By the Inside Outreach team · October 15, 2023Five hundred meals. One day.
Aunty Blanche’s crew at Hui Mahiʻai ʻĀina made the water and hygiene packets. We teamed up with them, loaded everything up and hit several homeless camps around the island, including Waiʻanae’s Twinkles spot.
Why go to them?
A lot of people ask why we don’t just set up a table and let people come to us. Simple. A lot of the folks we serve can’t. No car. No bus fare. Health problems. Kids to watch. Belongings they can’t leave behind or they’ll be gone.
So we go to them. Camp to camp. And we sit down and talk story while we’re there.
It was humbling
Honestly, that’s the best word for it. You hand somebody a plate and a bottle of water and they thank you like you just changed their week. Maybe you did.
And the best part is that a lot of the people packing those hygiene kits used to live on the street themselves. Now they live at Aunty Blanche’s. Drug free. Working the garden. Serving the same people they used to be.
That’s the whole thing right there. Not a handout. A way out.
Mahalo to Aunty Blanche and her crew, and to everyone who gave so we could do this.
