Compared to where I grew up: my brother and I started taking the bus to school on our own (separately, coz we went to different schools) from the time we were 7 years old. Our grandparents took care of us. Our parents worked solid healthcare jobs. We ate homecooked food most of the time, usually some combination of rice and a veg and a fish. When I wanted to, I could buy myself a nice cheap local meal any time. I walked to the train station and back. I walked everywhere, even in that heat and humidity.

Now that I live here, I’ve noticed some key changes: one, that the only way I can taste chicken that tastes like real chicken is to spend much more money on procuring ‘heirloom’ chicken. Coz you can only have nice things here if you pay for special things. Two, I do walk more, but that’s a specific function of the very narrow experience I have living here, which is with the urban dense core of San Francisco. Go a bit outside it and it’s not the same.

Luckily, our produce is good and cheap, but it still takes time to prep and cook. Most people around me in San Francisco are people with tech jobs who can afford meal kits or who are fed at work for free, so it’s a totally different experience from the rest of the country. We also live right next to all the major transit systems of this area, so we are good there. I only get into a car when I want to go birding or camping. But that’s because I had the opportunity and intentions (and privilege) to choose to live my life here this way. It was a nonstarter for me to live somewhere where I can’t walk or take transit.

It’s a series of cascading things.

Because there is so little transit here, most parents have to plan their day around school drop off twice a day.

Because daycare services cost so much, people who can’t afford it privately have to make the choice to give up on one income.

Because of racism, red lining, and other legislative remnants of slavery, there are massive food deserts, and places you can’t get fresh food without driving an hour or so.

Now imagine doing all of that on two minimum wage jobs.

I moved temporarily to Monterey, a rich city, and without a car I found that I ate more convenience foods than any time in SF, where I live walking distance to 20-40 grocery stores including the ‘ethnic’ stores with the stuff I actually want to eat. And Monterey is rich! And has great produce! And I had (some) money! (Not as much as the residents of Monterey, but I had a good job!)

And of course I eat more convenience foods in SF than at any point in my life in Asia, because there is just so more of it and frankly I would lose my mind trying to replicate how I eat in Asia. The infra is not set up for it

@nprofile1q... yay