Uganda Recap: Top 10 Highlights

Four months ago, I set out on an adventure to Africa for my mater's research project with the University of Minnesota. It was an amazing 3 weeks full of adventures---  definitely a trip of a lifetime!! I am so grateful for the Healthy Foods Healthy Lives (PDF Doc) grant that helped get me to Africa--  and made the research component of my trip possible!

Now that my grad school semester is over-- and things are winding down, I decided to go through some old pictures and highlight just a few of my experiences and perspectives!

Top 10 highlights and lessons learned:

1) Met amazing people!! My awesome Ugandan research team, a few med-students, public health students, "random" travel buddies, a peace-core volunteer.. and more!

2) Learned a lot about the Moringa tree (PDF abstract about my research study). I am still in the analysis stage of the research--- so I can't say anything more! Qualitative research is much more difficult than I had anticipated--- but really incredible!

3) African food!!!! It was delicious --  extremely cheap and easy to eat vegan there too! I consider that a bonus! (see related blog posts: Feasting on Traditional Foods and In Uganda: Plant-based )

4) Witnessed the globalization of food, diet, westernized culture. We live in a small world. Big food industry and tobacco (yes, still) are taking over the world... This was definitely not a highlight, but rather lessons learned.

5) Ran out of water for a couple of days.... (see related blog post). It had something to do with these pipes....

6) Went on an African safari!!! It was absolutely breathtaking to watch these beautiful creatures in their natural environments. The creatures of this Earth are incredible! Let's be good stewards to them.

7) Elephants!!! I fell in LOVE with elephants!

8) Met 2 designer and had a dress made for me! (see related blog post)

9) Deeper appreciation for life of all forms--- animals, humans, and plants. Richer understanding of community--- and the importance community plays in our need for security and ultimately our survival.

10) I feel privileged, yet very thankful to be able to do what I do, to see the places I have seen, and to have met the people I have met on all of my global journeys.... all these people, places and experiences have helped shape who I am today and the perspectives I have on life, health, and living!

Bonus: Jackfruit... new favorite fruit!!

I am already looking forward to my next adventure! Hope you can come along with me! Stay tuned for upcoming Moxie travels!

Peace,

- Moxie Dietitian

Originally posted on Moxie Musing

SNAP: DAY ONE

Monday, Day One of my SNAP Challenge. 

How did it go!? Well, pretty darn good! I keep thinking about my meals though. It's like this constant counting and planning.. and worrying. Will my food go bad? will I be hungry later and not have enough? After dinner tonight, I decided that I might actually have more food than I thought... I  need to sit down and plan things out so I can STOP stressing and carry-on with my life. Writing a menu will help ease my mind about planning for the week.


Breakfast:
The morning started out with cinnamon banana oatmeal and a small side of berries. Seriously, don't buy the $1 berries unless you have to.. or if they are from the Farmer's Market. These were horribly sour. I threw mine in the freezer and plan to blend them up at the end of the week.

Oh and my coffee... I am not a black coffee kind of girl. I prefer a little dark cocoa powder in there with a splash of Almond milk. I know drinking coffee/ tea with your milk/ plant milk isnt the best for optimal nutrition (there are binders in the tea and coffee that inhibit absorption of minerals). I drink my coffee this way out of luxury not out of nutrition. I am "privileged" enough not to have to worry about those kinds of things...

I worked out before my class today, and had to contemplate if I wanted to eat my apple as a post workout snack. I opted not to. I decided to wait... I knew I was going to be hungry again come 2-3 pm. My glycogen stores will just not be prime today. Maybe tomorrow I will have to eat breakfast after I work out instead of before?

Lunch: 
Pumpkin soup: (Click me for recipe)! It was so tasty... except the microwave was broken at school, so I ate it cold. None-the-less, it was filling and held me over for the next 3 hours.

Thank you to my friends in Haiti for teaching me to make this!!! 

I drank a lot of water today. Well, actually no more than usual. Filling up my bottle really made me think.... you know, I am privileged to have access to clean drinking water and a BPA-free water bottle that gets cleaned in a dish washer. I am able to drink water that's CLEAN.. for free. I just kept thinking about what my (soon-to-be) sister-in-law was telling me about the water in El Paso, Texas. People can't drink out of the faucet. Water is muck brown and people get sick if they drink it. So what do they do? They have to buy water. Yeah, and mind you many of these people are not rolling in dough... This is something I take for granite EVERY SINGLE DAY. I don't have to make a decision between water or food.

SNACK: 
Just what I needed.... Something naturally sweet and chrunchy! Hmmm mmm

Dinner:
Well, I came home and was hungry. So I ate a small bowl of pumpkin soup.... (that soup will be never ending. I might have to freeze it by Wednesday). And I got to work on my master piece of a dinner.

I found the recipe first at the No Meat Athlete. And then followed his link to the burger recipe here: Lentil Burgers.


What did I do to modify my burgers?

1 cup lentils (40 cents)
1 1/2 cups oats (24 cents)
2 carrots (16 cents)
1 cup or so of spinach/ kale (25 cents)
A dash of garlic and basil (???)


....and then followed the instructions on the original recipe.

I contemplated topping them off with a little tomato paste, but decided to save that for the end of the week. I have some other creations up my sleeve!


Total cost of one burger?

Hmm its about 15 cents. 
THE DOLLAR MENU HAS NOTHING ON ME! 

Seriously, sometimes I think I eat like a queen.

I served my lentil burger on a bed of spinach with some roasted garlic squash and broccoli on the side. Nom Nom NOm..

And did I mention, I have six of these left in my possession! Looks like I can eat a vegg burger every single day of my SNAP challenge if I really want to! Maybe I will have to have friends over for dinner on Sunday to eat veggie burgers to celebrate the end of a successful week.....



Life is NOT boring eating plant-based on a budget!


Oh and about these little buggers....

Yeah, like I always say: SAVE THOSE SEEDS.  I roasted up the seeds from my squash this evening, and will be using them for some snacks throughout the week. Seriously, squash has to be the world's perfect food; starchy vegetable rich in vitamin C, beta carotene .. (that's just to name a few)... and packed with a center of proteins and fat (THE SEEDS).


So how much money did I spend on food today?
That's to be continued... time to get some actual homework done!

June 2013: Young Adult Mission Team

This is a long overdue blog about my last 4 week trip to Haiti (June 17- July 15). Each week will be it's own blog since I had some pretty incredible experiences over the course of my time in Haiti.

 So here goes a summary of week one.
Pictures are one of my favorite ways of telling the story, so don't be alarmed by the number of photos.


June 17- June 24:

My first week in Haiti, I lead another young adult mission team through Healing Haiti. Prior to the week, the thought of leading a short term mission trip was very difficult for me, especially after having had the experience of living and knowing Haiti on a much different level than a one week trip. I was a little nervous about leading the team and ruining their experience as either first timers or second timers to Haiti. To my surprise, the week ended up way better than I had ever imagined. We did a lot of new things that I haven't done before and all of the team members dove deep into their experiences. They asked serious questions about mission work, poverty, culture, and the world. It was a very insightful group... that wanted to discuss issues of why poverty exists, cultural differences, and the impacts that we can have on reducing poverty and oppression in our world. Weeks following the trip, the team updated each other about what they were working on changing in their lives to help create a healthier and more just world. Many of the efforts were related to consumption-- reducing their consumption of wastes (energy wastes, material wastes, water wastes), consumption of foods that impact the environment, buying fair trade food and clothing, and becoming educated about more worldly problems. The things that the team became aware of and a lot of our discussions came back to the fact that Americans consume much of the world's resources-- and often times at the expense of others. We discussed every thing from fast fashion to factory farms to the environmental toxins we put into the landfills and water streams due to our cosmetics and hygiene products. If your interested in learning more about these, here are a few useful resources:

If the world consumed as many resources as Americans, we would need 4 more planets!http://public.wsu.edu/~mreed/380American%20Consumption.htm

Environmental Work Group (food and products): http://www.ewg.org/

Food Empowerment Project (responsible food): http://www.foodispower.org/

Sol Inspiration (responsible fashion): http://www.sol-inspirations.org/


Day One: Travel Day! Haiti bound!

Some of the team members on our first day into Haiti!


Day Two: we took a group of children from Gerturdes (an orphanage for children with disabilities) to water therapy.

Off to our first activity! 

The children loved the ability to move in the water!! 

After water therapy a few of us ventured to a soccer field to play soccer with a few of the neighborhood boys!

The team was WAY too good at soccer,... beyond my ability. So we decided to run the field! 

Day Three: Delivered water to people in Cite Soleil, Haiti.

It's Water time kiddos!!! 

Washing out her bucket before filling it up!

My little buddy that I met two years ago in Cite Soleil! Haven't seen him in forever! He is turning into a young man! 

Hanging out with the animals at the water truck stop! 

Day Four: We toured Grace Village-- the place I called home for the past year! Following our tour, we took a visit to the elderly in the community. The team also took a trip to Wahoo Bay to enjoy the beautiful beaches and oceans along Haiti's coast! 

Touring Grace Village! 

Visiting the elderly! We brought them peanut butter sandwiches and bananas!

We had a few really interesting conversations with the elderly! 

My beautiful co-leader!

Just being goofy before hitting the waves!

I love the beach!!!

Day Five: Back to Cite Soleil to deliver more water! 

Water stop!

I guess I like to have a little fun with the kiddos! 

And while in Cite Soliel, I couldn't help but notice some beautiful things being sold.... plant food!

green onions and potatoes

Look at all those green leafy vegetables! Cabbage and Carrots! 

Fresh Mangos!

Plantains! 

Fresh coconuts!

(one of my favorite snacks)-- Popcorn!!! 

Peanuts! 

Even in Haiti's poorest slum, you can find a nice balanced and variety of food. Carbohydrates (potatoes, vegetables, fruits),  proteins (peanuts, vegetables), fat (peanuts, coconut). So it's not quiet the food desert you would think! Healthy Food IS AVAILABLE HERE. You just have to keep your eyes open for it!

A man in Cite Soleil even pointed out the Moringa tree to me when we were talking about nutrition! 

A recycling project in the heart of Cite Soleil! Love it!

Following our trip to Cite Soleil, we had the opportunity to visit the general hospital in downtown PAP. It was a very different experience than I have ever had before in Haiti. We interacted with some of the children and the elderly at the hospital. We talked with a few of the parents that were there caring for their children. The hospital is known for being one of the only hospitals that remained standing during the 2010 Earthquake..... just imagining the devastation and the heartbreak of what the hospital looked like that day was unbearable.  

 Day Six: Grace village! Our team went to Grace Village and did stations with the kiddos at the orphanage. We set the day up to be like an Expo Fair where the kids could learn a few different things! We had a solar activity, a fitness activity, a hemoglobin test, and musical lessons. The hemoglobin test was apart of a research project for a student and for my nutritional work at Grace. We were surprised by the number of children who were willing to participate! Following our day at Grace Village we hit up some of Haiti's finest metal artists and then had some of the children from the orphanage over to the guesthouse for dinner! What a treat for them!

Hemoglobin Testers!

I had my hemoglobin tested too. 13.4 g/dL (Normal for woman is 12-15.5 g/mL).  Looks like this vegan has a stellar hemoglobin! 

A homemade solar oven! 

Racing Solar Cars!

Teaching the children about solar energy! 

Yoga with the kiddos!

Picking Moringa! I made my team try it! 

zumba! 

All the younger children joined the teams for Taco night at the guesthouse!

My good friend skye came down from Grace Village to join us for dinner! Skye is a LTM with Healing Haiti. We use to be roommates!! It was so great to see her and catch-up!!

Day Seven: We went to church at Grace Village and then shopped for artwork in Haiti. We also brought some of the neighbor boys out for another round of soccer! They loved it!

Church at Grace Village!

On our shopping trip, we ran into a car race in the middle of PAP! Awesome to see some community activities! 

Soccer! 

On Monday (day 8) the team left back home to the United States, except for my team member Kayleen who was just starting her long term missionary work in Haiti. The two of us hung out for a bit to talk about mission work, nutrition, health, and transitional living. I am excited about the work she will be engaging in at Grace Village. Following our conversation, Kayleen headed to Grace Village and I stayed in PAP for another week to attend to other business!! 

To be continued. 

Might I also add that my team members ROCK! We just had a reunion party last night and it ended-up being an entirely vegetarian meal!! It was potluck style and this was the order from me:

1. fruit 

2. veggies 
3. grain 
4. protein
5. dessert
6. beverages 

And this is what we get.....

A great group of friends! 

Homemade bruschetta with sweet potato chips

"Pitimi" (sorghum in English) all the way from Haiti!! I made this one with coconut milk, bananas, mangos, and fresh mint leaves!

"Pitimi" and black beans with lightly sauteed kale, carrots, and onions. Topped with lemon juice, fresh basil, and olive oil.

Grilled veggie and fruit kabobs! No meat here! One of my friends soaked the fruit in Haitian rum and then grilled it... awesome! 

Fresh Summer fruit mix! 

Vegan Rhubarb pie! Complements to the chef for keeping out the animal products! 

Our fancy Healing Haiti cake! 

Need a new refreshing summer drink? Try soaking cucumber, kiwi, and lemon (or use a dash of 100% lemon juice)  in your water. Add mint leaves and chia seeds if you want to get fancy!

Now are you hungry!?