Biggest Loser Challenge Day 2 and 3

Day 2, 3

            Day two was extremely easy for me. My mother and I went to buy groceries at the local market and came back home to prepare meals for the rest of the week. We walked around the market for about 45 to and hour and spent the rest of the day on our feet cooking and preparing food for the week. Our goal was to have healthy and tasty food on hand whenever we wanted instead of going for the easily accessible junk food. This process was actually a lot easier than I had expected. I was about to turn down the offer of going to the market and prepping food but then I remembered that I had to exercise at some point during the day for an hour at the very least. I wound up pushing past my goal of an hours exercise with pretty much a whole days worth of exercise. I remained active the entire day and when we were finished we rewarded ourselves with fruit smoothies. Completing my goal of eating a cup of fruit a day.

            Day three on the other hand was not as easy. A friend from the embassy put together a small belated birthday party for my mom’s birthday and decided to have a pig roast and make a big feast for us. Knowing full well that we had a competition ahead of us, we happily accepted the request and went to celebrate my mother’s birthday and my baby brother’s homecoming. Because I am allowed one cheat day to eat whatever I want, I decided today would be the day to do so. I was fairly disappointed because I didn’t want to have to use it so soon but I still stuck to my diet as well. I had my fruit and I still limited the intake of my “cheat” food and I played with my brother and our hosts’ child while the food was cooking.

Biggest Loser Challenge

Jan 1 – Biggest Loser Start

Biggest Loser is an American reality game show that features obese people competing to win a cash prize by losing the highest percentage of weight relative to their initial weight. In the American Embassy there is a similar competition amongst the families that aims to:

1. Lose weight

2. Build support amongst the competitors but still build healthy competition

3. Achieve/maintain a healthy lifestyle.

            Although I am not overweight and don't see the need to lose weight, I have chosen to include myself in this event. My whole family is participating in the competition and our goals as a family are to

1.     Challenge ourselves/push us out of our comforts zones and maintain a healthy diet.

2.     Work together to support each others choice to lead a healthy lifestyle within a hectic work life

3.     Maintain this lifestyle after the competition has finished

This competition lasts 3 months but my family’s goal is to keep up this healthy way of living for the rest of our lives. We have chosen to start fresh and completely anew. We tossed out all the processed junk foods, unhealthy snacks/sodas, and replaced them with fruits, vegetables, healthy meat products and cereals. We plan and prepare the majority of our meals/snacks for the week so that later preparation is quick and simple. My parents and I all have busy lifestyles so we’re trying to make time to include a healthy meal in our every day lives without having to spend hours in the kitchen preparing it or just choosing take out when we’re too tired.

GOALS FOR THE WEEK

1.     Reduce caffeine intake

2.     Reduce refined sugars and processed food

3.     Exercise for 1 hour a day (in any way possible)

4.     At least one cup of fruit a day

5.     Reduce carbohydrate intake

6.     No sweets but can be allowed ONE cheat day a week

Day 1

            Today I am starting out slow in order to ease in to the diet rather than jump headfirst into it. I realize that in the past that jumping headfirst into a strict diet/exercise routine doesn’t last vey long because I get extremely tired and busy and can never work out the time to do any of it. I plan to reduce my caffeine intake and sugar intake because those are the two main things that make me extremely sluggish and tired at the end of the day. I drink coffee/energy drinks as often as I possibly can. In a sense you can say I’ve been addicted to anything caffeinated, but I choose to reverse this with the reduction of caffeine intake. On a normal day I’ll have about two cups of coffee… in a big cup. Some days I might have a couple Red Bulls or Monster energy drinks to keep me awake. I believed this would be the most difficult thing for me to do so instead of drinking coffee in the morning; I replaced it with a fruit smoothie. It’s quick and easy and tastes delicious. Coffee can suppress appetite and can lead to high blood pressure; I chose to slowly ease out of drinking coffee but it proved to be impossible.

Run For Their Lives (5k Run for Cancer)

Today was the 5k For Their Lives run at Independence Square in Colombo. RFTL is a charity run held annually in Colombo in aid of the Maharagama Cancer Institute. It's a fundraiser of the Rotaract Club of Colombo Uptown (See more at http://www.facebook.com/runfortheirlives). I had three goals for the run 1. Finish under 30 minutes 2. Don't stop running and 3. Don't slow down at the finish. Discipline in pushing myself actively has been somewhat of a challenge for me so I made these goals in order to push myself and push myself out of my comfort zone and undertake a (somewhat) new challenge. I love to run and it has always been a passion of mine but I never really set goals for myself. I set these small, yet important goals, in order to feel more accomplished in my run and run to the very best of my ability. 

Before the run my father and I walked around for about a mile around Independence Square, to warm up as well as see the area. Later we met up with some friends from the American Embassy and we warmed up before the run.

When the run started my dad and I started slow in order to set a good pace as well as avoid being trampled by the runners who decided to sprint the entire trail. While I was running I felt really good about keeping my goals up. About 3k in was when I started to feel the pressure of the run and started to slow, but didn't stop running. My dad helped me to run the rest of the way but while I was starting to slow down more I remembered why I was running, and who I was running for. I thought of all the people I was running for who didn't have the option to quit like I did. They don't have the choice to stop or slow down. Their lives are constant battles; this realization helped me to push forward. I finished strong with a sprint to the finish. I felt accomplished because not only did I run just to run and complete my goals; I ran for people who are going through a lot of pain and suffering. When I realized the importance of the run I felt like I ran faster, harder, and better. 

 

After the run my dad and I went to have a big breakfast in order to relax our legs. I felt very good after the run and I felt like I fulfilled my goals. I didn't stop running, I made it back in just under 30 minutes, and I sprinted to the finish without a problem. 

                               

                                                        Obviously I was still feeling really good when I got home...

Helping Hands

Helping Hands: First Meeting

Goals:

• Work collaboratively with others (supervisors, children etc).
• Take on a new challenge of working independently with the children, and overcoming a slight language barrier with the Sri Lankan students.
• Take initiative when planning activities.
• Practice communication skills when initiating activities with the children. 

     My first meeting with the Helping Hands group went very well. Helping Hands is a program that teaches less fortunate children to read English as well as provide them with the company, companionship, and services they might be lacking. The group works to provide the children with a fun learning environment as well as the opportunity to learn and interact with other children. I found that I settled in very easily and upon my arrival I was requested to join a certain group within the program by two girls who already knew who I was. My first task was to read to the Sri Lankan children who are learning to read in English and the primary students from school. I started by picking out a few books to read to the group; I chose a small book called One Duck Stuck. My supervisors, Ms. Powell, helped guide me through my first group reading by encouraging me to ask questions and include the children in the reading. Later she paired me with two girls who read English well but still needed improvement. Ms. Powell helped me to get settled and gave me the overall idea of the group and how it works but for the majority of the time I was left to my own devices but I quickly made good use of my situation and decided to read aloud to the two girls I was paired with and had them read back to me. 

    From my previous work with the Fatima Girls School I learned that lack of comprehension is common when learning a new language. In order to overcome this at certain parts of the book I would stop and quiz them in order to test them and I would also have them read a few lines back to me. I felt like I adapted very and I completed all my goals: I worked collaboratively with my supervisor as well as the children I taught by planning and initiating certain activities, I took on a new challenge by working  independently with the children as well as planning my own activities within our little group. 

   Working independently with the children gave me for free range to do what I wanted to do and work how I was the most comfortable. At first I was a little nervous about reading in front of children because I'm not very comfortable reading anything out loud. Being able to read to the children and talk to them gave me the confidence I needed to work with them in an effective manner. I like working with children and I quickly learned that they like working with me as well. Overall the first meeting with the Helping Hands group when really well and I look forward to working with them next Monday. 

Goals for Yearbook

August 29th: first yearbook meeting.

  I was very happy to be accepted into the yearbook group despite my lack of experience in photoshopping skills. I'm very enthusiastic about developing a new skill as well as undertaking a new challenge in order to produce an amazing yearbook this year. We hit the ground running in our first meeting. We talked about senior pages, working of educating those who have little to no experience with photoshop, and we also reviewed other yearbooks to get a sense of what we want to accomplish with this years yearbook. I'm very excited to be working with the yearbook team and my first and most important goal for yearbook is to learn photoshop in order to create my pages. 

Goals for Senior Year

  Goals for 2012-2013

1. Yearbook
2. RCCI
3. Prepare for Hash House Harriers trip in September
4. *Hopefully* be able to join the HHH club

Goals

 This year I hope to be able to start work with the yearbook committee despite my lack of experience. I hope to develop new skills with my participation in yearbook such as photoshop. I will also work collaboratively in the RCCI service group. I also plan to train in order to attend a Hash House Harriers running trip.

Yearbook 

I've always wanted to work with yearbook but in the past but have never had prior experience with it so I never fully got the chance. I will take my chances this year with yearbook because I'm interested in it but I have just never had the experience with it. I hope that even though I'm inexperienced in this area I will be chosen to join the committee and do my best to make the yearbook of year of my graduating class the best it can be.

RCCI

I began work with RCCI last year and found that it would be a service program I was interested in. I love working with people of all ages, especially children. I enjoy helping people in any circumstance. When I do service work I like to do the same sort of programs that are aimed to help out others. I don't have a preference when it comes to service but if I can interact with whomever I'm helping it makes the experience more exciting and meaningful. 

Hash House Harriers Run

  Over the summer I have started training for a Hash House Harriers trip. Hash House Harriers, HHH, or H3 is a well known non-competitive running club. Although I am not an official member of this club, yet, I have been invited to a trip where anyone can run and participate in the clubs events. Although my workout schedule was interrupted due to long work hours, I planned to get at least one and a half hours worth of exercise whenever possible. This amounted to exercising once a week, I want to change this. My goal over the summer was to get to the gym at least once a week and work out for an hour and a half in order to prep for a Hash House Harriers trip. My goal is to build up my endurance so I can participate in this event. There are other factors that influence my attendance on this trip but I'm hoping I'll be able to at least get to my best physical shape as my first goal.  My new goal for the school year is to work out whenever possible but minimum of two or three times a week depending on my work schedule. Because I do not like being competitive but enjoy a challenge and a good run, non-competitive running is ideal for my circumstances. 

Music Makers 2012

Last night (April 20th) I performed in OCSs Music Makers concert of 2012 with Zahara Dawoodboy and Aya Razzaz. We played a song called "I Can't Hear You" by the Dead Weather. I practiced every day in order to be prepared for the show. Before the concert I felt very confident that we would do well. Although I had performed for a large audience several times before, I still had some nerves before going on. I love music so much and it's a big part of my life but playing in front of a crowd is extremely nerve-racking for me. I pushed past my nervousness and pushed myself out of my comfort zone in order to give the performance my best, despite one tiny hiccup. Overall it was a good show and I enjoyed every minute of it.

Ramona- I Can't Hear You (Cover by the Dead Weather)