The school menu for June was released today. June 15: Whale. Eek. Now you know I have to eat it. I am not a vegetarian. I have no qualms about eating dead animals so how can I possibly take a stand against this particular animal? It's like 'vegetarians' who eat fish... four legged animals are somehow more worth taking a stand over than aquatic ones? But vegetariansim is a slippery slope at the best of times. Where do you stop? At some point you have to draw a line and say "this organism is not intelligent enough for me to care about its being eaten." Clearly for me anything that is edible is fair game.
Before coming to Japan I never really thought about it much. For some reason there is a disproportionately high number of vegetarian Westerners living in this area, some of whom eat fish and some who don't (I don't know what the hell they are eating though because virtually everything in this country is in some way fish-based). For me the whole meat eating thing is a non-issue I think. For a great many years humans have been eating meat, hunting and killing animals. Why would I stop just because society has found a more efficient way of finding said meat than running through the bush with spears? Yes, this is what I think, I have discovered today. It is good I think to check your opinions on such matters occasionally. Sometimes your opinions change so you have to keep updated. I could be a meat eating vegetarian for all I know!
Anyway, in summation. I will eat the whale for 3 reasons;
1) I try not to be a hypocrite
2) I am curious about the taste
3) If I don't eat it I will be very hungry indeed on June 15
The lunch woman told me that a previous CIR refused to speak to her because she served whale meat. I speak to the lunch woman. She's friendly and I am sure she has never been whaling, I am even sure that if the menu were up to her she would not serve whale because frankly, it isn't that popular any more. I suggested that they add kangaroo to the menu and their horror was something approximate to that I encounter in Aussies when I say I will eat whale. Hmm.
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Who ever said it was impossible to say too much about ones own travel experiences? That person shall be proven wrong by a minute description of every scandalous detail of my endeavors to survive Japan.
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- With all the appearance of a pessimist and yet loving the idea of tomorrow.
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2006
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May
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- The staffroom is not cosy
- The whale issue
- Undoukai goes off with a bang
- Rubbish is a serious business
- Why not take a cruise to Terra Australis?
- I resist the charms of kittens
- Quack-o
- The Japanese Inquisition
- Jo's going down in Japan
- Kids are weird here
- I'm busy for once
- I'm a life saver
- What kind of poo did you do today?
- Nishi crew DO know how to have fun
- I get excited about the weekend
- Teeth schmeeth
- Why does it always rain on me?
- Adelaide, the pleasure of provincial life
- You local?
- Driving without a care for public safety popular i...
- Poor tora-chan
- Travel is surprisingly Fun!
- I go on a school excursion to the park
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May
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3 comments:
Ah captain Ahab.
It is good to find ones limits and going hungery is not a good thing. While whales are cool and the killing is not to be encouraged (endangered and all), I could well do with out the crap "whale song" albums that seem to propergate in new age shops.
I tend to agree about the eating of meat. I have had discussions about this with Mark and often tell him that if I had to kill the animal I could and would. It is just that others are better than me at it.
And you have to wonder how strict their morals are. Eat meat or die. I wonder how many would choose death.
Anyway Know thyself is a good motto.
Is this whale to be eaten in the science lab so the outcome of such eating can be monitored for their "scientific experiments"??
Okay, the problem is not that we kill animals, the problem is that we kill more than we should be, and are making some animals extinct.
The reason so many people have an issue with Japan and whaling is that Japan is one of the worse offenders, and that they blatantly deny that they are whaling for food.
Of course Jo should eat whale in the school canteen, im sure thats part of the Japanese experience, but she probably shouldnt go out and buy it every week....
Also, I think the argument for vegetarians is not that they object to animals being killed (or perhaps they want humane killing of animals) but that they object to the inevitable fact that for every cow we 'grow' we use up a much larger amount of natural resources than if we just ate the grain or something similar that was fed to the cow to fatten it up for us! IE growing meat for our consumption is an inefficient use of scarce resources (if you ignore that people like to eat meat and therefore assume that people are indifferent about what they eat, clearly not the case).
Hmm. All this talk about meat has me thinking of dinner. Tonight is lamb :)
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