5 NOV 2021 - 231 MEALS

Menu: Vermicelli with chicken, vegetables and eggs. Biscuits (donated from Agoda team)

Meals served: 231

Today, we had our corporate volunteers from Agoda.com come in and help to pack. It was great and the team brought in biscuits to distribute to the kids as well. A great day, thank you everyone for your positivity, your amazing contributions and hard work.

Biscuits is something the kids really love. Baked products are actually quite expensive to purchase so these are really considered treats.

And it's always great to see the gratefulness of those that take our food boxes. We delivered to nearby sois where we have identified needy families that need our assistance.

To keep our work going, please donate here. And should you wish to volunteer, please email us at hotmealsphuket@icloud.com.

4 Nov 2021 - 305 MEALS SERVED

Menu: Rice, scrambled egg and vegetables; chicken porridge

Meals served: 305

We had a full stack of volunteers today, thank you Young Christians in Phuket that dropped by to help pack meals. It was a crowded afternoon at the chapel. The food queue started building up at 4pm.

We often get asked How do you validate if these folks are needy? Our response:

- We serve hot meals that have a very low market value. These meals are also consumables and do not last beyond 24 hours. This is not a high value Survival bag which has a street value of THB 500 where there is economic incentive to get a free bag and resell it on the street.

- We have come to speak to those that queue for food. About 40% of the people that take food from us are the working poor. They may have jobs but these are based on commission or they have suffered a significant paycut (sometimes up to 50%) due to covid impact. Making ends meet is a challenge and us providing a hot meal helps alleviate their economic situation. We hope that certainly this group of people will "return to normal" once the economy recovers.

- Whenever there are free goods, one can expect that there is a proportion of free loaders. But we underwrite some amount of yield loss and just move on. To punish the 90% of people who genuinely need and benefit from our hot meals, vs the 10% of free-loaders is not rationale to cut the program. And it is definitely not economically feasible to vet every single person.

What would truly help fix it all, is a rising tide. We need jobs and we need proper living wages. For the SME businesses or corporations, feel free to post up jobs at our chapel. I am sure any person would prefer to make a living wage rather than queue 1 hour for a free box of food.

Email hotmealsphuket@icloud.com if you wish to donate items, offer jobs or donate money here to keep our program going.

3 Nov 2021 - 262 MEALS

Menu: Chicken and vegetable soup with rice

Meals served: 262

Today, we served chicken feet soup with vegetables. This is a very hard dish for farangs to understand but something that Asians really love. The glutinous texture of chicken feet is both crunchy and soft and the taste comes from the surrounding soup. In any case, Sunee makes this dish once in a while and it is always popular.

Another day of long queues. We see increasing number of families queuing for food. Many are from Myanmar, Nepal and all fall through the cracks in terms of being able to receive social security or any Thai government assistance.

Phuket has officially opened up its borders to over 60 countries with limited quarantine. We hope this translates to increased work. We are monitoring the situation in our food queues daily and will be providing updates to all as we progress through the OPENING of Phuket.

Should you wish to volunteer, please email us at hotmealsphuket@icloud.com. We only accept vaccinated volunteers, due to risk of contracting covid.