No Brainer

Food is vital to living. We need it to build and sustain strong and healthy bodies. Our eating habits start at childhood and continue until we die. What we eat goes into our bodies and makes us who we are. (NOTE: What we also see, read and hear, in combination with what we eat, makes us who we truly are.) If we ingest crap, we will be crap. If we eat McDonalds hamburgers and French fries everyday, we’re going to end up looking like a big fat cow or potato. Developing a healthy eating habit and lifestyle is essential to staying healthy and fit.

Eating healthy is a difficult task to undertake though especially in this day and age when all you see on TV and advertisements are beautifully slim people consuming burgers and fries and Diet Cokes. Big businesses sell their products so well that many people believe they can be just like the people they see on TV.

Kids, almost automatically, don’t want to eat certain foods. They base their likes and dislikes not on flavors so much as texture and colors. How many times have you heard a child say they didn’t like something without ever tasting it? It happens all the time! They are very sight oriented. Kids, however, want to grow up healthy and strong. They love to hear how foods will build them up into strong and healthy adults. That’s why it is the parents’ duty to enforce what kids eat and don’t eat.

Parents know, or at least should know, the benefits of eating certain foods so they can teach their kids how to eat properly. God put parents in charge of their kids. They are their children’s teachers. Kids know nothing until they either experience it or learn it. So who better to learn from than mommy and daddy?

The best thing a parent can do for their children is to find out the healthy facts about the foods being served before you ever serve them. That way, you can tell your child exactly what it does and show them the importance and benefits of eating it.

My wife and I have been blessed to have two children that like about anything placed in front of them. Their likes and dislikes for foods wasn’t their doing, however, but from us making them eat the food we’ve placed in front of them. There have been many times when they have said they didn’t want to eat certain foods, but we made them eat them.

My 8-year old daughter has eaten just about anything placed in front of her up to recently. For some reason or another, she doesn’t want to eat certain foods now.

So today, I sat her down and talked to her about food. It all started out at breakfast. I made the family some muffins. These are no ordinary muffins. They’re made with bran cereal and 7 other grains and cereals, banana, raisins and nuts, egg, flour and so on. It’s filled with all sorts of goodies. They’re very tasty and healthy.

I told her the ingredient inside the muffins. Then I told her how each one provides certain benefits to her body. Once I showed her how important it is for her to eat healthy foods, her desires to not eat those yucky foods changed.

Learn the true benefits of the foods you are serving and inform your kids how eating them will benefit their bodies. Because kids want to grow up strong and healthy, this information will reinforce the need for them to eat the foods even if they don’t like the flavors so much.

Traffic in Japan is terrible. But it is especially bad during holidays. Obon is the worst time to travel in Japan because so many people are off work and drive to their hometowns to visit family. I've heard of traffic jams as long as 30 kilometers. I'm sure there are jams worse than that.

On our way home from Okayama, during spring vacation period, we experienced a traffic jam backed up for over 17 kilometers. Luckily, we caught the tailend of it and got through in less than thirty minutes. Our friends got caught up in it several hours before we got to it. They said it took them over 2 hours to travel 10 kilometers. Can you imagine that?

We went camping down in Wakayama to Shirasaki Ocean Park this week, right in the middle of Obon holiday. Before we left, we saw a lot of the traffic just when we were out and about shopping around town getting stuff for the camping trip. So we decided to travel late at night in order to beat the traffic. Still, we thought we'd see a lot of traffic from others doing the same thing. Luckily for us, we didn't. It was smooth driving the entire way. Of course, it helped by driving the highways instead of the toll roads. We left for Wakayama at midnight and arrived there at 4am. Sure it took us probably an hour longer, but if there was traffic on the toll roads like usual, we may have actually saved time. And besides saving time, we saved over 8000 yen in toll fees. That's a huge plus!

If you plan to travel anywhere in Japan during a holiday, it is best to travel at night. And if you want to save money, drive the highways instead of the toll roads. They're not only much cheaper, but the scenery is much better too! It's a great way to experience Japan.