While I'm on the subject...

Thanks everyone for your comments on my International Women's Day post - it was gratifying to get any comments at all, but to share such thoughtful and interesting perspectives, it was fabulous. I think that choice is the key, choice without judgment.

So while I'm on the subject, or perhaps the soapbox, let me quickly mention something else I've been thinking a lot about lately (and then I promise some knitting content at the end!).

That thing is chocolate. I mean, clearly, I think about chocolate a lot anyway. Like at 7am this morning, when I decided it was not too early to have last piece of chocolate that was sitting there on the coffee table. Because then I could throw the wrapper in the bin, and tidying up, that's good right!

A few weeks ago Em posted about chocolate, and in particular about the production of cocoa beans in Africa by farmers using child slave labour. And that's a pretty horrible thing to contemplate. I know different countries have different cultural norms, and I believe that, on the whole, one particular country or culture does not generally have the right to force their beliefs on other different countries or cultures, but to me some things are inherently wrong, and slave labour, whether by children or adults, is one of those things.

So while confectionery companies agree to do something about it by 2005, and then 2010 (as was reported on the news on the weekend), what can we do? An easy thing to do is buy fair trade and/or organic chocolate.

Since I read Em's post and the follow up post, I've been consciously buying Green & Black's chocolate, which is organic (and therefore far less likely to be produced using slave labour). And also, I have to say, it is totally delicious! I succombed on Saturday to a bar of Cadbury's, as we'd been without chocolate for a day or two and I couldn't get by, and the Cadbury's (which in the past I have soo happily eaten) was just not so nice. (I must add a disclaimer - I am not aware where Cadbury's sources their cocoa...am off to investigate their website...where I found lots about obesity, sensible eating of chocolate, marketing to children and tours of the Cadbury factory in Tasmania, but nothing about this issue).

While doing the grocery shopping yesterday I noticed two new different brands of organic, free-trade chocolate on the shelves in Coles. And since I'm a sucker for chocolate orange, I thought I'd try one of the new brands alongside my Green & Black's.

Now, Green & Black's and Cocolo are more expensive than Cadbury's and similar name brands, but the other thing I find is that while it not only tastes better, I actually tend to eat less, because the flavour is stronger. So it lasts just as long as a larger block of Cadbury's, and I'm also dieting! (well, sorta...)

And since I promised knitting content, and I'm on a do-gooder thing right now, here's the pilchers I've made for Terri, who is collecting them to send to an orphanage in China who need them for disabled kids.
I just need to put some elastic in the legs and then pop them in the post for Terri.

And tomorrow, shoes. Because I am totally shallow and materialistic about some things. And contradictions are one thing that make human beings such interesting things of study!