Being Picky to Help the Hungry

I am a student from Taiwan, working on a master's degree in San Francisco. As a visitor to a new place, I like to hang out with friends and explore my surroundings with them.

My group recently thought it would be nice to volunteer at the SF-Marin Food Bank. The food bank is a nonprofit organization that buys tons of fruit in bulk from area growers at steeply discounted prices. That's the good news. The bad: Because the fruit arrives in bulk, it needs to be sorted. People need to remove the bad fruit from the good before the food bank makes fruit available to the area's poor people (according to the group's website, one in every four people in the San Francisco area would go hungry if not for the food bank and other charities).

My friends and I decided to be fruit sorters for a day to help the poor. We booked a day on the food bank's website and went there with excitement. We were given the assignment of picking the edible oranges from loads of good and not-so-good oranges and package the good fruit.

The instructor of the food bank told us that with our help, they could save the money to hire workers so that they could buy more food for more people in need. We were performing a valuable service.

During the sorting and packing, my friends and I not only chatted with each other but we also talked with other volunteers. We felt relaxed and satisfied after the great day.

As a result, my friends and I are now volunteering at the Food Bank on a regular basis.

By Chi Wei Ku, Taipei, Taiwan, China