Today I find myself in a
wet and windy Exeter, enjoying the hospitality of the library in the
city centre which has been thoughtfully provided with a pleasant
little coffee shop in the vestibule. The castle backs on to the
grounds of a centuries old Norman castle which, in recent years, has
been thoughtfully landscaped to provide a very pleasing setting on a
warm summer's day. Unfortunately, at the time of writing, warm
summer's days are but a distant hope; the ground beneath one's feet
squelches to the tread and all is soggy and waterlogged, adding an
extra incentive to stay within the confines of the building and enjoy
the fayre on offer here.
Apart from a wide variety
of cakes and similar comestibles, the fayre seems reasonably fair in
this place, in contrast to most establishments I have visited since
returning to the UK. What passes for food in this benighted land is
normally high in fat, swimming in grease or comes pre-wrapped from a
factory, bearing little or no resemblance to anything natural or
organic. Quite often these packets come with pretty little labels
indexing all the various ingredients and percentages thereof and just
how much fat, carbohydrate and protein is contained therein. Little
or no food seems to come in its natural form, unprocessed or sans
addictive that add little to the nutritional value.
These days, such 'food' is
the standard fayre on offer in the UK; if one requires anything
beyond the range of these mundane offerings one is required to both
search far and wide and to pay out a proverbial arm and a leg. Most
don't bother, or simply cannot afford to bother, hence insuring an
unremittingly poor diet for themselves and their families.
For all my criticisms of
China, and there were many, the diet there is infinitely better (and
infinitely cheaper) than it is here. One comes across the odd rotund
person in China, but the norm, even into great age, is slim and
fit-looking people. The contrast with the UK could not be more stark,
and seems to become more and more obvious each time I return from
one of my sojourns.
The streets of Exeter seem
to be filled to bursting with the rotund, the generously-proportioned, the
wide-of-berth, the ample-figured, the big-boned, the plus-sized, the
hefty, the chubby, the plump, the obese and even, what we used to
call in previous, less politically correct times, the fat. They
wibble and wobble down the street, huffing and puffing, panting and
grunting; so much so in fact that one is concerned as to their very
survival whenever they are met with such severe challenges as an
incline, a few steps or a slightly more than normally substantial door..
A close friend of mine
insists that these people are their own worst enemies, that the
choices they make dictate the state of their bodies, that they really
should have the self-discipline to make appropriate food choices and
to take a little exercise occasionally. Personally, I feel that is a
tad unfair given the type of fayre that is normally on offer in the
supermarkets and hostelries of this land. There really isn't that
much choice, particularly if you live in straitened circumstances, as
so many do in what the Daily Mail insists is economically successful Britain.
Another good friend
espouses a type of conspiracy theory wherein the great mass (no pun
intended…) of people are fed rubbish in order to render them
suitable customers for the pharmaceutical industry as their health
inevitably deteriorates. Again, I would not fully subscribe to such
ideas, but one has to admit that the average UK citizen is usually imbibing
a copious cornucopia of tablets and other forms of medication by the time they reach the ripe old age of fifty. Huge sums do indeed seem to be made at both ends of this
equation, firstly in feeding people such poor food as to lead
inevitably to obesity, and secondly from the doomed attempts to deal
with the concomitant health problems such as cardiovascular disease,
high blood pressure and diabetes.
Many moons ago, back in the
nineties, I enjoyed an interesting, if somewhat challenging, trip to
India. As happens to so many who take on extended visits to that
land, I managed to contract a form of 'Dehli-belly' (appropriately
enough in Dehli) and came back from my travels some 10 kgs lighter
than when I left. The people of the sub-continent were, in those far
off days, more or less inevitably slim. A couple of months later, I
followed that trip with another to Florida, my first to the United
States. The contrast could not have been greater. On my first
morning, I came across my first mall and my first food section,
stuffed full of fast-food outlets. A few metres in front of me, bound
for the same outlets, was a woman of indeterminate age wearing,
perhaps unwisely, shorts and a singlet. She must have been at least
150 kgs, probably more. As I observed her ponderous advance towards
her fervently desired destination I found myself trying to work out
within which folds, of a very high number of folds in her ample legs, her knees were contained. The image reminded me oddly of the
Michelin Man in those wonderfully antediluvian French posters.
At the time it was known
that the US was in the midst of an obesity crisis. Little did I
realise that just a few years later many of those same fast-food
outlets would be littering the streets of the UK (and indeed, Europe
and the World) bringing with them the subsequent problems and
deleterious effects on the nations health, perhaps particularly on a
younger generation who have scarcely ever known anything better.
Back in the library café,
the rain is lashing hard against the windows as I finish this week's
offering. Currently in the West country, it tends to vary between
drizzle and violent downpour, so I await my chance to get merely
slowly soaked rather than drowned beneath a veritable inundation. In
the meantime I have treated my self to a second Americano but, in
view of the above, resisted the temptation to indulge in the various
cakes, muffins and sticky buns on offer ...
On this incredibly bright
and cloudless day I find myself seeking some relief from the
relentless white heat of the sun in the air-conditioned sanctuary of
the Hua Hong cafe in the old, down-town part of Kanchanaburi. The cafe
in itself is somewhat unique with its separate rooms, partitioned off
from each other, its black-lacquered wood and its enchantingly
old-world feel. Architecturally, it is something of a leftover from
the 1930's when this part of town had a thriving Chinese community.
These days, the area is largely run down, the paint fading, the
buildings crumbling, but it still retains enough of its charms to be
redolent of former glories.
It is around half three in
the afternoon, so the schools are emptying and a steady stream of
young Thais are making good their daily escape from the tyranny of a nearby educational establishment,
resplendent in their white and blue uniforms. I watch them filing
past whilst I alternately sip either a hot americano or an ice-cold
strawberry shake. I wonder why, all around the globe, it seems that
kids are condemned to wear European style schools uniforms; what is
wrong with the local style I wonder, in this heat it might be far
more pragmatic.
Amongst the kids, to quite
an alarming extent, I cannot help but observe that there are a large
number of the big-boned, the heroically proportioned, the plump, the
Rubenesque or what used to be known, in the less PC days of yore, as
the fat. They waddle down the road blocking the already far too
narrow pavements, sweating and grunting their way through the hot
afternoon sun.
In typical Thai fashion,
many prefer to avoid the waddling and instead plump themselves onto a
groaning scooter, their bodies seemingly settling down over either
side of the too narrow saddle as the suspension groans under the
weight. Tis often the case that one espies many of the younger, not so
gravitationally-challenged Thais on scooters sharing the experience,
travelling two, three or even, on occasion, four to a bike. This is
not the case with the more full-bodied, amply proportioned kids …
just one of these specimens is quite enough for any bike to bear.
There is an interesting
phenomena that occurs when one revisits a country several times over
a period of years. Much as when one visits a young family every few
months, one becomes aware of the changes in the children, how quickly
they change and grow, perhaps even more conscious than the parents
themselves. Much the same sort of thing occurs when one revisits a
country, one notices changes that those who live in the country may
not.
Revisiting China, for
example, it was noticeable how the traffic is just a little better
behaved (still terrible, mind you, but better ...), the expectorating
reduced, the air a little more breathable. Revisiting Thailand for
the third consecutive year, it is clear that some things are
changing, and changing quite rapidly. Riders are mostly wearing crash
hats now, whereas this was a relative rarity on previous visits,
Bangkok is booming, even if against a background of economic
struggle, and the kids are getting fatter and fatter.
There is a perception,
fairly commonly held by many in Asian countries, that people from the
West are bigger and stronger. They generally put this down to the
diet of Western countries and, in particular, to the consumption of
meat. For many cultures, China and India in particular, corpulence
is even looked upon as a sign of success, a sign of the overweight
person having the ability and the means to be able to afford to consume large amounts of
food.
The consumption of meat, in
particular such things as burgers and fried chicken, has gathered
pace to an alarming extent in recent years across the region.
Now, in China, it is actually quite difficult to find restaurants
that cater adequately for a non-meat diet. There is even a look of
incredulity when it is explained that someone does not actually want
to eat meat. My friend and guide in China often had to explain my
lack of meat eating in terms of my being a monk and thereby having
'special' dietary requirements (I quite liked the bit about being a
'monk', few things could be further from the truth ...).
The Chinese themselves now
have many of the same old problems associated with the consumption of
meat that the West has suffered for some time. Rates of high blood
pressure, stroke and heart attack are all increasing rapidly. Cancer
rates, already high because of the toxic affects of polluted air and
water and the large proportion of smokers, are now also growing in
those types of cancers related to diet. On top of this, the Chinese
military have also suffered some less generalised (no pun
intended...) problems: it seems that many of the new recruits to the
Peoples Liberation Army are now not only much less fit than they once
were, but struggle even to fit into the standard issue tanks. This
has meant a huge (again, no pun intended...) expense to redesign and
refit their armoured weaponry.
In Thailand, the problem is
exaggerated somewhat by the less than active lifestyle. To be fair,
often the country is simply too hot to exert oneself on a continuous
basis and one has to pace oneself throughout the long, hot day.
Living daily in such an environment, the Thai's have become
highly-skilled exponents of such pacing. During my flaneurial
meanderings, I see many examples of the application of their
expertise as they snooze happily by the roadside in home-made
hammocks, slung beneath improvised lean-tos, contentedly dozing for hour after hour.
This is all very well, and
even maybe a necessary adaptation to the conditions, but when you add
this lack of movement to a diet high in sweet foods (sugar or syrup
seems to be added to almost everything that is not savoury here),
burgers and fried chicken, then you have a recipe (I have got to stop
doing this...) for disaster. Even during the three years that I have
been coming to this land, there has been a noticeable increase in the
numbers of rotund, of the well-built, of the generously configured.
Those of more ample proportion may not be in the majority yet, but
they are weighing in (sigh...) and changing the balance considerably.
The big-boned, the buxom and the cuddly are becoming the norm,
especially amongst the children. This is not a healthy development
either for Thailand or, more importantly, for themselves.
Back in the Hua Hong cafe,
I look around at several other Thais enjoying their coffee. Most of
them are in their late twenties, several are older. The females are
slim and slight and appear to be quite healthy, the gents a little
corpulent, but still relatively reasonably proportioned. The
contrast with many of the younger generation could scarcely be
greater.
Oh well, at least the coffee is good, the air conditioning pleasantly cooling and the cafe itself rather wonderful. In fact, I would have to say this is one of the loveliest I have ever had the good fortune to visit. Kanchanaburi is fortunate in having a wide selection of interesting cafes but, having sampled many such establishments by now, I would have to say that this is one of the most beautiful and an ideal place for those of a flaneurial mindset to sit and ponder on a hot afternoon in Thailand.
