Bali backslip

This week, I’ve been naughty. Coming back from Bali with no more (or less) weight on my bum, I figured all that delicious Indonesian food, while of course being practically fibre and protein empty, couldn’t have been that bad for me. Ensuing this thought, the week has been equally filled with healthy food, and very unhealthy food. On Wednesday, I had a pizza from work (no, no); on Thursday, I had terrible sushi from university (no); on Friday, I even had a cheeseburger from Hungry Jacks (that’s Burger King in Australia). For breakfast. And then we had deep fried chicken at a Chinese restaurant for dinner. No. No. No. 

I think that since we did go for long walks in Bali, and did work out (for 20 minutes one of the days we were there), and did go for one long bicycle trip, we figured that clean eating is good, but not essential for sustained and long-lasting energy. That was until we went to the gym on Thursday and had absolutely zero performance ability. I felt pathetic. And I did try blaming it on the fact that I hadn’t worked out for a long time (go figure, since my activity level was the reason I ate poorly in the first place), but after forty minutes of dragging myself through what used to be a perfectly simple obstacle course, I finally faced the truth. I had no energy, because I’d been eating food with no energy. And so had Ariz. We called it quits after fifty minutes, and decided that when we went grocery shopping next, we’d go back to the dedicated health freaks we had been when first starting this eating project. 

On the floor on Thursday afternoon, struggling with my twelve sit-ups (thinking, ‘Oh my god, I’m so unfit’), and taking a break halfway through, I hear the deepest grandfather voice I’ve ever heard uttered in that ground level gym. 

“You know, you won’t get any training done if you just stare out into the universe,” the old man says, laughing sympathetically at my distress. 

I am mildly annoyed. “I know. I’m just out of energy.” I carry on with my sit-ups. 

After a while, I pass him again, and smile, trying to reprimand my rudeness. 

“You know, I can’t place your accent,” he says silently this time, and I laugh at his sweet, almost childlike approach. 

“Norwegian,” I say. 

“Oh, lovely. Do you like Grieg?” Jason goes to the gym every days, and is 70 years old. Impressive. I’m going to stop winging about my 36 sit-ups now.

Yesterday, we bought groceries. They were 244 dollars and 56 cents, which is more than half of my weekly salary at the bar.  But there’s so much of them. Ariz calls me the Tetris Queen now; we have a three-shelf fridge. It’s tiny, but somehow I manage to fit all the food anyway; all ten bags of it. Lovely, lovely food. Artichokes, strawberries, capers, kalamata olives, shrimp, walnuts, mozzarella, turkey breast, thyme, red wine, broccoli, salmon fillets, rosemary, Greek yoghurt, mango, pork chops. All these things (and at least forty more) are on our grocery list. Yum. 

Here’s the shopping list: http://agilityfiles.cleaneatingmag.com/PDFS/ShoppingLists/CE19ShoppingListsWeek1.pdf, which goes with week 1 of this meal plan: http://agilityfiles.cleaneatingmag.com/PDFS/ShoppingLists/ce19mealplan.pdf. 

Today, we went to the gym, after two days of eating deliciously healthy food again. The difference is, to say the least, incredible. Because there is literally more healthy energy in my body, guess what? I have more of it to spend too. I spent 45 minutes on the treadmill, and another 35 doing weight work; I burnt 620 calories. I’m back. We had hummus, scrambled eggs, brown rice cakes, and tomatoes for breakfast; an unblended pomegranate banana smoothie for snacks (that is, yoghurt, banana, pomegranate juice, and protein shake) - we don’t actually own a blender yet; and now, I’m about to make a couscous lemon salad. We’re having shrimp for dinner. De-li-cious. 

I also thought I’d show you what I look like, just to prove that I’m very normally built. Kind of normally built, anyway. I have crooked legs, enormous hips, a thin waist and green eyes. If I look any fitter further down the track, I’ll let you know. 

See you next week :)