Korean Vs. American

As you know I was in Vegas over the weekend for my Black Belt test. And, while I was there, I observed some pretty interesting things. Things that I knew all along, but when you see it in such a bold fashion, it really drives a point home.

Yesterday, I had the same discussion with 2 individuals. I felt like the words were verbatim between the two people. Here is the concern- "the fat just wants to hang on no matter how hard I work..."

Do you remember the first day when I said, "Who here wants to go extreme and you're not afraid to give up certain foods to have the body you want?" Do you remember what I said? "Cut out all breads and pasta!" Then I said, "...or if you want to feel good, eat 'good', and make smaller improvements, go ahead and eat the breads and pasta, just make sure you keep it in the right proportions." I'm not anti-bread and pasta, but... it's the food that will really make it more difficult to shed that fat at the rate you might like.

I know, I know... bread is so good! We eat it as toast, we use it for sandwiches. It's the staple of an American diet! How can we get rid of two things that are so prominent in our food culture?

When I was at the Black Belt test, and when we broke for lunch, all the Korean officials had food brought in for them. I made it a point to check out what these people were eating. Their plates consisted mainly of vegetables and different meats, and a small portion of rice. Not a single one of them had bread or pasta. This is basically how the Korean people eat.

Then... there were the Americans. They were at the buffet loading their plates up with things like- bread pudding, potato wedges, pasta, self made sandwiches, etc. It was carb after carb, and not the good carbs either. Very few loaded their plate with salad and fish or chicken.

Now, let's talk about what I observed between the two groups of people. On average, the Koreans were older (officials), but they were slim. The ones that were taking the test were slim as well, and very powerful. Their flexibility, force, and execution of their techniques was amazing. Point being, they were slimmer, but they definately weren't weak.

Although, there were plenty of Americans that were in excellent shape, but on average, many of them had spare tires. I'm not talking big spare tires, well some were big, but on average, you can definately tell that there was no six pack behind that uniform.

Cutting out breads and pasta and eating more vegetables seems foreign to us because we're not used to it. As a society, we need to realize that our food, that is widely accepted, is taking us down the wrong path. By the looks of all these Koreans, they don't have the same struggles we do with fat. I don't believe we necessarily need to train harder, we just need to eat smarter.

As for me, I'm Mexican!

See you in class!

Duncan