Tuesday 9 December 2008

The Need For Fresh Food: Or How I Learned To Stop Worrying and Love Walmart.

Today I finally managed to find a Walmart within walking distance. This feat has taken me over 3 weeks to achieve, and has made me so happy I'm a little scared. Being in the centre of world capitalism, I would have thought it would be easy to find anything I need at any time, but it hasn't been like that at all. Sure there are plenty of stores. Lots of little corner shops, convenience stores, and Walgreen's (each more identical than the last). But in all of these places, the ratio of real food to candy is like 3:1 in favour of candy.

So you go about your business being a tourist. You're hungry, you look down the street. You see McDonalds, Starbucks, Subway, Popeye's everywhere. You begrudgingly have to settle for these things more often than you'd like to, unless you want to break the bank. You crave fresh fruit. Broccoli. Salad that isn't incarcerated within a greasy burger prison.

It's funny how my mind works. In the back of my mind I've been worrying quite a bit about eating right (which I haven't been accomplishing well since LA). But it doesn't manifest itself in the way I would think. I don't worry about feeling sick, weight gain, weight loss, or any long term health problems. No sir. I walk down the street and I think to myself:

I am going to die because I haven't eaten an apple.

If I don't find a salad, I will die.

But it's all alright now. Today I found Walmart. It may be costing me an arm and a leg to eat right in this country but it sure is worth it.

3 comments:

Alyce said...

you know you stole hilarious tagging from me.

What's McDonald's like over there? I need to know. I might die if I don't find out. Also, what have you been making yourself? Have you stolen my awesome tuna pasta salad recipe yet? Do you remember how good that salad was? I thought about it yesterday in Fresh Provs. I was like shit dawg, check that inferior salad. Mine had haloumi and chilli olives in it.

MC said...

McDonalds is pretty much the same, except the packages don't have all that crap about the quality of the beef like they do in Aus. You know, with the crazy diagram of a cow cross section.

The only real difference in the fast foods is the sizing of things. You need to order 'small' if you want our medium. Medium is large and large is gargantuan. Though portion sizes are a bit better here then in the mid-West.

I've just got some tuna and a few vegs and things. Gotta keep it simple coz I'm moving again soon.

And you copied me with the tagging! I remember telling you about doing it when I started the blog, and then the next time you updated you were doing it!

MC said...

Seriously though, Walmart's not much better. Everything in this country has too much sugar or too much salt in it. Or both....