Healthy Living

Most Americans, I’d bet, have heard the piece of nutritional advice that asserts “you are what you eat.” The Chinese tend to agree. However, based on my experiences dining and speaking with many Chinese people, I've learned that this friendly, figurative reminder from home is taken quite literally over here. Expressed in the six character phrase 吃什么补什么 (what you eat is what you nourish), most Chinese seem to believe that when you have digestive problems, for example, you should eat stomach or intestines. When you are experiencing problems with virility, you should eat the male genitalia of another animal. Eating fish eyes is good for, well, you guessed it, one’s eyesight. Another example of this philosophy in action can be seen in my post on dragon bones. I’ve asked several people how to apply this belief when eating something a bit more exotic, such as 三叫 (san jiao), but I never got a straight answer. What is 三叫, you ask? Well, this Guizhou Province minority specialty (also readily available in Guangzhou and other parts of the south) translates into English as ‘three screams,’ which tells you right away that it’s probably not the most pleasant thing you could stick on a fork. It’s actually a tiny mouse turned snack-treat that supposedly screams once when you pick it up by the tail, again when you dip it in chili sauce, and for the third and last time when you stick it in your mouth. Apart from those who eat this food out of necessity or tradition, the only thing I imagine this snack nourishing is one’s tough-guy ego (count me in!).

Anyway, I was reading about people’s attitude toward this “eat what needs to be fixed” philosophy on some Chinese forums. More than one response echoed the following sentiment (roughly translated): “I can say without a morsel of doubt that 吃什么补什么 not only holds true, but it’s one of Chinese medicine’s most important guiding principles for health preservation.” The following post on the forum read, “吃猪脑子、补里脑子,” which means “eat pig brains \ nourish your own mind.”

I couldn’t help but think about this notion of natural supplementation when I came across this article posted on Ananova News that describes what one Chinese mom has been doing with the extra milk that her super active mammary glands have been producing since the birth of her baby Shan Shan. First, her mother, husband, and mother-in-law drink their fill and then the leftovers are used to give the baby a breast milk bath. Apparently, this beauty treatment makes the baby’s skin “really smooth and white.” Is it science? Is it crazy? Who knows… at least it’s interesting!