13 OCT 2021 - 204 MEALS, STORIES & INTERVIEWS

Menu: Egg, spicy curry chicken and rice, cucumber with stir fry chicken, biscuits

Meals served: 204

Today Sunee served spicy and fragrant curry chicken and cucumber with stir fry chicken as 2 meal choices. She also specially made stew chicken for the children that is non-spicy.

We also welcomed a reporter from Le Monde, the french newspaper, who is in and around Phuket and Thailand covering the impact of Covid on its economy and people. So we had a chance to interview and hear the stories from those that collect our food packets. It is always good to know the beneficiaries whom we are helping.

Here are some highlights:

- Most of the working poor here in Phuket are migrants from other province, in our food line yesterday we had folks from Bangkok, Nakhon Si Thammarat, other countries such as Nepal and mountain tribe people, all were working here previously but now have no jobs.

- Quite a number came to collect food from us from Kathu and Karon. Which is pretty far to go just to get 1 pack of hot food, but they know we have been consistently serving for past 2 years so it is worth the trip.

- Almost all we spoke to lived in multi-generational homes, 4-8 in one room places, which they rent month to month. It has been difficult as multiple younger persons in the family household are jobless. So everyone is just scraping the bottom of the barrel to get buy. Many were late on rent.

This taxi driver thanked us for providing food for past 2 years. He said today he made THB 60. It is slow and hard going but there are simply no tourists anymore. But still he plys his trade daily, because what else can he do?

This gentleman works as a security guard in a nearby hotel in Patong, but lives with 6 other family members in Chalong. He used to make THB 11K per month but since covid, he has to work the same hours but makes only THB 5K. His room rent to house his whole family costs THB 3K. He simply cannot make ends meet. He collects our food pack daily just to shave off some personal expenses as every cent counts. He is also 70 years old and still working.

It was certainly eye opening to hear from the horse' mouth how covid has impacted "the small guy". Sure big businesses are suffering, but there is a blue collar class of workers and the poor that have been made even more impoverished by this virus and by poor government planning.