A Meaty Subject

Not far from my house, there's a long, small street full of ramshackle market stalls. Most sell fruit or vegetables, others rice cakes, but there are a couple of butchers too.
Just like back home, many Koreans get their meat from the supermarket these days, and I wouldn't be surprised to learn that small local butchers are on the wane here, much as has happened in England amid the rise of the supermarket chains.

The old-fashioned butcher's shops here (there are also more modern versions) are quite a sight to be seen. Entire animals are often chopped up on a table out on the street, and various gruesome-looking body parts hang from hooks both inside and outside the store.
Today, in one of those moments that made me wish for blip video, a woman in the shop casually browsed through a rack of huge cuts of flesh hanging from hooks on a rail - pulling each one out and perusing it in exactly the same manner as someone looking through a rack of T-shirts in a clothes shop.

I'll leave it to you to decide whether the photo above is one that makes your mouth water or your skin crawl. For me, just stepping foot in the place was a grim experience. In the tiny store it was hard not to physically bump into meat at every turn, a dim red light that they maybe use to make the meat look redder made the whole thing feel more Texas Chainsaw than Sunday lunch. The whole experience was then nicely garnished with a large plastic bowl filled with pigs feet, nestled in the middle of the floor.


One of the other big changes in my life since my last blips was the decision to go vegan.
It kind of came about by accident, as a group of my marathon-obsessed friends were experimenting with vegan diets as a performance enhancer. Thus conversations over a beer would often centre around diet, not only it's relation to athletic performance, but also the health, ethical and environmental issues related to eating animal products.
They would often talk of a professional ultra-runner named Brendan Brazier, and his book Thrive is one anyone interested in the effects of their diet on their health should read. The book turns much of what you think you know about food on its head, and along with a second in the series, I highly recommend them.

As I began to study the topic more, everything I uncovered seemed to make sense to me, and I very quickly made the decision to turn vegetarian. As with many vegetarians though, that quickly became vegan with the knowledge that animals in the egg and dairy industry actually suffer more and for longer, than their meat industry cousins.

Apart from an epic craving for cheese that lasted a good few months (here's one theory explaining how we may literally be 'addicted' to cheese) I found it relatively easy going, and as Brendan Brazier explains in his book, so much of the bad stuff we love to eat is either simply habit, or the body's mistaken reliance on it. My diet before going vegan and subsequently eating a lot more plant-based whole foods, was pretty terrible, and it amazes me now how if I try something unhealthy that I used to love, it now tastes like garbage.

I don't want to post links to shocking videos etc here, but if you are interested in a vegetarian or vegan diet, or simply cutting down on your animal products, there are a couple of great documentaries worth checking out.

If you're interested in the health benefits of a vegan diet, Forks Over Knives is a great place to start, an incredibly interesting look the western diet's link to health and an array of health problems.

If you're more concerned with the animal welfare side of things, Earthlings is an absolute must-see. Covering pretty much every industry out there that in some way exploits animals, you will at best cry your eyes out and at worst find yourself having to turn it off. Be warned, this documentary alone has been known to turn people vegan.

Both documentaries appear to be available on YouTube and elsewhere for free, and despite Earthlings difficult content, I recommend both it, and Forks Over Knives, very highly - who knows where they might lead you?


Food For Thought:

The global meat and dairy industries produce greater carbon emissions than all the world's transport combined.
The natural life span of cattle is 20-25 years. Most dairy cows are slaughtered before they even reach three years of age.
Millions of days-old male chicks are thrown, alive, into grinding machines, or suffocated in plastic bins each year - the industry standard method of disposing of the non egg-layers.
Due to the huge demand for meat in wealthy countries, up to 50% of all grains harvested on the planet are then fed to livestock for the meat and dairy industry.
Livestock production uses 70% of all arable land on the planet - almost one third of the planet's land mass.
Usable, non-polluted fresh water makes up less than one percent of the earth's total. 70% of that one percent is primarily used for agriculture animal feed.
Kilograms of antibiotics given to humans each year: 1.4 million.
Kilograms of antibiotics reportedly fed to livestock each year: 8 million
Due to overfishing and increases in fishing technology, it is estimated that 70% of the world's fish stocks are either fully exploited or depleted.