Seth and a little buddy at a feeding site in BoracayNo valentine treats for Seth today. The eighth graders at Concordia are doing a project this week entitled "The 50% Experience." Their task was to purchase food for themselves for seven days with only 70 RMB, the US equivalent of about $10. They also had to turn in their personal electronics, and will need to take cold showers this week. The required journaling about their experiences this week must be written by hand, in cursive. Who writes by hand anymore?!
I let Seth do his food purchasing on his own. He went to Carrefour with a buddy, and came home with two loaves of bread, three carrots, 6 kiwi, 2 chicken breasts, 2 packages of instant noodles, 15 eggs and a bag of bulk rice. He had 7 RMB left over, about $1. He decided to keep that in reserve for when he might be desperate towards the end. Seems like a fair amount of food, but it's not really.
He chopped up all three of the carrots yesterday and put them in the blender with some water, thinking juice would be a good way to consume the carrots. Just raw carrot and water didn't turn out to be as tasty as he'd hoped, although he did drink some of it. Last night we brainstormed an idea to cook some of the leftover carrot juice with the broth from cooking his two chicken breasts... maybe if we throw in a little cooked rice and put it all in the blender again, it could pass for carrot soup. Necessity breeds invention, right?
The idea behind the project is that 50% of the world lives on less than $2 per day for food. Interesting for this project to be happening for Seth on the heels of our Boracay trip, where we were feeding impoverished children. Hoping he makes the connection.
6 comments:
I love this idea! I will keep it in my teaching file. I have to help give some ideas for Seth's food. Two chicken breasts can be split up into 4 by slicing it horizontally. I have fed 12 people with 2 chicken breasts, broccoli, and rice. A lunch we ate when food was little in China was rice and steamed eggs (of course we also added soy sauce) A dish a friend taught me. We still crave it and make it here. I can hand over the recipe if it sounds good to Seth. I think Chinese food is so creative because they have learned to eat cheaper. It would be interesting to bring someone into the class that has lived on this amount. I know some people that have done it in the past. I was told I should be able to eat well with 1000 RMB a month in China by a local grandma (of course food is more expensive now). Don't forget the sweet potato soup, a sliced potato, water, brown sugar. Old rice in China is used to make porridge a good way to use his carrot. Tell us how the week ended or a link to his blog.
Lisa
This would be tricky! I'll be praying for the loaves and chicken breasts to multiply!
Young Seth is looking more and more like another young Mr. Liptak I remember from days gone by.
Very cool to hear of this life altering experiment!
Wow, I'd like to try that... Maybe a modified version of that. For example, I've got four bags of potatoes in the root cellar we grew last summer that I need lots of creative ways of using.
Will be interested to read his jounal on this project! Mom
Looking forward to hearing more about his week!
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