Food around the world

Originally i was going to just write about the goat roast that my roommates and I hosted this weekend but just before doing that I got distracted by the following facebook album.
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=48101028&ref=profile#/album.php?aid=57521&id=608888964&ref=nf


For those of you unable to access it, it is a series of photographs of families and the food they consume in one week, along with the cost of food. The original website and book review is here: http://menzelphoto.com/books/hp.html.

The photographs ranges from food purchased for 500 dollars in Germany featuring a lot of beer, pizza, and meat products for a family of four to 1.25 in Chad featuring a couple bags of rice and three or four small piles of fruits and vegetables for a family of four. It is an interesting look at the amount of food, amount of money, and amount of necessary nutrients consumed around the world. Although it would make sense that those in the wealthiest countries would have the best diets, it is easy to see based on the pictures why Americans are plagued with heart disease, Indians with diabetes, and English with no culinary skills. For me what was particularly interesting was to look at the amount of fruits and vegetables on each table. Those countries which had the most vegetables and the least packaging also seemed to be the ones that spawn diet fads (Mediterranean diet, japanese diet, french). Coincidence? Or a coincidence that the American family featured on average contributes four times as much garbage to the planet than the European families featured?

I will get to goat roast but I really want people to actually look at this album. I am a huge advocate of eating locally grown, seasonal produce; in other words eating sustainably and healthy, at least most of the time. I encourage each of you to look at it and consider what impact your food choices have on your health, on your wallet, and on the world.

General update

I sent this email out a little while ago but I know that I dont have everyone's email so this is just a general update...

Hi everyone,
The spat of emails checking up on me over the past few days was a kick
in the pants to write. Thanks everyone for reminding me.

Things are going pretty well here. I am now half way through my contract at PSF and have settled into life. Rwadda doesnt seem quite so foreign anymore, in fact, it is starting to feel a little like home. Life is really pretty routine here, in its own way. I spend most of my time cooking or watching dvds or studying french. OK I dont really study french that much but it felt good to say. I found a gym about a month ago in the giant hotel near my house and go there a couple of times a week. Especially after seriously spraining my ankle a couple weekends ago leading to a swift curtailment of running. There are small differences, like the fact that my oven is about the size of a toy oven and can only fit one baking sheet in at time, making any kind of baking take twice as long. There is the fact that the gym is the size of a small bedroom but it does have a tv, so if there is a football (soccer) game on, there is always a crowd of hotel employees ringing the room with their faces pressed up against the glass watching. The dvds are usually pirated versions and occasionally have people walking in front of the camera that someone somewhere smuggled into a movie theater. The power has been a little spotty lately. It will be fine and then will just shut off for five or ten seconds and come back on. Its no problem except that it screws up downloads from itunes, which take days or weeks or in some cases months to finish.
Last weekend, I went to Bujumbura in Burundi with Carey and Leigh, two of my friends here. It was a beautiful, right on the coast of a very large lake and completely ringed by mountains. Across the lake in the distance, we could see the Congo. I have the idea in my mind that the Congo is all jungle, not too different than the Heart of Darkness. From the few glimpses I have had of the Congo and the total lack of development along the lake or in the mountains, I am pretty sure that I am not too far off. Carey, Leigh, and I just relaxed on white beaches and drank Amstel Bak, the only medium bodied beer I have had in six months and it only took a six hour drive to get it. Sometime later this month, Leigh and I are going to go up to Lake Bunyoni in Uganda and do much the same thing. As much as I love Kigali, there is a serious lack of bodies of water in town. We dont have to go as far as Burundi or Uganda to get to lakes of course, but if you are traveling anyway, why not?

In other news, I have gotten a few calls from graduate schools regarding the PhD applications I submitted in a panic a few months ago. Now that they are actually thinking of accepting me, I have to figure out what the heck I want to do. I was hoping to put the decision off another year or two but it seems as though, destiny was not going to give me the option. So there is a good chance that I will be back in the States in August, although where in the states is still up in the air. Either way, it will be a coast though, thats for sure. Oddly enough, I think the thing that I am most looking forward to, besides of course seeing all of you, is the seasons. The weather here is beautiful every day and although that isnt really a reason to complain, I look at pictures of people in winter clothes and the upcoming spring fashions (yes I look at pictures of spring fashion online) and I cant help but be a little envious. Wearing the same six or seven outfits gets pretty old and I miss the way the air feels different depending on what season it is.

So all in all, things are good. There are days when I love being here and cannot think about coming home and other days when I would give anything to be back. And usually those are actually the same day or even the same hour.

I love all of you. Please keep emailing me!

Burundi

This past weekend I went to Bujumbura, Burundi with Carey and Leigh, two of my friends/ colleagues. Leigh has a friend who lives there so we hopped on a bus on Friday and rode down there. The bus ride is incredibly windy on narrow roads, but it is also incredibly beautiful and even though I was car sick, I didnt want the ride to end. During the whole trip, I looked out the window at the small farms and hill terracing. Although I have said it many times, it continues to blow my mind how every square inch of land is utilized here. Despite the ingenious way of terracing the hills however, erosion is definitely present. Alongside the road, I could see the places where there have been mudslides. There are so few trees left on the hills that there is nothing keeping the soil in place other than the terracing. Kagame really needs to address the deforestation of the land, both for economic reasons (keeping national forests as tourist destinations) and for land management.
But I digress. After a few hours we got to the border crossing (apparently the fact that we were white really threw the Burundi border patrol for a loop. Our bus driver, Edmund, had to go into the office and demand our passports back. I really love that that was even possible. He just went into the office, no security, no check, just walked right in the door and said that they had held us up long enough, we were all nurses and we needed to be going thank-you-very-much). Once we had crossed the border, the difference between Rwanda and Burundi was quite stark. Although overall the quality of life is probably not too different, both countries are quite poor, Burundi was quite obviously dirtier and less organized. The roads were packed with people walking whereas in Rwanda there are usually sidewalks or something close to that and the hills, although cultivated, were not nearly as well organized and there was much more jungle and brush surrounding the farms. After another two hours or so, we came around a turn and there were suddenly no more hills. The hills sloped down to a large plain and in the distance there was a gorgeous blue lake. It still took us a while to get down to the bottom and into the town, but we were there!
Buj is very nice, more chaotic than Kigali but also smaller. So though it has lots of traffic and rule breaking and horn honking, it still manages to maintain a small town air. The first day, second, and third we went to the beach on the lake which has white sands and small trees sort of like palms and when you look across the water, in the distance you can see the green mountains of Congo ringed by clouds and mist. The beach hasnt really been developed yet so there arent too many people on it and no one hassling you to buy cloth or food or necklaces or whatever. People just leave you alone to sleep on the beach. When we got hungry we went to a small restaurant just down the beach that had a pool and pizza and tropical drinks with little umbrellas. That was pretty much our life for three days. All in all, a wonderful vacation.