Food Journal

Ma Po Tofu (Chinese Tofu Dish, its usually made with ground beef but didn't eat it with beef)- Eaten yesterday evening for dinner. Extremely satisfying since I only eat one other thing that day during lunch. It was very delicious and had not eaten Ma Po Tofu since I was young. I cooked it myself, it was a pain to cook but eat it fast. It was very hot, eaten with spoon. Eaten in my dad's room while doing math homework which was surprisingly easy so I was in a pretty satisfied and good mood but the environment was that it was very hot but I had a fan which helped a little.



Doughnut- Eaten this morning around 10:00am. Eat with right hand, no utensils. Given to me by Paul (guy in our class), I don't usually eat breakfast so it satisfied me pretty good. Eat it in the science class room, many other people were eating the doughnuts he gave everyone while Mr. Avigan makes a fail attempt to get authority and tell people to stop eating.

Peanut Butter and Jelly Sandwich- Eaten while walking down stairs to math class to work on exhibitions. Eaten with right hand, it was sort of sticky. It was too much peanut butter and jelly for my taste and was sort of too sweet but was quite hungry so eat it anyways. Drank a whole bottle of 16oz. water to get full (I always drink a lot).


3 Strips of Twislers - Eaten during "Making Your Own Choice group" with a couple of students that I am pretty comfortable with. Eaten in Andy Snyder's room. Pealed off plastic, eaten with mainly right hand. The environment was pretty uncomfortable consider I sat in that same room for about 2 and a half hours. The feelings when I eat this was amused since I was joking around with the others while I was eating.

Four bites of gold fish crackers - Also eaten during "Making Your Own Choice group for after school. I had a few bites but my feelings for it were pretty bland and I ended up not really wanting it and put it in my bag. Eaten by holding the bag with my left hand and gold fish crackers in my right. I eat most of this food during the class is because it is free.


Small bottle of apple Juice - Drank this during the same class. Very much enjoyed this apple juice because I was really thirsty and I really like apple juice. Drank with my right hand.

Slice of extremely thin pizza (cheese was mozzarella) - Eaten around 8:30pm. Got home late so I was pretty hungry and the slice of pizza was really satisfying. Eaten with 4 cups of water because I can never eat anything without drinking A LOT. Eaten with my boyfriend, no toppings or pepperoni or anything like that because we both don't eat meat. Eaten in my dads room since my dad is gone on a business trip. Eaten while watching "ghost hunters". I eat it pretty quick because I was really hungry, eaten while sitting on the bed next to my boyfriend.

Cup of green tea- Was extremely satisfying and felt relaxing to drink. It was very warm and satisfying. Drank through a coffee mug while watching t.v. and checking email. I drank this very slowly because it was hot.

-Between the green tea and going to bed I had around 3 cups of water.

"Foodways"

Through my life I have been assimilated many times when dealing with the way I eat or my food ways. This may have something to do with the different family changes in my life dealing with divorce, moving, family members moving out, etc. So mainly for me the way my family works has a significant part of the way I eat. When my family was still together my family was very big on eating traditional chinese dinners with occasions of eating different foods and going out to eat and having "dim sums" which are chinese equivalent to tea time which was extremely big with my whole chinese family including grandparents, aunts and uncles. Real chinese food that I use to eat in Hong Kong was extremely different then the fake chinese food here in America. In Hong Kong there is no such thing as chicken and broccoli or sesame chicken and most of the foods are more freshly made. When I moved to New York when I was ten years old my eating habits changed completely. I no longer eat dinners or any meals at the dining table, there were no more dim sums and my family was pretty separated most of the time. This was the time I was living with my father for the first time and my father mostly eat out, I eat in front of the television, and my brother eat his meals while hiding in his room playing warcrafts (which i must state I hate warcrafts and anyone who plays that mine sucking game is a looser). I started to indulge on a lot of things because when I moved to America it was my first time eating certain things like McDonalds. There was always a good amount of food in my old apartment that I lived in when I first moved to America. I think this really relates to the mainstream corporate food ways since most Americans eat in front of the television and I never really heard of any other families eating together at a table unless it was when they went out to a restaurant. My present eating habits are pretty much the same but a little different. I do not actually eat full healthy meals that a human is suppose to eat, breakfast, lunch, snack, and dinner. Sometimes i eat up to one to two meals a day, this may be because of the fact that I am usually really busy. For example in the morning when I wake up I always try to get ready and rush to school and not be late making no time to eat breakfast. I think this is true for many other Americans as America or New York is a rushing city where everyone is always in a rush. There are many time that there are foods that I am not able to finish and although at times I wrap them up to save in the fridge they end up either staying in the fridge to rot forever or end up being thrown away, I think this definitely show the typical mainstream food ways since most Americans waste hundreds of dollars worth of food a year. American has become a country that cares so much on making money off of anything that people make money off of something people need on a daily bases to survive, food. Since food is processed so much in America and all the different types of foods that people do not really see it as something with a lot of value like gold or luxury items and tend to waste it a lot not thinking of the many people in other countries or the many who are in poverty who can't get the basic foods they need.

At the restaurant that my boyfriend works at, me, my boyfriend and some other friends eating. The restaurant is Italian or supposedly Italian and a little fancy. I stuffed my face that day since food was free. We get free food since my boyfriend works there on weekends.


This was taken in Hong Kong of Summer '08. Me and my friend from Hong Kong met up and eat dinner together. This dish is the real Chinese version of what you can find in Americanized Chinese restaurants as "Pan Friend Noodles". This day we only eat this dish for dinner, which we shared. I do not eat and stuff my face as much when I am in Hong Kong then when I am here in America.

Food Question Assignment

One question that I had on my mind was: How much food that is harvest gets wasted by an average American household?
America apparently is known to be the "throw-away society" where many Americans waste a large amount of food that is thrown away and never consumed. According to a study by the University of Arizona shows that 40 to 50 percent of all foods that are harvest and never actually consumed/ eaten and end up being thrown away and wasted.

How much can America or an Average American can save on the wasted foods they do no eat?

To an average household of four people the percent of food wasted is 14 percent and the money they are wasting away can add up to $590 per year just from meat, vegetables, fruits, and grain products. And as nationwide household foods can add up to 43 billion dollars which can be a major economic situation.

Source: http://www.news-medical.net/?id=6445

Whats in my fridge...

In my fridge contains:
-Frozen Peas
-Frozen Ego Waffles
-A Blue Ice Packer Thing
-Butter
-Pasta Sauce
-Two Potatoes
-Month old almost empty orange juice carton
-Two apples
-One fairly old orange
-Icing
-Milk
-Craft Cheese
-Almost empty Perrier bottle
-And a crap load of different sauces such as Caesar dressing, soya saucse, Italian dressing, ketchup etc. that has probably never really been used.

In my fridge it may be noticed that it does not contain a very large content of fresh foods and mostly frozen foods. I think compared to many other middle class families or households with two people would probably on average have a lot more food in their fridge compared to my fridge. I do not think this has anything to do with the fact that I am vegetarian although my friends seem to think so. Personally I think the lack of fresh foods such as fresh vegetable or even drinks or fruits and other common fridge items is mainly due to either 1) me and my father are too lazy to go shopping 2) I don't eat very much and somtimes only eat 1 meal a day with some small snacks throughout the day and 3) my dad doesn't spend much time at home so the majority of his meals are eating outside in resturaunts or wherever he eats at. I think by looking at the content in my fridge, if anyone else has the same amount of food as I do, shows that maybe americans tend to have a lot of frozen foods that can be kept in the fridge for a long amount of time such as frozen waffles, frozen vegtables, t.v. Dinners, frozen everything! I think this is because of the laziness of americans to actually cook a whole meal from scratch. Everyone does it the easy was of popping things into the microwave. One two three and ready to eat. I personally do not know many people who actually cook meals from scratch besides from my boyfriend's mother who is spanish. I think it is a tradition and common for her to cook her daily rice and beans, fish, and chicken compared to my daily life to frozen peas. She does not work and spends most of her time at home, but not everyone is lucky like my boyfriend to have a mother who loves to cook huge amount of meals for the family. Another thing that my fridge may say amount how people buy food in America may be the fact that people tend to buy foods that they may sometimes leave in the fridge till they grow mold and eventually needs to be thrown away. In America, people who are at least living over the poverty line probably most of the time buy foods that they don't actually really end up eating and if they do cook it most people tend to waste food and even over flow there plate and not put the amount they can actually consume which results in perfectly good wasted food. Although my fridge may not contain a lot of foods it still can show how people deal with their food on a daily bases.

This is a picture of my fridge. I eat the frozen peas so you even though its on the list it is not in this picture. This picture when i saw it made me laugh because it somewhat embarrassing on how empty my fridge is. And I also put a picture up of whats in my cabinet so that I can show that even if my fridge is completely empty my cabinet is somewhat full and that there is a a few things I would eat that is in the cabinet.

American Health Care Essay Assignment

Comparative Analysis to Health care in the United States vs. Health Care in Canada and a little bit to other countries. Why is health care so difficult in the United States and why doesn't anyone do anything about it?

In the United States health care is a big issue that people and families have to face at least once whether it is a big medical treatment that is denied by health insurance or the big expenses and dept from medical care. America is supposedly one of the countries that spend the most on health insurance according to the OECD (Organization of Economic Co-operation and Development). This is ironic because America is also one of the countries with the highest prices and expenses for one to get health care services(Wikipedia.com). In America, there is almost no such thing as free health care. Insurance companies have made is extremely difficult for people to get the right health care, especially for those who are poor and cannot afford health insurance at all. The result of this is the 18 million out of 50 million people who die because of the fact that they do not have health insurance (Micheal Moore, Sicko). It makes one wonder why so many are left with no medical care. It is said that citizens from other countries such as Canada or Britain are far more healthier and have a longer life span than Americans. In Micheal Moore documentary Sicko, mentions that according to the Medical Health Associations, illnesses such as hearth diseases, stroke, lung diseases, cancer, etc are more common and significantly higher to Americans. What is it that causes all the citizens in other countries to be far more healthier? What system are they using that America seems to fail to adopt or realize? The answer may be free health care.

In the United States the health care system are run by a system known as HMO (Health Maintenance Organization). It is a specific type of health care plan that sets guidelines under which doctors can operate and are also mainly run mostly by private businesses. When joining HMO plans a person is usually given a negotiation of certain affordable health care and eliminate unnecessary treatments so HMO can reduce cost. A person is usually provided with one doctor where the doctor works with the HMO in determining what treatments a person does and does not need. Health care coverage through the system of HMO is supposedly to cost less than traditional health care coverage but the catch is that there is usually a limitation and denial of a range of different treatments(WiseGeek.com). In other countries such as Canada, the system is different but first to explore the difficultly that people face with the health care in the United States.

In the United States most people cannot afford certain medical treatments, and most people always seem to have some difficulty when dealing with insurance companies. In my family I have medical insurance known as child health plus and although I have come to many small annoying conflicts with my insurance company I am lucky enough to say I or anyone else in my family have not have any major medical treatments that were denied by our health insurance. As I wish I can say this is true for other families unfortunately in most cases people can be denied of medical treatment whether how extreme the medical problem may be. In the United States those who cannot afford to pay for health insurance or medical bills are thrown out on the street like garbage. This is especially true for homeless people in America. In Los Angles many who cannot afford to pay for a medical bill in hospitals are dumped by the hospitals to the Union Rescue Mission group in downtown Los Angles or maybe even just dumped out on the street(Sicko). This is shown in Micheal Moore documentry as he states "Is this what we've become? A nation that dumps their citizens like so much garbage on the side of the curb because they can't pay for the medical bill?" Those who can afford health insurance and afford to pay medical bills get the medical treatment they need but as for the others are associated to garbage. This is most likely why the 18 million people out of the 50 million die.

It is common to hear that Canada has a better health care system then the United States. Although this can be a matter of opinion. In interviews that were conducted during a session in history class there were many different opinions on the American health care system by common citizens in the streets of New York. Many who said that they very much liked the American health care system are people who were most likely either rich or are payed for by the government since they were people who worked for the government. For example was a elderly man on crutches, he stated that the health care system in the US was a 10 out of 10 for him and the best health care. He stated that his doctor charged him more for a medical treatment since he was rich and he was okay with that. This shows the idea how those who can afford the medical bills get the medical treatment they they need. Although others disagree with the American Health care system such as Scott Chesler who stated "Health is a right and the government should be giving people means to be more healthy." and that "If the government is not keeping us healthy then what are they doing?" He also mentioned that the health care system maybe should not be exactly socialist like England or Cuba but the government should definitely provide the health care that is needed. Unlike the United States Canada's health car esystem is more of a single payer which is a system where everyone is covered by the same plan which pays private providers(Class Notes, Andy Synder). The advantages to this is that since it is free it enables there citizens to get the proper health care they need. This may be one of the main reasons that some Americans citizens who cannot afford health care go to Canada to get there health care even though this is illegal if you are not an acutal Canadian citizen. Many Canadians who visit America on the other hand tend to buy insurance before stepping over the boarder because of the 'just in case' reasons since they do not want to get caught in the American Health system in case anything happens that causes them to need medical attention (show in Sicko). "It turns out that Canadians live three years longer then we do" (Micheal Moore, Sicko).

Another country with free health care along with England and Canada is France. What are some reasons that these countries are using this system and not America? I mean free health for everyone does not sound like a bad thing does it? One of the reasons is fear and protest. For example in Sicko, Micheal Moore interviews a group of Americans that are living in France and something I found insightful that was mentioned to why America may not be getting the basic needs they want as much as France is because the government in France are afraid of the people.As if the people run their country the government fear protest and bad reactions from the citizens. In the United States it's almost the complete opposite, the people seem to be more afraid of the government and are afraid of protesting. We fear the government that we are not willing to stand up what we believe is unfair or wrong. Micheal Moore also mentioned that as America sees another good idea such as a better car, a better wine, better technology that another country comes up with, America does not seem so hesitant to adopt that idea so why is it that America is having such a hard time being able to adopt a better health care system that will insure better health and at least one less hardship for all? The answer to this could be the conclusion that Micheal Moore's documentary when he stated that other countries" live in a world of 'we' not 'me', we'll never fix anything until we get that one basic thing right. and powerful forces hope that we never do." Without this basic concept of thinking as a country whole and not just about the money we make in out pockets America will keep being one of the only countries without free health care and will remain at a low on the list of good health care. And the "powerful forces" may have more power but if we continue to give them that power and not do anything about it we may never receive anything that will better out lives and our health.

Health Care

The movie Sicko explores the health care systems in the United States and how health care companies try to get as many people to sign up for there health care plan and also the many people who are denied certain health care. It also compares the health care system in the United States to many other country's health care systems.
My health care plan is Child Health Plus which what I think is quite common for most. The health care company is Empire and I have never faced any major emergency problems where I am denied any care but I have encountered many scenarios for denial of care of smaller things. One of the main thing that my health care denies the most is situations dealing with dental care. It puzzles me and makes me wonder what is going on since my father who needs some pretty major surgery on his spine because of a fractured disc is able to get the surgery since the health care is in fact covering the procedure. I was surprised when my dad told me that our health care is going to cover his procedure. Although luckily my dad's surgery has be approved I have come across many problems that are not as major that have been denied by my health care. For example is when I got a root canal and went to the dentist, after the procedure was done as soon as I was going to get the crown to insure my tooth would be okay my dentists tells me "your health care company doesn't cover crowns." At that moment I was so puzzled and annoyed. The dentist ended up filling up the giant whole in my tooth but told me I would need to get a crown eventually because the filling would not last forever. That was around 6 months ago and to this very day I still have not gotten the approval to get a crown. Another thing that my health care does not cover is birth control. It frustrated me on how many tiny little things that my health care denies to treat but it also makes me wonder why they would accept to cover my dad's surgery and not cover all my tiny little treatments. Does Child Health Plus not have as many benefits as if you were an adult? Although there has always been a little annoyance my family's experience with health care isn't not that bad. Most of the heavy bills and bad experiences my family had to deal with is dental care. It does not compare to those in the movie Sicko, like the man who was denied surgery and ended up dieing because of the health care companies denial of treatment.
The morals for health in the United States are horrible. It is surprising to me how other countries, people are almost never denied of health care and go into the hospitals sick and come out totally healthy. It makes me wonder more to why the United States does not adopt these other health care systems that other countries have. Personally I think that people's health should not be needed to be made into a waiting game of whether they can or cannot get certain treatments.

Wealth is like Musical Chairs

Poverty in the United States is a big problem as around 35.9 million people are living below the poverty line, the poverty line is 1400 dollars in the US. According to (http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_many_people_in_america_are_homeless)"Approximately 750,000 Americans are homeless due to lack of employment, mental illness, drug abuse, physical and mental abuse, lack of or low education, developmental disabilities and the stigma of HIV/AIDS( National Coalition for the Homeless,2001)." When reading this answer you can notice that this answer implies that those who are poor or homeless are mainly because of problems that involve their personal fault like illnesses or drug abuse. I think this answer can be true to my guess of 10% of the time the other 90% it is not because is is not always the poor people's fault. I think this is a ridiculous reason because even though as we discussed in class that some main theories to those in poverty is lower expectations, subculture of poverty, kids that are influenced that by throwing out their education they win by loosing, etc, but one main significant reason to why poverty is consuming most of the Untied States is because there just is not enough damn opportunities provided for those trying to get out from under the poverty line.
In class we demonstrated a number of different reasons and explanation of poverty in America by using chairs. First we played a game of musical chairs. Everyone should be familiar with this game, there are only a limited amount of chairs or "slots" for people to claim until they have no choice to sit out as not all are willing to fight or kick each other for a seat. Comparing this game to poverty the chairs are suppose to represent number of opportunities such as employment or aids such as health care or food stamps, etc. People have to fight for their "chair" and those who cannot fight are not helped at all and are even blamed for their lack of will power to fight for those opportunities and are even blamed for being lazy.
When learning in class about the wealth distribution in the United States, it is really shocking how unfair it is as there is that 1% of people who claim 17.5% of the wealth the the US as the bottom 60 million only have 2.2% of the wealth. To visually demonstrate this unfairness to the class we again used a line up row of chairs. Each chair represented I think 5% of the wealth. In the front of the line of chairs the one percent or the one person claimed 5 of the chairs all the himself. As the next one person claimed 4 of the chairs, the next two people had to chair four chairs, and the numbers shrink and shrink till people become cramped at the end of the live where around five people are so are cramped up and are forced to chair one or two chairs. The cramped up people at the end of the row represent the huge amount of people who are in poverty and only get the tiny percent of wealth compared to those three or four people in the front of the row that are living large. This is clearly an unfair distribution but ironically it is an example for how the wealth is distributed in the United States.
Lastly, with another game of musical chairs, this time the game was a little different as some of the chairs were claimed by certain people in the class. These three people represented the rich. As the game went on, more and more chairs were claimed by the same people as more people where being booted out of the game. In the end of the game, all the chairs were claimed by the same three people and for those did not have a name on a chair we either had to fight for a chair without a name on it or we had to give up. At the end there was only one chair left that was not claimed. If i could remember the last chair was claimed by Kevin Williams, the rest of us were being blamed for our lack of will and our laziness for not fighing for the chair as that oppourtunity could have been open to anyone. The last chair that was not claimed is to signify how there is always that one tiny and almost impossible to get oppourtunity to claim so that the poor are able to fight for it and can never mention that there were no opportunities and are made to blame themselves for not being able to claim that oppourtunity. Again, there are not enough opportunities because all the opportunities are already claimed by the rich. Those who are poor wish they were middle class, and those who had claimed 4 chairs wished they had the next ran up claiming 6 chairs. It just shows how the people, even those who are rich enough just look up to wanting to be those who are richer. What about those under poverty, are they really being helped enough? Those who are rich get so much opportunities already. Even if there is certain welfare and aids for those who are poor the tax is the United States does not help either. The tax in the United States is mostly regressive which basically means that those who are poor pay a higher percent of income then those who are rich. With this new knowledge learned in class I think the reasoning on that website of people in poverty because of their own fault should definitely be changed as it is not always the people in poverty's fault and is the system in the United States for not giving enough opportunity to be blamed.

Wealth and Poverty Internet Research

1-What percentage of people are below the poverty line?
According to the US Census Bureau, 35.9 million people live below the poverty line in America.
http://www.soundvision.com/Info/poor/statistics.asp

2-How many of those are children under the poverty line?
There is 12.9 million children living under the poverty line.
http://www.soundvision.com/Info/poor/statistics.asp

3-How many people who are in poverty actually own there own homes?
43% of people who are poor actually own there own homes.The average home owned by persons classified as poor by the Census Bureau is a three-bedroom house with one-and-a-half baths, a garage, and a porch or patio.
http://www.heritage.org/research/welfare/bg2064.cfm

4-What are the poverty rates of different races?
Poverty rate for African Americans: 26.1 percent
Poverty rate for Asians and Pacific Islanders: 12.5 percent
Poverty rate for Hispanics of any race: 25.6 percent
Poverty rate for non-Hispanic whites: 8.2 percent
http://www.soundvision.com/Info/poor/statistics.asp

5-What are percentage of people under the poverty line in other countries?
Hondurans: 50.7%
Afghanistan: 53%
South Africa: 50%
Venezuela: 47%
Dominican Republic: 42.2%
Pakistan: 35%
Brazil: 31%
Philippines: 30%
Romania: 25%
Spain: 19.8%
Russia: 14.8%
Mexico: 13.8%
Canada: 10.8%
China: 8%
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/eco_pop_bel_pov_lin-economy-population-below-poverty-line

6-What are the the different ages of people in poverty?
The poverty rate increased for people 18 to 64 years old (from 10.8 percent in 2003 to 11.3 percent in 2004), but declined for those age 65 and older (from 10.2 percent in 2003 to 9.8 percent in 2004).
http://www.census.gov/Press-Release/www/releases/archives/income_wealth/005647.html

7-What is the Census Bureau?
"Government agency that is responsible for the United States Census. It also gathers other national demographic and economic data. The Bureau of the Census is part of the United States Department of Commerce. The agency director is a political appointee selected by the current President."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Census_Bureau