Hello Mi Neighbour | Making today ‘giveaway day’

Hello, mi neighbour! Today is payday for some! For others, it’s just like yesterday and the days to come. The prospects of a brighter tomorrow continue to be elusive. It’s been so for a while, with no change of fortune in sight. Scarcity of jobs is one thing, the other being the age factor, which could humbug employability. Of course, others have their stories. Imagine the misery/frustration of these needy neighbours!

With your imagination now activated, imagine today as ‘Jamaica Day’, a day when Jamaicans who have the wherewithal, share freely with those who have nothing at all. And, we may call it ‘giveaway day’. Someone always needs something (they can’t afford) from someone else. As we speak, some need food, some need clothing, a child needs lunch money and shoes for school. A baby needs diapers and milk. Some need money to visit the doctor and buy medication etc. as they say, “water is always more than flour” for some people.

On making today a ‘giveaway day’, imagine the positive outcomes: more children will eat lunch, less people will go naked, more families will have dinner, there will be less tension in the streets, a senior citizen’s roof will be fixed, more persons will have a good night’s rest and so on.

Due to the lack of life’s basic necessities, some neighbours become sick and depressed. Bro M of a St Catherine address is a case in point. He can neither buy food nor pay his rent. His present condition is not his own doing. The action of a crazy motorist has left this brother no option but to depend on others for his daily bread.

We do not choose those life-changing misfortunes. Even with our best plans and projections, as they say, “life happens”, and sometimes we are forced to depend on the benevolence of others to go on. It is for this very reason that we are commanded to “love our neighbours as ourselves and to do unto others as we would have them do unto us”.

Despite all this talk about food shortages, with millions dying of starvation annually, there is enough food on our planet to feed at least one and a half times its population. How can we be wasting more than 500 million tons of food and watch more than 800 million people eat themselves into obesity annually, and sit still. Isn’t it sad that 36 million people, including children, will die of hunger this year, not because of insufficient resources but because of man’s inhumanity to his kind? What part are you playing?

Okay, we just went global. Coming back home, on this ‘give-away day’, some families will eat a little more, the beggar will add a piece of cheese to his bulla with a box drink to wash it down, some children will buy lunch and the malnourished will have a little more nutrition going into their bodies!

By buying into ‘giveaway day’, our earthly sojourn is further legitimised. And before you go, please help someone from list below, on this special day.Hope I’ve made a difference.

THANKS TO NEIGHBOURS

- Thanks to YUMMY Bakery, for act of kindness.

- Mrs Melbourne, St Andrew, for donation of clothing.

- Marcia, St Andrew, for offering a one piece sofa to a neighbour.

- St Andrew, for offering a TV to a neighbour.

Requests

- Murica, Kingston, mother of three, desperately in need of a bed.

- Wheelchair user neighbour asking for a refrigerator.

- Neighbour, lost household items due to a misfortune. Asking for a few pieces.

- Neighbour, son is attending high school and badly in need of a pair of size 7 shoes.

- Fifty-year-old woman, unemployed, asking for financial assistance to start a business.

To help, please call Silton Townsend @ 334-8165, 884-3866, or deposit to acct # 351 044 276 NCB. Alternatively, send donations to HELLO NEIGHBOUR C/o 53 Half-Way- Tree Road, Kingston 10; Paypal/credit card: email: zicron22@yahoo.com. CONTACT EMAIL: helloneighbour@yahoo.com. Visit hellomineighbourja.blogspot.com Mr Townsend exclusively manages the collections and distributions mentioned in this column and is neither an employee nor agent of The Gleaner.