My attempt at veganity …

Some time ago I had a discussion about „healthy life“, so to speak. It wasn’t really a discussion – it was a match of cliches and who – if any – gave up first. One of the topics I most strongly disagreed on was the „vegan lifestyle“. After a bit of tracing out, we came to a working definition of vegan food (and even I know that there are many, and in my opinion  they all have one thing in common, which I will tell you further down the article).

„Living without eating animals or things produced by animals. So, every fruit, plant, nut, oil and spice and everything that is not made by animals in the widest definition (including bacteria and mushrooms) or has animal products in it, is fair game.“

And, quite shocking, after a rather short discussion – which only lasted about 20 Minutes, I have to admit, I was floored, down for the count, dumbstruck and so forth. Not by the arguments, but by a simple question: „It isn’t hard to do, It doesn’t require prepartion, but you haven’t done it. Why not? “

Well, that stung.

Quite a bit actually, and therefore: „Science ahead!“ I became a vegan, for the forseeable future, or what I thought would be the forseeable future at this time. For two weeks I lived completley without any „animal intake“ whatsover. I certainly am not an advocate of the daily pig, but as a former baker and notorious eater and food-adventurer I actually know a thing or two about food, and what’s in it.

As one of many examples: pretzels (ger: Brezen) containing animal fat – namly lard – to make the dough more stabile and the pores within finer. So, in my vegan live, no pretzels. And no eggs, milk, meat, cheese, yoghurt, sausages,butter or anything contasining animal fats…

After two weeks into it – and remarkably, I stayed with it, because (self-analysis ahead, skip this next sentence if you just don’t care, which would be completly understandable and quite literaly the sensibel thing to do) I didn’t tell anyone about it. Usually I motivate myself for almost anything by sharing the enthusisatic beginning and rely on my friends to carry with a little nagging, once the initial burst is over. Sometimes that inital burst lasts only to the end of telling the intention, but when you got awesome friends (like I do 🙂 ), you get stuff done, inspite of it.

So, 2 weeks „concious“ living, and I took an settlement of accounting. And please, read this niow, if nothing else, because here comes the truth:

BEING VEGAN SUCKS.

Big Time!

The results:

1. While it wasn’t that much more expensive, it was much more time-consuming. If I didn’t have an abundance of time right now, I wouldn’t have managed it, because only someone with a clearly disturbed view on nutrition could ever accept the stuff at the discounters – tasteless, meek, watery substition that only matches fruit and vegtables in shape (barely) and colour (supposedly).
2. You don’t feel good. after the initial adaption, you are jsut tired the whole time. You function, but any excitement is gone. Like a zombie you strutt through life. Initially, I didn’t realize that, but after I read a book again that always moved me, I wondered if I had changed. I’m talking about Hiob by Joseph Roth, of course. The book didn’t move me anymore, or if I always read it with to much adoration and too little objectivity. No, that wasn’t it, I tried again, and it still is very moving . But while vegan, everything seemed dampend. EMotionally, less energy. Meek.
3. Even if you supposedly should feel cleansed in some way. Nope, not me, but I rarely react to placebos anyways. Healthwise I didn’t improve in anyway. No data there.
4. Pretty much the only positive effect is, that you pay more attention to the food during shopping, which is where I found some seriously strange things. One example below.
5. What vegans, vegetarians and all of their thousends of sects share is a blatant disreagard for facts and common sense. Actually, none of those people even bothered to think about bread, sustainable shopping (yeah, its time for mangos, isn’t it? In southern amerika, fools!) or the simple fact that humans eat everything. That’s something we share with only a few species – the proud and the few, so to speak, namely rats and pigs. Deal with it.
6. Your colon is the strongest muscle in your body. With the amounts you eat, it’s ungodly. I will not go further into that.

So, I been there, done that, got the t-shirt. Next person to tell me a vegan or strict vegetarian lifestyle is „good for you“ will get a hearty laugh, a slap on the back and a lolly, shortly before being sent out to play, and let the grown-ups talk. So, one finding of that time and I’ll get down from my pedestial.