VictoriaMasters

I am already feeling guilty that I am not properly following my challenge and it's only day two of Oxfam poverty week. I am not blogging daily nor am I eating solely rice and beans. Having forgotten to soak and cook any beans, I substituted lentils with which I made a daal.

Is this acceptable I ask myself? I think not. My friend suggested that each day I eat a different meal from different poverty-stricken countries, in order to keep me from getting bored. I was deliberating at the time what I could actually eat without straying too far from the challenge, yet remaining fairly close to what I set out to do. I now realise this is flawed.

People living in abject poverty do not have the opportunity to substitute their beans and rice for a tasty, piquant daal. In fact when I ate daal in some poor parts of India and Nepal it was far from “piquant”. It was bland, gelatinous slop. Poor people living on less than a dollar a day cannot afford to add a hint of chilli and a smattering of spice to turn a simple legume into something delicious.

This was a good lesson to learn. I am so lucky that I have choices. A choice to decide what to eat, what to wear, what job I do, where I live, who I socialise with. I have the freedom to do as I please.

Next time your job is getting you down, you wish you had more room in your beautiful terraced house, or you are complaining that you’ve nothing to wear, spare a thought for the women in the world that have no choice: women who are not even able to voice an opinion, never mind be able to wear the latest fashions, women who live in fear and suffer violence.

I shall think of them this afternoon when I am boiling my beans.

At first I thought a week of eating rice and beans for Oxfam poverty challenge week would be easy, after all I loved eating "gallo pinto" whilst travelling in Costa Rica. Also, working for a social enterprise cookey group, Cracking Good Food in Manchester, I was sure to find many ways in which to liven up my thrice daily fodder.

Alas, it dawned on me, that to truly realise the hardship of this challenge, I would have to forgo daily pleasures such as decent coffee and tea, drinks we take for granted in the West. Did you know that in tea and coffee producing countries the good stuff is exported so that we can have our daily caffeine fix? In countries like India and Nicaragua, a daily low-grade tea or coffee is often a luxury preserved for the affluent. I won't, however, drink low-grade tea or coffee that isn't fairly produced, so I am allowing myself one cup a day, together with some low-cost fruit and vegetables.

My purpose is to encourage my family and friends to take a minute and think about people that suffer real poverty, often so that we can benefit: farmers who aren't given a fair price for their crops and therefore can't feed their families, whole townships that are without water to enable us to eat tropical fruits such as pineapples and men and women working in appalling conditions so that we can have a new item of clothing that we may only wear once.

Please take a minute to think about the things that you consume, and question if it is harming the lives of others. If it is don't buy it. Just because you can't see the suffering, it doesn't mean it isn't happening.

My challenge is to eat nothing but rice and beans for a week

I am greedy and love my food so this will be hard for me. I am doing it because having travelled extensively I am aware of how privileged my life is and wish to show solidarity with those who do have to live with a less nutritious diet.

I live in Manchesterand will be asking my MP John Leech what he thinks about it!