In response to the July 28 post of DDN:Of course we are what we eat! It would be foolish to say that what we eat does not directly affect our appearance. As for the spicy Thai food, it is a general rule that anything spicy is usually good for you. When you observed these people, they were eating the same basic foods that their ancestors ate thousands of years ago. In a sense, their bodies are specifically adapted to that kind of diet.
An interesting story that you'd like to hear would be that of the Native Americans. For centuries before the white man invaded America and poisoned the culture of the Native Americans, their diet consisted of things like corn, beans, buffalo, native woodland game, fish, etc. Their bodies were and still are in the case of those with much Native American heritage "programmed" to operate off of that diet. However this kind of diet is not the norm of the rest of America. The result? A high occurance of obesity in these people. I read awhile back somewhere that some overweight Native Americans switched back to the traditional diet of their ancestors. Its no surprise what happened: they lost their excess weight and kept it off.
So it is no surprise that you found a culture eating a traditional diet with little obesity and the like.
Since this is one of my areas of specialty, I'll post more on this later
