Healthy living comes to Turkey

healthy living

English-language online newspaper Turkish Daily News ran an interesting story a couple of days ago about Ersin Pamuksüzer, the former general manager of Ericsson who has now abandoned his corporate lifestyle in favour of creating a Turkish health-and-wellness company called The LifeCo. People talk about how unhealthy Americans are, but I was shocked when I first came to Turkey at how many people here live an unhealthy lifestyle due to poor public education about the dangers of things like smoking, sedentary living, and overeating. Over the past few years, though, I’ve seen a marked improvement in the way many people take care of themselves— nowadays when I go for my morning run I actually see some other runners sometimes, and now only about 25% of my Turkish friends are smokers, compared to about 90% three years ago (though I’ll admit smoking is still embraced in Turkey with the zeal of a national sport). Also, more and more people are veering toward the healthier side of Turkish cuisine, abandoning fried foods in favour of salads, baked potatoes, and grilled chicken and fish.

So far it seems that most of The LifeCo’s facilities and products are geared toward the Istanbul market (yawn, so what else is new?), but hopefully they’ll be spreading some of their healthy living down here on the south coast before too long. Link

4 Comments

  1. 21 May 2007
    Reply

    Maybe the drop from 90% to 25% is due to attrition? hehe.. I’ve been looking into diet for another reason, mainly to beat prostate cancer, but also for general health reasons, and Mediterranean diet is a part of the equation but by no means all of it.

    My partner was married to a Turk and they livedon Cyprus for a few years at his folks’ village, I’ve never been there. But it’s on my to-do list…

    I can has shish now?

  2. 21 May 2007
    Reply

    Maybe the drop from 90% to 25% is due to attrition? hehe.. I’ve been looking into diet for another reason, mainly to beat prostate cancer, but also for general health reasons, and Mediterranean diet is a part of the equation but by no means all of it.

    My partner was married to a Turk and they livedon Cyprus for a few years at his folks’ village, I’ve never been there. But it’s on my to-do list…

    I can has shish now?

  3. 21 May 2007
    Reply

    As in most cultures, there are two sides to the Mediterranean diet. The part that gets exported is the healthy stuff, the fish and olives and salads. What people forget, though, is that it’s just as much about greasy kebap meat and fried potatoes and ten times as much salt as any human needs.

    Prostate cancer, eh? You seem oddly calm about it. I guess that means I should be calm about it, too.

    You can has shish now, definitely.

  4. 21 May 2007
    Reply

    As in most cultures, there are two sides to the Mediterranean diet. The part that gets exported is the healthy stuff, the fish and olives and salads. What people forget, though, is that it’s just as much about greasy kebap meat and fried potatoes and ten times as much salt as any human needs.

    Prostate cancer, eh? You seem oddly calm about it. I guess that means I should be calm about it, too.

    You can has shish now, definitely.

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