Tuesday, May 29, 2012

I'm reading a book right now about a young woman who moves to Africa to serve and care for the people of Uganda.  It comes as no surprise that the book talks about starvation, lack of food.  At one point it describes a woman making cakes of mud and salt just to have something to fill her children's hungry stomachs.

Yesterday I was listening to NPR and they were talking about the First Lady's new book, "American Grown".  A book about gardening.  The discussion led to the poor diet of most Americans and the "Obesity Crisis".

The contrast between these two bites of information collided!  I mean, it's not like it was news to me that there are people in the world that are starving, or that there are a large number of people in America that are fat.  The piece that struck me is that the problem in America is that we're eating too much.  And the problem in Africa is that they don't have enough to eat.

We're dying because we're eating too much food.  They're dying because they don't have enough food

We're trying to keep our kids from getting fat.  They're trying to keep they're kids alive.

Some of us have to force ourselves to drink a few glasses of water per day.  They're dying because the nearest watering hole is 6 miles away.

I am not pointing the finger, and if I am it's at myself. (This is coming from the girl who downed 5 s'mores last night)  I'm just saying that this is CRAZINESS!  If we consume less, and give to them, doesn't everybody win?  We won't die from heart attacks and diabetes and other diseases linked to obesity.  They won't die from starvation.

And I know about all the food processing and how that factors in.  But I'm just thinking about pure quantity.  We have much, they have little (if any).  If we give out of our abundance, they have what they need.

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