Sunday, March 10, 2013

Valentina Volynkina: Food

Food has huge influence on people's lives. Our health depends on what, when and how we eat. As health generally as mood, performance, and even the ability to be creative, and our inner life depend on food. Food plays two main roles in our lives.

Firstly, food plays physiological role in the lives of people. Food provides the development and updating of the cells of the organisms. It is the source of energy for our vital activity - height, weight, normal hematopoiesis, vision, skin, performance and longevity. Also, food has an effect on the mental development of the organism. For example, there are products like alcohol, sweets, fast food, red meat, fat food that can cause depression. Not tasty and monotonous food can contribute to nervous diseases and mental disorders, as tasteless food reduces the emotionality, causes the apathy and promotes the fatigue. On the other hand, people eat vegetables, fruits, and fish less likely to suffer from the depression. There are necessary nutrition for human lives - water, carbohydrates, proteins, fats, minerals, and vitamins. They protect our organisms and vital organs, regulate systems, build genetic material and help to keep our skin, organs and hair in good shape. We get them by food that we eat.

Secondly, the social role of food in our lives is important, too. Food helps us to communicate with the family members, friends, colleagues and partners. There are the good traditions to meet with the family and friends to celebrate the holidays or the memorials at the same table. Family meals, where family members can discuss the current occasions and events of their lives, or to discuss plans for the future are very important for all generations. It helps the family members to get close, and friends to meet again in our busy time. A good opportunity to get close to the colleagues is a meeting with them in informal conditions at the holiday table. The discussions of the important issues with business partners are also not complete without a cup of coffee, lunch or dinner in the restaurant, which dispose to make the right decisions in business. Now we have a great opportunity to get acquainted with the cuisine of the other nations. People can do it by visiting the national restaurants. They can learn about cooking of the certain dishes from their foreign friends and acquaintances. With new dishes, we can increase our rations and enter the new dishes and food. And also we can introduce the cuisine of our own country to people from the different cultures. This is one of the ways to explore cultures of the other countries which is very important for understanding people of different cultures.

 
In conclusion I would like to remind that nutrition plays very important social and physiological roles in human lives, so it should be: balanced in the quality and quantity compositions, regular - 4-5 times a day in small portions, sterling with a ratio of the proteins, fats and carbohydrates 1:1:4 in the day, variety - vegetables, meat, fish, nuts, berries and herbs. This will contribute to the maintenance of health, physical and mental health and active longevity

Grace Tao: Food


Food is the most important factor in people’s lives. Since the beginning of human being’s history, people have gathered, hunted and planted all kinds of food. Why is food so important? In my opinion, food plays different roles such as material support and spiritual satisfaction in our lives.

 

Firstly, food provides material support to people. Food is our basic sustenance. It is ingested by an organism and assimilated by the organism's cells in an effort to produce energy, maintain life, or stimulate growth. Besides the need to survive, we also need food to provide energy in our daily activities such as study and work. What is more, food contains many nutrients, such as carbohydrates, fats, proteins, vitamins, or minerals. These substances are essential to our health. In some areas, people also use food therapies to cure some liinesses. For example, Chinese people are used to eating pork liver to treat anemia.

 

Secondly, food is also very important for people’s spiritual satisfaction. We enjoy the processes, both in preparing the food and in eating them. Spouses spend several hours preparing food for the ones they love. Those who eat them enjoy not only the delicious food but also love. Both food and the ways we eat have artistic expressions. We can find many beautiful books that teach us how to prepare food and eat food. In addition, food is a very useful method of communication. After a whole day of working and studying, dinner time becomes the warm and relaxing moment for family members. Parents and children eat, talk, listen and laugh. If we have dinner with friends, we can share our happiness and sadness. Furthermore, we often make agreements of business at dinner tables.

 

Therefore, food not only provides material support to people but also bring us spiritual satisfaction. We cannot live without food. We also need food to seek a high-quality life style. All of us appreciate the gift from nature: food.

 

                                            Grace