Have you ever gone to a food bank?

[Kim]

Please share your experiences! It can be difficult to get up the nerve and go for the first time, so it might help people to hear about what it's like.

Please stay on topic and don't troll or ridicule (your post will be deleted and you will be threadbanned).

[Kim]

lungs response in the previous thread:

i went along with my parents a few times as a kid so i don't have the knowledge that i would as an adult interacting with staff and picking out food or anything. i vaguely remember rows of food on pallets, nice people, weird generic brands. iirc they were supposed to pick out so much of different categories of food.. like x amounts of grains and x amounts of canned veggies, etc. but i know that other places pick out the food for you and just bring it to you (this place i used to volunteer at but never ended up with that duty). so it depends. sorry i don't really have anything concrete. but i don't think its a particularly complicated or "big deal" sort of thing and i'm sure the staff there are used to people being nervous or being there for the first time. i know people who go now and sometimes they'll give away some food cuz they'll have a bunch of one thing they didn't want.

[InvisibleJim]

I raid through my unused surplus and donate it about once every 3 or 6 months. I think its a good thing to do because I hate waste and I often buy things without proper planning.

Useful food is stuff wot keeps.

e.g. Tins/Cans (often the expiration dates are ludicrously conservative)
Pastas
Bottles and Jars.
Carbonated beverages
Bottles of water (which are incredibly overpriced, and in many parts of the world you can't just get clean water from a tap like in the UK)

Out of generosity and since I keep a chocolate cupboard I usually donate the remaining contents at the same time.

There are a lot of charitable organisations which work as logistics to get food to banks, usually when I'm in the UK I take it to my parents who whiz it away through various magical charitable devices, e.g. churches, school donations and the like.

[mu4]

No, I've never done this. I generally am not fond of physical item donations since I have to buy them and carry them. I tend to donate money.

I have donated to like the local food bank deposit box at the supermarket. Does that count?

[squirreltual]

I have never been to one, but as part of my work I now routinely direct people to local food banks. I almost had to use one when I had no income for about 9 weeks, but I felt weird about it - I was still wearing shoes and hadn't contracted TB so I guess I didn't feel "poor enough" or something. The amount of people using them has tripled here in just one year. I guess it's fast becoming a part of life now for many.

[Beautiful sky]

I've donated eggs and other stuff to a food bank. If I get free food from a local grocery store, I'll take advantage of it and take it to our local church. As a donator, you just walk in and place the goods on a table, no questions asked. As a receiver, the same thing, go look at what's on the donation table, grab what you need and go; you don't have to talk to anyone, in fact no one at our church will solicit people there for anything except offering them bags and boxes to carry the food out to their car, not offer them religious advice, coax them into Christianity or any such thing; any person from any religion is welcome to take food; most of the food is donated by local grocers and manufacturers.

[Kim]

Yay!

[Beautiful sky]

I've lived in my community area for over 25 years and I've seen artists of all types come and go, try to make it in this tough and deceptive industry. I consider our efforts to be a community duty to others to make sure people are ok. It has nothing to do with pride, religion, it has to do with enriching your life and your society. If you guys ever get a chance to read http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gl%C3%BCckel_of_Hameln

A diary that describes the life of a Jewish community in Germany, you get such a wonderful sense of what I'm talking about in the way that communities help enrich the lives of people who live there.

You're so much more productive when you are well nourished.

[Capitalist Pig]

I've been to all kinds of food banks. Lotta stuff is not worth keeping, and I never trust most of it. There are some good food banks that won't give you expired stuff, but be weary of everything.

[Cuddly McFluffles]

My parents have gone before, when we were doing particularly badly. I'm not sure I could bring myself to; it'd be a crushing blow to my pride.

[blackburry]

When I was living alone in my own apartment two years ago, I didn't know there were food banks, totally could've used them then. I lived off ramen noodles and food my parents would give me once in a while, my bank account was always so extremely low after paying all my bills, I simply didn't have enough for food. It was horrible. I felt super sickly. I'd have to work one to two days a week overtime just to afford groceries and even then I didn't have enough to take lunches with me to work so I'd have to take a few snacks from the galley to eat. I once went to the grocery store and my debit card was declined, I was like "oops, brb I'll get cash from my car" and just left... totally transparent but since I've always made sure I have money in my acct before I go to a store.
Also the summer and winter months were horrible because I would refuse to put the a/c or heat on... living with a bunch of people helps with bills. I' really dislike being a poor student.