Destiny Torres

I returned to Hialeah Marketplace Hub, but this time the process was different. When I arrived at the location we had to wait for the food truck to deliver the items. During that time, I noticed the line of people outside was very long and mostly consisted of Hispanic families. Once the truck arrived we began to sort all the items into bags. After everything was sorted the people came up one by one to collect three bags. At the end, we cleaned up the area and helped put the tents back inside.

For this activity, I donated ten packs of ramen noodles to a fall community food drive and created an educational pamphlet on healthy eating. My pamphlet focuses on healthy eating for adults. It included tips for choosing water over other drinks, eating more vegetables, and including fun physical activities. It also explained the benefits of a healthy diet, such as lowering the risk of diabetes, high blood pressure, and heart disease.

I volunteered at Lotus House Women’s Shelter and assisted with kitchen work. We helped the chefs by cutting vegetables and meat to prepare them for cooking. After that we distributed meals in the cafeteria, where each person selected a meal. This experience showed the importance of shelters for those in need because they provide not only food, but also safety and a home.

I went back to Feeding South Florida, this time helping in the client choice pantry. We worked at the conveyer belt where we sorted donated goods into categories. My assigned category for this day was snacks, which came down the belt quickly in large quantities. This required me to work with another volunteer to keep up with the amount of food coming down. As the belt started to move you would see different items of foods and daily home necessities. As the snacks began to come down together we placed snacks into boxes as it was quickly coming down. We later worked together by swapping tasks of grabbing new boxes when needed and stacking up the filled ones so it could later be packed and shipped out to families.

For this activity, I volunteered at Hialeah Marketplace Hub, where food was being distributed to the community. When we first arrived, I noticed that a long line of mostly Hispanic and elderly people were already waiting outside. Inside, we started by sorting pantry items like tuna, beans, and jelly. After, we moved to the tents outside where pre-packed boxes full of vegetables were arranged to be handed out. The process involved calling people one at a time, handing them a bag of canned items and then giving them the box of vegetables. We continued this process until everything was gone.

On the day of my service learning, I attended Feeding South Florida. I worked in a warehouse where I was assigned to pack beans into boxes on a conveyor belt, and together with my group, we filled about 300 boxes that were sealed and sent out for distribution. After we were moved to another room where donated items came down a conveyer belt and we had to grab the items in our group into bins. I was assigned “Hygiene Products” and sorted those items into boxes for families in need. It was a hands-on activity and it gave me the chance to help families in need.