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Eating on $1 a day?

I have been poor. In fact, I’ve pretty much perfected the art of being poor the last few years of college. But, I’ve never had to eat on $1 a day, as this guy chose to do as a month-long experiment. He kept a blog of his experiences — from hunger pains to 9 cent hot dogs — that is a pretty quick read (click on the November archive link and read top to bottom).

I know I waste a lot of money eating out or eating fast food, but mostly I do it for the social aspects anyway. The Monday/Wednesday lunch crew? The weekly Chipotle runs on Sunday after the editors meeting? Ethnic Tuesdays? The list goes on.

Although I spent much of college eating one meal a day because I didn’t have time to eat more frequently. (Seriously, I can’t even begin to count the number of times I got home after midnight and considered I hadn’t really eaten that day but decided I’d rather sleep an extra half hour than think of and prepare something to eat.) I can’t imagine forcing myself to sit down and think about how I could make that one meal each day within the budget constraints of $1. I always knew I could grab something on-campus or run to Taco Bell. That was always an option.

I also have to give him kudos for donating the difference between what he spent and his normal food budget to the food bank. That alone validates the experiment and what he learned.

In some-what related matters, I also came across this posting (What the World Eats), which has photos of several families from around the world and what I surmise to be everything in their cupboards/stockpiles. It’s insightful to see how what Americans eat compares to other families in other parts of the world.

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