6 Year Vegetarian in Europe

Hello, friends!

For those of you know have known me personally for a long time, you probably know about my dietary restrictions. For those of you who don't know, I was previously a strict vegetarian for 6 years.

Frequently asked questions:
"Oh, did you give up?" "Did you want meat so bad that you stopped?" "Did you give in?"


To answer all of these rather annoying questions, no. I didn't "give up". Here's my philosophy:
As a person who is obsessed with food, cooking, and travel as a personality trait, I would be a fool not to experience French and European cuisine to the fullest extend. In other words, a foodie isn't going to give up the oppertuinty to eat real French food.

From my vegetarian moral point of view, I choose not to eat meat because of animal treatment and abuse that goes on upon slaughter. That may be a major issue in America, but in Europe there isn't as much animal cruelty. In fact, France is working on a law in which restaurants must let customers know where the meat, poultry, fish, etc. is coming from by printing it on the menu. Luckily, the French are just as obsessed with food as I am so laws like this make me feel better about eating their meat.
Yes, I am still a little bothered by what I'm eating, but at the very least, it's much more humane and people care a lot more about what they're eating.

My other reason is that I thought it would be inconvenient for my host families to accommodate for me. I don't believe vegetarians are as popular in Europe as they are in America and I didn't want to ask them to go out of their way. Not to mention going to restaurants would be a major bother. Being used to Portland's many vegetarian friendly places, I can't expect the French to be the same. It's the easiest solution. 

In my opinion, it's best case scenario for someone who's making the decision to quit vegetarianism for exchange or any short period of time. I will be continuing my diet when I return to the states.

The purpose of this post is to feed the curiosity of my friends/family and to maybe help people who are going through the same thing. I hope the people reading this found it helpful or interesting.

That's all for now.
~Effy

P.S. 6 days until departure.