Issue #107. July 8th - 24th, 2005

London 7th, July- Why we are here tonight.
There was some discussion as to whether we should publish this issue after today's horrific events in London. In the end we decided it would be business as usual for us and I would like to explain why.

How can something so sweet taste so wrong?
A Dutch television journalist is trying to draw more attention to this subject and has set up a petition for him to be arrested. Since he believes he is aiding and abetting crimes against humanity by purchasing chocolate, he wants to be incarcerated for his crimes.
By Athena Sydney

Reinventing the meaning of indiepop
That night she stayed up half the night listening to the same song over and over again and staring at the (newly-borrowed) record player while the song, slowly and steadily, itched its way out of the vinyl imprint and into her heart.
By Dimitra Daisy

Make Poverty History, Edinburgh, 2nd July
Their messages were written in brightly coloured felt tips. They were forthright and to the point and written with a simple naivety and wisdom that only a child can have. Most of all they were written by people who were probably sick to death of being told to "share" their toys with their brothers and sisters and friends. Why should we forget that lesson as we grow up?
By Rachel Queen

The Disappearance
Alice is the dog who lives with the woman across the road. She is a nice dog but we don't have a lot in common. She likes to chase after balls and bring them back for her people. I like to chase after balls and run as far away from my people as I can.
By Belle

Record review #1: Tugboat (Tugboat - album)
Canada rocks, it’s official, all that maple syrup and ice hockey seems to have finally paid off. Finally, the land of the mounted policeman, the giant redwood and some kind of defiant insistence of certain occupants to remain French is giving us some good stuff for a change.
By Johnny Mac

Record review #2: The Fallout Trust (When we are gone - single)
When We Are Gone is the kind of tune that should be played in locations fitting to its unpretentious grandiosity - starless nights in vast fields; precipitous cliffs: it has a very exciting, brooding intensity to it.
By Michael Hartnell

Africa Calling: Live 8 at the Eden Project - July 2nd
Hastily arranged in association with WOMAD - possibly in response to the lack of African artists at Hyde Park - this free event features ten hours of performances from that continent's finest singers, dancers, rappers, musicians and performers.
By Grant Lakeland

How can something so sweet taste so wrong?

It’s a proven fact that chocolate makes you feel good; cocoa contains phenyl ethylamine (PEA), which is an internal stimulant and antidepressant. The effects of phenyl ethylamine are similar to epinephrine and amphetamines, and this explains why people feel better after eating chocolate, and why it is so addictive. It is no wonder that chocolate is exchanged between lovers, or that those who are feeling down ingest it. I have to admit, I’m one of those people; chocolate is my pick-me-up, my friend in times of trouble.

After reading this article, chocolate may not taste so sweet – for the circumstances under which the cocoa labourers work, are bittersweet to say the least, atrocious is the word that comes to mind.

Forty-three percent of the cocoa used in chocolate comes from Ivory Coast, which makes this African country the biggest producer of cocoa worldwide. Most of the labourers on cocoa plantations are between twelve and sixteen years old, some of them are even younger, nine years old. These young children are treated like slaves – they don’t receive any payment for their labour, and are beaten with sticks when they don’t work, or try to escape. They are locked up at night, don’t get sufficient nutrition and work eighty to one hundred hours per week. The children are separated from their families, since they are ‘purchased’ from their families in adjacent countries like Mali, Burkina Faso and Togo, and they live in constant fear on the cocoa plantations. Although it is not known how many children are enslaved in Ivory Coast, it is estimated that approximately fifteen thousand child slaves work on cocoa, cotton and coffee farms in this African country. It seems like a low number for a country that harbours seven million cocoa farmers, who account for a third of the nation’s economy.

The Chocolate Manufacturers Association, a trade group for American chocolate makers, are aware of the fact slaves harvest the cocoa on Ivory Coast plantations, yet nothing is really done about it. One has to wonder why. Ivory Coast ministers claim chocolate companies are only interested in their own profits; the companies would have to pay considerably more to the farmers if child labour was put to stop. Because the international chocolate industry encouraged more countries to grow cocoa, the price has been forced down, and therefore they are the root of the problem of child slavery in Africa. The price of chocolate would be ten times higher than it is now to ensure quality of life for the seven million cocoa farmers in Ivory Coast.

Can you find out whether the cocoa used in the chocolate you eat comes from Ivory Coast?
Although most chocolate manufacturers do not mention on the package or wrapper where they get their cocoa, several companies have admitted to using Ivory Coast cocoa in their chocolate. The leading American chocolate manufacturers, Hershey and Mars, who control two thirds of the American market, do use cocoa from Ivory Coast. Other companies who probably use cocoa from Ivory Coast are: ADM Cocoa, Ben & Jerry's, Chocolates by Bernard Callebaut, Fowler's Chocolate, Godiva, Guittard Chocolate Company, Kraft, Nestlé, See's Candies, The Chocolate Vault and Toblerone. Even though most of these chocolate companies claim they do not condone child labour and slavery, they continue to purchase the Ivory Coast cocoa. Only a few companies have taken a stand, like Cadbury Ltd., which has a long-standing human rights policy prohibiting forced labour, especially when it concerns children. The Cadbury Schweppes website even has a dedicated section to Fair Trade with reference to cocoa farmers on which they state: “We share with the Fair Trade movement a commitment to improve the livelihoods of cocoa farmers and their families. We want all farmers to receive a fair return for their cocoa crops and Fair Trade is one way of achieving this goal.” The Sara Lee Corporation has stopped buying coffee beans from Ivory Coast several years ago, because they didn’t want to be associated with the practices on the plantations; it is therefore likely they refuse to purchase cocoa from this area as well. And the European Union trade association for manufacturers of chocolate, CAOBISCO, claims they would rather pay more to the right people.

What can you do?
Since giving up chocolate is out of the question for me, I’ve asked myself this question ever since I found out about the circumstances under which these child labourers work. Thus far I haven’t been able to come up with a satisfactory answer for myself, other than buying Fair Trade chocolate and avoiding the large companies who do use Ivory Coast cocoa. In a way, I feel like I’m depriving the people of Ivory Coast of an income they can definitely use, but the circumstances on the cocoa plantations have to change before I go back to buying M&M’s or Hershey’s Kisses. A Dutch television journalist is trying to draw more attention to this subject and has set up a petition for him to be arrested. Since he believes he is aiding and abetting crimes against humanity by purchasing chocolate, he wants to be incarcerated for his crimes. I’m not saying we should all go that far, but we should be aware of the child labour abuses in Ivory Coast.

More Information
Bitter chocolate
Child slaves may be making your chocolate
Chocolate & Slavery
Cocoa & Chocolate
Cocoa & Slaves
Demand Fair Trade for cocoa farmers from the world's biggest chocolate company
Global Exchange: Nearly hidden, slavery on Ivory Coast cocoa farms is easy to miss>
How your chocolate may be tainted
Ivory Coast accuses chocolate companies
There’s nothing sweet about child slave labour in the cocoa fields
What the cocoa industry says

Athena Sydney

More by this author

(reinventing) the meaning of indiepop

Friday, March 8, 2002
(...when I first found you, you lit a light inside my head...)

Once upon a time there was a little girl who lived (in her own world) in an introverted yet big northern greek town, where the postal service is rather poor. Even so one long gone day she received a package from a kind Australian stranger containing three 7" records, which changed her life. That night she stayed up half the night listening to the same song over and over again and staring at the (newly-borrowed) record player while the song, slowly and steadily, itched its way out of the vinyl imprint and into her heart where it lit a light. That made it easier to see through all the darkness, and she found that she could see what life was really all about.

Song: The Pines - Not actual, not lasting

Friday, May 9, 2003
(world falls into place)

A little over a year later and the girl from the previous story can be seen walking through an empty park lit by orange lights (in the same northern greek town.) It's past midnight and I can tell (you from experience) that she's feeling rather depressed. She's just been out with some people whom she loves a lot but who, somehow, always end up making her feel that everything (herself included) is just wrong. It's always a little harder to breath after having spend time with them. But as she walks through the park she is quietly singing a song. And when she gets home she sits in the dark and plays a record so she can listen to a boy sing that same song to her, and this, slowly but steadily, makes things fall into place again. And then she writes 'thank god for pop songs' down somewhere. And she goes to bed knowing that at least something, somewhere, is just right.

Song: Occasional Flickers - Rain until Monday

Friday, November 21, 2003
(indiepop is an international love affair)

That is the day when the girl in our story goes to sleep in the afternoon in a lovely flat in south London and wakes up with a song in her head. (As you might have gathered by now this happens to her quite a lot.) The song (which to her speaks of falling leaves and a slowly-flowing greyish river and London streets) stays there while she crosses the city to the west, where she sits at the window seat of a restaurant excitedly looking out at the dark rainy street. She spies on people she knows because they play in bands she likes and people she knows because they write to mailing lists she likes and people she doesn't know yet, but will decide she likes a lot later on, and she gets excited. Until, that is, she goes to the toilet where she bumps into the girl who sings the song in her head who smiles at her in the mirror rather shyly before she disappears. Suddenly the world seems ever-so-slightly magical.

Song: Pipas - Golden square

Saturday, November 22, 2003
(everything will be allright, forever)

As if this wasn't enough on the next day she watches a bloke with a distinct scottish accent play an acoustic song about becoming a millionaire and going dumper truck racing which has the unlikely effect of temporarily making her feel absolutely sure about everything. This is just great as "everything" includes making something important and outrageously pretty out of her life one day and subsequently getting very, very happy. And staying this way.

Song: Ballboy - Dumper truck racing

Wednesday, July 28, 2004
(we can have a party by the river every day/ and ride our bikes all over town)

...is a happy day in the middle of a mostly sad (although not bad) year, mostly spent riding a bike around Stockholm (the day, not the year obviously) with a boy she would never had met had it not been for the pop songs (okay, and the internet.) It is a perfect summer day like those in poems and films and songs, fleeting, gorgeous and spent playing out; because this is what all the speeding down bridges and singing her heart out when it seems one is listening feels like, and picnics in the park only make it more so.

It's hard to point a finger at what made the day so great (or impotant for that matter) but let's say it's the fact that it was the trail of pop songs that had led to this moment of utter perfectness. Just as it had been promising all along.

Song: Tidy ups - Snow song

Friday, December 11, 2004
(a still point in a turning world)

Following the trail further along brings the hero of our story to London Waterloo station on a cool December morning where she first encounters (what definitely feels like) true love. It's hard to say this out loud in a world of unbelievers but I swear the world stopped spinning for a while then while her dreams (all those dreams that the pop songs had help make up and then remember and keep faith in) came true with a happily shattering sound. That's when she realised what being in the right place -knowing there is a right a place- felt like.

And for a little while it seemed like the pop songs had been made redundant.

Saturday, January 12, 2005
(for once, I know that I am doing the right thing)

Except when most of your dreams come true the rest become rather jealous and decide to follow suit. So further along the (now famous) trail of pop songs we find the girl that sometimes calls herself Dimitra Daisy on a green hill in the middle of (Athens and also of) a weekend of such condensed magic it is hard to believe it is true.

But it is. Also, it is spent with a dizzyingly high number of people mentioned in the paragraphs above even though the girl is way too happy to notice that or its perfect symmetry. It's just for a moment when she walks into her front room to the sound of that first song that started everything and the following conversation that her heart stops for a while.

-I've never heard this song!
-This song was recorded in our house.

It is a very small world, this indiepop one, but somehow so pretty. And since it makes me feel so great I must be doing something right (by living in it.)

Song: The Pines - Not actual, not lasting (reprise)

Saturday, June 11, 2005
(you make my grey skies so wonderfully blue)

After a spring of wondering whether any of this indiepop stuff meant much to her anymore the girl in our story found herself at a gig she had organised but almost forgotten to get excited about. Once there she found herself singing along to every song and marvelling at how far she'd come in the past three years (and four months.) Because all those songs -songs about being in love and staying in love forever- sounded effortlessly true. That's when she reminded herself, or rather remembered, that if a song makes you feel like your whole life is rushing towards you in great spead, and that feels good, then that song does mean something to you.

Song: Nixon - Snow day (live in Athens)

Thursday, July 7, 2005
(warmer corners)

It might seem at least a bit strange (after what happened in London) to read about indiepop today. It definitely felt strange writing about it, at least at first it did. It's only about pop songs after all. Surely their importance pales in comparison to other things sometimes? And oh, in a way it does. Of course it does. But in another way I know what I have discovered lately: indiepop is not made up of just pop songs. It is made up of pop songs made, by and large, by sweet, passionate people who believe in happiness -that it exists and that it is possible to achieve it. And this -this sweetness, that passion and that faith- overflows out of the songs and into our lives creating large puddles of light where the world is a little better.

And it can do with that. Tonight, as much as every other night.

Dimitra Daisy
(More by this author)

Make Poverty History
Edinburagh, July 2nd 2005

At 11.30am, 2nd July, I found myself stood in the meadows in Edinburgh watching helicopters chase the clouds from the sky. I was surrounded by smiling, hopeful and friendly people all wearing white, all hoping to make poverty history.

I have to admit that my decision to go to the rally had not been an instant one. For a day or two I let things like organising a place to stay, and someone to look after my dog, and trying to book time off work worry me unnecessarily. But all these things seemed trivial as soon as I thought about the millions of people dying needlessly every day. Just hearing the sound a finger being clicked every three seconds was enough to convince me that there was nothing more important than trying to stop this from happening. Looking back I almost feel guilty that I didn't decide to go straight away.

The day itself was good humoured with a carnival atmosphere. Stalls were set up around the meadows to highlight the scale of poverty around the world but perhaps more importantly they were set up to demonstrate that people are already working to help make poverty history and that there are things that we can do right now.

I think that for me the most moving stall I visited that was one set for to children write their own messages to Tony Blair to ask him to give the chance for children their own age go to school.

Their messages were written in brightly coloured felt tips. They were forthright and to the point and written with a simple naivety and wisdom that only a child can have. Most of all they were written by people who were probably sick to death of being told to "share" their toys with their brothers and sisters and friends. Why should we forget that lesson as we grow up?

Everyone surrounding me stood and waited patiently as the vast number of people slowly trickled out of the meadows and formed a circle around central Edinburgh. Despite getting the starting place at 11am for the march, by 3pm we still hadn't left the meadows. (OK, OK we were standing in completely the wrong place for about an hour!). This was the time designated for a minute's silence.

I stood still listening. To say it was silent would be wrong. The air was filled with the sound that people make when they just exist. Not the coughing or the rustling of clothes, not even the faint sound of them breathing. Just that vague transitory sound that you can't really describe but when multiply it by hundreds and thousands of people and it becomes overpowering.

The day ended as it started in good humour and I ended up a little less cynical, and feeling privileged that I had been part of the event.

By the time most of you are reading this we will know the outcome from the G8 summit. And maybe the leaders of the world's richest countries won't have reached agreement that will end poverty. And maybe the protests since that day have been less than peaceful. But on the 2nd July approximately one quarter of a million people circled Edinburgh and shared he dream of a better world… and there was only one arrest all day.

It gives you hope doesn't it?

Rachel Queen

(More by this author)

The Disappearance

Most days the girl leaves the house and disappears and I stay at home searching for food she has forgotten about and sleep in the sun. And most days she returns looking a bit tired and shouts "hiya Belle" so I jump as high as I can all around her to show that I am pleased she has returned.

But the other day she disappeared and she didn't return. Or rather she disappeared and then I did too!

The morning started off in a normal enough way. In fact it started out a little better than normal. The girl was in a friendly mood and kept coming over to me and giving me a pat and saying "you're a good dog aren't you Belle" and then as she was leaving the house she gave me an extra bit of toast to eat while she was away.

A little while later I heard a noise at the door. "The girl!" I thought and rushed to greet her.

But it wasn't the girl at all it was the woman who lives over the road from me and the girl. This was pretty exciting and a lot better than sitting around the house waiting for the girl to come home so I rushed around in circles and was over the moon when the women said are you going to come to see Alice with me?

Alice is the dog who lives with the woman across the road. She is a nice dog but we don't have a lot in common. She likes to chase after balls and bring them back for her people. I like to chase after balls and run as far away from my people as I can. She likes to sit quietly and think about things. I like to rush about and do lots of things. She likes to eat her food very slowly. I like to eat my food very fast. Nevertheless, sometimes it is nice to see other dogs. I love my girl but there are somethings that she will never understand. For example, she'll never know why I have to chase rabbits.

After I had been in the house over the road for a little while I started to worry about my girl. Was she at home wondering where I was? She would be very lonely without me. I ran to the window to see if she was there but I couldn't tell so I sat by the front door hoping that the woman over the road would let me go and look for my girl. The women looked at me and then said "Time for your food" and I got all excited again and ran into kitchen to follow her.

Now the girl is always telling me "don't eat your food so fast Belle, nobody is going to take it off you." and I always ignore her because you never know who is lurking under the table or around the corner. It is fortunate I do because on this particular day eating my food very fast eventually paid off.

The woman who lives over the road from me and the girl had given me my food and seeing as I was in a different house I ate it quicker than ever. Just as was I lifting my head from the bowl, out of the corner of my eye I noticed a second dish full of food!. I rushed over as quick as I could and ate that at record speed. It was lucky I did because from the looks of things I had only just managed to get there before Alice. The woman who lives over the road from me and the girl shook her head and laughed. Then said "Come here, Alice I'll get you another bowl." And they went into another room.

Now by the time I had eaten two dishes of food I was feeling a bit full and a bit sleepy so I stopped wondering where the girl was and lay down on the carpet and fell asleep. It was morning by the time I woke up again properly and realised I was in the wrong house and that the girl was still missing. I wondered if she had got lost. I always worry about the girl getting lost. She never ever smells where she is going. She could have ended up in all sorts of places. I started to wish that I had never let my girl leave the house without me the previous morning. I sighed and lay down on the carpet with a heavy heart.

The woman from over the road looked at me and said: "I think it is time for a walk don't you?"

"Great I thought! We are going to go and look for the girl!"

We went to a place that I don't ever go to the girl which I thought was a great place for us to start looking for her because even the girl is not likely to get lost in a place we go to a lot.

To begin with I kept a constant look out for the girl but after a short while we came across a river and I just knew that even the girl wouldn't mind me going for a paddle instead of looking for her. I had great fun walking up and down the river drinking the water, and trying to catch some ducks and I didn't have time to worry about my girl.

I didn't have time to worry about my girl after we returned to the woman's house either because my fur was all muddy from the walk so I had no choice but to clean it. It took quite a long time to do and just as I was pulling out the last pieces of dirt from between my toes there was a knock on the door.

I ran to the door and shouted "don't go away the woman is coming soon, the woman is coming soon" over and over. Maybe it was someone who found the girl.

It wasn't. It was the girl herself!

I looked at her in amazement. "How on earth did she know to find me here?"

The girl smiled and looked down at me.

"Thanks for looking after her. I hope she has behaved."

It all became clear. The girl hadn't been lost at all! She had told the woman from over the road that I would look after her for a day or two!

Belle

(More by this author)