Organic-Ally

It's a bit like the British troops in Singapore pointing their guns in a southerly direction and the Japanese troops attacked from their north, via Johore, on their push-bikes. I was talking about the bird flu a lot and now we hear the pandemic is of swine flu. My husband is permanently on immuno-suppressant and you can understand some of the anxiety in our household. He also goes to work on the Tube every day. He is very vulnerable. The authorities have been promoting the use of tissue paper, something about binning it after we've blown our nose. My instinctive feel (rightly or wrongly) is used tissue paper left in open bins are just as great a health risk. Of course I have vested interests. I want people to buy my lovely organic cotton hankies (now with embroidery!!). The thing is if one is not mindful of one's hygiene, paper tissues and hankies are equally bad. At least, one's cloth hankies are usually isolated in one's pockets. I remember my first impression of ...

Suffolk this time. In a factory farm. Am I surprised? Not the least bit. See Bird farms, bird flu Hopefully, more people will begin to realize the dismal conditions that these cheap supermarket birds are reared and think about better animal welfare and stop buying cheap-cheap-cheap all the time. At this factory farm, there's no more chip-chip-chip. See previous blog . Back to Organic-Ally .

Well, cousin has flown in again to attend classes as part of her PhD programme. She looked at the stuff we have in the fridge. 'Wah, you're buying all organic now.' My reply was, 'You know, in my mother's time, everything we bought was organic. Then they brought in intensive farming. And now we are paying a premium for "organic".' While we were both growing up in Singapore we could drive down fairly main thoroughfares and catch a whiff of organic manure. (I am thinking of Potong Pasir and Braddell Road.) There were vegetable farms and pig farms where now high-rise flats are standing. Fruit and vegetables were plentiful and not too expensive. Meat was dearer. Chicken was only for celebrations. I remember my sisters having a school reunion in our little flat. Can't imagine how brave they were to even think of that. They gathered a group of school friends from primary school and they partied in our tiny little two-bedroom flat in Queenstown. The highl...