As part of its annual “Celebration of Hope,” which is an attempt to raise money and awareness for the plight of the global poor, my church has challenged the congregation to eat as a poor person would for five days straight. This basically means that the meal options are oatmeal or cream of wheat, rice and beans, or rice with bits of meat and vegetables. For five days. Straight. I am now on day three of this challenge.
It is not so easy.
Day one was not so bad. I was actually fine until about 8:00pm, when I started to get really hungry. My mind immediately wandered to the kitchen, where I could usually just grab something if I was feeling peckish. But I have really set my mind to this challenge, and I know that the poor don’t have a fully-stocked kitchen where they could just go “grab something.” So I held my ground, but the hunger was very distracting and doing my homework was a nightmare.
Day two was worse. The rice and beans I had for lunch were fine on day one, but on day two they were difficult to get down. I’ve always hated beans. Also, between my “lunch” of rice and beans and my “dinner” of rice with bits of chicken and vegetables was a period of about nine hours. I had to go to work from 5-9, so I didn’t eat dinner until I got home around 9:30pm. These were a long nine hours. At work I started to feel a little weak and dizzy. Plus, I work at a salad/sandwich place, so there was plenty of good food to tempt me. It was a tough day.
I think today, day three, will be fine. I really don’t have anything to do, so I won’t need a lot of energy. Days four and five will probably be the hardest for me. To be honest, I can’t wait for Saturday. The crappy part is, if this was a real situation, it wouldn’t be over after five days.
Posted in Poverty, Social Justice, church | Tags: awareness, church, Food, hunger, poor, Poverty, Social Justice
