Today my group in church (Roots & Shoots) held an Oxfam Hunger Banquet. A Hunger Banquet demonstrates what hunger really is in our world. When each person came in they paid $5, they reached into a basket and took out a card. The cards read one of the following: High-Income, Middle-Income, or Low-Income.
The High-Incomes received:
- Table and Chairs
- Silverware
- 3 Course Meal
- Waitresses
The Middle-Incomes received:
- Chairs
- Silverware
- Rice and Beans
The Low-Incomes received:
- Seats on the Floor
- Rice
- No Silverware
- No Chairs
- No Beans
I read two pages of the script in the beginning and was a food server. I spooned out rice and beans to the Middle- and Low-Incomes.
Here is an informative page from the script my friends and I read today:
In over 35 years of Oxfam’s work, millions of dollars have been raised to support human rights and put an end to poverty. Millions of people have participated in an Oxfam Hunger Banquet or skipped a meal to recognize the plight of the world’s hungry.
While the proportion of the world’s populations living in hunger has decreased, hunger endures for millions of people.
This Hunger Banquet is a metaphor for how food and other resources are inequitably distributed in the world. As such, an Oxfam Hunger Banquet can only touch upon the issues. We cannot recreate the many and complex ways in which poverty manifests itself. We will not have time to go into all the problems associated with lack of access to healthcare, education and employment opportunities, and the realities of the day-to-day struggle for survival.
The one thing that we would like you to remember is this: everyone on earth has the same basic needs; it is only our circumstances – where we live and the culture we are born into – that differ. Each person’s place is randomly determined.
Some are born into prosperity and security while millions, by no choice of their own, are born into poverty.
As each of us walked in the door here today, we chose our lot at random. Look around, and you can see that equality and balance don’t exist here.
It is important to note that no one section of this room represents a single country. While the US is one of the wealthiest countries on earth, 36 million Americans live in poverty.
Hopefully along with the money we raised for Oxfam, we also raised awareness about hunger in our world.
