Say no to child pornography and prostitution: Eat cake! December 25, 2008

 

I’VE been dying to announce this for a while and now it’s finally time:

I’ve made a bit of money from the sale of my cakes. As of now, I’ve collected a grand total of $860 and it’s all going to charity. YAAAY!

The idea came about a few months back when friends started asking me to make this cake or that for birthdays and stuff. Frankly, I got lazy and dragged my feet because a profit of $10 or $20 really wasn’t worth the effort. I gotta drive out to get the ingredients, spend time away from my baby as I bake, and – the most vomitous of all – do the washing up.

But, from a divine confluence of triggers – like reading about horrific child-kidnapping stories in the news, watching the heartbreaking The Kite Runner, and gazing at my baby’s face nightly as she sleeps – I felt I want to really do something about the scum-of-the-earth who exploit children in prostitution and pornography.

But I’m just a part-time copy-editor and mother of one who loves to bake. What can I do? Well, okay, I’m gonna bake. Even if it’s just for $10, knowing that it’ll do something to stop this evil scourge makes any form of kitchen drudgery worthwhile.

The money from my cakes will go directly to two non-profit organisations that work towards these causes. They are:

ECPAT (End Child Prostitution Child Pornography and Trafficking of Children for Sexual Purposes). Founded in 1990 and based in Bangkok, ECPAT is a global network of organisations that works on various levels – local, national, international – to eliminate all forms of commercial sexual exploitation of children. It now has more than 80 groups in over 70 countries. Through awareness and education, ECPAT works with governments, law enforcement, the technology industry and other NGOs to report and respond to such crimes. It helps develop laws to protect children and have aftercare programmes to rehabilitate victims. www.ecpat.com

INTERNATIONAL JUSTICE MISSION, a Washington-based human rights agency that operates in 12 countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America. Founded on the Christian call to “Seek justice, protect the oppressed, defend the orphan, plead for the widow” (Isaiah 1:17), its investigators partner with local police to carry out rescue missions to free victims from slavery, sexual exploitation and other forms of oppression. In particular, it has field offices in Cambodia, Thailand, the Philippines and India where their focus is releasing children from trafficking, forced prostitution and pornography. Not only do they have aftercare professionals who help rebuild the victims’ lives, their lawyers also fight to put their perpetrators in jail. Yeah, you go! www.ijm.org

If you order a cake from me, I will donate the profits to these two organisations. As a little nudge to give generously, I will ask that you pay whatever amount you wish (But if you’re stingy, I’ll kick your ass).

Do give me lots of notice though. I have only Mondays and Tuesdays to bake so I always have to plan early.

For the record, the $860 I collected came from the following ‘child crusaders’:

– Daphne Chan (chocolate mayonnaise cupcakes, chocolate ganache birthday cakes)

– Yong Siew Fern (oatmeal birthday cookies)

– My mum, on behalf of Hakka Methodist Church (buttercream cakes, banana and raisin cakes)

– Jessica & Han Ee (3-tier wedding cake)

– Charmayne & Alvin (3-tier wedding cake)

– Clare & Hong Meng (wedding cupcakes)

Thanks for partnering me in saving innocent children: Eat my cake! 🙂