The growth of FoodBank in the last few months has resulted in an network of 4 operational FoodBanks, serving some 900 beneficiary organisations, and providing more that 1.2 million meals a month. While statistics serve their place in helping us measure the impact FoodBank is making on reducing hunger, behind each number there are stories of hope for each child, women or man who is helped by the FoodBank network that are also worth telling.
One set of stories come from children at Luzuko Primary School in Guguletu, one of FoodBank's beneficiary organisations. Each child was asked to draw pictures of their hopes and dreams, or what they wanted to be when they grow up.
Here is one such story:
Thando (not his real name) is 9 years old, and lives with his grandmother and father, having lost a mother to tuberculosis when he was 4. They live in a wood and iron shack in an informal housing settlement outside Gugulethu. The room he lives in is basic: he sleeps on the floor, and the room he shares with 2 other siblings has only two small airvents and no windows. When he walks to school each day, he walks past the emerging middle class part of Gugulethu where the school is located, looking at the newly erected brick houses. It is this walk that is his inspiration for his picture that day.
The picture he draws is of a brick home, with a large blue, oversized window the central feature of the house. When quizzed to explain the picture Thando replies: "One day we are going to have a family home like this. It is made of bricks, and outside there is a garden and grass to play. And my room has a big window. All the rooms in the house have big windows so they can see the garden."
Listening to the story, Thando gives us a perfect metaphor for what giving a child a regular meal can accomplish: FoodBank is in the business of creating "windows in every room": By taking away the stifling problem of hunger and food insecurity, we allow our beneficiaries to create windows of opportunity in the rooms of their dreams.
Help create a window of opportunity in a child's room of dreams:
Purchase a Care 2 Carry Bag at your Fruit and Veg City,
or make a donation to FoodBank South Africa's work.
