We joined a hundred or so volunteers are helping at Valencia’s World Central Kitchen to provide hot meals for people in locations effected by the floods of a month ago.
They are very well organized. When we arrived, we first had to check in. I was not registered so they took my name and phone number. You can register on Telegram if you have the group link. Then we visited the assignment board. Two volunteers had a long list of activities. The cooking was already started so there were three sections for packaging the food. Then there was the delivery process, broken down by location. Each activity had the number of people needed notated with phone numbers.
At the packaging stations, there was a table set up to receive the huge paella pans. Two or three people placed portions in the sturdy containers. These were passed down to several people who installed the lids. Then people placed the containers in large gray insulated boxes. These were then placed in vans either provided by volunteers or rented by WCK.
There were no shortages of materials or labor. There was coffee for the volunteers and a bathroom that looked totally normal that had been dropped in by WCT when they arrived.
WCT was founded 2010 by Spanish American chef José Andrés to help in Haiti in the aftermath of the earthquake. It has served millions of meals since then. They are sometimes located in war zones, and there have been several fatalities.
