Looking Back

My identity at the Oxfam hunger banquet.

When reflecting on this assignment I noticed a few trends in the meals I ate, things I noticed mostly from the pictures I took. But I also realized a lot about my eating habits from attending an Oxfam hunger banquet. At the banquet, we each were randomly assigned to either the lower, upper, or middle class. I was randomly assigned as one of the 6 members of the upper class. During this exercise, I ate at a fully set table and was waited on and served a three course meal(which was similar to the foods I would eat at home) while the majority of people there sat on the floor eating rice out of bowls with no silverware and drinking 'dirty' water. The upper class was defined as people making more than $12,000 USD/year! I can't believe that is the world's standard for the upper class. As cheesy as it sounds, this experience was really moving for me, especially after documenting what I had been eating for a week. I realized how fortunate I am to have food everyday, without working for it really, and also how fortunate I am to have choice. To chose what I want to eat, to be vegetarian or not, to chose healthy(and expensive) options, and to be able to eat until I am full. In real life, I am also in the upper class. As I mentioned in my blog entries, many of of my meals were eaten around a table complete with table cloth, candles, and multiple options and enough food for everybody. I am very fortunate in many aspect of my life, and my diet is no exception.

I noticed some other things about the meals I eat. I noticed that I am healthier than I give credit for. Only one of my meals contained meat, and it wasn't the biggest portion on my plate. Also my meals contained an average of 2.57 different vegetables and five of my seven meals had a salad as the main course or a side dish. I also noticed that I did not cook a single meal of the seven I documented. I think this can partially be attributed to my traveling for the first half of break, and also to the fact that I am not home very often and my parents like to cook my favorite meals for me when I am home.
I found this experience to be more personal than I anticipated and I am glad I chose this as an option for my creative activity project. I also learned how to make a blog, this is my first, and I think it is really fun. If I won the lottery(big time though), I think blogging would become a new hobby of mine. When thinking about this project in relation to Earlham College and my Environment and Society class, I feel like we should have more assignments like this that put us into the context of what we are learning. I think a really interesting project option would be for students to document every single action they take in one day (i.e. turning on lights, checking the weather online before class, using the sink to brush teeth, attending class, eating in saga, working out in the wellness center, using the Internet to do work) and record how many of those actions are only possible with a technology or source not seen to the student. I think it would be fairly impossible to track back this sort of think, but I believe a serious reflection on the disconnectedness of our actions would be really interesting and eye opening.