Seeking Life

A woman I know was telling about how she and her husband used to connect with, and serve, people on the street and how she used to enjoy it, and how alive it made her feel. That was before kids. Her life now, similar to mine, involved 3 kids, school, kinder, home, community, part time work and so on. It didn't always seem as 'alive'. So, I've been thinking today about the times and things in my life that make me feel most alive. Hmm, also, I think, at different stages of our lives, we need to see the 'alive' bits differently, or identify them anyway, to see they are actually there. I reckon it can be hard to actually choose to do the things that make us feel most alive.

A knot in my shoelace

I tied a knot in my shoelace, and then I tied a knot in my other shoelace. Not to remember anything special but because the shoelaces broke. I am good at this kind of dodgy repair and fashion faux pas, or is it dodgy fashion and a repair faux pas... I'll let you make your own decision about that one!

But it did make me think about the many people who might not be able to buy a new shoelace, or have other pairs of shoes and what that means for me. How might my actions make a difference here? I really truly want to live in a world where we care for our neighbours, both local and global. Where we recognise the impact of our decisions, both large and small, upon others. Where we, with God's help, can help bring life into the world and not take it away. Idealisitic perhaps but it truly motivates me.

So, my little shoelace repairs set me thinking about some of the other teeny things I do that try to mean we take care of this world by living a little more simply, by being a little bit thoughtful about the impact of my actions, by not just throwing something away and buying something new.

• I reuse little snap lock bags, washing them after use; I use them in lunch boxes and for snacks, etc.
  
• I buy barbecue shapes in a box, not little bags, and put servings of them in the little snap lock bags to go in as a lunch box treat. (Actually, my son asked me to buy the bag of them with their individual packages and I explained my decision to him how we reuse the bags again and again so that there is less rubbish going into land fill, so that there is less energy going in to making individual bags, how we want to care for the environment, (I might have said some other things too, can't remember at the moment), he was TOTALLY fine about the whole thing - I thought he would have been still requesting little packets like everyone else, but no, it was like he got it and wanted to be part of this little caring for the earth revolution. He now selects the boxes of barbecue shapes when he is shopping with me.)
  
• I darn my socks (lunatic fringe, I know), but I think, "do I really need new socks, or is the rest of the sock okay for a while longer?" (I may have taken this one too far on occasion)
• I keep one sided paper from everywhere for the kids to draw on, to use as scrap paper, as list paper, and so on!

Have you got anything to add to the list?

The Chocolate Cake

"Mum, is that chocolate cake fair trade?" Ah, we try to educate our children about how some of our purchasing choices can make a positive difference for poorer people around the world and then you can't even buy cheap chocolate any more without your kids checking that it's fairly traded. Oh, the guilt! Oh, the consequences of education! Oh, my conscience!

When I think about buying non-fair trade chocolate or cocoa now, I think, what will I say to my children when they ask me, "Mum, is that chocolate fair trade?" I've thought I could answer, "Sorry darling this chocolate is probably made from cocoa that children your own age worked to harvest. Children who were taken from their homes and forced to work on a cocoa plantation, often under dangerous conditions in West Africa, who paid very little or maybe nothing." (ouch!)

I have reflected upon whether I am just motivated purely by the guilt of being caught out here. Well, maybe, but I feel very unhappy about needing to give the above answer to my kids, and as I think about that answer it reminds me that I am unhappy about a world that exploits children so that I can have a treat.

And so, in our house, we have just about completely switched to fair trade chocolate(I say just about, because I know I am not always 100% perfect at this decision). It is more expensive, it is not as readily available (at least not the dark choc, and I reckon a number of the brands are not as nice as the big name brands), and it is hard to find fair trade cocoa. We have made this shift to almost 100% fair trade chocolate gradually. I figured previously, that even if I bought one block of fair trade chocolate that was making a little bit of a difference, and now we do it a bit more, it's a little bit more of a difference. Chocolate and cocoa have moved to be a true 'treat' food in our house. I can't make chocolate self saucing pudding or a plain chocolate cake as often I did, and I know this almost sounds silly, but I feel the pinch of this decision.

We keep talking with our kids about how products that are 'fair trade' mean that the people who worked for them get paid enough money to feed their family (this makes more sense to them than 'a living wage'). The kids tell visitors proudly that we have fair trade coffee, chocolate, some clothing, and that Mum has a pair of fair trade runners (much to my embarrassment). We are rich, we can choose to move chocolate from a cheap, whenever treat, to a special occasion treat.

And when my 7 year old wanted a chocolate cake for his birthday I knew it would be an under-appreciated , expensive, fair trade cake; that's what he wanted, and I knew that making it was also making a small quiet difference in the world, one that my conscience found life-giving.


You might like to look at Stop the Traffik, or Fair Trade Association for more information.
There is a Bible study you might like to use for some ideas from Stop the Traffik.

TEAR Australia's Kids 4 Kids kit "Lessons in Hope from Cambodia" is not about chocolate or fair trade but it is about about how kids in Cambodia are sometimes taken from their homes and forced to do dirty or dangerous work they don't want to do, the kit covers how TEAR's partner organisation CHO is helping to keep children safe through education. "Chann, Srey Leak and Heng live on the border between Thailand and Cambodia. Their families are very poor, so everyone - women, men and children - work hard to survive. In this Kids4Kids resource pack, you'll find out how Cambodia Hope Organisation is working to protect children from exploitation and strengthen community spirit." Ideal for primary aged children.

The Meeting

Well, I involved and took my 7 year old to visit our local member of parliament today. Before we went I talked with him about how many children in developing countries get sick and die unnecessarily from easily preventable diseases such as pneumonia (which he had twice as a baby and due to great medical care quickly recovered), malaria, and diarrhoea. We talked about how children who don't have enough to eat are more susceptible to disease and illness. We also talked about how many illnesses are easily prevented by providing access to clean water and immunisations. Our conversation included talking about how mothers are key players to healthy kids and that by keeping mothers healthy and by educating them everyone was healthier. Sam generally has his own comments and observations to make as we talked about these things, as he linked the things in our conversation with things we had already talked about and things he'd learnt doing Kids 4 Kids programs with me.
We went with a couple of people from our community. We wanted to be part of the Micah Challenge voice to let our government know that we want to see global poverty halved by 2015 and especially see more movement by our government by contributing to aid projects targeted specifically on MDGs 4 and 5. Sam understands about sharing, and I wanted him to understand that we are asking the Australian Government to share from our bounty. Sam was in our midst during our discussions around what we would say. He made a card with a "5" on it and helped with the colourful cupcakes I made to highlight the issue of wanting all children to reach their fifth birthday. He might have played with his cars during our discussion time with Martin Ferguson but he was there. Who knows how this kind of action will shape his ideas about the world and the outworkings of his faith. Who knows. I'm glad he was there.