SDS 084: Why i became Vegetarian

Alright guys, super excited about this episode, this is going to be a fun one. I’ve actually done some interesting research on this. So we are travelling here in the Czech Republic right now, and we were in Karlovy Vary with some friends just a few days ago. And we stayed at this one hotel which is the only vegan hotel in the whole of the Czech Republic, or they advertise themselves as that, and it was so fantastic. The food there was amazing. I’ve never had such great vegan food. It was very, very inspiring. And Hadelin even said at some point that he wants to try being vegan, so we’ll see how that goes. It’ll be very interesting. And I want to try it as well now.

But why I wanted to record this podcast is because a few things have been going on on this trip. We’ve been talking about vegetarian and vegan food quite a lot. And we were very surprised when we got to the Czech Republic. We were still on the road trip with Hadelin, and we were expecting that when we get to the Czech Republic, there would be a lot of meat here, it would be hard to be vegetarian, because I’ve been vegetarian for a year now.

At the same time, it’s not. It’s the opposite. So many vegan restaurants. Not just vegetarian, but vegan restaurants, in Prague, in Brno, in Karlovy Vary, so many vegan restaurants just all over the place. I was definitely not expecting this from a country where it gets really cold in winter. We’re here in summer, so I’m not sure how all this works in winter, but it seems to be very culturally accepted, and a lot of people are actually attending these places and eating vegan, vegetarian food. So that was very interesting.

And that’s why I wanted to record this podcast, because I’ve been vegetarian for a year now. I was inspired by a friend at the start of last year, so about April-May 2016 I started, and now it’s already August 2017, and I’ve been vegetarian for all this time. I don’t eat meat at all, occasionally I eat fish, if I’m near the ocean and I know there’s fresh fish. I eat fish sometimes, otherwise I’ll eat it like once a month. But all the time it’s vegetarian, so that basically means plant stuff, and eggs, which I don’t eat much of, and cheese. The only main non-vegan thing I eat is cheese. I don’t even have milk. I can’t have milk, I’m lactose intolerant, but I’m totally fine with cheese.

So that’s what I’ve been up to so far, and today I wanted to share what inspired me to do this, why I started on this journey, because it’s really been life-changing for me and I want to maybe inspire you guys to try it out, or maybe just cut down on your intake of meat. Or if you’ve been considering trying it or not, this might be your push to trying it out. So there’s usually three reasons why people become vegetarian. One is to protect the planet. These are three reasons that I see, maybe there are more. But one is to protect the planet. Another one is to improve their health. And the third one is to look after the animals and be more caring for animals.

And so for me, it was the second reason. For me, it was my health. I wanted to experiment and see if I would feel healthier if I started eating vegetarian food and became vegetarian. And I tried a couple of times before, and the diets I was looking at were more smoothie-based diets, and that didn’t work for me. But this time when I tried, it was nothing specific, I just started eating vegetarian food and found what I like, like potatoes, and rice, and different types of cuisine which are vegetarian, and it worked. And as a result, what’s important, as a result, I feel so much better.

Some of you who know me a bit will know that I haven’t been drinking coffee since I left Deloitte, which was in 2014. So I haven’t been drinking coffee for three years. I had one coffee just to taste it a few weeks ago, but I don’t drink coffee any more. And after that, I started feeling better, like after a few week transitional period, I started feeling better. And also, now being vegetarian, I feel so much better. I feel so light, I never feel bloated, I feel energetic, just everything is fantastic.

And in fact, one thing improved significantly, is that before becoming vegetarian, for some reason, maybe a year before becoming vegetarian, I realised I cannot eat bread any more, because I started getting bloated after eating bread. And bread is something that I really, really like, and I’ve always loved all my life, and I started being worried, maybe I’m a celiac, and maybe I can’t eat wheat any more, and so I stopped eating bread. I really cut down on bread. But after becoming vegetarian, removing meat from my diet, I can now eat bread again, and it’s so much better. I can eat pasta and so on. It’s really, really cool. So in terms of health, it definitely has benefits. Of course, consult a doctor and do your own research, do not take this as blind advice. But for me, it’s had fantastic benefits in terms of health.

And now I’m slowly being vegetarian and hanging out with people, and meeting more people who are vegetarian, I’m slowly getting to know about these other two reasons. So the planet reason, how you’re helping the planet, and also how you’re protecting the animals, and how you’re saving animals. And for me, those aren’t the primary reasons, but they become very, very powerful additional benefits that I didn’t think about at the start, I didn’t consider them as important, but now I can see how they are more and more important, what contribution I am making to the world by being vegetarian.

For example, in terms of the planet, I’ll give you an example. To produce one burger, it takes approximately 50 litres of water in terms of the crops that the cows will eat, feeding the cows, and so on. So to produce about one burger, the meat required for one burger, is about 50 litres of water. So you can eat a burger, and that’s pretty much the same as leaving your shower running on for almost a whole day, or not a whole day, but a couple of hours. So that’s a big impact.

And then there’s other things, like for instance, the greenhouse effect. Well, guess what. That doesn’t come from power plants, or cars, or airplanes. All of these exhausts, and all of these oil plants, and refineries, and so on, all of them amount to less than 50% of the greenhouse gases that we have on the planet. More than 50%, I think it’s like 52%, of those greenhouse gases, and the most toxic one of them, methane, they actually come from cows, from their digestive systems, and from the gases they emit as a result of their digestion. And that’s something that when I found out, I was really shocked by this, and I had to double, triple-check that, and that really is the case.

So that’s in terms of saving the planet. And in terms of saving animals, we often don’t realise how mistreated animals are, and we are seeing more of this and slowly understanding that being vegetarian is definitely really helping, or keeps me at peace that I’m not contributing to animals getting hurt.

And so, without going into too much detail on this, I just wanted to share my story on this, but also, I wanted to share three movies with you which can help you whichever way you’re thinking about exploring this space, if you are thinking about exploring this space. If you’re worried about the planet, then the movie for that is called Cowspiracy. That’s the movie I watched. Out of these three, I’ve only watched that one, and I’m really looking forward to watching the other two, but Cowspiracy really talks about the planet and how becoming vegetarian can help save the planet. And it talks about the other two aspects as well, but at the same time, I think that’s their main focus: how we’re hurting the planet through this production of meat and cheese and dairy and so on.

The second movie, about health, is Forks Over Knives. I haven’t seen it myself, but from the trailer and from what I’ve heard about it, it sounds like it’s mostly about health and it’s actually got Dr John McDougall in there, who’s the leading doctor on plant-based diets and he’s got a really cool blog and so on. I really like him. I follow not exactly his diet, but a lot of things I’ve learned were from him. So Dr John McDougall, if you like, but he’s interviewed in the movie, and it’s called Forks Over Knives. So check out that movie if you’re thinking about all of this. If you want to just explore this topic, not necessarily become vegetarian, but if you want to explore this topic from a health perspective, Forks Over Knives.

And finally, if you want to see how you can help save animals and be more fair to them, then the movie for that is Earthlings. But with that one, I’ve got to warn you, I haven’t seen it, I will watch it, but it’s got very, very graphic scenes. So be very cautious if you want to watch it, because it’s a very sad movie, and the worst thing is that it’s all true. It’s all, all true. It’s not just like a science fiction movie, it’s exactly what we’re doing with animals. So I’ve heard of people who watch that movie and just after watching that movie, they just became vegetarian on the same day. And whole families who have done that, just because of what it portrays. But be careful that it is very graphic at the same time.

So there we go, that’s three movies: Cowspiracy for environment reasons, Forks Over Knives for health reasons, and Earthlings if you want to explore this topic from the point of view of animals. And ultimately, I’m looking forward to watching all three. I’m going to get onto it very soon. And hopefully this will inspire you. And even if you don’t become vegetarian, maybe this will help you perhaps reduce the meat intake. And if not, that’s totally fine as well. Maybe you’ll just get some additional education in this space and we all love learning here, so it’s always interesting to learn a thing or two about how our bodies work, how the environment works, how the world works.

So there you go. Hope you enjoyed this episode, and hopefully that will inspire you to look into different ways that you can improve your health, improve the planet, improve the way we treat animals, and things like that. So thanks a lot for being here. And I look forward to seeing you next time. Until then, happy analyzing.