Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 15, Number 2, 1 February 1998 — Well-formed physiques in 1998 [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Well-formed

physiques in 1998

By Claire Hughes, N u t r i 1 1 o n i s t , Hawai'l Department Of Health RECENTLY, THE frightening discovery that popular weight loss treatment causes permanent, life-threaten-ing damage to heart valves made headlines. This program offered a

boost to some who fight excess weight. Obesity in the United States has been increasing at an alarming rate, with more than one of every three American adults classified as obese or overweight. The real eoneem is that obese people are 26 times more likely to have diabetes and 3.5 times more likely to die of heart disease. Health professionals, while searching for solutions, recommend simply eating less fat and exercising more. How fortunate that our traditional Hawaiian diet (THD) easily fits the definition of a low-fat diet. It is also high in fiber, whieh protects against heart disease, some cancers and becoming overweight. The THD is mostly vegetables (78 percent), namely taro, sweet potato, yams, breadfruit and the greens of taro, pōpolo, fern shoots and other plants. Fruits like bananas, mountain apples and berries are also part of the THD. The oeean provides low fat sources of protein: reef fish, deep sea fish and shellfish. Our ancestors ate large quantities of seaweed. Unfortunately, today it is hard to fmd good reef beds of seaweed. Taro and poi are expensive and in short supply, particularly during summer months. However, such introduced foods as potatoes, spinach, horenso, broccoli, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts, carrots, tomatoes, watercress and others ean supplement the THD. Our ancestors were "above middle stature (tall), wel!-formed, with fine muscular limbs," a Reverend Ellis wrote in 1836. They were "well made; they walked gracefully, ran nimbly" and were "capable of bearing great fatigue," Captain James King wrote in 1779. Maka'āinana and ali'i were tall and muscular. The Hawaiian physique was envied by the first visitors. Our genes provide the opportunity to resemble these descriptions. Eating our ancestral diet, while adding some newer and more plentiful vegetables found in the market today, is a step towards developing a Hawaiian physique. Physical exercise is the other part of the recommendation to avoid and correct obesity. Life in ancient Hawai'i demanded hours of hard physical work. There was no need to exercise; "workouts" eame from daily tasks like farming, building, digging large fields with the 'ō'ō stick and working in the lo'i. Today we have machinery to perform many of these tasks, cars that take us from plaee to plaee, and remote controls to change television channels. It is easy to eat more calories than we use and to put on weight. The solution is as simple as a few minutes of daily exercise, before or after work. Walking is the easiest form of exercise and good walking shoes and socks are all that's needed. Listed here are a few of the high fat foods we consume and their fat content: Shortening, margarine and butter (98 percent); mayonnaise (98 percent); Spam (85 percent); Portuguese sausage (80 percent); commercial laulau (72 percent); Big Mae (55 percent); kālua pig (54 percent); fries (47 percent); Snickers bar (43 percent) and Egg McMuffin (42 percent). Pizza, nuts and many convenience foods also fall into the high fat category. Making other choices, eating these foods less often or in smaller portions are ways to start cutting down the amount of fat in our diet. 'Oki kilohana ka pali o Waialoha. "Straight and tall is the cliff of Waialoha," is said in admiration of a tall, well-formed person. Throughout our culture, rigorous eoneem for the soundness of the body has been a primary consideration. Beauty and physical grace are equally important and are systematically cultivated through eating right and exercising. The infant's features and form were modelled as a sculptor molds clay. ■

N u t r i t i o n ,