sleepy even after I have had the coffee. I sometimes get a French Curler (donut) with my coffee but today I did not buy one. Instead I went to Duane Reade and bought a bar of dark chocolate by Ghirardelli Chocolate, it was 60% cacao. Although I prefer 72% cacao because the more bitter the chocolate is the less likely I feel inclined to buy and eat sweets during the day. While in the drug store I also bought a Special K strawberry "meal bar," which contained approximately *10g of protein (or so it claimed). After I ate that with my coffee I felt good because it is slightly healthier than having a donut because the bar had protein which made me feel full enough, not to snack during the day. I also had a small piece of the dark chocolate bar and saved the rest for later.
4/29/09 Lunch: Today I did not have lunch, the Special K meal bar really filled me up so I didnt feel hungry. I went to a deli and bought a bottle of Aloe Juice and a small bag of Cheese Its. I also bought and ate a banana on the way to the movie theatre.
4/29/09 Dinner: Tonight I had a small appetizer because Jin and I were hungry, he decided to make something to eat. I had two small bite size bread crisps with smoked salmon and cream cheese on top. For the main dinner I ate a feta and chicken sausage pita pizza (homemade, by my mom and brother, while I was in the shower). I ate about 4-5 slices (each about the size of two fingers put together, very small and thin). I had a glass of milk and wanted more but we were out. So I poured a glass of gatorade. After dinner I had a few small pieces of dark chocolate (60% cacao).
Apr 27, 2009
Food Question
Which countries have the healthiest food/food habits? What foods do they eat? Ethnic Cuisine?
Produce and whole grains: China and Greece
Traditional Chinese diet usually consists of: vegetables, fruits, and whole grains.
In Greece: "vegetables and legumes are main meals, not just side dishes." Antonia Trichopoulou, M.D., Ph.D.
"Research finds that three servings or more a day of produce can lower the risk of stroke, heart disease, and some cancers."
In a study, "85,000 women over 12 to 14 years, found that those who ate the most fruit and vegetables had a 20 percent lower risk for heart disease."
http://www.cnn.com/2007/HEALTH/diet.fitness/08/31/cl.worldly.advice/index.html
Produce and whole grains: China and Greece
Traditional Chinese diet usually consists of: vegetables, fruits, and whole grains.
In Greece: "vegetables and legumes are main meals, not just side dishes." Antonia Trichopoulou, M.D., Ph.D.
"Research finds that three servings or more a day of produce can lower the risk of stroke, heart disease, and some cancers."
In a study, "85,000 women over 12 to 14 years, found that those who ate the most fruit and vegetables had a 20 percent lower risk for heart disease."
http://www.cnn.com/2007/HEALTH/diet.fitness/08/31/cl.worldly.advice/index.html
Apr 26, 2009
Refrigerator Assignment: 4/26/09 4:40pm
First Shelf:
Red Bull
White Rose Mayonnaise
Organic Milk 2%
Rice soaking in a tub
Open can of tomato paste
T. Marzetti, Honey Balsamic
Aunt Jemima Syrup
Papaya
Mini Potatoes
Bottom Drawer:
Apples
Celery
Cole Slaw
Romaine lettuce
Second Shelf:
Left over-beef/ginger fried rice
Saint Andre Cheese wheel
Tomatoes
Chicken Skewers
Bacon
Gulden's Spicy Brown Mustard
Vicks NyQuil (x2)
College Inn Chicken Broth
Mom' Lunch
Mission-wraps, sundried tomato basil
Pitted Dates
Sunsweet Prune Juice
Calimryua Figs
Top Shelf:
Athenos Feta Cheese
Greek Yogurt
Sabra Supremely Spicy Hummus
Breakstone's Sour Cream
Left over, crushed tomatoes
Pepridgefarm White Bread
Eaton Jamaican Jerk Seasoning
Gohan Desuyo Shitake Nori (Seasoned Seaweed)
Hillandale Farms Grade A Extra Large Eggs
White Rose Shredded Cheddar Cheese
Shiro Miso Paste
Green Curry Paste (x2)
Pepito Corn Tortillas
Peppers
Hellmans Mayo
Door:
Sriracha Hot Chili Sauce
Terriyaki Sauce (Kikkoman)
Japanese Miso Dressing
A1 Steak Sauce (x2)
Maille Old Style Mustard
Lea & Perrins Worcestershire (x2)
Mongolian Fire Oil
Soba Tsuyu (x3)
Louisiana Hot Sauce
Holland House Marsala
Newman's Own Olive Oil & Vineger
Heinz Tomato Ketchup
Honey
Hot Salsa
Balsamic Glaze
Horseradish
Soy Sauce
Jam
Peach Preserves
Tabasco Hot Sauce
Fresh Lime Juice
Imported Gorgonzola Cheese
Log-Goat Cheese
Fresh Ginger Root
I have noticed my refrigerator is filled with uneaten food and just plainly food I don't eat because I don't like it. I also have a lot of condiments on the door that are very random and unopened. Sometimes my mom buys duplicates of food because she forgets what we already have in the refrigerator. A lot of the time food in my fridge goes uneaten until it is expired. Food is wasted and thrown out when it should be eaten. I can be picky about food. If I don't feel like eating all of my food I sometimes throw it out and my mom usually yells at me. She will tell me to put it in a Tupperware container and she will take it to lunch. She really hates wasting food.
Red Bull
White Rose Mayonnaise
Organic Milk 2%
Rice soaking in a tub
Open can of tomato paste
T. Marzetti, Honey Balsamic
Aunt Jemima Syrup
Papaya
Mini Potatoes
Bottom Drawer:
Apples
Celery
Cole Slaw
Romaine lettuce
Second Shelf:
Left over-beef/ginger fried rice
Saint Andre Cheese wheel
Tomatoes
Chicken Skewers
Bacon
Gulden's Spicy Brown Mustard
Vicks NyQuil (x2)
College Inn Chicken Broth
Mom' Lunch
Mission-wraps, sundried tomato basil
Pitted Dates
Sunsweet Prune Juice
Calimryua Figs
Top Shelf:
Athenos Feta Cheese
Greek Yogurt
Sabra Supremely Spicy Hummus
Breakstone's Sour Cream
Left over, crushed tomatoes
Pepridgefarm White Bread
Eaton Jamaican Jerk Seasoning
Gohan Desuyo Shitake Nori (Seasoned Seaweed)
Hillandale Farms Grade A Extra Large Eggs
White Rose Shredded Cheddar Cheese
Shiro Miso Paste
Green Curry Paste (x2)
Pepito Corn Tortillas
Peppers
Hellmans Mayo
Door:
Sriracha Hot Chili Sauce
Terriyaki Sauce (Kikkoman)
Japanese Miso Dressing
A1 Steak Sauce (x2)
Maille Old Style Mustard
Lea & Perrins Worcestershire (x2)
Mongolian Fire Oil
Soba Tsuyu (x3)
Louisiana Hot Sauce
Holland House Marsala
Newman's Own Olive Oil & Vineger
Heinz Tomato Ketchup
Honey
Hot Salsa
Balsamic Glaze
Horseradish
Soy Sauce
Jam
Peach Preserves
Tabasco Hot Sauce
Fresh Lime Juice
Imported Gorgonzola Cheese
Log-Goat Cheese
Fresh Ginger Root
I have noticed my refrigerator is filled with uneaten food and just plainly food I don't eat because I don't like it. I also have a lot of condiments on the door that are very random and unopened. Sometimes my mom buys duplicates of food because she forgets what we already have in the refrigerator. A lot of the time food in my fridge goes uneaten until it is expired. Food is wasted and thrown out when it should be eaten. I can be picky about food. If I don't feel like eating all of my food I sometimes throw it out and my mom usually yells at me. She will tell me to put it in a Tupperware container and she will take it to lunch. She really hates wasting food.
Moral Health: 4/26/09 4:37pm
Moral health is being selfless and to do things that are justifiable to you. Exploring different ideas about moral health I have noticed that there are a lot of contradictions between different beliefs and most people have a general idea about what is normal, to their standards.
I personally find it extremely difficult to judge a person's moral health; there are so many things that need to be taken into consideration. For example you are in a situation: you are married and your spouse is dying of cancer. There is only one drug to save them, and only one place is selling it, which happens to be in your town. The drug costs $20,000 and it only costs $1,000 to make it. You save up $10,000 and try to bargain with the man selling the drug. But he will not sell the drug for any less. Your spouse will die if they do not get the drug. Will you break into the pharmacy for the drug to save your spouse?
There were many questions that flooded through my head when I thought about this situation: I would probably consider breaking into the pharmacy to get the drug because it is the cure. I think I would also be upset that it was so inexpensive to make the drug and it is being sold for a much higher price. But then I thought about the consequences of breaking into the pharmacy and stealing the drug. What would be the consequences and punishment of breaking the law? Also, how much do I care about my spouse, to put myself in danger to save their life? Is thinking of my safety before their life morally wrong? Does that decision make me a bad person or just a person who made a bad decision? If I love my spouse I would do anything for them, right? I thought about all of these questions when it came down to making a decision about stealing the drug. I decided that I would steal the drug to save my spouse’s life, making my decision morally right, by treating others the way I would like to be treated and not by putting myself first, but I found that I felt I was a bad person for breaking the law.
Kohlberg's Scale of Moral Development is one theory of moral health that I am unfamiliar with but find it an interesting way to describe and judge people on their morality. According to Kohlberg there are 6 stages of moral health:
Stage 1 is Obedience and Punishment
Stage 2 is Individualism-self-being [<^Pre-conventional]
Stage 3 is Interpersonal
Stage 4 is Social Order
Stage 5 is Rights and Social Contrast
Stage 6 is Universal [<^Post-conventional]
According to Kohlberg’s scale of Moral Development, I would say I am at Stage 3, Interpersonal because I decided to steal the drug in order to save my spouse’s life in the first situation.
There is another situation, Peter Singer’s Bugatti Dilemma: Where you work and save all of you money to buy a Bugatti with your life savings. Basically your car is all you have in your life, it means the world to you. There is no parking in a lot so you decide to park it on an old train track off to the side. As you walk away from your car you see a speeding train going down the track. You look ahead in the direction it is traveling and see a baby who is sitting on the track in the direct path of the speeding train. In that moment you have two options, you can either let the train hit the baby or flip the leaver to switch the direction of the train and send it speeding down the sidetrack and destroy your prize possession, you Bugatti.
My first instinct would be to save the baby and let the car be destroyed. But I would probably hate myself for a while because the car meant everything to me and it is worth my life savings. Although by letting the car get destroyed I have saved a life and therefore have made a moral decision, making me morally healthy. But there is still this feeling of selfishness because it is my car and I don’t even know this baby. I also thought about the baby, I don’t even know the baby personally and it is just one life. What if I saved the baby and it died young anyway? Then there was no point in saving the baby. I guess you can only base your decisions on what is currently happening in life and not on the future, because the future can always change based on the decision you make now.
Who decides what is morally healthy anyway? It frustrates me, if I make a decision that is considered morally unhealthy in our society because the decision I make may seem morally acceptable my personal standards.
I personally find it extremely difficult to judge a person's moral health; there are so many things that need to be taken into consideration. For example you are in a situation: you are married and your spouse is dying of cancer. There is only one drug to save them, and only one place is selling it, which happens to be in your town. The drug costs $20,000 and it only costs $1,000 to make it. You save up $10,000 and try to bargain with the man selling the drug. But he will not sell the drug for any less. Your spouse will die if they do not get the drug. Will you break into the pharmacy for the drug to save your spouse?
There were many questions that flooded through my head when I thought about this situation: I would probably consider breaking into the pharmacy to get the drug because it is the cure. I think I would also be upset that it was so inexpensive to make the drug and it is being sold for a much higher price. But then I thought about the consequences of breaking into the pharmacy and stealing the drug. What would be the consequences and punishment of breaking the law? Also, how much do I care about my spouse, to put myself in danger to save their life? Is thinking of my safety before their life morally wrong? Does that decision make me a bad person or just a person who made a bad decision? If I love my spouse I would do anything for them, right? I thought about all of these questions when it came down to making a decision about stealing the drug. I decided that I would steal the drug to save my spouse’s life, making my decision morally right, by treating others the way I would like to be treated and not by putting myself first, but I found that I felt I was a bad person for breaking the law.
Kohlberg's Scale of Moral Development is one theory of moral health that I am unfamiliar with but find it an interesting way to describe and judge people on their morality. According to Kohlberg there are 6 stages of moral health:
Stage 1 is Obedience and Punishment
Stage 2 is Individualism-self-being [<^Pre-conventional]
Stage 3 is Interpersonal
Stage 4 is Social Order
Stage 5 is Rights and Social Contrast
Stage 6 is Universal [<^Post-conventional]
According to Kohlberg’s scale of Moral Development, I would say I am at Stage 3, Interpersonal because I decided to steal the drug in order to save my spouse’s life in the first situation.
There is another situation, Peter Singer’s Bugatti Dilemma: Where you work and save all of you money to buy a Bugatti with your life savings. Basically your car is all you have in your life, it means the world to you. There is no parking in a lot so you decide to park it on an old train track off to the side. As you walk away from your car you see a speeding train going down the track. You look ahead in the direction it is traveling and see a baby who is sitting on the track in the direct path of the speeding train. In that moment you have two options, you can either let the train hit the baby or flip the leaver to switch the direction of the train and send it speeding down the sidetrack and destroy your prize possession, you Bugatti.
My first instinct would be to save the baby and let the car be destroyed. But I would probably hate myself for a while because the car meant everything to me and it is worth my life savings. Although by letting the car get destroyed I have saved a life and therefore have made a moral decision, making me morally healthy. But there is still this feeling of selfishness because it is my car and I don’t even know this baby. I also thought about the baby, I don’t even know the baby personally and it is just one life. What if I saved the baby and it died young anyway? Then there was no point in saving the baby. I guess you can only base your decisions on what is currently happening in life and not on the future, because the future can always change based on the decision you make now.
Who decides what is morally healthy anyway? It frustrates me, if I make a decision that is considered morally unhealthy in our society because the decision I make may seem morally acceptable my personal standards.
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