Would you eat in a McDonald's vegetarian restaurant?

As McDonald's plans to open its first vegetarian restaurants in India, two vegetarians argue for and against the idea

Kavitha Rao v Andrew Tobert

McDonald's has announced it is to open vegetarian-only restaurants in India.

Kavitha Rao: McDon't do it!

As a lifelong vegetarian and as an Indian living in Bangalore, I have been eating cheap fast food all my life. But not the skanky plastic garbage peddled by Maccy D's, KFC and their ilk. Instead, I might have a crisp, lightly browned dosa (rice and lentil crepe) with coconut chutney for breakfast, pav bhaji (bread rolls with a buttery vegetable hash) for lunch and chaat (a spicy mix of potatoes, yoghurt, onions, tomatoes, cilantro and crispy bits) for a snack. Usually, these will cost me about Rs 50 (about 50p), less than a McDonald's veggie burger, which goes for Rs 59. They will be healthier, tastier, fresher.

The recent announcement by McDonald's that it is launching a veggie restaurant in India had me bellowing "What fresh hell is this?" It's the culinary equivalent of selling ice to Inuits. Inuits may not have more than a hundred words for snow – apparently it's an urban myth – but I can assure you that Indians have many more than a hundred varieties of veggie fast food, not just a plain one-size-fits-all potato patty.

Oh, I have tried McDonald's veggie offerings, the ones carefully created for my primitive brown taste buds after years of research. Once. The dull McAloo Tikki burger is not a patch on the infinitely more delicious crispy alu tikkis with tamarind chutney found at any street vendor. Their McSpicy Paneer is a cop-out, falling back on that bland veggie standby: paneer. It's the insipid nut roast of India, the tofu of timidity.

Cleanliness, you say? Nope. Even if you are a foreigner with a stomach like tissue paper, you are better off eating piping hot, fresh dosas from a busy street vendor than you are eating stale fast food. India has always had homegrown chains of veggie fast food joints which are every bit as clean and quality conscious as McDonald's, perhaps even more so. And I'd rather give my money to a small business owner than a McCorporation.

But hey, I am not going to sermonise. Or even tell you, Morgan Spurlock-style, that veggie burgers are killing you slowly. I don't need to. After almost 16 years in India, McDonald's has just over 250 outlets here, which, in such a massive country, is pocket change. I suspect that Indians are smart enough to know which side of their pav bhaji is buttered. Sure, broke students and tubby kids hankering after plastic toys will continue to eat there, but there will also be plenty like me who shun the Golden Arches in favour of a truly happy and tasty meal.

• Kavitha Rao is a Bangalore-based journalist

Andrew Tobert: I'm lovin' it!

There are few more powerful symbols than the Golden Arches. For me, they represent at once the homogenising influence of market forces, the evil of industrialised agriculture, the obesity crisis. And the last time I was truly happy.

McDonald's, from the first time I crossed its air-conditioned threshold, has offered a place of sanctuary and calm. The smell of whatever-that-smell-is wafting through the air and the happy children, joyous with additives swirling around their blood streams. This is where I've had my best thoughts, my most cherished memories. This is where I can truly be me.

And I'm not alone. From Shanghai to Chicago, kids, pensioners, lawyers and students come and are welcome. However much people might not want this to be true, McDonald's is the global restaurant – the place that unites humanity. You might find better, cheaper food elsewhere, but that's not going to convince Parisian school kids or London lawyers coming back for more.

I used to go three times a week (and yes, dear readers, I was a fat child). I wasn't just lovin' it, I was stalking it on Facebook, and naming our soon-to-be-children. But three months ago, my life changed for ever. I became vegetarian (something about climate change and global hunger, but I forget the details). My place of solace was now closed off.

Of course when I walk by a restaurant, it looks as it always has. As I stand on the street corner, I see people laughing, enjoying themselves. I want to go in, and share the things that make us human. But I know I can't, the temptations will be too much. The Chicken Selects, the Big Mac, the fries (I could go on), so delicious and so stunningly cheap. I miss them. A lot. But I made my choice, and I must accept the consequences. So there's me, outside. An outcast in a meat-eating world. But perhaps not for much longer.

That's why a McDonald's veggie restaurant in India fills me with unadulterated joy and hope. Yes, there are haterz, there always are. And to them I say, whatevs. Indians won't all become obese overnight, and their cuisine isn't going to suddenly disappear. Maybe Indian vegetarians, like their meat-eating peers the world over, watch McDonald's ads and think "you know what, that looks cool". And isn't that a wonderful thing? That we live in a world where people can pick and choose the best of global culture, regardless of where they were born? McDonald's is the global emancipator. May its benevolence spread far and wide.

But first, could the veggie outlets spread to London? Say, Hackney, E9. Then I won't feel a stab of jealousy every time I pass a branch. And maybe then I can stop resenting being a vegetarian, and start actually enjoying it. Yes, those really will be the (Mc)Salad days.

• Andrew Tobert is a copywriter, an environmental activist and a lousy vegetarian

Taken from guardian.co.uk, Thursday 6 September 2012 11.00 BST, HERE.

Why do we behave so oddly in lifts?

Many of us use them several times a day without really noticing. And yet the way we behave in lifts, or elevators as they are known in the US, reveals a hidden anxiety.

"Most of us sort of shut down.

"We walk in. We press the button. We stand perfectly still."

Taking the lift could be the least memorable part of your journey to work, but Dr Lee Gray of the University of North Carolina at Charlotte has made it his business to scrutinise this overlooked form of public transportation. People refer to him as "the Elevator Guy".

"The lift becomes this interesting social space where etiquette is sort of odd," he explains. "They are socially very interesting but often very awkward places."

Conversations that have been struck up in the lobby tend to be extinguished quite quickly in the thick atmosphere of the office elevator. We walk in and usually turn around to face the door.

If someone else comes in, we may have to move. And here, it has been observed that lift-travellers unthinkingly go through a set pattern of movements, as predetermined as a square dance.

On your own, you can do whatever you want - it's your own little box.

If there are two of you, you take different corners. Standing diagonally across from each other creates the greatest distance.

When a third person enters, you will unconsciously form a triangle (breaking the analogy that some have made with dots on a dice). And when there is a fourth person it's a square, with someone in every corner. A fifth person is probably going to have to stand in the middle.

Now we are in uncharted territory. New entrants to the lift will need to size up the situation when the doors slide open and then act decisively. Once in, for most people the protocol is simple - look down, or examine your phone.

Why are we so awkward in lifts?

"You don't have enough space," says Professor Babette Renneberg, a clinical psychologist at the Free University of Berlin.

"Usually when we meet other people we have about an arm's length of distance between us. And that's not possible in most elevators, so it's a very unusual setting. It's unnatural."

In such a small, enclosed space it becomes vital, she says, to act in a way that cannot be construed as threatening, odd or in any way ambiguous. The easiest way to do this is to avoid eye-contact.

But perhaps there is more to it than just social awkwardness.

"In the back of our minds we are a little anxious," says Nick White, an office worker in New York who was unfortunate enough to be trapped in a lift for 41 hours.

Nick White was trapped in a lift in his office building for 41 hours.

"We don't like to be locked into a place. We want to get out of the elevator as soon as possible, because, you know, it's a creepy place to be."

During his ordeal, he began to think of another enclosed space that lurks at the back of our minds - a tomb.

It would be understandable if White refused ever to step in a lift again. But if you work in a city built on a vertical plane, and if you have aspirations above being a receptionist, that isn't an option.

"I certainly remember what happened to me every time I go in one," he admits. "It's part of the commute, the part you have the least control over."

Elevator Guy Lee Gray agrees that a sense of disempowerment is the main cause of lift anxiety.

"You're in a machine that's moving, over which you have no control. You cannot see the elevator engine, you don't know how it's working," he says.

This sense of passivity in the hands of a machine may become more pronounced as we enter the age of buttonless "smart" elevators.

After swiping through security or touching a central control panel, travellers are directed to a lift that has been programmed to stop at their floor, removing the need for any further commands. The system is designed to cut down on unnecessary stops, but although more efficient, some people find the experience unnerving.

Regardless of the qualms and anxieties associated with lifts, Gray is adamant that they are safer than cars - and significantly safer than escalators.

"It is in in fact of one of the safest forms of transportation, if you look at the billions of miles that lifts travel every year and the very, very small number of accidents."

We all know this, which is why we continue to take lifts every day, despite our anxieties.

"We have learned that we can take an elevator and it is safe to do so," says Renneberg. "So in a way it's a triumph of rationalism over our more animalistic instincts."

This pleasing thought - that we become more sophisticated by travelling in lifts - is perhaps one to ponder next time you get in one.

Just don't, whatever you do, start a conversation about it.

Taken from the BBC HERE.

There is a BBC podcast about this HERE.