I’m at the age where all the targeted advertising I receive is for freezing my eggs, shapewear, period underpants, weight loss, weight loss and weight loss. Well, the joke’s on capitalism because I have no intention of participating in the international sport of narcissism, I mostly wear oversized men’s clothing, I have perfected the art of no leakage and I have been obsessively training for half my life.
The thing about exercise is that it has never been for aesthetics. Not long after I was accused of being antisocial (see the previous newsletter), it escalated to depression. It clung to me like wet hair and for as long as I can remember, I’ve had insomnia. Doctors thought the insomnia came with anxiety and when they asked me what I would think about at night, I’d say, “Everything. Nothing. I just think.” There was nothing about the sky falling, self-criticism (why would I need that when I have Asian parents?), not fitting in or any of that growing pains crap. It stumped them. The solution, rather than highly addictive medication with a tonne of negative side effects, was to change my diet, upend my schedule, introduce “quiet time” (which was 90s speak for meditation), remove stimulus, and eventually, exercise (but not after a certain hour). First, it was walking, then it became cycling, and finally swimming (because like most Asian kids, I have asthma). I had no interest in school sports because I’m not a team player. Cross-country could get fucked (see: asthma).
There are also two types of Asian parents. One kind of Asian parent pushes academia, makes you play an instrument and hopes that you come up with the cure for cancer. The other type of Asian parent wants to use your inherited flexibility and discipline to win a gold medal in gymnastics/swimming/badminton or be a principal dancer for an international ballet company while maintaining an A+ average at school. I had the former. In fact, my parents used to ‘bribe’ me with outside time (yes, like a jail) by saying I could play a sport if I passed the next level of piano with at least honours (the equivalent of an A). Of course, this was all bullshit because ‘x’ sport could give me a finger injury and hinder my piano advancement, or ‘y’ sport had conflicting timetables with my piano teacher and nothing was allowed to change, or just simply, “No, not until you pass the next theory exam.”
It was all a lie.
Blame my upbringing, but fun has never been my primary motivation for exercise. I had to learn a skill and I had to be the best at it. Cut to me training in Muay Thai six days a week with additional personal training, kettlebell classes (for power and endurance) and strength and conditioning classes (for more power and more endurance) for the next eleven years of my life. I’d pick up aerials for control, flexibility and strength. Little did I know, that while I was doing all this, I was part of a community. I didn’t notice this because there is something in common with the martial arts, circus and hospitality community: we all love to get fucked up and eat trash. In fact, we are trash, and we are proud of it.
Now that I am old, I am about training smarter, not harder. Covid-19 has also ravaged the fitness industry and a lot of my trainers are either stranded overseas, had to move back to their home country or have switched careers because they have to survive. This means I have joined a conventional gym (I call it my ‘pick up, put down’ gym) and I’m getting my first taste of the real fitness industry. Not the break-someone’s-ribs-and-laugh-about-it-later-with-them industry or the this-fall-looks-awesome-but-beware-the-vagina-rope-burn industry, but the does-my-arse-look-big-enough-in-this industry.
When I exercise, I’m ugly, and I don’t mind if I get uglier. I make a face that looks like I have a cat’s anus for a mouth, I sweat until it looks like I’ve gone swimming in my clothes, I *gasp* wear mismatching tops and bottoms. Never in my life have I been in a room designed for you to get ugly, surrounded by perfectly tanned, insanely sculpted, meticulously manicured, beautiful people who look like fitness models. I would later learn that half of them are fitness models and that shit is a full-time job and a half. What I find completely rude is not only are these people ridiculously good looking, they’re lovely, too. Sure, they prop up the entire life coaching podcast industry, but someone’s gotta. This community does not get fucked up. Their version of getting fucked up is having a day-drinking session and actually finishing it when the sun goes down. What is this self-control?
They also don’t treat their bodies like dumpsters. Obviously. They eat Spud-lite potatoes, cook all their food dry, substitute beef for kangaroo and subscribe to high-protein, low-calorie meal services.
And because I’m a nosy bitch, I couldn’t help but look up some of these high-protein, low-calorie meal services while I procrastinated. I expected to see meal after meal of lean-protein paired with broccoli, cauliflower or Spud-lite potatoes. I was wrong. Clearly, subscription services have realised that fit people know how to make themselves tough meals with no flavour- they’re here to spice up hot peoples lives with some international flair. I saw bastardised Sri Lankan curries, ‘Yia yia’s’ moussaka, Asian noodle salads, Mexican bowls. What the fuck is a Mexican bowl? Is it crockery made in Mexico? Who eats crockery?
As I scrolled through the menu of these services, I realised that contemporary, conventional hotness is a very westernised idea. Back when I was a kid, there were two acceptable body shapes for Asians. You were either really fucking fat because it represented luck and wealth, or you were rail-thin because that is the epitome of femininity and hard work. When I go back to Hong Kong, everyone can spot from a mile away that I have been raised in a westernised country because I have muscle, and muscle is masculine, and therefore, I am unattractive by eastern standards. It’s slowly changing, but not fast enough. Asian diets are in some way driven by health, but in a yin-yang, heaty-damp, balance of all elements with the peasant food you can afford kind of way. Not a calorie-controlled, macronutrient-focussed, thirst for flavour amongst the bland kind of way.
I’m not against fit people eating food with flavour. What I am against is calling a dish Greek just because there are olives in it. What I am against is lumping all of Asia into a shitty soba noodle dish and dumping a packet of plastic-wrapped sriracha on it. I don’t even know where to start with this bowl that is apparently from Mexico, but I will say this- corn does not make a dish Mexican. Also, where is the seasonality? Where is the transparency of where and how the food is sourced? Who is coming up with these recipes and who is actually cooking this food?
I’ve seen a lot of terrible shit done to food in the name of health. Dishes have been stripped of meaning. A quest for flavour has meant a lot of liberties have been taken and dishes become appropriated to the point of zero recognition. A moment of silence for curry, herbal soups, anything carb-based that has been swapped out for cauliflower, and all the primary cuts that have been cooked to shit in the name of fitness.
It shouldn’t be the case, but health on any level is a privilege. Having money to go to a gym is some highly privileged shit. Being able to eat a shit tonne of animal protein, have access to fresh fruit and vegetables and have countless stand-ins for dairy is next level. But I can’t fully reconcile the last part. It might help you manipulate your body so you look like some kind of mannequin, but the impact on farming, agriculture and carbon levels gives me so much anxiety that I don’t want to eat. It’s important to understand that the food we choose to purchase and the chains that we purchase them in have a direct environmental, social, racial and climate impact, even if we don’t see it immediately. And while I will never achieve peak hotness, I am comfortable knowing that my very average appearance is a direct consequence of my values.
Stick that algorithm in your pipe and smoke it.
What I’m reading:
I’ve been putting it off for a while, but I just started reading A Little Life. It’s torture porn in 700-something pages and I still can’t put it down.
What I’m watching:
To relieve myself from the subtle devastation of A Little Life, I am contrasting my screen time with the trash as fuck Bling Empire. Look at me having layers like an onion. Also, Drag Race is back, back, back again.
What I’m eating:
Hi, my name is Jess and I am addicted to Nana Thai. It is my mission to eat through every single som tum on the menu with grilled things and sticky rice. I finally hit up La Pinta and I love everything about them. It’s also a welcome surprise to see Catherine Chauchat pouring drinks again (you may remember her from Boire on Smith St, the space that is now Ides). Did I covet the Rofco in the kitchen? Yes, yes I did.
What I’m listening to:
I read that Marianne Faithfull is about to release a new album with Warren Ellis, so I’m revisiting her entire back catalogue. God, I love that woman.
Wanna send this to your friend who has made diet resolutions?
Have I accidentally encouraged you to abandon your clean eating?