While living in America can sometimes make me a bit of hypochondriac, traveling outside of the country I am bizarrely less worried about getting sick.  My time in China has been a good example of me laughing in the face of illness.  I, of course, wash my hands here in China, but there is never any soap to use (if there is it has been watered down for weeks and can no longer be called soap).  People cough, sneeze and spit in all directions without any thought of using a tissue, but I don’t let that worry me.  Anti-Malaria medicine hasn’t been in my mouth since 2002 when I went to Belize and Guatemala and discovered I hate Anti-Malaria medicine.  To be fair Malaria is not really a problem in most parts of China but can sometimes be found in Xishuangbanna and Laos, where I just came from.  When my American hometown ended its Beijing exchange program early in 2003 because of the SARS crisis I thought they were being a bit too careful.

My casual nature overseas is even more apparent in the way I eat.  America is a bureaucracy that loves to regulate and centralize its food systems.  Restaurants are frequently inspected, forced to buy expensive equipment to deal with stuff like grease and the possibility of fire, and are in general expensive propositions for the owners.  These safeguards make us feel safe but they also limit the choices of what and where we can eat.  People far too often go to chain restaurants with a lame variety of dishes that are unhealthy for them and the enviroment.  So many restaurants fail to make a sustainable business and many are forced to close down just months after opening.  Not only that but the financial costs of opening a restaurant limit who can do so and therefore keep great cooks from ever sharing their cuisines with the greater community. Can you tell I’ve been reading Michael Pollan’s fantastic book The Ominivores Dilemma?

Food is and will always be one of the reasons I love Asia.  Anyone who has a bit of money, some cooking skills and a strong spirit can open a restaurant or cart selling whatever they want to.  The sheer variety and number of restaurants in China makes every time I go out to eat lunch an adventure (and a cheap one at that).

Stomach aches, diarrhea, vomiting and other ills are a natural byproduct of such a open and diverse food system, but it’s not as common as you would think (I have never had to use the Immodium AD I brought with me to China).  I am of the opinion that the Chinese and Asian food systems are in many ways better than the American version.  This thinking on my part is not limited to restaurants but also encompasses the produce markets, butchers, tofu makers, noodle makers, and local distilleries that are found all over the place including within a 15 minute walk from my apartment. The vegetables, fruit and meat that I eat and cook with in Hunan are for the most part locally produced, processed, and sold.  When I go to my local wet market to buy tofu or some spinach – a completely different experience from the way we buy food in the States – I know where my money is going and who is doing the work.  When you buy a bag of organic baby spinach in Boston that was grown in Arizona using machines and Mexican labor you have very little idea of where it came from or how your money is being divided.  This is why I love markets, whether its a farmers market in Burlington Vermont or my local wet market in Huaihua.

This thinking of mine was dealt a heavy blow when I read that the H5N1 Bird Flu, which had been absent (or maybe just unreported) in China since February 2007 came back with vengeance during the first month of this year.  Of the first four killed this year (the number of fatalities has since grown to eight) one was a 16 year old boy in Huaihua, Hunan.  Just to make this very clear, Huaihua is where I live and teach.  It is a city of 2-3 million people (maybe more) who are largely not rich, it is also only 10 years old and growing at a frantic Chinese pace.  Needless to say the city is full of chickens, no doubt some of them sick with the flu.  Huaihua is also a railway hub and gets thousands and thousands of vistors passing through every month.  During the Chinese New Year these numbers swelled, as with every other part of China.

This boy was from Guizhou province (a mere hour away by car or train from Huaihua) and came to Huaihua because of the better medical care, in fact I would bet money that he went to the city’s best military hospital where they don’t allow foreigners to enter the premises.  He was one of only 4 people 8 people to have had died from the H5N1 Bird Flu in this new year in China, though there are upwards of 30 people infected by it.  Man, I mean, of all the Chinese cities in the world he had to die in mine?!

Reading the story I was reminded of my frequent trips to my local wet market.  The poultry section in particular where they kill the chickens, ducks and geese.  The cement floor is wet and slimy from fish scales, blood or unknown origin and feathers, lots and lots of feathers.  I once got a Chicken feather stuck in my nose.  When you buy a chicken (or duck or goose) they pull it out from a crowded pen made of an oversized basket turned upside down and walk it to the killing area.  Here they deftly slit the neck of the bird and collect the blood in a little plastic bag as it runs out so that you, the consumer, can use it in your cooking.  Then the bird is scalded in a pot over a little coal fired stove that looks like a British tax man that was given the tar and feathers treatment during the American Revolution.  Then the bird is plucked and tied up by its feet so you can hang it from your bicycle on your ride home.  Everything and everyone seems to be covered in bird.

Bird Flu cannot be transmitted from human to human only from a sick bird to a human.  You cannot get the disease by eating cooked chicken in a restaurant, only from the living bird itself.  So while I think I’ll continue eating Kungpao chicken I don’t think I should hang around the chicken killing area of my local market anymore.

This news as odd timing for me because I’ve been planning for months to buy and slaughter a chicken on my own.  I love cooking and feel that they way we eat is one of the best ways to help the environment and connect with nature.  In America it is not easy to slaughter a chicken on your own, especially in the suburbs.  So it seemed to make sense to try it out here in China where such a ritual is practiced everyday by millions of people.  I kept thinking about all the knowledge I would gain and how such an exercise would force me to use every part of the animal.  My dream was so well thought out I even studied how to slaughter a chicken and decided on a name for the bird: Dinner.

Now the news is just getting worse and after a autumn spent reading about tainted Chinese milk I’m not sure I can just continue ignoring the problems with food here in China.  Most disheartening is that I am now scared to cook with poultry and even just thinking about going to the market gives me pause.

Then a couple days ago I read this article in which Lo Wing Lok, a Hong Kong government adviser on infectious diseases, said:

“There’s no doubt of an outbreak of bird flu in China, though the government hasn’t admitted it.  Inefficient communication between the Hong Kong and mainland authorities is an ongoing problem. Hong Kong has not been well-informed by the mainland.”

Wow.  So now I keep wondering where this new food crisis will go and what it means for the people of China and me.  What a great way to start the new year!