Vegetarianism

Well I am really busy and have work piling up on my desk. "And you still have time for that stupid blog" I can hear my wife saying. Yes! She thinks that blogging is a waste of time but actually it only takes about 5 minutes for me to write what I think (OK sometimes more, when I have to do some research). That’s why there are sometimes a lot of grammatical errors and spelling mistakes.
Anyway, here I am taking a break from my work to tell you a little bit about myself. I am a vegetarian. Have been for quite sometime now. No! Its not for religious reasons and none of my family members are vegetarians. My mum tried to change me, even slipping in a little chicken soup in our curry but in the end she gave up and left me with my choice. My wife accepts me for what I am even though she told me that she can’t live without meat or chicken or fish. Its hard to be a vegetarian in Malaysia but it is not impossible and many now understand the concept as compared to a few years ago. Over here way up north, its still quite foreign and it was quite hard to find vegetarian food but as they say "I will survive". Sometimes people ask me “how do you survive?” I always have to mention “sayur sahaja” “tamao daging (meat), ayam (chicken), ikan (fish), sotong (squid), tamao samua laut–laut” because sometimes if you say tamao daging they will put in either ikan bilis or prawns. I have had to explain several times that Ikan or prawns are not vegetarian to a grumbling waiter.
I do take eggs which means that I am not a pure vegetarian. Some would call me a “Tipu vegetarian”. There is a technical term for people like us - Ovo-lacto-vegetarians, which means vegetarians who consumer both diary products as well as eggs. There are of course the lacto-vegetarians who consume diary products but not eggs. Finally there are also the pure vegetarians who don’t consume any animal product at all and I have heard that there are people who consume only fruits called fruitarians, though I have not met any. I am not that extreme and sometimes I get tired of telling the waiter to take back my food and just take out the prawns or ikan or sotong whatever, and just eat the vegetables.
I have not always been a vegetarian and used to love fish, fried chicken wings and so on but I don't why, I decided to become a vegetarian. I gradually gave up meat, than chicken than finally fish and sea food. "Do I suffer from any disease?" " Do you feel weak?" are some of the questions I get all the time. The answer to both is "NO!" But I take care to have a proper balanced diet. In fact I am healthier than many of my non-veg friends and I have noticed one great thing – we vegetarians look younger.