Traveling Raw

Traveling Raw

Since becoming a dedicated ‘raw foodist’ this year, I have had to travel twice so far. Once to Germany and the Czech Republic in April/May, and then to Amsterdam and Bulgaria, in July/August.

Obviously there were challenges, but let me give you the goods in a nutshell.

Way back in May, on the flight there, 9 hours from Vancouver to Stuttgart, I brought with me two very large (Parnoosh Dates) plastic containers stuffed with delicious fruit salads, and some apples and oranges, which passed through security no problem. So I had plenty to eat on the way there. The on flight meals they provided gave me very little additionally, and I was not tempted by any of their packaged, processed products sold as food….

I was in Germany to do workshops and sign books!

In Stuttgart, Germany, where I was conducting my Elemental Magic animation workshop and book signings, I immediately found a very well stocked, organic grocer near my hotel, stocked with fantastic organic bananas, pineapples, berries, mangos, and veggies. So I filled my hotel room with fruit and veggies, emptying the fridge of all the other stuff I don’t touch, and using it for veggies and berries. I had brought those Parnoosh containers with me, so I made two fruit salads each morning before leaving the hotel. That’s about ten bananas, a whole pineapple, a whole box of strawberries, and/or raspberries/blackberries and maybe some mango too. A good amount of pure, fresh organic fruit carb energy to get me through the day.

The FMX conference, where I conducted a workshop

Incredibly, I had been worried about the breakfast buffet, because I’ve always adored the croissants, buns and danishes, cheeses and cold cuts whenever I have visited in the past. Well, much to my delight, I walked into the breakfast buffet to find, incredibly, three huge bowls of fresh fruit, one mango, one pineapple, one strawberries, and all fresh and beautifully cut into bite sized pieces. On top of that there was a enormous fruit salad, with the standard melon, grape, apple concoction you usually see, but with some bananas in it as well, pretty tasty.

Sitting in the sunshine with my delicious breakfast!

There was a lovely courtyard, where I sat in glorious April sunshine and ate my freshly prepared fruit and listened to songbirds and the sound of the water fountain…

So my morning salad at the salad bar, afternoon fruit salads from the Parnoosh containers made at the hotel each morning. And then, every evening during the FMX Conference that I was attending, the guest speakers are all treated to enormous gourmet buffet dinners. Over a hundred of us, filmmakers and animators from all over the world, having a huge dinner party every night. And there was almost always a good supply of fantastic fruits and salad to fill me up as much as I could possibly want. At least the salad was consistent, not the fruit. But I had the fruit supply at my hotel.

And this is pretty much how I got through each day.

This banana on the plaque at the amazing Staatsgallerie was cool....

However, there was the time…that I went walking down to the theatre where people gathered during the day. The temperature, after several days of exquisite sunshine, had plummeted, and it was near freezing and started to rain. I found no one. I walked around a bit and bought an umbrella. I looked at people in warm cafes, where I was also looking for anyone I might recognize. I began to feel the cold, and I cursed the fact that I had not ‘carbed up’ more, I had not eaten a large amount of fruit before heading out.

So now I’m cold and hungry, wandering the streets of a suddenly cold and empty and forbidding Stuttgart, I’m lonely, and I can’t find anybody I recognize, although there are dozens of people I know who must be around somewhere, I have no way whatsoever of contacting anyone. Cold, lonely and hungry. Great combination. I’m texting Mariya, letting her know somewhat of my plight…but I’m hanging in there, shiveringly….

I am in a part of Stuttgart where there are a ton of restaurants and cafes, so everywhere I go, the smells of cooking and fresh baked goods  and candy shops and coffee fill the air. Everywhere I looked I see warm, smiling, happy looking people huddled over plates of steaming, warm, delicious looking hot food. Yikes! I made it back to my hotel and stayed out of trouble, and never left the hotel without eating enough first.

The following week, in Ludwigsburg now, just outside of Stuttgart, I had another close scrape. It was cold and I was walking through yet another bustling restaurant district near the school where I did a workshop. I had gone to visit friends earlier, where I had eaten a very nice salad they had prepared for me, knowing that I was a raw vegan. I broke the rules a tiny bit and tasted two pieces of tortellini pasta from the dish they were all sharing, to be respectful of their food too, and because it smelled SO damned good! It tasted good too and I didn’t worry about it too much. I ate a pretty good amount of food overall I thought, but when I left their place I was still inexplicably hungry. Very hungry. So as I walked through the long stretch of restaurants and fast food places, my stomach grumbled. Oh how I wanted to bite into one of those familiar old Gyros or a disgusting slice of pizza! With every step I was hungrier and it all smelled better and better. The last hurdle was the huge Joe Pepe’s Mexican Restaurant right next to my hotel, with its terraces packed with people, the fresh smells of their hot steaming tacos, burritos and tamales, spices and cheese making me dizzy.

With my small class of seven students 

who took the workshop in Ludwigsburg

 I made it back to the hotel, made a huge fruit salad, and then I ate an enormous box of organic cherry tomatoes and two heads of lettuce while talking to Mariya on Skype and calming myself down….I had gotten back to the hotel room shivering and pretty badly worked up. But slowly but surely I warmed up and I seem to remember having a pretty good sleep. Had the two little pieces of tortellini made me crave even more as I had walked home? Was that part of the inexplicable craving after a perfectly good dinner?

Did I ever cheat on any other occasions? And If so how much?

Yes, I ate about three croissants mixed in with everything over the first ten days of my trip. And I do drink coffee every morning. And I do smoke moderately as well.

More to come, on my smoking, drinking coffee, and making it through my Raw Journey through Prague….and then later, on through Amsterdam and Bulgaria!