Have you ever seen a fat Chinese?

Think about it, have you ever seen a fat Chinese? And I'm not talking about Chinese babies, I mean one that lives like people in China do? I suddenly accured to me the other week and since then I have been trying to figure out what it is that make them non-fat.

You might say it's the food itself. That would make it very easy, simply eat Chinese take-out every day? (YUM!) But rumours have it that they don't have chocolate, icecream or dairy (correct me if I'm wrong, because that's just sad), but instead only eat soup, vegetables and chicken. I guess that could be true. You see, I have had a lot of Chinese colleagues and being invited home for dinner once, I learned the fried stuff they serve in restaurants, is not 'real' Chinese food. We were instead presented to a big table covered with little bowls filled with vegetables, roots, meats, mushrooms and fruit. In the middle of the table was a hotplate with a big pot of boiling water and exotic spices. You could then choose whatever looked the best and put it in the pot to boil. It was amazing!

Must warn, original Chinese food does not necessary equal delicious - I also went to a restaurant in China town called Poo Dong. The soup I had resembled the name of the restaurant, and the 'chicken' was nothing but skin and fat (not even quite sure it was from a chicken) no need to say I was dissapointed.

Others may say it's genetic - but adoptees or individuals living a western food style is often rather chubby like the rest of us. (Except for the English, I don't get it!)

Anyway, I even had one suggest that it's all the gymnastik they perform each morning in the public squares with someone blurring out instructions from a speaker. If that's you, please start reading papers. Even though older people should be seen around the parks performing some sort of kung-fu for retired. Pretty cool.

No, I think I know why. Chop sticks! And before you discharge it please consider this. Eating with chop sticks takes a long time, even for the most rutined chop stick champion out there, it still takes longer than eating with a fork or spoon. If you eat slower you'll know exactly when you full and not 10 minutes later when you are stuffed. And have you ever tried to eat a spring roll with chop sticks? It takes for ever just to figure out how.

Ok, that is a pretty weak theory. But I'm still eating my dinner with chop sticks tonight. Kung Pao Chicken anyone?

Healthy a la America

Can you believe it! I finally lost 5 pounds! I know, it's pretty amazing... the thing is that I also flew to Texas to visit my brother and sister-in-law. After spending one week in America I have now gained everything back, and it seems like it brought half it's Facebook friends...

It's not like I didn't try eating healthy, but when you order a celery stick here it comes complete with peanut butter and raisins, vegetables are generally fried in butter, a salad is drenched in dressing and buried in cheddar and the rest is either deep fried or covered in blue cheese. The worst thing I have yet come across is deep-fried-chocolate-covered-bacon... and I've only been here a week.

The weird thing is that people is eating this on a daily basis... It's like they forgotten that vegetables have a taste of it's own. If you try to get a carrot, just a carrot without sauce or dressing or breading, no one will understand what you are asking for. Maybe the 'alien' entrance in the airport is more literate than I thought.

The worst thing is that the fried, breaded and buttered are easier to make than a standard 'healthy meal'... you see, it all comes in a mix-box. Kind of like bake-and-shake, but without the shaking. Home made fast food is a reality.

So when my dear sister-in-law announced she would make a salad for dinner the other day, I was genuinely exited to see a plain green salad, fresh and naturally crunchy. What came out of the kitchen was a green salad with tomatoes, deep fried chicken, cereal looking pieces, half a gallon of dressing and KaZaMm! cheddar enough to feed France for a year. I never knew you could make a salad have more than 1000 calories...

Of course some of this is exaggerated and it is far from every American that does this... But I have no doubt that Texas invented cholesterol. I am also a bit worried... I have to be here two more weeks...

Besides that I really enjoy how extremely jolly everyone is... and the milkshake.

Pigeon the dead terrorist

We all know by now how terrorists work. They hide, disguise and attack when you least expect it for no other reason than it seems to be the meaning of their lives. As I moved back to Denmark last week I started moving back furniture to my apartment from the attic and discovered to my horror that I had been the victim of a suicide pigeon terrorist.

The pigeon had entered the attic, through a carelessly opened window, to find a perfect victim (all the rooms are genius connected by pigeon-sized holes so I am unable to find the idiot) and probably cued in evil happiness when it entered the only used room. Here the attack began! First it messed around to remove any plastic covering delicate furniture and then emptied its bowels over anything that could be reached making sure to especially hit any antic pieces. “That little table looks old, let’s fill it up and cover it in feathers and uh let’s make a special acid attack on that white cabinet”. Then it squeezed out a couple of egg-bombs midair before it died on the only non-covered furniture left. Mission accomplished.

As I tried to save whatever was left of my belongings and careful not to slip in the remaining of the attacker, I became more and more mad. Thanks to some idiot, that obviously did not know the secret of the flying rats, I had to scrape pigeon of my favorite table. The madder I became the more I thought “Oh bullocks with it all!”, so going down to buy pigeon-free parts for my bed I stopped by the candy store on the corner.

After a whole week of nothing but healthy food, only interrupted by a delicious birthday cake, I now scuffed down on gummy bears and caramel chocolate. Thinking back on my first encounter with the devils as a naïve newcomer I remember how I had done the exact same thing:

Waking up a beautiful Saturday morning during my first week in the city I heard a strange noise. Searching through every (…) room I finally found the source, a pigeon slid down between the wall below the kitchen window and the cabinet (come to think of it, why is this place not pigeon-proof?) For an unknown reason it had jumped into the ridiculously narrow hole and decided to die there, so I ran down to the first floor to my landlords’ office only to find out he would not be back before Monday. My kitchen would have a disgusting odor already before the end of the weekend, so I found a big screwdriver and took the cabinet apart – for good. After much cooing and swearing the flying intruder finally got cold feet and jumped out of the window again. This was when I first learned that pigeon eskrements are extremely acid. Despite having promised myself a new start with fresh habits, I made my first trip to the candy store. Come to think of it, I always enter that shop frigid, steaming and mumbling curses under my breath. It’s a miracle I had not been banned from the store yet.

Now do you ever do that? Have a special emotion that triggers an: “I don’t care just give me a chocolate bar – now!”?

As I get mad quite often it could explain the extra baggage on my thighs and I have hereby located one of my main problems. But to learn how to control it or how to go around it will be a huge challenge. If you have any suggestions or good advice, be so kind.

In the meantime, be good, eat fruit and whack some pigeons before they get you too.

I love a girl who can eat...

Last Monday a colleague of mine, let’s call him Jim, was describing his weekend to me. He thoroughly covered the highlights of the soccer game (I actually watched it myself but I decided not to burst his manly bubble), his new cool sneakers and his date Saturday night. After describing how the wonder looked (the girl) – tiny waist, longs slender legs, blond – he exclaimed “…and she ate almost as much as I did! I love a girl who orders a big steak with lots of sauce instead of a skimpy salad.” EERHHH, now wait just a minute, did he say tiny waist AND steak dipped in béarnaise? As Jim received slaps on the back from the nearest cavemen, the woman next to me looked as puzzled as myself but shook it off and continued with the news paper. As you might know by now – I talk before I think and even if I think first, I rarely find much reason to shut up – so I said what every female within earshot was thinking. “…and how long was she in the bathroom after you had dinner?” Well I never said I was elegant.

Now it was Jim and the buddies turn to look puzzled. If you feel the same way let me explain to you as I did to them. If a girl has long slender legs and a tiny waist she must have a certain diet. Either she eats healthy and is an excessive runner, or she doesn’t eat. If she on the other hand inhales a big steak with chips and cream sauce on the side and suggest dessert afterwards you have a binger. Which means she loves food so much that she sees it twice – second time in reverse.

Jim huffed and said “no no, she said she has a high metabolism,” Yeah…

Let’s set that one straight once and for all. High metabolism is a syndrome and is very rare. The people who suffer from this disease really struggles to maintain a healthy weight not to lose all the calcium, iron, vitamins and other essential things for the body to function that flushes through their system almost untouched. It is so to say an ‘error’ in the body that makes it unable to hold on to the nourishment it is fed with. Considering the rareness of this illness, the chance of you dating such a person more than twice in your lifetime, is very little. On the other hand, the chance of you going on a date with a person with an eating disorder is one to two.

The numbers are frightening high when it comes to eating disorders (ED) and includes everything from anorexia (the small-salad-and-a-pickle-girl), bulimia (king-size-in-reverse-girl), binge eating disorder (king-size-major-guilt-girl). The latest will often be overweight, while the first two will look ‘normal’ or under-weight. Did you know that the ED has the highest mortality rate of all mental illnesses? Including diseases as schizophrenia and depression?

This is why I reacted rather strong to Jim’s indifference. As he said, I ‘killed’ the fun for him, but it is really important to acknowledge that this exists. Now Jim can be a jerk, but I think he hadn’t realized the seriousness of his date leaving for the bathroom after dinner. Well, maybe it really was nothing. Maybe she always eats a big dinner on the first date, knowing she will get a guys attention this way, or maybe she actually has a high metabolism. But the next time you notice your date, a friend, a sibling, a colleague or anyone you are close to constantly going to the bathroom right after dinner, having cut their nails very short without reason, yellowing teeth or vomit in the sink after their visit to the bathroom… please be alarmed.

I cringe inside every time I hear a guy say “I love a girl who can eat” and sees how skinny his girlfriend is. A light bulb should go on in his head when he two minutes later makes fun of the fat woman in the street, commenting “she should eat less”. I am mystified of how this is still going on, because it really isn’t that hard to figure out.

Calories

Last week I stumbled upon an article on America’s most calorie-stuffed drink, the Cold Stone PB&C. I would normally gracefully have skipped it as my mother learned me calorie counting were for obsessed Jane Fonda’s. Yet, I was curious about this mysterious math piece (never thought that was going to happen) and decided to do the only logic thing whenever in doubt. I googled it.

Women’s logic #3: Google always has the right answer and you can choose the one you like best.

After much searching through several web pages I found a simple set up, where you should enter your age, sex, height, weight and level of daily activity. Then it would automatically give you an estimated number on just how many calories you were burning. “Hm… looks good” (read “I have no idea if that number is high or low”), but even I could come to the conclusion that consuming less calories than you burn will result in weight loss.

That afternoon I ventured out to the supermarket for a few necessities (pickles, crackers and cotton pads, exiting hah?), but the freezer desk was lurking for me. Yeah, I know what you are thinking… no, I did not expect to find pickles in the freezer. Turning the Häagen-Dazs cup around though revealed a calorie number.

Now, as I studied the web earlier, I found that a 1200 calorie diet was a good starter to kick things off. But apparently 1200 is not a lot when we are talking about the nasty little buggers. The cup consisted of 1000 of them, which would leave me with just a couple of carrots for the rest of the day. But since I already had breakfast and lunch, I would break it on the very first day. I don’t have much spine when it comes to ice cream, but I won’t break a rule the same day it is made. With a trembling hand I put the cup back in the desk and started an Indiana Jones search around the store for my favorite products. A snake was hiding in paradise and I’m sure Dr Jones would have made a smock comment about this, even though I changed it slightly to "why did it have to be [insert any good tasting product]". The ‘adding-invisible-sugar-to-your-product-conspiracy’ suddenly made sense, the products I buy over and over again which seems healthy, are actually filled with sugar or other addictives.

The next day I used most of my morning looking up calorie amounts in different products on my computer. Except for a couple of times when people rang and disturbed me for the job I’m actually paid for, I covered most of the contents of my fridge and what might replace it. So today my fridge is now calorie low except for half a jar of pesto… one must have some fun and pesto makes me feel sophisticated… yeah.

Have you ever tried counting calories and what is your best low calorie snack?

But it all comes with benefits. Whenever I have a craving I can simple turn over the box, cart, bag or whatever and read the number of nasty buggers, it makes it a lot easier to resist. Although my colleague today, who tried to convince me his chips was healthy as the label read 70% less fat, presented me with a new logic. “It might be 500 calories, but it’s much less than a normal bag of chips, so you are making the healthier choice”.

I often tell him he’s a girl.

Paparazzi!

One week has gone in best paparazzi style, hiding around corners, hoping to snatch the well kept secrets of the skinny-French-girl. How does she get so skinny that the highest point on her body while laying down is her hipbones? How does she manage her diet so that her thighs never touch? And how does she get upper arms almost as tight and skinny as her wrists? Having only seen those women assembled is such large groups when flipping through Vogue and knowing those pictures are photo-shopped too perfection, there logically must be a secret.

Day 1: Having chosen two skinny-French-girls in my office get’s more difficult as we move office. They now sit in the other end of the room, in the corner even. Luckily the table right next to them is the official cake/coffee table, so I have an excuse to drop by now and then. But as I don’t drink coffee, going to the cake-desk 3 times a day is not doing any good to my behind, so a discreet stretch now and then off my chair gives me a small peek of their status. Hopefully my new neighbor likes my deodorant.

Result: Has not observed anything but coffee going in.

Day 2: Having respect for them not taking a single piece of cake – I think I know where this is going – but maybe they just don’t sugar on Mondays? Ate lunch close to them today: Noted intake of salad, the obligatory yoghurt and a piece of fruit. Plus more coffee and even more cigarettes.

Result: Can someone actually live on coffee??

Day 3: Colleague brought sweets to celebrate becoming a dad, lots of kisses but not a single piece of chocolate gets near the lipstick. Lunch is salad, fruit, the tiniest yoghurts I’ve ever seen and more coffee with cigarettes.

Result: They must be non-human. Sitting an arm’s reach from a pile of kitkat’s, twix’s and other goodies, without as much as recognition of their presence is amazing will-power.

Day 4: Went out with a friend from work to celebrate pay day, this always calls for ice cream at the little café by the park. Spotted my experiments at a table nearby – having espressos and cigarettes. For a moment I considered to curl in shame when the huge banana split landed on the table between my friend and me. We looked at each other and I could see she was thinking the same thing, but then a smile spread across her face –‘you know what?’ she said ‘we only live once, and when those skinnies become 50 they are going to be nothing but bones and loose skin with lung cancer.’ So we dug in – and it was good!

As we were fighting over the chocolate pieces, the skinny-French-girls started stealing glances towards us. They were jealous! Obviously they didn’t want us or each other to notice, but the conversation dipped to nothing as the attention shifted to our calorie feast. I could see the cravings in their eyes for the first time in a week and made me realize that they have cravings just as everyone else, they just choose not pursue it, but instead drown it in coffee and nicotine.

Result: They are human and they might be unbelievable skinny, but are they really happy? I’m sure having a body like Gemma Ward gives you a load of recognition and you don’t have to worry about your belly fat bringing too much attention when wearing a thin t-shirt, but living on coffee and cigarettes to get there is not my definition of enjoying it proper.

BUT until I convince fashion, Vogue, my mirror, general opinion but most of all me that skinny equals unhappy, I will accept this, until then the fight against the 5 pounds will continue. But without the caffeine and ciggies, there are limits to this craziness.

Disguised food and mayonnaise

I once read an article stating that women should allow themselves to be pampered once in a while. I guess this article was meant for stressed women with big jobs and crying babies, but nonetheless I thought this was a wise suggestion and have been living it ever since. I now hold an impressive shoe collection and am not shy to treat myself to a blueberry muffin.

But as I’m trying to loose some weight, I have collided with this little saying quite a lot. The main thing in loosing 5 pounds must be changing food habits and watching what you eat. So I have started to look around for healthy snacks and swapping out bad habits with healthy habits, I started with exchanging the easy pasta dish with couscous. So far so good – Now, if you are a bit brighter than me, you would know couscous is in fact the exact same thing as pasta, I simply didn’t bother to check this as I really like couscous and deep down knew it was too good to be true.

A women’s logic #2 – If you enjoy a new type of food, it’s doomed to be unhealthy.

As I already bought quite a stock of it, I will have to finish it before I can completely devote myself to brown rice and barley. But to avoid binging the whole thing at once, every Thursday is now pasta/couscous day. Hopefully I can clear out the last box before I have to go back to Denmark.

I am not completely hopeless in knowing healthy from unhealthy foods though. My mom taught me well and I know shredded wheat, gravy, sugar and fatty meats are a no-go if you want to shed a few pounds. So to eat and be comfortable full afterwards, I decide one evening at a cramped train station, that a whole wheat chicken sandwich with plenty of salad and tomatoes must be the best choice in these pasta-box-mania days. As I investigate the display case I see nothing but chicken sandwiches, but all full of what seems to be mayonnaise. In my broken French I ask the nice girl behind the counter if they have a chicken sandwich without mayonnaise. She simply stares at me. Knowing that my French is almost non-understandable I ask again, with same result. She explains to me that no one has EVER asked for chicken without mayonnaise, she slowly explains it would make the chicken to dry without and I will not find such a sandwich in the entire France. I doubt she has been in every sandwich shop in France, but I get the point. Mission is failed as my grumbling tummy is attracting insulted looks from the travellers in the queue behind me. I give up as she ensures me it is fat free and buys a sandwich.

For once this was not hard for me to have choosen the healthier option, I really hate mayonnaise and the fat free version is one of the biggest scams on this earth. Fat free mayonnaise is like anti-wringle cream. It does not exist.

But what can you eat in this country that makes you full and is still healthy? Looking around for inspiration, the skinny-French-girl catches my attention, how does she do it? It can’t all be good genes, so I will secretly spy on a couple of good examples of the species that happens to work in my office. Report will follow.