As recently as in the last 50 years China has experienced massive famines reaching millions in death tolls. The prosperity of the last few decades is so new that many Chinese are still acclimating to the idea of eating meat daily. Only a tiny percentage of Chinese people eat a quarter-pounder or fried chicken per meal. This might be as hard for Americans to imagine, as it is for Chinese to imagine American vegans living in a land full of affordable meats. For a large majority of Chinese population, vegetarianism has been a means of survival, not a choice. During the last two centuries it was common practice for families who could afford it to serve meat during meals on the 1st and the 15th of the lunar month. Now the practice has inverted and many Chinese observe a vegetarian meal on the 1st and the 15th of the lunar month in order to remember their roots. Being sometime vegetarian, rather than an absolute vegan, is culturally far more common among Chinese than it is among westerners. A Chinese might accept that you are vegan one day and the next day offer you meat again. They don’t have a memory lapse; they just don’t generally think of vegetarianism as a daily commitment unless it is for survival.
