Food here

I realize that I've been in Tanzania for about a month now. (It's crazy to think it's been that long already.) and I think I'm adapting to what it's like to be a food-eating human here.

During homestay, we have limited control over what we eat, as we are usually not the ones doing the food-growing, food-shopping, and food-cooking. As a result, my diet in the past few weeks has been a large amount of refined carbs, eggs,

some cooked greens and veggies, and some meat. I haven't had milk since I was sick and my mama decided I wasn't allowed to have it anymore (oh sad day).

As a side note: I was surprised to find out that some of my fellow Americans were not aware that brown rice and white rice come from the same plant. White rice is simply polished rice: its bran has been milled off, basically, so white rice is essentially a refined carbohydrate, as you lose the complex carbs present in the bran.

In the US, white rice is often less expensive than brown rice for reasons such as subsidization. It seems illogical because white rice is more processed, therefore you think it would be more expansive, however that is often not the case.

Here in Tanzania, I believe a lot of the rice is imported, and you can pretty much only find brown rice in specialty shops in the larger cities. Practically speaking, brown rice does generally take longer to cook, and in a country where a lot of people are using charcoal stoves, and where fuel is becoming more and more of an issue, it makes sense to eat foods that cook faster. But it's a tradeoff because you're losing a lot of nutrition by not eating the bran.

Enough of that tangent. Bottom line is, I've learned how to house copious amounts of white rice in one sitting. And I'm looking forward to having more control over what I eat once homestay is over. :)