COMMENT The only food you should discard are the ones you unleash when sitting on the throne in the toilet.
 
But sadly, we always prepare or order more food than we can eat, and what we can’t finish, we trash: 15,000 tonnes of nasi goreng, rendang, pan mee and more, daily.
 
And overeating is not the only thing Malaysians do with food.
 
We use them as ingredients to create the longest something, biggest something; anything that would earn us a place in the Malaysia Book of Records.
 
A visit to the Malaysia Book of Records website reveals a list of events where I suspect enormous amounts of food are used:

  • Largest coffee drinking event;
     
  • Most number of variety of rock melon dishes;
     
  • Biggest gathering of people sharing same birth date (featuring a nice, big cake); and
     
  • Longest dragon formation using rice (dated Aug 19 last year,in Kampar, Perak).

Did the participants consume the food after they were done setting these Malaysian records, or did a significant amount end up in the dumpster?
 
While we try to become famous by playing with our food, the homeless in Kuala Lumpur and other Malaysian cities trudge along the deprived trail of life, rail thin like anorexic super models and ever-thankful of the food handouts by charity soup kitchens organisations.   
 
Granted, some are the scum of society who would not bother trying to find a job, but others are unfortunate people from broken families, broken relationships, broken lives who are doing their best to get their lives back in order.
 
Malaysians, fattest in Asia?

A friend said if eating was an Olympic event, Malaysia would have snagged the first gold medal decades ago.
 
The overweight and the obese make up 47.7 percent of the country’s 30 million populace (thanks for the statistics, Health Ministry).
 
But what about the underfed, unfortunate ones that make up part of the other 53.3 percent?
 
So, well done, my beloved, overfed fellow Malaysians. Quite a number of us have managed to think with our stomachs, and not our hearts.

TERENCE TANG is a member of the Malaysiakini team.