Soup Kitchen

I overused the word marvelous many times today as I was experiencing the Soup Kitchen in downtown Greenville. My students and I arrived about fifteen til eleven. Serving would start in fifteen minutes and the volunteer crew had been working since nine a.m., not very long to prepare a meal that would feed over 200 if you ask me. A huge pot of vegetable soup was being stirred and tested by the retired engineer who has prepared the soup every Thursday for over ten years. The different types of breads were being heated on trays in the big commercial oven, golden and buttery. A yummy salad of mixed lettuces picked that morning from the garden in the back was being tossed. There were roasted baked potato wedges that had been given by a local steak restaurant and barbecued chunks of chicken. (They don't know what they are going to fix until they get there and see what they have to work with, i.e. what has been donated.) Before the doors were opened, one of the regular volunteers gathered all of us workers together, and he prayed as we stood in a circle, hand in hand. I got a good job - scooping ice. Two of my students took tickets as the customers came in and the others worked the serving line. It was a marvelous experience. The diners were what one might think of as stereotypical people who would come to a soup kitchen, needy. Some were gracious and said thank you and others didn't. What was amazing was the ease in which the regular workers performed and all that they were able to accomplish in such a short time including a magical clean up. Presto! The kitchen is a big and really nice commercial kitchen, but one of the volunteers took us to an even finer kitchen behind it. This one is being used for education and training, not for paying students but for the unemployable or homeless who desire to work and want to learn a skill. In a twelve week program, a chef teaches the students about cooking and everything they need to know about restaurant equipment. There are many success stories. One cool thing about it is that it is only the fourth program of its kind in the US. The garden, I understand, was put in by some master gardeners. Isn't it lovely! It was a marvelous experience for the students and me.