Day 4 & Day 5: Nearly there

And so the end of the challenge was nigh, and thank goodness because my bread really was starting to taste a bit questionable. There was a bit of a disaster on Thursday as I forgot to put the food I had cooked the previous night in the fridge, so when I went downstairs in the morning it was sitting on the counter looking less than appetising. Luckily I still had enough of my soup (/baby food) to split between lunch on Thursday and Friday, and of course an abundance of odd bread. One of the things that I really found tough is the amount of planning that has to go into doing a task like this. Every meal has to be meticulously thought through and often prepared in advance so you spend so much longer preparing food than actually eating it, only to be confronted with a great culinary disappointment when you actually do get round to having it. My last two days of food were much the same as the rest of the week, with carrots a very prominent feature as they are particularly cheap. Lunch was carrot and potato soup, with carrot sticks as an afternoon snack and carrot and tomato pasta for dinner. I think I might be steering clear of carrots for a while now!

The challenge was made all the more bearable by the shared experience with the others in the Restless Development office doing it at the same time. As those famous High School Musical lyrics tell us: We’re all in this together. It was nice to share (and in some cases over-share) the effect that eating this diet was having on us. It was great to get back to eating ‘normally’ at the weekend and being able to eat pretty much what I wanted, when I wanted. Living on such a low budget does not just mean being short of food, it means eating a very unbalanced diet which is very carb-rich which in turn means feeling tired and lethargic a lot of the time. It also means missing out on sharing food with other people, and the social element that comes so often with eating with others. It means spending a considerable amount of time planning how you are going to be able to feed yourself and worrying about if you will have enough. I am glad that my week is over, but it’s fine for me, it was a choice, but for some people it is a daily reality, and I think that it was such a valuable experience to get a small, personal, experience of what it is like to Live Below the Line.

If you would like to sponsor me then the address is: https://www.livebelowtheline.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&query=Fiona+Brown&commit=Search 

I added a bit more water to make it slightly more like soup and slightly less like baby food.

Tomato and carrot pasta

Day 2 and Day 3: Where's the crunch?

There has been a slight failure on my part over the last couple of days, as I have not only neglected to update this blog, but I have also been so engrossed in making and eating my food, that I have forgotten about taking pictures of it until it is too late, and I don’t think an endoscope is a viable option. Nevertheless the last couple of days have not been too bad in terms of the amount I have had to eat, but there has been a distinct lack of variety. Rice is a very common feature, but thanks to my training in Cambodia, I am managing to cope with that. I think I am going to mix things up tonight with some pasta… go wild! One thing that I have found is that I am distinctly un-hungrier that I was before. Maybe it is the prospect of eating the same thing over and over again that makes my stomach less inclined to remind with the rumbles I am so often greeting with at 11am. Another thing I have noticed is that everything that I am eating is very soft- there is a distinct lack of crunchiness… what I wouldn’t give for a crisp right now. Having said that I do have 46p left on my budget, so maybe that can be arranged as a final day treat. So for now I will leave you with some of the few photos I have taken of my gastronomic delights from that last couple of days.

mmmm value porridge (with water)!!

The 15p crumpets with a smidge of marmite are a saviour!

ANOTHER double-yolker, what have I done to deserve this!

The fried rice (my third serving of the week).

Day 1: Optimism

I am actually feeling quite optimistic about the whole thing, after snapping up those bargains- I shall enjoy this feeling while it lasts! So let me take you through my first live below the line day:


Breakfast
Two poached eggs on some of my discount bread, but what a surprise as I cracked open my eggs: they were both DOUBLE YOLKERS. Perhaps a sign of a good week ahead. Needless to say after my four yolks on toast I felt quite sated.

Lunch
As the weather forecast is promising good things for the week ahead, it was decided that if we couldn't eat nice food, then we would at least eat it in a nice place, so, accompanied by our various Tupperware contents, the Restless Development LBL contingent went to sit by the river next to parliament. Very nice. Lunch for me was a carrot and potato soup I had whipped up yesterday which I was pleasantly surprised with, even though the lack of water did leave it with the appearance and consistency of baby food. Accompanied by some more bread (which is already tasting less than fresh on day one) it was an acceptable lunch..... 

Dinner
To keep me going through the afternoon I had two of my crumpets as a snack, which were eyed up jealously by all sitting round me. It's every man for himself I am afraid. On the menu for dinner was one of my recipes from my time in Cambodia: fried rice. I fried up small portions of onion and garlic, a few carrots and one or two beans, then cracked an egg in (ANOTHER double yolker,obviously had a super chicken stocking my box!). After that added some rice and some seasoning that I bought back from Cambodia and there it was. To make my meal seem bigger I decided to eat with a teaspoon- a least it lasted a bit longer. Apart from my sister sitting and eating Ben & Jerry's right in front of me, I have not really felt a desperate need to eat more than I have done today. I am sure that that will change as my meals get more repetitive, and the 15p bread gets staler, but for now, I am feeling positive!

If you would like to sponsor to raise money for Restless Development, the link is right here: https://www.livebelowtheline.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&query=Fiona+Brown&commit=Search

Failing to Prepare is preparing to fail

So it’s nearly time to start living below the line. I wasn’t quite sure how to go about the weekend before. In my mind there were two options: The first was to eat everything in sight in preparation for a week of restraint, and the second was, like all good athletes, to taper down before the big race, i.e not eat too much to prepare myself for the event ahead. As you can probably guess, it was the former that won out. In between my various eating binges, I took a late night shopping trip to Tesco to get my supplies (didn’t feel like I could go back to Lidl after MushyPeaGate). Turns out late night Tesco was a great choice though as I go some bargains: 15p bread and 15p crumpets. I have no doubt I will be picking mould off them by the end of the week, but for now I am going to live in ignorant bliss. If you are interested in seeing exactly what was on my shopping list you can have a look here: http://www.restlessdevelopment.org/livebelowtheline-hintsandtips-1 My meals have been meticulously planned so I think if nothing else, I will survive until Friday.

But for now I shall leave you with a picture of my crumpets. What a bargain!

Living Below the Line for Restless Development

So what’s all this about then?

I am sadly no longer in Cambodia, but back in London jumping on the crowded graduate job hunt wagon. I am reviving this blog, however as I once again find myself involved in another challenge. About a month ago I started an internship at Restless Development, a youth-led development agency doing some brilliant work around the world. I first heard about Live Below the Line on day one of the internship, when I was informed that I WOULD be taking part. Like it or not. Well I am never one to shy away from a challenge, so lets go for it! Live Below the Line is a campaign that challenges the general public to live on £1 a day for food and drink for 5 days. As one of the partner organisation, Restless Development is looking for people to do it on their behalf to raise money to support projects in Africa and Asia. 

The actual campaign is from the 7^th- 11^th May, but along with the rest of the team I am doing it next week (26^th-30^th March) so we can share our pearls of wisdom with those doing it later. As the days draw closer there seems to be a general air of dread, and conversations over lunch all seem to migrate to what food we are going to be eating next week. As a first timer I am caught between naïve optimism and a fear of such hunger that I might mug someone for their burger king on the way home.

Ever the planner, I decided that I would not be caught short by last minute shopping the night before the challenge starts. No, no, no. I am going to put in some solid groundwork and make sure that I am not sifting through the bins of London by Friday.

So last weekend I decided to start my investigations and have a look at how much I can get for my money. Stage one: Lidl supermarket, Kingston. I wanted to document this investigation, but having no subtle picture taking equipment (my lack of iPhone is a touchy subject) I had to take my rather large SLR camera. Dragging an embarrassed sister behind me I proceeded to snap some of the top bargains that I could sniff out. Turns out Lidl aren’t a huge fan of people taking snaps of their 22p mushy peas. Once I had explained to the security guard that I wasn’t from the press and was not writing a report, I thought it an appropriate time to end my first step of investigations. Online browsing from now on I think.

Thus far I have not managed to convince any friends and family to join me, but I have been receiving some stellar advice. ‘Just eat porridge for every meal and you’ll be fine.’ Really? Apart from developing a life-long aversion to porridge, I can’t imagine my digestive system would thank me for that. I think I will respectfully ignore that piece of wisdom. There are, however some good blogs out there with some cheap meals which I am going to look at. Let stage two of investigations commence……

If you would like to do it sign up here https://www.livebelowtheline.com/participants/sign_up?partner=uk-restlessdevelopment

If you don’t fancy it then I would be very grateful for a bit of sponsorship! you can do it here https://www.livebelowtheline.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&query=Fiona+brown&commit=Search

And here is a bit more about Restless Development http://www.restlessdevelopment.org/

And here are the mushy peas......

Some more Snaps

Just a few of my photos which I have enjoyed playing around with.

 Savry

 Boromey

 Happy Home

 Sambat

 Samot and Chhouy

Chris

Meet the Family

This is a montage that I made of photos of all the children under NHCC care. A lot of names to remember, but I am pleased to say that I know every one of them.