Feeding The Hungry

     This post is in response to Mr. Bolos's post on the physical and mental heath of homeless people. The lack in physical health that Mr. Bolos describes sound like people are buying the cheap food that is high in sodium instead of the more expensive fruits and vegetables. I remember hearing about an old women living in a poor area of Chicago who had to walk over a mile to the closest grocery store if she needed something. Even when she had time to go to the store she didn't always have the money to pay for her expensive food. This makes me think that Chicago needs more stores where homeless or poor people can go to buy cheaper groceries. 

     There should also be more services like Meals on Wheels or the Night Ministry that travel to the places where there are high populations of poor and homeless people and give out free meals. These meals also need to be healthy though in order to make a change in the physical health. This situation would be ideal because this  way people could get healthy meals brought right to them. Also, on the Night Ministry bus there is also doctors that give free check-ups. Maybe if there were more doctors and volunteers willing to give free check-ups the homeless people who are mentally ill could be better taken care of.  I actually think that New Trier has a service like this as well. If I am not mistaken it is called Food Taxi. I love how even our high school is helping out with hunger problems. 

     Mr. Bolos also mentioned how he wanted to talk to the people he was serving. Sometimes, I volunteer with my church at a soup kitchen in Evanston. Like Mr. Bolos I find myself wanting to talk to the people I am serving. I bet they all have really interesting life stories, but all I and the rest of the volunteers will know them as the homeless people we served. How can we make better connections with the people we are helping? What are other ways to help the physical and mental health of homeless and poor people?