live to consume or consume to live?

"We are all consumers, mere units who go out and buy stuff", says a Newsweek reader, in response to an article about the looming recession.

Is that really, what we all have become? Do we go out and toil our hours away at work, just to get more money to consume more unnecessary things and make the rich, richer?

I was out with Rus the other day, at the supermarket. We were at the frozen food aisle. "Yang ini, isi ayam dicampur dengan cheese (this one's got chicken meat mixed with cheese)", Rus said. Next to it, I saw chicken nuggets, chicken wrapped in seaweed, chicken balls and more variety of chickens. I stopped myself.. and I told Rus, "beli ayam aje lah. Tak payah belikan budak2 tu semua. (let's just get the chicken. No need to get the children those other stuff)." Chicken is what we need (want?). I want the kids be used to eating simply.

It got me thinking how ridiculous we have become. We find endless means to make our life more... interesting? fanciful? Eating - food, has become a VERY BIG thing. We eat to live. That's the most basic reason for eating. But human endlessly find more interesting ways to present the food, that we'll gobble up in the next few minutes - the main reason why i don't like to make sushis anymore. I'd take 1-2 hours to prepare the sushis and it takes 15 minutes to finish them all.

I read before, a lady who lived beyond a hundred. What did she eat daily? Plain porridge and water - day in, day out. And what do WE eat? Oh, just..rice with chicken curry and vegetable cooked with soy sauce, omelette with onion, rose syrup drink and perhaps ice cream with fudge later. That's for lunch.

During recession, are we really in dire need, if we can't afford the seaweed chicken or the soy sauce?

So, that's just the food part. Of course there are also other products to make other parts of our life more interesting too - like the different facewashes, soaps, lotions, shampoos, conditioners - to clean ourselves. And the many many different types and colours of blouses, shirts, pants and skirts - to dress ourselves.

So I think, insyaAllah, we will not necessarily suffer from recession. All we need to learn to do, is to consume lesser and more simply. Learn to live moderately, and if there's some balance - give to charity.

Let the recession, not affect us that much, but only affect the already rich people/companies - they just don't get more and MORE, but insyaAllah they still have lots more, to live on, simply.