a lovely day

london monday 2014

Many will be working today and some may be looking out at the fine weather and wishing they are out there. imagining themselves sitting in the sun and enjoying it. whereas here i am, all the time in the world and i am not sitting out in the grass bathing in the sun. hmm. why? i ask myself too, and wonder am i missing something?

i walk about in the sun, chosing to walk on the sunny side of the street, but i have noticed that i do so when it is in the early morning, as i walk to the library at about 9.30am. but later in the day, i find myself gravitating towards the shadowed side of the road.

I have to make a conscious effort to keep to the sunny side.

this makes me realise that just because a bit of something is good, a lot of it need not be better. well, i know that allready, so i should correct myself and say it reminds me rather than make me realise … 

and that is something that the world do not realise. that you hear of something that the world values, in this case the leisure time to sit out in the sun… and you put a high price on it. because so many work and can never do it. and you hear of these people spending a huge amount of money taking the plane to fly to places with the sun, and spending a fortune. and you dont appreciate that u allready have got all this … you can sit in the sun all day, and it is free… but u dont appreciate it. you think it is not worthwhile… because u have not spend thousands of £s to get it. the world do not value something that it can get free, but put a big price to it and they all want it… fight for it even. and there is a twist to this… you begin to feel u should value it, but then realise that it is not really that valuable, the sun is not all that great to sit in it… especially if there is a lot of it and it is very strong, and can burn you. so now u not only can pay a lot of money to get it, but it is not really very good for you .

like chocolate.

I saw in my wordpress reader a quartz article showing a video of some african cocoa farmers given chocolate to eat as they have never tasted the finished product of their harvest. the author laments that he finds it a disgrace that they are unable to afford the chocolate, that they cannot afford to eat the fruits of the end product of their harvest.

i was minded that if u grow something to sell, it is not wise to eat the end product.

i was thinking of heroin producers , the poppy farmers may well be wise to keep clear of the end product of their opium harvest. you might say now, now, that is taking analogy too far, but generally it is wise that producers dont get to be addicted to their products…  or there will be none left to sell.    

the interesting thing about the whole video is this… instead of saying how delicious the chocolate is, the first thing they all say when they taste it, is that it is so sweet. i think they got it right. it is sweet, you never can taste the cocoa in chocolate, because it is so sweet. u can taste cocoa in a drink, but that is only if u make it yourself and not add suger… otherwise a normal shop bought chocolate drink is very sweet and it kills any taste of chocolate. u can never get the taste of chocolate. what  u will like is the taste of sweet. give someone who says they like chocolate a cocoa drink without suger, and i can guarantee that they wont like it.

I have tasted cocoa without suger, i make it myself from cocoa powder, and believe me it is an acquired taste. it is slightly bitter. i enjoy it, as i feel i am getting the real taste of cocoa, but i bet not many will like it.

it is the same with coffee. a real coffee drinker will drink it neat, no suger, and as an espresso. any others who drink it with suger are simply drinking coffee for the suger in it. maybe u will say hang on, that is being rather harsh… harsh but true.

I have a feeling that those farmers are not so deprived after all, at least as far as not tasting cocoa is concerned. they should quietly thank the stars that the west is so brainwashed to value cocoa so much in their sugered drink, that they are willing to pay for the cocoa. And quietly thank the stars that they  have a product that finds ready buyers from the west.

 it seems to be  real easy to grow the fruit, as once the tree is mature it does not seem to take much looking after, and only need to be harvested once a year. they should use the rest of the time to find other work, or enterprises. or seek work elsewhere. then come back once a year at harvest time to get the fruit. and take it as a nice supplement and easy way to make some money. and if they have other sources of income, they wont be so desperate to sell the fruit too any middle man , and can hold out for a higher price.

so that if there is a low rainfall and less fruit, they can hold out for a higher price. and so poor harvest  wont be so devastating to them. there was talk of people getting rid of the cocoa trees and planting rubber, but if i were a cocoa farmer i will hold on, because there will be a shortage of cocoa if they all change to rubber and i should be able to sell my cocoa at a huge price. 

it is the desperate people who cannot hold out for a higher price for their cocoa that is spoiling the market for every cocoa farmer. that is what happens when u are poor, and have no other source of income. that is why low paid jobs are low paid, because there  are too many desperate people who want the job even though it is low paid. if enough people dont apply for these low paid jobs they will have to raise the wage. that is why all those who are waiters or macdonalds servers or lowly paid staff, they are in a market where too many people are willing to work , even though the wages are too low to make a living. those jobs are not a good jobs to seek work in. they are unskilled jobs. which is why it is generally not a good thing to seek work in those. it is better to find some skills and upgrade the kind of jobs you can get. jobs that not many can do, and so u can get higher pay for it.

i am thinking of nurses working for temp agencies… they can get a lot of money for each shift as they are skilled and in demand and there is a shortage. any locum work in jobs that demand is high will be good jobs to go for. look for any jobs where not many people want to do them, either because of unsocial hours or shortage of skills, or even jobs prone to wild swings of demand. if u are starting on the road of working, look carefully at what is in demand and chose those rather than just go for the low skilled jobs that everyone is fighting over.