Our day started out with a trip to Our Daily Bread, a shelter in Baltimore. When we first arrived we were given a tour of the facility, which was huge! I was not expecting a homeless shelter to be so nice. One half had a career center for people to get their lives back on track and the other half had an industrial kitchen and dining area to serve the homeless. After the tour we did an activity where we were put into the shoes of a disadvantaged family in Baltimore. We had to use a $3000 combined monthly income to decide how to spend our money (paying rent, buying food, etc). This activity made me extremely grateful for not being in such a tough situation. It was so difficult to decide how I would spend the money and I could not imagine doing this every night.
After finishing our tour and activity, a few of us continued the day by serving during the lunch period. Our Daily Bread serves around 600 people days during lunchtime. We were all given various tasks. Some served bread and tea, some passed out sandwiches and I collected plates and utensils and cleared away food. By working the lunch shift, I interacted with some of the Baltimore homeless population. I was surprised by the large amount of mental disability and also surprised by the amount of food wasted. This was definitely an eye opening experience and something that made me feel extremely grateful for the opportunities I have.
We finished off the day by cooking dinner for Boys Hope Girls Hope, and organization that houses middle and high school teens. The kids that get to live in the houses are nominated by teachers, and the director we met in the afternoon couldn’t say enough about how great and promising all of the kids in the program are. We will be working with this organization throughout the week, but tonight we cooked dinner at the boys’ house.
After cooking and eating with the 8 boys who live in the house, I really got the feeling of being part of a family. Talking to the boys who are about to graduate, we were all so inspired about how far they had come. It seems as though it would be easy to say that a program this small can’t make a big difference, but the difference it has made in the lives of these boys is unbelievable.
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