Colette Price and John Leahy, volunteers of the Soup Kitchen, which operates from 12pm – 2pm, every Saturday in the, Teach an Solas hall, next to St John’s Church of Ireland on Ashe Street. Photo by Gavin O’Connor.
TWO elderly men come to a soup kitchen in town.
Dressed in their Sunday best, the men take their seats in the hall and eat three full dinners each one after another.
It later transpires that the men, aged in their 70s, had not eaten in four days.
This is just one story from the Soup Kitchen, in the Teach an Solas hall, on Ashe Street, right next to St. John’s church.
The Soup Kitchen began in October 2012 when two women, Colette Price and Dawn Roberts, felt there was a need to reach out to less fortunate people in the community.
“When we started we had two or three people coming in the door, now we’re averaging about 80 people each week. Last week we had 95 people coming to us,” said Collette Price of the The Soup Kitchen.
Every Saturday, from 12pm – 2pm, the Soup Kitchen opens its doors and provides people of all ages with a three course meal, which is kindly donated by local businesses and restaurants. The Church of Ireland also provides the hall for free.
“The social aspect of the soup kitchen is just as important as the food being served. From talking to people, we can find out who is having trouble putting food on the table or who has not been well. Not only that, it’s also a social outing for a lot people,” said Colette.
The build up to Christmas is an extremely important time for charitable organisations. Around this time last year, the Soup Kitchen, was contacted about the need to help two women who were living with each other and had children.
When they got to the house to drop off non-perishable food, the two women broke down in tears. Under closer inspection from the people who came to the woman’s aid they found they had no food at all in the house.
Because of the huge undertaking involved in feeding 90 people, Colette and Dawn alternate every Saturday and enlist the help of between 40 and 60 volunteers.
“This Christmas we want to appeal to people and businesses if they can donate food. We only open on a Saturday so we want to make sure that people will have something the days they can’t come to us,” said Colette.
The Soup Kitchen won’t be serving on Christmas day, but on the Saturdays either side of it they will try to put on Christmas dinner, all depending on what donations they get.
“If food is coming to the end of its shelf life, instead of throwing it in the bin, there’s no trouble with us coming to collect food. We will find someone who needs it,” said Colette.
If you would like to help in any way, call Colette Price on 086-3188736.
