Fitness is hard in a Third-World country! I have questions.

hdME

Hi! I work for a Christian humanitarian organization that runs an orphanage of over 100 children and a school of over 300 in The Carribean. We are also finishing a 17,000 sq. ft. hospital right now - so needless to say our small staff is always busy! However, that doesn't leave a lot of time for things like sleeping, working out or eating healthy. In the US I like to jog and eat a lot of veggies, but here there are not a lot of options. After about 8 months of living here full-time and my immune system not agreeing with me anymore I realized that I needed to make some changes. Nothing helped until I began taking on some Ayurvedic breathing exercises and recipes. It has really helped to bring my digestion, etc... back into alignment. After about a month of this, I found MFP to help track nutrition and exercise and after only a couple of days - I love it! I would love to meet some of you for encouragement, etc...

Here are questions that I have so far for those of you who are Pros:

1. What are some ways that I can meet my calorie levels without adding a ton of sugar or fat? I always go over in order to reach my calorie goals.

2. My targeted caloric intake is 1,200. Anyone with around this much - how do you time your eating? I feel like I am trying to cram in calories at the end of the day - which can't be good so late in the evening.

3. For everyone - what are some of the best exercises that you have found to burn good calories when you don't have much space/ equipment?

Thanks! Looking forward to this journey!

love_

Definitely try jumping rope. This is what I'm using mostly at the time because of a lack of space and no time to get to the gym right now and it's GREAT cardio. I've been stationed overseas and was able to order things from U.S. stores over to me. Maybe you can do that for a jump rope?As far as calories try to make your first meal of the day with the most calories in it. That way later on during the day you can kind of snack on different things to continue to intake those calories but not be worried about the bulk of it at the end of the day. It sounds like challenge for sure there but nothing you can't overcome, I bet.

Eafears

There are lots of bodyweight exercises you can do and you dont need much space. I don't know how much computer time you have but there are ZWow workouts and they are all about 15 minutes long, intense and don't use equipment. If you enjoy jogging can you do that around where you are? If not you could always run in place and do jumping jacks, simple but really effective for raising your heart rate. Even if you just spend some time searching the internet for bodyweight moves you should be able to put together a routine for yourself. Below are 2 links, one to ZWow and the other to a strenght training post I made when I first started. There is a lot of great info in it. Good Luck!

http://www.youtube.com/user/ZuzkaLight

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/679868-strength-training

hdME

I bet I can find a jump rope at the local market - it's a popular toy for little girls here. Thanks for the tip!

hdME

Thank you for the links - I will definitely try them out!