Day One Hundred & Twenty One - Food For Thought

Random thoughts of the day…

Food is a big issue in many places all over the world including South Sudan, despite its incredible fertile land in the southern region. Having enough food is a difficulty for many people. Through my observations I have concluded that there are not too many overweight African, especially in the rural areas, unless they have reached financial success of some kind and can afford the food that brings on extra pounds and inches. Hence why the bigger you are, the more money people think you have. Story: When I was in Torit, I was eating at a local restaurant with Lawrence. Our waiter was Kenyan and we had become regulars at this place so he was quite used to us coming around. The portion of rice any local restaurant gives you is massive and I can never finish it. I always try to ask for a small portion but even with this request, a very large bowl of rice comes with my beans. On this particular day I only ate half of my rice and our waiter made a comment. He told me I should eat all of my rice so I would become fat and beautiful. This comment took my by surprise and I did not quite know how to respond. Lawrence explained to me that Kenyan’s like their women big and it is a sign of wealth. Strange. People from the West are obsessed with weight loss and food, and people here think the exact opposite. Here, when you get fat, you are seen as being successful. This is obviously a generalization, not everyone thinks that fat is the best, but for the most part it is true. I have also had someone at a restaurant make a comment to me about asking for small portion of rice. They said to me “We don’t have that option. Of asking for less. We take what we can get.”

Food costs a lot of money and if you live in the city where you cant grow your own, you have to rely on purchasing all of your food. People living in rural areas, for the most part, can grow enough food to feed their families for a period of time. The length that the food grown will last depends on how good their harvest was and the number of people in their families. From the research I have done in the last 3 months, it was made apparent to me that in the rural areas most people can only grow enough food to support their family and even then they usually do not have enough food. People eat less here, leftovers are not a common occurrence and I think that one meal a day is possibly a common thing. Here in Juba this may not be the case, but outside of Juba this would be a normal thing.

Read this: http://www.sudantribune.com/South-Sudan-warns-food-crisis,40342

Farming was once the primary way of life in nearly every country. People cannot live without food, and nearly all their food comes from crops and animals raised on farms. I have been thinking about food and agriculture a lot lately. I had a friend tell me that I should become a farmer. Obviously I would not have much of a clue how to farm but I have had time on my hands so have been mulling it over in my mind. Growing up on an acreage and spending massive amounts of time on a farm I have always fancied the idea of being a farmer but I have never been convinced that it would become my way of life. I am still young anything could happen right? I met a woman in here who farms with her husband in Uganda. It sounds pretty amazing, however, they ship their vegetables out of the country to Israel and other places. I would want to be providing produce to the local community/region if I were to have a farm. I know from observing my Grampa, Gramma, Aunt and Uncle and all the other relatives and friends farm, that farming is exciting and a rewarding job. You are your own boss, you live and work in a rural environment, working the land, being close to nature, however, I know that it is also an incredibly demanding and unpredictable way of life. You have to be a risk-taker to be a farmer, no? There are so many factors that help determine whether or not your crop will be successful or a failure, and usually it is out of your control. Even so, the successes out weigh the failures and if it were for massive corporations creating these large-scale farms and putting small-scale farmers out of business, farming would be a much better life style to pursue.