09/08/2025
This is what challenges me when I travel the world. You see other people's perspective and their challenges and it too challenges your perspective. I lived a plant-based diet for 6 years while living in Australia, prior to travelling. And in Australia, we are very lucky to have the opportunity to make ethical choices to what goes into our mouths, choices that will retain our health but also kind choices for our planet.
In Mongolia, this notion was challenged while I lived out in the Gobi Desert and out on the vast steppe (grassland) where very little plants grow and the nomadic lifestyle meant, agriculture, could not be implemented.
In Kyrgyztsan, the same thing, nomadic lifestyles meant ppl were on the move every season. So what is their solution?
Livestock.
Tending to animals provided these people with health, nutrients and a means to trade and barter with other tribes and people. As someone living on a plant-based diet, the idea of tending to animals and slaughtering them for calories is absurd. But how else could these people and cultures survive without the need to slaughter their animals?
In Uzbekistan, the animal market is a place for people to trade and sell their livestock to sustain their life/living. Not only is it a place to make some $$, but it is also a place where people can connect and come together, a place for community. Taking the livestock away would mean losing both connection and a source of income. Is this a viable solution for these people?
There are plenty of arguments on both sides to continue or end this type of life. But without travel, I wouldn't get to witness an animal market in real time and in real life in countries that rely on their animals so heavily for survival, for income and most inportantly, for connection, which poses questions to my lifestyle.
What are your thoughts?
| Veganism | Meat Eater | Nomad | Nomadic Culture | Life Photgraphy |