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kparsons · Joined: 30 Jun 2005 Posts: 63 Location: Hanoi, Vietnam

I figured once in Asia, I'd get skinny. Boy was I wrong. While living in a country where some of the skinniest people on Earth reside (Vietnam -- where all the students make resolutions to put on weight and tell me they can eat whatever they want, yet no one here works out -- I kid you not -- they laugh and point when I run in the streets), I've managed to gain weight, despite all my best efforts to avoid doing so. I work out five to six times a week, eat pretty damn healthily, and yet I've still put on the weight while here. I partially chalk it up to the hours a language school teacher has to work. Many nights, we work until 9:00, which means you don't get home until 9:30 or so, then you eat late, which is never good for your body. Perhaps I'm just an oddity (although my boyfriend has put on weight here too...).

Mavis the Fat Fairy · Joined: 21 Sep 2006 Posts: 15

Being a fat fairy, I guess it's only right my first post should be about weight.
Just curious, a friend who went to Japan with Jet told me that in general, over their first year there all the blokes lost weight, whilst all the women gained it. Anybody else noticed this?

yaramaz · Posted: Wed Sep 27, 2006 1:22 pm Post subject:

I have actually lost weight since I have been in Turkey but I can't say how much, exactly. For me it wasn't the fact that I have to walk everywhere (I was equally active and carless everwhere else I have lived) but rather because there are very few convenience foods here. If you want dinner, you have to make it from scratch. There are no frozen dinners, no jars of pasta sauce. I bacame quite adept at making lovely fresh veggie-rich meals quickly without resorting to unhealthy fast options(cos the fruits and veggies here are great). Even alot of the takeaway foods are healthy- I ordered a chicken shish the other day from the place down the street, and it came with three different salads and lots of grilled veggies and rice. If you don't live on doner kebab and beer, its hard to gain weight here.

dmb · Joined: 12 Feb 2003 Posts: 8397

Jyulee · Joined: 01 May 2005 Posts: 81

Despite what the locals keep assuring me, Colombian food isn't that great, so I am not tempted to keep eating and eating. That combined with me being a smoker means that I can happily live on less than three full meals a day. Oh, and food isn't that cheap either, relatively speaking.

Getting the bus in Bogot� is as physically demanding as (if not more so than) walking - owing to the amount of pushing and holding on required.

You would think, then, that I would be skinny and muscular. But no! Since arriving I have put on weight.

Go figure Shocked

yaramaz · Posted: Thu Sep 28, 2006 2:34 pm Post subject:

dmb, I have been tempted a few times to order from them when I came home from a long day wrangling the hordes but never followed through because the minimum orders were just too much for one person, and the bloody cat hates take away.

dmb · Joined: 12 Feb 2003 Posts: 8397

No problem. Invite me round Mr. Green

jpvanderwerf2001 · Joined: 02 Oct 2003 Posts: 1117 Location: New York

I've stayed about the same, fluctuating a little up and down.

An interesting (at least to me) note. While I was living in Ukraine (a country not renowned for their food), most of the guys I knew (mostly Peace Corps cronies) lost weight or stayed about the same. However, most of the girls (again, mostly Peace Corps and in their 20s) gained, and gained a LOT. I've never really been able to figure that out. We were eating the same foods, walking a lot and drinking about the same. I wonder if new diets affect the female body more than males'?