In Washington D.C., I followed my friend to her Social Action site. I drove to the clean, white building of Food and Friends Inc. and entered a fresh and new lobby with a friendly receptionist. She told me that the service mostly happened upstairs and pointed me in the direction. Ready to see the action, I put on a required hair net and entered the busy scene of fresh food and packaging.
Food and Friends Inc. runs a business of service. There, people volunteer to bring in food and help make meals for people who cannot afford to buy food at the supermarket. Some people help in the kitchen to cook the meals, and others organize and sort the prepared food, assigning meals to different bags. People cook all three important meals – breakfast, lunch, and dinner – and deliver them to the people when ready.
Here is how the process works: The work is determined by how many people call in for need of food and how they want their food prepared. Slow days and fast days vary because of this. The meal itself, whether it is casserole, sandwiches, or pasta, changes everyday. Food and Friends takes the dietary needs of the people into consideration. Say someone calls who is lactose-intolerant – there is a bag without any dairy products in it. Say another person calls who is diabetes – a bag with low or no amounts of sugar and fat (depending on how serious the case is) is prepared. It all depends on the people calling. The food is then stored away in a giant freezer, where it waits to be delivered.
I watched my friend, Catie Ryan, who volunteers at Food and Friends Inc. every other Wednesday. She sometimes works in the kitchen, where the food itself is cooked, but most of the time she works in the packaging section, separating and organizing the different bagged meals. Shelves of hundreds of packaged meals line this area of Food and Friends Inc., showing how many people call the company for food. Along with the girls who volunteered from my school, several adults, young and old, worked hard to get the food ready.
“One of my favorite things about this place is the atmosphere,” said Catie Ryan. “I really like how friendly people are and how they love their job. It’s nice to know that there are people out there who enjoy helping others for a living. It’s also fantastic working with them.
“I also like Food and Friends because I am actually doing direct service,” she continued. “Last year, I felt I was not benefiting or helping anyone who was really in need. But here, I am directly making the meals of people who cannot afford food. Everyone should be able to get food, and I am making it possible for others to have a meal at least twice a day. I feel that working here empowers me and strengthens my character, and because of it I can go out and encourage others to do the same, to go out and volunteer to serve the hungry. I would not change anything about Food and Friends. I love this place and how it makes me feel and what it does to help the community. I am proud to be part of this organization.”
