September 16, 2012
-
Guess what is for breakfast? Rice. Day 1
I woke up grumpy. Yesterday I decided that enough was enough. Quit saying it is a cool idea to go a month with only rice and beans. Quit writing it on your to do list for eventually and just do it. So I cooked a pot of rice and a pot of beans. And realized I don’t even know how to do that, because at home we use a rice cooker (how long? How much water?) and beans…well, I learned how to do them in a pressure cooker (and that was still iffy). Waking up to the knowledge that you will only have rice and beans available is not fun. It just makes things a little heavier.
So I am letting myself put ONE thing in my rice and beans each meal. For breakfast, it was rice with a lil bit of sugar. And tea. I figure tea is about as universal as rice and beans. But that is it. Hmmm. What for lunch? Oh, I know…rice and beans. Snarky. I am a bit snarky as well.
At least with fasting (when I don’t eat anything) I feel like I have a valid reason to complain. Now I don’t even have that—I am only fasting from excess, nothing else. I have food. I can fill my belly at any moment. And that, it seems, makes things even harder.
In simple words, it takes away a pleasure. It is a simple pleasure to eat, and have flavors and texture and colors and all those things that please our appetite. And being poor takes that away. There is precious little that is free—no wonder those in poverty have so many kids—sex is one “free” pleasure. In a base way of thinking, when you don’t have anything but other people, you can still do that.
Eating is a pleasure we are given. Eating what we want to eat even more so. when you are hungry, or limited, everything turns to food: “oh, there is a party tomorrow—cake!” “Oh, I will be going to so and so’s house—dinner! “ And so on. And then my face falls because I remember—oh yeah. Rice and beans. Rice and beans it is.
Top most popular foods in the world (http://www.china.org.cn/top10/2011-06/28/content_22875896.htm ):
- Pasta
- Meat
- Rice
- Pizza
- Chicken
- Fish and seafood
- Vegetables
- Chinese food
- Italian food
- Mexican food
