Location: All Saints' Episcopal Church
Date: Tuesday, October 22, 2013; 6:00-8:00 pm
I found this opportunity on the
Volunteer Meetup group and upon closer inspection saw that none other than
Wilson had posted it. I asked him about
it and he said that initially he had approached One Brick to put this event on
their calendar, but they had been reluctant and so he had “gone rogue”. He had been
talking about getting more involved through Meetup and this seemed to be his
first foray into that realm. A lot of
people had signed up and there was in fact a waiting list. Seeing this makes me wonder why One Brick
sometimes has difficulty in filling up their spots. I did not know anyone else on the roster
except Amanda, who had also signed up. The
information on Ravenswood Community Services said, “Ravenswood Community Services provides hunger and poverty relief,
health services, and life skills education in the Ravenswood and Uptown
neighborhoods. In 1993, they began handing out bags of groceries to about 20
neighbors through the front doors of All Saints' Chicago. Today, this vibrant
non-profit serves hundreds of hungry neighbors each week and implements
strategic neighborhood change through their feeding programs and through their
partnership with Ravenswood School.”
Definitely looked like an ideal organization to support.
 |
| The 'Haven' |
I arrived at 6 pm and it was good
that instructions had been provided on how to get inside since the entrance was
hidden between two buildings. Many
volunteers were assembled and some of them asked what One Brick was all
about. Since there was no official EC for this project, I gave a short overview
and some folks said that they would like to participate. We were still waiting to be called in and so
I looked around the waiting area; and was delighted to see that behind me was
what appeared to be an office, and inside were 3 dogs. They were the site manager’s pets and seemed
pretty exited to get some attention. I
was taking their pictures, and one of the volunteers Katarina asked if I liked
dogs so much, perhaps I could walk hers!
Anna, the volunteer coordinator for the pantry, came in and welcomed
us. She told us about the pantry and how
besides food distribution, they also did a dinner service, where tonight we
would be serving around 125 guests. She
then took us to a place that she called “Haven”,
where various pantry items were on display, and people were browsing. We then went down to the kitchen, where a
team of volunteers who had arrived earlier in the evening, had finished cooking
the meal. Our task was to carry the trays of food upstairs and serve the
various tables. The menu for tonight was
‘Ham & Veggies’ and ‘Mashed Potatoes & Gravy’. It looked good and it seemed like the cooking
team had done a great job.
 |
| The dining area - all cleared |
We formed a line and picked up
the trays and walked up two flights of stairs to the dining area. Once there we looked at Anna for instructions
and served the tables as per her directions.
The room was buzzing with people and I made several trips, as did other
servers, but we were done quite soon – all of us getting a decent workout with the climbing. Even with our
speed, with so many guests, by the time the last plate had been served, the
empty trays had started piling up and were on their way down to the kitchen for
washing. I went about collecting the
empty trays and delivered them to the waiting volunteers, many of who had
formed an assembly line of dryers, since there were many hands that were
already washing. As I wasn’t needed
in the kitchen, I went back upstairs to help clean the dining area, which had
now emptied out. We folded the tables
and stored them, following which I grabbed a vacuum cleaner and went around the
room. I came back down to see that cleaning, drying and storing were in full flow.
There was a lot of excess food that had not been served and most of it
was being thrown in garbage. This is a
pet hate of mine and I mentioned to Anna that they should have take-home
containers – similar to what many other places do. She said that it might not be allowed, though
she would look into it.
I chatted with one of the cooks
from the earlier shift and he has been volunteering here for a long time. He told us that once a year during the
holidays the place transforms itself into a restaurant and they do a gourmet
dinner with Tablecloths, printed menu’s and the volunteer’s even dress up. The idea is to make the guests feel important
and more festive than usual. It is a
brilliant idea and I made a note to try and come for that. As I took out the garbage and came back in, I
saw a flyer for a fundraiser event that they were having on Friday. I asked
Anna if she required volunteers and she said that in fact they did. I said I could come, as did many others. She seemed delighted at this and it looked
like we were already booked for our next assignment. Although this wasn’t a One Brick event, we
still went out afterwards and I chatted with Katarina about other projects
where she could get her dogs, like ‘Pet
Therapy’ at Lakeview Nursing. It had
been a good evening, meeting some new folks who typically would not have signed
with One Brick, because they didn't know about it. Well, now they did, as did I about Ravenswood
Community Services. And I would be
seeing them again very soon.
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