Senior Auditor Chichi Bhene is known for feeding people and being a natural nurturer. As she says, “you don’t come to my house hungry and leave hungry. You certainly don’t go out with me and don’t grab anything to eat.” For each of the last five years, she has committed to making at least one family Christmas lunch. One meal eventually became 50 and she lost track in between. She makes it her goal to make it a higher number each year.
In 2020 she made 62 meals and with her passion it grew to 150 meals in 2021. She says, “I remember how crazy and terrified I was as I was walking through Makro getting supplies. It’s a 150 people, that’s a large number to try and feed on your own but I did.”
On December 25, 2021 her and her siblings packed 150 meals and drove to a couple of shelters. Each meal they put together consists of juice, water or flavored milk, an orange and a snack, rice, gravy, a chicken drumstick, green beans and, pumpkin and some coleslaw. Here are some fun facts to take with you that she learned during this food drive:
- 20kg of chicken drumsticks equates to a 168 individual drumsticks
- You will find a nice wholesale veggie place in the depths of Cape Town and;
- Two heads of cabbages plus approximately 15 carrots can make coleslaw for 150 people.
Chichi reminds herself that Heaven has its own angels tasked with reminding inhabitants of this earth that humanity is not all but lost. She is extremely grateful that she has enough food for each shelter that she and her siblings went to.
Chichi makes the comment that almost all of us can point and reflect to an event in our lives that seem directly orchestrated by heaven or a greater power, “I can’t believe that happened” or “that was a miracle”. She continues, “we all experience divine interventions and we tend to recount them over and over again for years.” In her experience, that’s God’s way of saying, “I’m here, I care and I can do what you cannot do by yourself”.
As we embark on this New Year, Chichi challenges you all to make tiny enormous differences, be a little less wasteful and give that which we no longer need. It could be the leftovers that have been sitting in the fridge for over a week and no one is going to eat, it could literally be anything. No good deed is too small a deed!
“To whom much is given, much is required!”
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