Volunteers Help Fight Hunger in Haiti

Hear firsthand how one of largest food packs went down

By Volunteer Zeba Haseeb

How many of us begin dreaming at a young age of all the things we want to achieve when we’re older? Some of us dream about careers and others about traveling all around the world and immense in different cultures. But how many of us can visualize a future for ourselves when the next meal we are having is uncertain. 

IRUSA has made it their top priority to not only help communities in need of meals, but also help the youth achieve their goals for a prosperous future. The school feeding programs specifically encourage children to attend schools as well as provide meals for them to be able to focus on their education. No child should have to choose between educating themselves or spending time providing food for their families. IRUSA has made it their mission to make sure each child that receives a packaged meal can focus on a better and brighter future for themselves as well as their families. 

I had a beautiful experience volunteering while meal packaging for Haiti. When I had first agreed to volunteer it was a way for my friends and I to do something together. But after being explained how much of a difference each of these meals make, that is when this task really sunk in. I had never realized how a simple function for me such as eating meals can be taken for granted it so easily. It brought tears to my eyes knowing that I am working with an association that prioritizes multiple countries to make sure they can have a little of what I have.

We all can fall victim to our personal lives and demanding work lives, but when our community comes together to help a cause such as this, it forces us all to leave our lives behind and be grateful for what we have. No matter what background we’re all from. Our Muslim community in Chicago came together to help those in need which is exactly the definition of how our Ummah should be. 

At the end of our volunteer day, we ended with packaging 53,000 meals. That means 53,000 people were able to nourish themselves for one more day. Hopefully 53,000 children could live for another day to plan a new life for themselves. In one day we changed 53,000 worth of meals and to know that IRUSA helped us impact all of those lives is an incomparable feeling.