Nachi's pointless rants and recollections

Well his was very interesting. Being a vegetarian for five days turned out to be quite the challenge for someone like me.
My family eats meat every single day, so the challenge was trying to resist temptation.
Nevertheless, I tried my best to stick to my commitment and follow through with it.

So here is the menu for the last day of being a vegetarian:

Midnight Snack - leftover Pasta
Breakfast - chocolate chip muffin
Lunch - Mac and cheese
Dinner - white rice and fried egg
Snack - one monster marshmallow

Overall the day wasn't bad. I spent the day in CT with family who also cooked some yummy meat but I was alright.
So what is my verdict on being a vegetarian?
Well, it was hard but it wasn't as hard as I thought it would be.
Something good that I definitely noticed is the fact that I less. Being aware of what I put in my plate made a huge difference in the portions I was consuming.
What I can take from this experience is that I can maybe cut back on what I eat specially meat. I don't think I can go full vegetarian but I can certainly try cutting back my meat intake and replace it with more greens.

Another day went by and I am very surprised I haven't gone mad.
Yesterday was the hardest by far of being a vegetarian, only because my father in law has officially decided to torture me with food, or so I think...
Let me show you what I mean:

Midnight Snack - Cheese Quesadilla, Coke
Breakfast - Cheese and butter roll, fresh squeezed limeade
Lunch - Greek pasta salad
Snack - Chocolate cereal balls
Dinner - Same as lunch
Snack - Jell-o parfait

Ok, so that wasn't so bad, the torture I was talking about is that what the rest of my family had for lunch were ribs. RIBS!!!
I had such a hard time resisting, I wanted to eat them so bad. I smelled them as soon as they went into the oven. It was pure, pure torture!
I did not cave nonetheless but it was very sad seeing that last rib being eaten.
I was glad though, I made it through four days of being a vegetarian and I couldn't be more proud of myself. One more day to go!

Well I am not really starving, but there are periods of times when I don't feel quite full. I feel like something is missing.
My body seems to be reacting very well to the vegetarian lifestyle though, I feel light, fresh, clean perhaps?
I don't know how these things work, but I feel healthy. I know, I know, three days isn't enough to see a huge difference, but I feel it.

Ok, lets get to the good stuff, menu of the day:

Midnight Snack - Avocado, and some nibbles of leftover torreja.
Breakfast - Fried eggs, and bread, fresh squeezed limeade
Lunch - Green rice with onion and avocado salad
Snack - Can't remember, but I ate something I'm sure of that
Dinner - Same as Lunch

So as you can see, avocado and eggs have been my best friends lately. They provide me what protein I may be lacking and they fill me up.
I know it's not very creative, but I'm working with what I have.
Two more days of this madness and I'm done. I can't say it's bad though, I like how this is going, may have to go vegetarian again sometime. XD

So I made it through day 2 of this crazy thing I'm doing; being vegeterian for five days!
It was a little more difficult, I had so many plans on what I was going to eat, but I failed at executing any of them. I just didn't have the energy or the motivation to do them.
So did I cave? Did I eat meat? No!
Here's my menu for the day:

Midnight Snack - Slice of home-made Lemon Raspberry Pie
Breakfast - Bagel with Viajero cheese, some butter, orange juice
Lunch - Potato and onion torreja (Peruvian omelette), white rice, tomato salad, water
Snack - Same as midnight snack
Dinner - Same thing as lunch
More snack - Avocado with a little salt.

So, there isn't much to it. I felt tempted to make myself a turkey and salami sandwich, I also felt the need to gobble up the stew my father in law made.
Thankfully my boyfriend made me three torrejas to last me through the day.
Hopefully day 3 comes with more options, I'm starting to miss meat, not as bad as I thought I would, but I do miss it. Being vegetarian for 2 days wasn't easy.

Wish me luck!!

No! No, no, no!
I am not giving up meat!
Then why am I doing this?
Well, many reasons, but it all comes down to this; I like to try new things.

Culturally speaking, vegetarians are an alien species who rarely make an appearance in society. We, or me I should say, have never met anyone who willingly gave up meat back in Peru.
It's just not something we do. If you can afford meat, you eat it!
No, I wasn't poor either, but my family did not have the "luxury" of choosing to be vegetarian. You ate what you could afford and that's that.
So I've never known anything outside of that world, we ate meat, that's normal right?

Well when I came to this country I learned so much, among some of the things I learned is that an individual has a right to make decisions whether others like it or not.
I still didn't understand why someone would not want to eat meat, but I respected it. To each their own.
Lately though, I started to feel intrigued by this lifestyle, could someone really give up meat and not miss it?
How would your soup taste without the flavorings of chicken, how would your stew taste if meat didn't simmer in it for oodles of time?
It just didn't make sense.

So I've embarked on a journey, a very short one I should add, but a very rewarding one I hope.
I've decided to give up all forms of meat for five days straight.
To you it may not seem much, but for me it's a huge deal. I eat meat every day, several times a day!
With the help of a very good friend, and a lot of motivation, I started my journey today Monday, May 30th 2011

Menu for the day:
Midnight snack - A full ripe Avocado and some bread
Breakfast - Scrambled eggs, some more bread, viajero cheese, and some orange juice
Lunch - White rice, beans, fried eggs, and iced tea
Snack - Chocolate cereal
Dinner - Boiled potato (oven broke), with butter, and water.

Wow, seems like so little.
May I add that my father in law made oven roasted chicken today? Dude! WTF!
You make my favorite kind of chicken the day I decide not to eat it?
Oh well, I'm glad it was yummy because my family gobbled it all up before I had a chance to steal some.
I should also add that I am a bit ashamed to be sharing this with my Peruvian friends and my family.
My boyfriend didn't take my decision so kindly. He made fun of me and told me that there was no point in it.
"Why do it?" he said.
Well, it's just like trying sushi for the first time, I want to experience it, learn from it, and then form an opinion about it. I may not like it, I may love it, who knows. This is something I need to figure out on my own, and the only way to do it is by experiencing.
I do want to give Ronald some credit, as the day progressed, he was very kind about eating things with meat in it, he fed the baby his chicken so that I wouldn't be tempted to sneak pieces of it into my mouth. When I hit the 12hr mark he told me he was very proud of me.
It was a good day all in all, meat did limit my options though, I'm not used to eating something without it, and I had to resort to simple things.

We'll see how it goes tomorrow.

Edit: I didn't explain this well so here goes a bit more info.
What I meant about vegetarian being a luxury is that you eat what you can get. My family in Peru can afford to eat what they want most of the time, but in Peru, if you happen to get I don't know, a nice chunk of meat that day, then you eat it. Sometimes you don't have enough for vegetables. They don't have the luxury of choosing what to eat, they eat what they can afford and period. So if they can afford meat, they will choose this rather than going vegan/vegetarian.