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Today is break day and I need it!  I cannot walk normally because my leg muscles are so tired.  This would be great news if I hadn’t taken it so easy last night.  Nevertheless what’s done is done and I’ll do it again tomorrow.  Today’s food is quite said.

• 2 Cups Coffee (0 *)
• Boston Chicken Sandwich, unbreaded (581 cal, 79g pro, 24g carb, 13g fat)
• 2 Cups Jasmine Tea (0 *)
• Chicken Fillets w/mushroom, tomato (343 cal, 66g pro, 9.5g carb, 5.5g fat)
• 1 White Pitta (150 cal, 6.25g pro, 59g carb, 0.75g fat)
• 1/2 tub hummus (316 cal, 11g pro, 13.5g carb, 41.5g fat)
• 1 cup whole milk (146 cal, 8g pro, 11g carb, 8g fat)
• 3 cloves raw garlic (just for fun)

Total for the day:

• 1,536 calories
• 170.25g protein (48% - 681cals?)
• 117g carbohydrates (33% - 468cals?)
• 68.75g fat (19% - 618cals?)

Strangely I get 1,767 calories when I use 4 calories per gram for protein and carbohydrates, 9 calories per gram for fat.  I’m not sure what’s happening here but I’ll use my original numbers until I figure it out.  I’ll have to increase protein and fat from what I took in today I guess.  Suggestions?

I’ve never really done strength training. My swimming provided fitness training and, of course it made me stronger but it wasn’t actually strength training. I tried with Erik when I lived in Dallas but our enthusiasm ran out after just a couple of months. The strange thing is that I’m faced with an odd situation of actually needing to eat more. I just added up my food for today.

• 2 Cups of Coffee (0 *)
• 1 Large Bowl Chicken Laksa Soup (630 cal, 43g P, 49g CH, 31g Fat)
• 4 Pieces of Bacon (300 cal, 32g P, 0 CH, 19g Fat)
• 1 Yellow Pepper (50 cal, 2g P, 12g CH, 1g Fat)
• 2 Medium Tomatos (22 cal, 1g P, 5g CH, 0.2g Fat)
• 1 Large Hummus Tub (632 cal, 22g P, 27g CH, 83g Fat)
• 2 White Pitta (300 cal, 12.5g P, 59g CH, 1.5g Fat)
• 3 Cups of Milk (438 cal, 24g P, 33g CH, 24g Fat)

This makes my total for the day:

• 2,372 Calories
• 136.5 grams Protein (28%)
• 185 grams Carbohydrates (38%)
• 160 grams Fat (34%)

The dietary guide that I’ve been reading suggests about 3,000 calories, 180g Protein, 180g Carbohydrates and 120g Fat. It looks like I need to try to get my protein and carbohydrates up and my fat intake down a bit. Unfortunately, it appears that hummus might have to be reconsidered as a major part of my diet and I might have to start drinking semi-skim milk again.

Tonight was the first night of my circuit. I’m absolutely stunned at how little strength I have in my upper legs. Everything else made about the showing I expected but I could barely manage fifteen pound weights in each hand while doing static lunges and even then I barely made my 15 reps per set. I’m looking forward to seeing how long I can keep this up though!
Weigh in: 78 Kg

On Saturday we went to Zoe and Jono’s house for a nice and sunny BBQ without the sun. The garden was enclosed by a tumultuous brew of threatening weather that luckily couldn’t muster up the energy to follow through and actually ruin the day.

Early Sunday morning we woke up and caught the train to Brighton. Everyone was rather tired from their individual activities of the night before but we managed to lumber (or slumber) through it. The bad news was that the winds were high and the sea was too rough for our fishing trip. So we went to a chilli market and sampled chilli chocolate (yuck!), garlic marinated in chilli and olive oil (yum!) and some wine (sans chillis). We ended up spending the most time in the arcades on Brighton Pier. Here we wasted away our savings two pence at a time. Nobody managed to win anything this time but Yu Kyoung and I did improve our horse riding skills!

A report on the number of immigrants over the last year caused a surprisingly bitter response from most of the media. One paper, The Independent, stood up and claimed that immigration is what makes this country a great and diversified place to live. Their article, Immigration: This island’s story, talks about the quite varied background of the people of Britain. As an immigrant to Britain of course I agree with them. It’s made me pick up the Independent every once in a while just to show my support.

I noticed something when we were walking through Seoul station after booking our train tickets to Busan.  I thought it was just an oversight but then I kept seeing it over and over.  Everywhere we went had nice, brand new flatscreen televisions.  The world cup is a huge deal in Korea and so it wasn’t a surprise that everyone was showing it.  What did surprise me was the stickers that were left on most of them.  A sticker on the top right that said “XD System” was always left on the television.  I think that everyone left the stickers on so that they could return the televisions after the world cup was over.  Of course, Yu Kyoung disagrees with me but I’ll check to see if every single restaurant, pub and store we go into on our next visit still has the television.  And if they do, if anybody ever got around to removing the stickers!

The title could just as well read Emart: Korean Walmart but since I’ve been living in the UK for over five years now Asda is more familiar to me than Walmart.  Of course, they are the same company in the end but that’s neither here nor there.  Emart is a department store that seems to have retained some of the ownership of where to place clothing.  These days you are forced to shop for clothes by brand instead of the infinitely more useful shopping by clothing style or by the type of event you plan on wearing it to.

Emart also has free samples.  I thought it would be quite rude not to sample local fare so we graciously accepted all the food that was offered to us.  This turned out to be quite a lot in variety and quantity!  We had soup and kimchi and drinks and even dessert!  In the end all I could say was “Bepola. Kaja.”  This translates into “I’m full. Let’s go.”

So we did.

Staying up to watch a football match that ended at 06:00 doesn’t do much for settling your mind and body from the effects of jetlag. We didn’t wake up until 15:15 which I guess you could call sleeping in since it was just over 9 hours of rest! We went to Myungdon to do some shopping. I couldn’t help but think that my mom would love to shop here because of the variety of brands and clothing. I had a rough time adhering to my no-logo mantra while shopping in Korea. It took me the whole trip to find an unbranded shirt and when I did I bought four of them in different colours!

We bought a traditional sugar cookie with a shape etched into it. The game is that if you can break off the outer pieces of the cookie and keep the internal shape intact then you take it back and you get another one for free. I only clipped two edges from my star but those small mistakes were enough to keep me from my free cookie. This wasn’t really a problem since the overwhelming taste of sugar from the first one was lingering in my mouth even after a couple bottles of water. Maybe I’m too old to enjoy pure sugar treats anymore!

For lunch we met Jooyoung again for Myoung Don, a spicy chicken with noodles.  It was quite tasty.  We once again had the waitress ask whether or not I, as a non-Korean, could handle spicy food and had to explain to her that I could probably eat spicier food than she could.  Not that she believed that of course but it probably is true.  I’ll sweat like mad while I’m doing it but I’ll enjoy it all the time and I’ll pour on more hot sauce.