Advice For Vegetarian

I'm a vegetarian & I'm starting to plan my RTW. I'm wondering if any members are vegetarians & if so how you deal with it on the road. I'm a little nervous that I'll have a hard time with my special dietary needs. Any advice or input is greatly appreciated. Thank you in advance.

I'm not a vegetarian myself but I'm related to some. I heard about a website that might help you:

http://www.ivu.org/phrases/index.html

It explains how to say things like "I don't eat meat" in most languages you can think of.

I spent 9 years on the road as a vegetarian and never really had a problem. The only useful advice I can give is claim its for religious reasons when dealing with overly zealous hosts. In Turkey, people kept trying to feed me meat, but when I told them I didn't eat it because I was Buddhist, they respected that, especially when I reminded them that beer was vegetarian.

The religious excuse also works well when people want to know why you don't eat meat. Ethical reasons can lead to arguments, offend people, etc.

BTW, I'm not Buddhist, just a non-practicing Muslim-Catholic.

A few options:

1) You can always cook for yourself if you're staying in a hostel with a kitchen.

2) Check out www.happycow.net for vegetarian and vegetarian friendly restaurants throughout the world.

3) Most decent guidebooks include a section on local cuisine, including recommendations for vegetarians. And the city sections of the guidebooks will often have a listing for a vegetarian restaurant or two.

4) Pizza and ice cream! I eat lots of pizza and ice cream when I'm traveling. Both foods tend to be available in most decent sized cities.

5) Most restaurants will be happy to specially cook you something vegetarian if they don't have something on their menu. Or if you're at a "fixed menu" place just ask for extras of the vegetarian dishes and none of the meat.

Shouldn't be a big deal as rice n beans is available most everywhere.

Thank you all for your advice. Guess I let myself freak for no reason. I think I'll go with the religious stand point since most people, even here in the US, don't seem to understand that I physically can't eat it. Will definately be doing the self-catering for the most part. Thank you again for the help!!

I would go with religious reasons, or even you could say you have a food allergy. I am a vegan and I find that even at most restaurants here, if I say it is for a personal choice, they might tell me it has no meat/dairy in the food even though there is. If I say that I have an allergy, they are way more accommodating and truthful! Happy Cow is a great website/app for veg food!