On healthy diets...

I have a week vacation right now and I'm kind of enjoying it. The boyfriend went back home to see his family, and I stayed here. My best friend from El Salvador came to visit me from Saturday to Tuesday, but other than that I have been pretty much FREE to do whatever I want.

I have some friends (2 boys and 2 girls) that stayed here, so I've been hanging out with them. Monday night, we had a fancy dinner with lts of wine and it was s'marvelous. :) We girls cooked salad, foie-gras-filled quails (these were already prepared, we just put them in the oven), gratin dauphinois and tiramisu. It was all sorts of yummy and the guys told us they'd tell our boyfriends we were good to marry.

In any case, my point with this whole post was to say that my friend told me he was surprised how I hadn't won any weight while in France. He's been putting on weight (normal, he's doing a master in food and wine), and he's seen other friends that while studying in France have put on SO much weight. I am proud to say that I have actually LOST weight (without any diet or eating disorder or going to the gym).

How is it possible? In a country that loves bread, chocolate and all those things that make you put on weight? Well, it's simple. It can be summed up in 3 words : PORTIONS, QUALITY and WALKING.

- Portions : It's all about self-control. My boyfriend is about 6'4", eats like crazy (seriously, I know few people who eat as much as he does), and still, has a body like this. Except he's a sports guy and must burn calories like no one else.

Since we eat together all the time (okay, we live together but in 2 separate apartments), I had to learn to control myself. As much as I loved many of the things that he cooked for me, I can eat A LOT and had just to learn to control myself.

- Quality : It's easy and cheap to just cook pasta, put butter on, and eat that. But do you know that what makes you gain weight is NOT what you call "grease", but the starches! So eating pizza and pasta and bread and rice and potatoes is what makes you gain weight. Obviously, we need all those (yes, we even NEED pizza), but as I said above, it's all in the portions. Try eating less starches and eat veggies instead. Here in France, veggies are expensive, but it's worth it. You're cleaning your body from all those BAD starches. I'm not going to say that you should stop eating yummy and fattening things, just that in smaller portions, combined with healthier stuff!

- Walking : For someone who was not used to waking like me, coming to Europe is hard. No car means public transportation and walking. Obviously, taking the bus/tram and not doing anything else is an easy escapatory, but what if you walked? I walk a lot everyday, and I will not stop until it gets REALLY cold here. I love walking, and it has given me great results. My legs are starting to get toned up (the 5 flights of stairs to get to the boyfriend's apartment are also useful) and it gives me my daily dose of exercise, without even going to the gym (which I find expensive and weird. For more on this, read this).