Introduction

We can put a man on the moon we can land a spacecraft on Mars but we can't feed the people of this earth. I don't believe we have the will to address the issue of hunger and the social and economic effects, which affect millions of people around the world. What is it about us humans that we are able to shut out all feelings and compassion for the suffering of others? That said I have had enough. In fact I had had enough a few years ago and started to act in my own small way according to the limitations of my own pocket. I want to network with people who are equally outraged about hunger and starvation. I want to start to show people that I am angry and no longer content to sit back and toss a few pennies down the well. I want to make a difference.

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To Jesse, hunger was an everyday companion.

Jesse put his nose into the soft, warm steam. Only for a second. Then, like any hungry seven year old, he could hardly move his spoon to his mouth fast enough.

His mom, Leslie, watched her brown-haired young son, her eyes filling, then brimming, then overflowing with warm tears. Relief. Humiliation. Pain. Confusion. Disbelief that Jesse was here with dozens of other children whose families were statistically labeled "below poverty level/working poor." Eating free meals.

Jesse didn't understand either. Just as he hadn't understood why his dad had been in the hospital for such a long time. Or why he had died. Or why they had had to move from their home. Or why his mom was away from home working so much. Or why he was hungry.

Jesse's teacher had told Leslie about the Kids Cafe that just opened in Camp Washington only a few blocks from their apartment. Now, several times a week, Jesse can breathe the warmth of the spicy stew and the tidy, cheerful church hall. And Leslie can breathe hope for a better tomorrow.

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Sacking hunger

Kirsten Day of Milton has a full plate with three children and her own business to run, but last spring, she decided to help make sure other people had full plates at mealtimes.

Day launched a food drive in the Rowland's Hollow West I and II and Olde Rowland's Hollow neighborhoods. She began by stuffing the roughly 250 mailboxes with fliers asking people to leave bags of donated food by their mailboxes on Tuesdays. Then she drove to each mailbox and picked up the food Tuesday afternoons or evenings. She made so many stops, the brakes went out on her car.

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School on an empty tummy

It was the little boy; the son of the late carpenter who had worked for me that drew my attention. He was supposed to be at school but was drifting aimlessly around the village, hungry and looking for some leftovers wherever they may be found. I was appalled and in typical human fashion I was trying to find someone to be angry with. I wanted to be angry with his mother. She it turns out could only manage to provide the eight children with one meal a day and that was in the evening. I tried to be angry with a lot of people. I wanted to find some way to explain away my intense discomfort, I needed someone to take the blame, I needed to be able to walk away from this. It was then that a memory from my childhood returned. In my early teens during a visit to a school friend we went out through the kitchen door to find two even younger coloured kids picking from the plate scrapings in the dogs dish. My school friend responded with: "hey, that's the dogs food". The reply which haunts me to this very day was: "yes, but it is nice". I could not walk away this time.

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The AIDS connection

I am in South Africa. I saw a TV programme yesterday on satellite TV about the suffering and deprivation of families hit by death and illness resulting from the AIDS pandemic. They don't get help because our president's position is that "a virus cannot cause a syndrome, which is a collection of diseases". Yea right, this is really helpful to the thousands sad, tragic and lonely deaths in backrooms and in some disgusting shantytown. When these people get sick it spells disaster for their families. Apart from the other deprivations there is seldom enough food on the table for the sick or the children. Like in the England of old where families used to lock their insane offspring in the attic we have a situation where the AIDS sufferers are kept in a backroom away from the world because of the stigma and shame attached to this infection. Now even if President Mbeki can not bring himself to accept that AIDS is a reality why does he not recognise that such families face hunger and destitution from whatever cause and provide social support?

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