Emotional demands coupled with bitter weather can make December a difficult time, but it also presents beautiful opportunities for building communities and spreading joy – Food Not Bombs Dundee didn’t waste a moment in doing so this month. Kicking things off, we had our Friday night trolley where we take a loop of Dundee providing hot drinks, sandwiches and snacks to the most vulnerable in our community. The cold weather and general time of year had spread many of the usual coughs, colds, and sore throats. As a result some people were finding it difficult to swallow food, luckily, we took on board a tip from one of our regular faces to get some Cup a Soup. An inspired idea that can be mixed up easily in a Vegware cup and sipped through the evening for both warmth, and sustenance. We’ve now added this as an ongoing feature of our Friday trolleys!
This action was swiftly followed by two events in partnership with the local vegan friendly cafe Marwicks. The Sunday afternoon saw us coordinate distribution of their food to people in the community who needed it, and on the Thursday the cafe provided a space for us to lead a talk on Community Solidarity. The talk was well received and gave people the backdrop of context for our group, what we do, and why there is a need for this type of group in Dundee. Interest drummed up by this education and outreach means we may soon have enough folk to get out onto the streets more often and extend our work, stay tuned!
The shortest day of the year was in fact a very long day for all at FNB Dundee. We took over a stall at the Punk Rock Flea Market, again providing education and outreach (as well as stickers and badges) to those around us – all whilst supporting local crafty folk, artists, zine makers and vegan bakers. We then had ourselves a much needed social and meal together at Rad Apples before skipping downstairs to Conroy’s Basement for a fundraiser gig to support Dundee’s Anarchist Book Fair.
You might think all this excitement would have us beat, but we were still standing and ready to see the year out with our most ambitious Saturday stall of the yet. In the hinterland between Christmas and New Year where all time loses meaning we somehow managed to coordinate a meet up for a communal cook facilitated by Serendipities in Dundee. A great stock of food was generously donated and we were able to use the wondrous facilities and team work to whip up such delicacies as BBQ jackfruit, coronation cauliflower, soup, curry and even mini pizzas! These were great treats chat over at our very busy stall seeing us greet over 80 people. We were also able to help minimise waste by handing out supermarket surplus veg by the sack (Santa has nothing on us), as well as responding to the winter needs of our community by providing a free clothes rail with donated warm clothes.
As per usual, December was cold, busy, tough but very worth it. We’ve seen our community grow on all sides with more people able to help out, more people coming to visit and more bonds with other conscious groups in Dundee. We can’t wait to take this energy forward into 2020!
