Hello friends!
I've missed everyone greatly.

In the past 3 months my life has taken a dramatic and drastic shift.
I think if anyone could have seen it coming it would have been those folks who read my posts in the past year.

I have dropped out of graduate school, and moved to Israel.
I am currently living on a kibbutz dividing my time between intensive Hebrew school and work for and at the kibbutz.
I have applied for Israeli citizenship and in about a year I'll be serving in the Israeli military. After that, I plan to take courses toward a tourism license that will allow me to use my history degree and "teach" Israeli history as a tour guide working for my own tourism company.
I am *much* happier now with my life than I have been in a long time. My mind is stimulated in a new way and I get to do work that directly benefits others..it's especially nice when I get to do work that directly benefits my *neighbors* as I did today working in the garden.

Meanwhile, now that my life has changed I am in dire need of a lifestyle change.

It has not been easy to adapt to Middle East life. I'm only now becoming used to the food, the attitude, etc., but alas it is time to stop making excuses for myself and match this great mental feeling with a great physical feeling!

The current situation I have is one that is *very* difficult for getting fit.

I have no gym, my food is already paid for and while it isn't all bad it has some aweful pitfalls, and I have little money (less than I had in Ohio anyway).

I am in the process of developing a plan of action, but I would like to get some insights while I'm in the planning stage.

As far as exercise, weight lifting will be difficult although I can purchase some hand weights. I am considering running or playing basketball (our kibbutz has a nice court overlooking the West Bank) 3-5 times a week for cardio, but even these have thier downfalls. For fat loss, I have used heart-rate as an indicator in the past and that isn't possible in my current situation. I'm not much of a runner, but 30 min. before class doesn't sound so bad (class starts at 7:30am, work can start as early as 6:30 so on those days I might just let the working be my cardio...no matter which job I have it keeps me on my feet for 8 hours).

While an exercise plan will be more difficult than I'm used to, it isn't my real concern. My concern is about making healthy choices amongst poor choices and trying to create a diet plan that will allow me to cut without counting calories.

For breakfast we have the same meal each day that consists of the following:
White bread
Eggs (I can take no more than 2)
Hummus
Butter
Cornflakes
3% milk
Sometimes some cottage-cheese like cheese
and then veggies: olives, peppers, tomatos, and cukes.

Lunch is the major meal here and consists of a wide variety of foods:
The problem with lunch is that while there could be some good options most of the food is fried or cooked in oil. I work in the kitchen so I have intimate knowledge of how it is prepared.
The healthiest choice might be boiled chicken.
There are salads that aren't so bad as well, but beyond that my options are limited.
I think the bulk of my calories will have to come from this meal...but how do I guage how much I'm consuming?

Dinner is about the same as breakfast but instead of a cornflakes/milk option there is a "main course" option that rotates between tuna (which I believe is canned in oil, but I can check on that), one slice of pizza per person, occaisonally pasta, and sometimes other random things.

(Note: My kibbutz keeps kosher, so the breakfast and dinner meal has no meat source unless fish is served because fish is not considered meat by kosher law. This makes lunch my main source for protien.)

Meanwhile, I have enough cash to make up some kind of 4th or 5th meal, but nothing too expensive.

8:30 is breakfast, so if I do cardio before then I could likely have something to tide me over for an hour or so before breakfast.
Lunch is at noon, so a small meal between 8:30 and noon would be beneficial, and dinner is at 6:30 which makes a huge gap and makes me really really hungry! A meal between noon and 6:30 is a necessity.
I have access to a grocery store, but other than a refridgerator there isn't a kitchen that I have access to.
Off hand, both almonds and tuna come to my mind as viable and healthy options.

All for now. I have internet only when I walk to the cafe down the road, so I can't check this everyday but I'll make an effort.

I appreciate everyone's comments and look forward to talking with you all again!

-Andrew

Congrat's Andrew- that's an amazing transition. I'm forgetting her name, but I believe one of the other regulars here lives in Israel?

Congrat's Andrew- that's an amazing transition. I'm forgetting her name, but I believe one of the other regulars here lives in Israel?

That's Gila Monster. http://forums.johnstonefitness.com/member.php?u=10007

Oh and wow that's an amazing move Andrew. Good for you! :tu:

Hey Andrew... good to see you back. While I'm sure it's a major change, I can tell from the tone of your post that you are happy and enjoying the challenge. Looking forward to your reports!

congrats on the big changes... change can be hard but it's usually really good for us :tucool:

can you order protien powder to be shiped to you? if you can then all you need is somewhere to keep it and a shaker cup... I know that some protiens like All-The-Whey mix really easily in a shaker cup... alonds and tuna would be great... maybe some cottage cheese &/or yogurt... what are your fruit options? if you're working on your feet that much fruit would not be a bad idea ;)

oh and for breakfast I might choose the eggs, hummus & cucumbers... hummas is made with beans (normally) so it has good protien in it ;)

I'm looking forward to hearing more about your new adventure :tucool:

Hey Andy - good to see you have access to the internet!

I'm gonna make it brief because I gtg, I'll post more a bit later:

B.fast - the amounts of food don't sound very satisfying, at any rate I'd reccomend to skip the butter and the hummus - Hummus in israel is made of chickpeas, sesame seeds extract (or grind sesame seeds, I'm not sure) and lots of oil. Dietwise It's not a good choice. Eggs are fine, veggies are great. White bread is ok - if you're still hungry (which you might be, since 2 eggs are probably not enough). Cornflakes and milk are ok. I'm not a big fan of those though because they dont satisfy the hunger that much. Also, from my personal experience diary products arent great for fatloss. With that said, many forum members include diary products in their diets and have had wonderful results. If you have a grocery store there, you can buy yourself some tuna to have with your meal, say 1 can per b.fast - they shouldn't be costly.

Lunch - Boiled chicken sounds like a good choice, I assume they also serve boiled veggies and a veggie salad of some sort which is also good - as long as it goes without mayo or such other dressings. As far as quantities of food go, you probably wouldn't want to bring a food scale to the dining room with you so the best advice I can give you is just to eat untill you satisfy your hunger - don't stuff yourself. You'll just have to eat carefully and listen to your body. It worked for me when I had my fat loss during the months of april-july. Just keep yourself fed on the healthy, unfried and unprocessed stuff and stop eating when not hungry anymore - that with a combination of exercise and cardio should help fatloss, although I can't guarantee you won't lose some muscle along the way aswell.

Dinner - I'm pretty sure the tuna is canned in oil, but it's a good source of protein so suggest to eat it nonetheless.


Otherwise, since you work in the kitchen you can try to ask the cheff to make one lunch protein dish without oil/frying for you. I'm not sure it will work but it's worth a try.
As for the gap between lunch and dinner, the only thing that comes to mind right now is that you take a double portion of whatever you're planning to eat at lunch and store half in the fridge so that you'd be able to have it between both meals.

Another thing that comes to mind is that almonds are probably going to be a bit costly: 5-6 NIS per 100 gr, while tuna would be 4-5 NIS per 100 gr. of almost pure protein. For your oil intake I'd reccomend some nice olive oil. It's a little expensive, but worth the investment.

About protein powder - I've tried to buy some from this site's sponsors a few good months ago but shipping to israel seemed to be a problem. Anyway, you can find good p. powders in israel aswell there are many shops in Tel Aviv, also in this site:
http://www.israelbody.org/Index.asp?CategoryID=89

I haven't seen an option for english, but there are phone numbers on the top of the page that you can call for info.
Hope that helps, let me know if I can help in any way!

Gila. :)

What a fantastic life change!

I don't think your choices for food sound bad at all. Gila Monster's advice is very good.

I don't actually follow the 6 meals a day method any more myself because my life has changed around, but I do tend to have pumpkin seed or peanut butter snacks so I don't get insanely hungry or pass out. I think having to walk to internet access is going to eventually make a huge difference for you-- I know it would for me. In my opinion, you can do an awful lot with daily walking, dumbbells and/or bodyweight exercises, consistency, patience, and completely immersing yourself in your life and the people around you so that you forget about yourself and what you look like. It's what has worked for me anyhow.:)

Have fun in your new life!:tucool:

Hey what's up Lemon!!! Haven't seen you in ages since we worked together! :cool:

~SC~

Wow thats quite a big lifestyle change.
What is the name of your kibutz?
How long will your military service be?

Workouts :
There must be something you could use for chins/pullups and maybe even dips. (maybe in some playground in the kibutz?)

Thats a half decent upperbody workout.

For your lower body you'll need to spend a few hundred NIS at least on
some plates and barbells/dumbbells. You can get a pretty good legs workout with some lunges/split squats and other single leg exercises.

A simple digital food scale should cost around 120~ NIS. If you don't mind looking funny measuring your food in the dinning hall thats your best bet to really know what you are consuming. As far as food goes
stocking up on some Tuna in water cans would probably be a cheap
and easy way to get an extra meal everyday. I'm assuming you have access to a simple grocery store so you can also get some cottege cheese for your last meal of the day.

If you have access to a small oven/frying pan/heating device you can always get some brand of precooked meat.
Some brands such as "Auf Tov" have very lean (120calories/100gram) options, with around 22grams of protein/100gram.
But these precooked meals are a little expensive (30~+ NIS/500grams)
Oh another good option is "tz-fa-tit cheese" thats around 18grams of protein/100garm and 140calories/100gram(with 5% fat).

Good Luck

Shahar.

Neat life changes man! I was just wondering what you were up to the other day and if you would ever drop by again!

My wife and I will have to be sure to catch up with you overseas if we ever make it to Israel like we hope to, perhaps by then you will be running the biggest Israeli touring agency?!

Good luck with your ambitions and congrats on taking bold steps that many others would not.:tu:

A simple digital food scale should cost around 120~ NIS.


A cheaper option is a mechanic food scale - they are pretty accurate (I use one) and cost no more than 15 NIS.

BlackDawn-- I live at Kibbutz Mishmar HaSharon and I don't know when my draft date will be. As of now, I've just applied for citizenship which will come through sometime before the New Year. Then I will have my psychometric exams, physical exams, etc. and depending on the outcome I might not have to serve at all (although I'm hoping to serve, I really *want* to!)...I'm excited about the military, but I hate the build up...I wish I could just start basic training tomorrow or something because it'll likely be another year before I"m drafted and thats just too long to have it hanging over my head.

Meanwhile,
I think that the food scale option isn't practical.

I have no access to any type of cooking instruments nor a range or microwave.

We do, however, have a chinup bar and dip-station just outside my room...it's rusted and I hadn't even thought of using it before, to be honest, but that's a great suggestion.

I need to formulate a specific plan and put it into writing before I begin anything, or I will be doomed to failure. I know common wisdom, particularly on JSF, is that one should just get going immediately and do some little thing right away...after all, why not just start *now*, why keep putting things off? Normally, I take that approach too, but at the moment I believe that doing random little things will distract me from making an all-out lifestyle-plan and I plan to spend Shabbat working on this so that I can start soon.

Otherwise, all is well. Black-dawn, where do you live? Are you Greenguy (name change?)?
(Gila, let's get together soon :D)

You might want to get some fish oil, if you can do so affordably, as this could help balance out any excess of omega-6 pufa's. With most of your saturated fat intake being the smidgeon found in your two daily eggs, I'd put my money on a pretty healthy heart.

I'm not "The Greenman". I'm me. :)

I live in Kfar-Sava, thats about 20km south of you on road #4.
So if you guys are gonna do another get together be sure to invite me. :)

There are a couple of gym/health clubs just south of you in "Beit Itzhak"

#1 09-8338090
#2 052-4631717

I think from their names that the 2nd one is just some sort of studio thing. Anyhow those are located about 2.5km from your location so if you can afford it, you could just walk/jog/cycle there.

Shahar.

I'm not "The Greenman". I'm me. :)

I live in Kfar-Sava, thats about 20km south of you on road #4.
So if you guys are gonna do another get together be sure to invite me. :)

There are a couple of gym/health clubs just south of you in "Beit Itzhak"

#1 09-8338090
#2 052-4631717

I think from their names that the 2nd one is just some sort of studio thing. Anyhow those are located about 2.5km from your location so if you can afford it, you could just walk/jog/cycle there.

Shahar.

SWEET! Thanks for the info.
I'll check to see just how far those are from me. I know where KfarSava is for sure, I used to date a girl from there.
Maybe we *should* schedule another get together...Eilat, anyone? ;)

Eilat could be very cool. but I its better in the summer when
we will all have our 6 packs to show off on the beach. :)

Contact me via PM.

Shahar.