'Lamb Ladies' respond to 'Lettuce Ladies' in Kaz

Kazakh ‘Lamb Ladies’ Respond to British ‘Lettuce Ladies’ with Gusto

Two Kazakh models, Assel and Aliya, staged a counter-demonstration on Almaty’s main square on Independence Day calling on their compatriots to reject calls from foreigners to go vegetarian and continue eating meat.

This was a response from Megapolis, one of Kazakhstan’s leading newspapers, to a protest by two People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) activists earlier in the week who sported lettuce bikinis and bras and called on Kazakhs to reject horsemeat, or any other meat for that matter. (See Kazakhstan News Bulletin, December 15.)

“Lettuce is for goats” and “Meat helps us study and live” read the banners of Assel and Aliya who made their point by wearing sheep skins. People around them were gleaming at their sight and cheering them up.

“I saw those British ladies on TV, and they were so pale… Who cares about what we eat? We have such a climate that we simply must eat meat! Meat helps us grow!” said Professor Madeniet Kobdikov of a Kazakh college who was on the square to join in the December 16 festivities.

“One should not exclude meat altogether,” said Professor Olga Bagryantseva of the Kazakh Academy of Nutrition in Almaty. “Meat has protein, and protein has eight irreplaceable amino acids which play a major role in the life of a human and must definitely come from food because they are not produced by the body. Those who are vegetarians need to very carefully select their food so that it does provide them with the necessary proteins.”

“In fact, there is such a thing as an ideal standard of protein. Horsemeat and beef are 90 percent close to this standard. So, indeed a Kazakh’s body is predisposed to eating meat, and the complete renunciation of meat can have negative consequences,” she explained.

People do love their meat in Kazakhstan, as U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Mike Johanns noted recently. There is even a popular joke the Kazakhs love to tell their foreign guests which goes like this. They first ask: “Did you know that Kazakhs are the second in the world in terms of meat consumption?” This usually invites a moment of puzzled silence followed by a natural question: “Who’s first?”

“Wolves,” goes the answer to the belly laughs of everybody in the room.

More: http://www.kazembassy.com.ua/