Food by any other name, part 5

Soya is an ambiguous word, and I couldn't say what exactly I would expect of something called "soya" at home. It might be soy beans themselves; it might be tofu or another soy bean product; it might be the ubiquitous soya sauce of Chinese restaurants. But I'm fairly positive that it would not ever be spiced, skewered meat roasted over a barrel fire on the side of the road.

It's delicious, despite its seeming misnomer. Some are "party in my mouth" spicy, while others are "get water quick, there's a fire in my mouth" spicy, depending on the vendor.

It's also known as "typhoid on a stick" but I prefer not to be so negative about food. As long as they're reasonably hot when you buy them, you just chow down with relish and pray that ignorance is bliss.

Comments

Electioneering again

Climate anxiety has entered the lexicon. For the last few years, it’s been talked about more and more in news articles, science discussions and even in spiritual care contexts. I shrugged it off as overly sensitive people, but the shoe has dropped for me now too. Extreme weather or one sort another everywhere all at once for the past few years has brought home what I always acknowledged intellectually but didn’t really synthesized emotionally: climate change is actually coming and it will be bad. I feel so angry and impotent in the face of these massive systems working against my small efforts to reduce waste and burn less carbon. So I went to the climate forum for this provincial election. It felt really important just to be in the room to declare “this subject matters!” The room had a remarkable number of grey hairs in it. This brought up terribly mixed feelings for me. On the one hand, good of them to continue to care about these issues, even as they can anticipate it won’t ...

What happened to the pledge?

To the 20 (re-elected) Liberal MPs who signed the Vote Palestine platform. You signed the Vote Palestine platform. The time to fulfill your pledge is now. Gaza is facing mass starvation. This isn’t food scarcity. This is intentional blockage of food as a tool of genocide. Canada’s joint statement with 25 other nations called on all the parties to “uphold the obligations of international humanitarian law.” But Israel has been flagrantly violating multiple obligations of international law almost daily since October 8, 2023 and certain on every day since Canada’s statement was released. There is no need to wait, to give Israel the benefit of the doubt to do the right thing. “We are prepared to take further action”, the statement reads. So do it. Canada must immediately impose a true arms embargo on Israel – a two-way arms embargo – and it must actually put it into force and close all loopholes. Canada must immediately levy sancti...

Letter writing success

Last week, several sources linked to a letter appealing to venerable Canadian scientist and nature advocate David Suzuki to withdraw from a supposed climate prize due to its deep ties to an unbashedly colonlialist Israeli organization. The JNF's claim to fame is planting trees in Israel. Pine trees. Non-native trees. Trees that are susceptible to wildfires. Trees intentionally planted atop forcibly-emptied Palestinian villages to try to erase their memory. The letters worked. Suzuki withdrew. I hadn't gotten around to writing before I got the news. So when a follow up letter to other participants in the prize hit my inbox, I rushed to put my own spin on the letter and sign it. Send your own here I urge you to join David Suzuki in withdrawing from the upcoming Climate Solutions Prize (CSP) festival. CSP was instigated by the racist Jewish National Fund (JNF) of Canada with support from the Israeli government. Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennet announced the launch of CSP...

kar0ling

Read more posts by subject (label)

Search This Blog