MooMoo Week? What’s that?

MooMoo Week is a challenge where you completely cut out meat from your diet for a week and go vegan or vegetarian. It is a new annual initiative that encourages the reduction of your carbon footprint through decreased meat intake. This year I participated in the challenge at my school and went vegetarian for a week. In fact, I tried tofu for the first time and absolutely loved it.

I chose to participate in the challenge this year to try something new, and because reducing my meat intake is one of the most efficient ways to reduce my carbon footprint. MooMoo week was rewarding, and it has pushed me to eat a minimum of one vegan/vegetarian meal a day.

Initially, cutting out meat from my diet took a toll on my body; I became tired quite easily and felt slightly weaker. I eventually realized that due to the lack of meat, I wasn’t getting any protein. Therefore, I began to eat larger servings of other protein-based foods like beans and tried out new ones such as tofu to regain my strength. Overall the change in diet was not very drastic. I didn’t crave meat nor felt as if I couldn’t survive without it. However, I will admit that I got jealous of those surrounding me eating meat, such as fried bacon and ham from time to time. In truth, the hardest part of the challenge was finding something to eat in my school canteen. I would often have to compromise and purchase a meal containing meat, and I’d set it aside for a friend.

 
Effects of cutting out meat from your diet

Vegetables vs. Meat

Reducing meat intake can have a significant impact on your health and the health of our planet. Eating less meat and more plant-based products helps solve livestock production issues, such as climate change, air pollution, and soil pollution. The land usage of meat and greenhouse gas emissions created from meat production has a detrimental effect on our environment. Globally, animal agriculture produces approximately 15% to 20% of greenhouse gases. One of the most efficient ways to reduce our carbon footprint is by reducing our meat and dairy consumption. Moreover, if just one person gave up their burgers, bacon, and nuggets, that single person would save 162,486 gallons of water annually. 

Cutting out meat does not only make our planet greener, but it also offers health benefits, and you save more money in the long run. Foods such as red meat are the largest source of saturated fats in a diet. Cutting down on meat or eliminating it reduces multiple health risks such as heart disease.

However, I strongly advise those with previous dietary and health conditions to take precautions or consult with their doctor before cutting out meat. Reducing or eliminating your meat intake is only healthy if you gain enough sustenance from other nutritious foods.

What do the organizers have to say about MooMoo Week?

The organizers of MooMoo Week 2020 are named Isaac Lim and Zoe Nai. The two sixteen-year-olds held the challenge for the first time last year with their peers and decided to do it again this year. I reached out to them and asked them about this year’s success.

What motivated you to create MooMoo Week?

Nai: MooMoo week started off as a small global perspectives project. We knew we wanted to do something related to sustainability and our carbon footprints, so we thought, what could WE do in our community. So we decided to focus on food waste, something we were able to try to make a difference in our community.

Lim: MooMoo Week was created, actually, for a small scale school project. Our idea was simple: how best could we help reduce the carbon footprint of the school? Our answer to this question was MooMoo week- a simple, seven – day challenge in which you attempt to go vegan or vegetarian.

What are some of the benefits to Moo Moo Week?

Nai: MooMoo Week is actually a very simple task, but it requires a lot of commitment. It helps others notice how much meat they consume, and could also lead to better awareness of what you eat.

Lim: MooMoo Week is about a lot more than this one week. After the week, our participants carry on taking the cost of environmental destruction into account not just when eating, but also in all of their purchases and decisions. We have to recognize our incredible economic privilege, the luxury we have of being able to pick and choose lower-carbon products. Not everyone can go vegan for a week, but we can, and maybe we should.

How successful was Moo Moo Week this year?

Nai: MooMooWeek was really successful this year, better than what we had expected. We got way more participants and way more people that made it to the end.

Lim: We were blown away by the support this movement gathered this year- we doubled our goals, with students and teachers from every grade at school pledging to go vegan or vegetarian. This action seems small, but when you consider the number of people who signed up and how they’re going to carry on thinking about carbon footprint, you see the huge impact.

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Photos: Pexels, Unsplash

Back in 2016, a Swedish man named Erik Ahlstrom became so disillusioned with the excessive litter lining his small town that he began snatching up scraps of trash during his daily runs. He dubbed the activity ‘plogging’ a combination of the Swedish phrase ‘plocka upp’ which translates to ‘picking up’, and the slightly more obvious ‘jogging’.

Over the next two years, the environmental health and physical fitness crusade spread across the globe, and reached Chinese mainland in 2018. Plogging Beijing, a group of waste warriors, waging war against the enemies of all that is cleanliness and goodliness.

Ostensibly, plogging, focuses on picking up trash along traditional jogging routes, such as in parks and neighborhoods, one Beijing expat has taken a similar environmental exercise mission to entirely new heights.

Terry Mieremet is a native of the Netherlands who first arrived in Beijing in 2011. Despite living in other cities in China over the next few years, he made his way back to what he calls, “the magnetic field of the Jing” in 2016. Since returning to the Capital, Mieremet has found work taking expats and visitors around the city on bike tours. Moreover, he founded CLUP club, a portmanteau of Cleaning and Up, in which groups go to areas such as the Gubeikou Jinshanling Great Wall and pick up trash in the surrounding nature and watch towers.

Much like with Ahlstrom, the Swedish father of plogging, CLUPing was borne of a frustration with all the trash wantonly discarded in beautiful places, and Mieremet cites a particular trip to Thailand as the inspiration behind his initiative.

“The CLUP is a movement that got created out of necessity,” Mieremet tells beijingkids. “Everywhere I have traveled to, I have seen tourism increase and behavioral change. Now anywhere you go, there is so much plastic rubbish. After my trip to Thailand, where I was shocked by all the trash all over the place, I was like, let’s make social media social again, and let’s spread this message.”

Initially, Mieremet tried various ways to spark a conversation with folks about the impact they were having on otherwise untouched natural areas. However, he quickly realized that if he wanted to truly make an impact, he was going to have to get his hands a little dirty, and encourage others to do the same.

“I tried writing messages or making art with the picked up trash,” says Mieremet, “so that people could see and think twice about what they do. I spoke many times to people to try to ask them why they throw their plastic bottles or other things away.”

Unfortunately, much to Mieremet’s dismay, many of the folks he would speak to didn’t even realize what they were doing. Mieremet decided to pick up the trash, with hopes to inspire others to do the same.

“This became a movement where people can join to help preserve our nature. Now we organize events where we go out to a pristine nature area and bring bags to pick up the trash that has been thrown out by people on their hikes or leisure activity.”

Those events have not only included Mieremet’s own circle of friends and CLUPpers, but even organizations as big as the British Embassy, who joined him for an outing at the Jiankou Sky Stairs section of the Great Wall. What’s more, late last year, parents at Western Academy of Beijing (WAB) got in touch with Mieremet, hoping to get their kids involved in a CLUP event. Unfortunately, the bitter cold of Beijing’s winter swept across the city, followed by the social distancing and quarantine regulations of COVID-19, forcing the plan to take a backseat until things get better.

Nevertheless, Mieremet is eager to get more students and families involved, “to get the younger generations out of the house and away from any electronic devices, just to be outside and active.”

The before and after

While working with schools and local organizations is a milestone in large scale events, the work of individuals can have an equally large impact, both on a personal level, and for the community. In fact, Mieremet credits the CLUP movement with significantly improving health and wellbeing, by encouraging participants to be more physically active and helping the environment in their free time.

“CLUP is a different lifestyle,” says Mieremet. “Many people always went to the club and that was their weekend. But now they can join the CLUP, go somewhere in nature, be outside, make new friends and clean up,” adding, “You will feel healthy, satisfied and fulfilled after.”

There’s no doubt that CLUPing is a uniquely positive activity, with untold benefits for our physical, emotional, and environmental wellbeing. And as Mieremet explains, “I think anybody and everybody can and should get involved. It’s not only about the deed, but also the example you set.”

“This is a more-the-merrier thing, and if we all do something it will make a huge difference. Also, if we can pass over messages where we inform others of the consequences, we could slowly be breaking the habit of, ‘somebody else will pick it up,’ or, ‘nobody will see what I just did.’”

As for getting involved, Mieremet advises that, “you can join the CLUP on WeChat (ID: Terdemier), and if you want to do any events please connect with us or bring your own crew and go out somewhere. Even with some friends or with the family, this gives a physical challenge to your normal outing, and great rewards in the teamwork and result you have made.”

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Photos: Courtesy of Terry Mieremet 

This article appeared in the beijingkids 2020 May issue