Enough with the Blind Eye!

For argument's sake, let's say that you read my last blog.  Let's say that you never buy food items from China because you were already aware of their many contaminations and other food issues.  Awesome!  Good for you, it's a step in the right direction.

Now let's say that you were at the grocery today and bought Ecuadorian bananas, mangoes from Costa Rica, and clementines from Chile.  Make yourself a mental picture of the workers who farm in those countries and harvested your newly acquired produce. Quaint, isn't it?  Straw hats, donkeys, Juan Valdez.

Now picture this:  thousands of Latin American families devastated by the pesticides and herbicides used to grow that pretty produce that now sits in your fruit bowl.  Atrocious sicknesses, infertility and sterility, cancer, paralysis, skin infections, headaches, lung damage, nose bleeds, and loss of sight to name a few.  Chemicals made by companies like Dow, Bayer and DuPont and used by companies like Dole and Monsanto.  Those companies then refuse to compensate the injured workers and their families and deny the existence of any problems.  American workers have also been affected by these chemicals and their injury claims denied!

No way can I sit back and eat my perfectly yellow banana and pretend this isn't going on.  Once you learn that the food you are eating has these chemicals on it, or that the people responsible for bringing it to you are dying for it, it's impossible to turn a blind eye to it. Twenty-five percent of the world's pesticides are used in third world countries and it this is where over 99% of pesticide related deaths occur.  Is this supposed to be ok?

 Today I read an article about this subject that came to me in a newsletter from a site called Natural News.  For the record - the article really pissed me off.  If you don't subscribe to the site already I highly recommend that you do so.  The headline caught my eye because of the blog I wrote the other day, and the subject has been on my mind.  The fact that this is going on all over the world and these American companies are taking such advantage of other countries well and truly offends me.  This isn't a case of another country poisoning their own soil because of their own lax policies.  This is American companies employing farmers and workers, producing food for export to Americans, and leaving their people sick and their homelands polluted for years to come.  It's so wrong.   

If we all needed another reason to buy organic and buy local (as if!), well there it is.  Read the article for yourself and look up the chemicals mentioned (try Wikipedia or EWG).  I did.  I also got the 'clementines from Chile' reference from my own fruit bowl.  I bought those clementines at my local Target, and let me tell you how I won't be doing that again.  

If you think that your government and governmental agencies are protecting you, wake up.  Open your eyes and watch what you're putting into your mouth.  Not sure why you should avoid pesticides and herbicides in the first place?  Explore here, and here.  Need more proof?  Find it here, here, here.  Support your local farmers, grow your own, and buy organic!  Support companies that are doing the right thing. You're making the world better for everyone by doing so!

The Good, The Bad and The Gelatinous

As the growing season starts and so many good little gardeners are outside planting seeds for vegetables and assessing fruit trees and bushes, the question of organic vs. non-organic seems to be at the forefront of a lot of discussions.  Organic vs. non-organic has become a pretty mainstream topic, and although there are all sorts of articles and t.v. shows and blurbs on the news (or blogs!) there are still so many who question what to do.

Organic is too expensive, say some.  It's worth it, say others.  You may be somewhere in between.  I am.  I would prefer to buy all organic and I wish I could afford $8 strawberries, but it's just not realistic. You may have heard of the 'Dirty Dozen'...the worst fruits and vegetables to buy non-organic.  If not, you can see it here.

If you're one of those good little gardeners who grow their own...good for you!  I wish I was a better gardener.  I really like it...I mean even the flowers, vegetables, all of it, but I have a major brown thumb.  I plant, and they inevitably die a dried up, withered death.  I can't even keep a houseplant alive.  There are some garden items that seem to take care of themselves, which is nice.  Strawberries, raspberries, some herbs.  The fruit trees just need occasional trimming, no biggie.  Rhubarb.  They just grow and grow.  If it's really low-maintenance and I can't screw it up too much, it's alright by me.  Or should I say, it's relatively safe FROM me.

I do like to be out there in the garden digging holes and planting, laying it all out, pulling weeds, etc.  But really I think my worst issue is the bugs.  As soon as the mosquitoes are in full swing, the spiders are as big as your hand, and the fliers have no concept of personal space...I'm outty.  I'm done.  No spray (though H2 wipes work pretty well) can fix it, I just can't tolerate the bugs. 

Last weekend I took the boy to the nursery and shopped around in the pouring rain.  That was fun.  While there, I noticed some vegetable plants, I think these particular ones were patio tomatoes, planted in this weird clear gel stuff.  After my initial recoil, my first thought was to wonder if the inside of the tomato turns out as gelatinous as the stuff it's growing in.  Yuckedy yuck!  I still don't know what that gel is (yes of course I Googled it), or despite some website claims - how non-toxic and biodegradable it is.  I just can't see myself being comfortable eating a vegetable that I picked off a plant grown in the same type of gel that a baby pees on in their diapers night and day.  What...?  Doesn't that sound delicious?

Finding this abomination inspired me to post a poll on my Facebook page:  Would you knowingly eat a vegetable grown in that water-retaining gel stuff?  I mean, maybe I'm overreacting and it's the best eco-friendly, organic enabling, water-conserving goo there has ever been!  Aside from my favorite hecklers who answer so many of my nutritional-type posts with just simply 'Bacon!' - you know who you are - I only got two serious answers.  The first answer was basically a resounding 'Oh hellll no!', and the other...the other was a little disturbing.  (Sorry babe, if you're reading this I don't mean to pick on you).  The answer was; 'No. That is why I do not want to know.'.  This baffles me.  Being so conscious of chemicals, and I fully acknowledge that not everyone is like me, this is something I think about with every vegetable I pick up.  Sometimes I will not buy an item at all if I don't like the looks of it and if organic is too expensive.  And I don't mean I skip it cause it's not pretty enough.  I mean, it's too damn pretty or the packaging looks...too...happy.  I don't know. 

Moving on.  

The other day a headline really caught my eye...when 'exploding' and 'watermelons' are in the same sentence...I mean, come on.  Like that doesn't sound fun?  I had to click it and see what was up.  I learned that a whole bunch of watermelon crops being grown in China were ruined because the melons exploded.  Exploded!  Awesome!!  No, no, forget I said that.  Not awesome.  The reason they exploded was because the Chinese farmers used some sort of growth chemical (forchlorfenuron) that caused the watermelons to grow so quickly that thousands of them burst right out there in those Chinese fields.  *Side note:  As it turns out, that same chemical is approved for use in the U.S. for grapes, raisins, and kiwi fruit, and is toxic to honey bees.  Just so you know.  And wouldn't you rather know?


In this day and age of 8 & 9 year olds getting their periods, I would certainly rather know whether my fruits and vegetables (or milk or meat or whatever) have been treated with some growth-inducing crapola.  You eat it, and it's in you.  This isn't confined to what I talked about above, either.  Pesticides, antibiotics, hormones, chemicals of every shape and form.  Ever heard this one...? -->  You are what you eat.


Now that we know what Chinese farmers did to their watermelons to make more money, do you wonder what they're doing in all aspects of food production?  I do.  China is infamous for pollution, ground contamination, poor practices in food production.  Arsenic in soy sauce, borax in pork, melamine in milk, and pharmaceuticals in water and earth.  Their lenient policies in these areas make them very successful producers.  And a lot of stuff comes out of China.  

One of those things I found not too long ago that really really bothers me is Capri Sun....because apparently we don't have enough apples here in the U.S. to make our own juice boxes...?   So we're even buying juice from China.  Why?

Because it's cheap and kids dig it.  Kids like it because it tastes good.  How can something taste so good, and be loaded with so much shit?  Sugar and artificial flavors in juice.  Why?  The real thing is great!  Sweet, refreshing, good for you.  It may not be blue or come in a fancy little pouch, but the kids drink it all the same. 


Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against the Chinese or importing other stuff from there.  But food?  I mean, freaking APPLE JUICE?  Obviously some things only grow in certain places, but I'm not talking about those.  Let's buy local, folks.  Or grow your own. Enough with the Chinese Capri Sun!  Get it together out there.  

No excuses, either.  I'm lucky to have a yard big enough for fruit trees and a garden, but I've also knocked on peoples doors to see if they were going to use the zillion apples hanging off the 7 trees in their yard, or the mulberries the birds are feasting on, or the pears hanging neglected.  Join your local freecycle!  There are constantly people posting free vegetables, fruit, whatever.  Make friends with your green-thumbed neighbor!  If they are supplying you with zucchini and green beans, suck it up and pretend to like them.  It's all out there, and it doesn't have to be from the other side of the world.


Be careful what you eat, what you buy, what you put in and on your body.  I can't say it enough.  Be aware and be knowledgeable.  And if you get an overwhelming desire for exploding items, for goodness sakes, the 4th of July is just around the corner!