PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — On Aug. 30, Jill Fink and her friend Judy Ni, owner of Center City Taiwanese restaurant Bao-logy, received an email from World Central Kitchen, an emergency food relief nonprofit started by Chef José Andrés asking for help.
"World Central Kitchen had just heard that there would be 40 Afghan evacuees stuck at the airport overnight, while they were waiting for military transport. And was there anything we could do to get meals to them?" Fink said.
The pair answered the call of duty, and Fink and her network sprang into action organizing halal meals.
"We really wanted to make sure that we were providing culturally appropriate and familiar food to the individuals that were coming in," Fink explained.
"Halal" is a term applied to foods that are prepared in such a way that they are permissible by Islamic law.
Fink works in Philadelphia's nonprofit sector to strengthen communities by connecting through food. She says Ni reached out to another colleague for help — Abbe Stern, who works with restaurants around the city to reduce food waste and promote food recovery.
Fink says Stern echoed the call for help through her Too Good to Go network. The response was immediate.
Within three hours of that email, they were dropping off 80 containers of hot chicken and rice, and salad, at Philadelphia International Airport. The meals were handed off to TSA and Department of Homeland Security agents, who then delivered them to the new arrivals who had been evacuated from Afghanistan.
"And so, like, while there was a lot of collective effort in making that happen, when I think about what these individuals had been through leading up to their arrival at the airport, ... I sort of feel like the least that they could expect was ... a hot meal," Fink said.
"And that, I think, is just a great metaphor for what happens when when individuals, you know, come together and ... work towards a common goal."
While Fink did some of the leg work and some driving between restaurants, she says the crews at Healthy Picks deli, 23 S. 19th St., and Pasha's Halal Food, 1652 N. 2nd St., deserve the praise. Many small businesses are still in a state of limbo because of the coronavirus pandemic, but the two teams still answered the call for help with urgency.
"I didn’t do anything extraordinary — nor did Judy, nor did Abbe, right? These restaurants, they did really spring into action to prepare meals — like, at a moment’s notice 8:30, 9 o’clock at night, when most of them were getting ready to close," Fink said.
"When we come together, and do it in the name of something that’s, like, bigger than ourselves, it can be meaningful and significant for the people that are most in need."
Fink says she realizes that many people in the City of Brotherly Love are eager to help these groups, and she’s grateful she could play a small role, but she says it’s only the beginning. There is much work ahead.
"This will require sustained effort over time, and for all of us to remember that it’s not just immediately about getting them settled with a roof over their heads, but what it means to welcome them into our community and to provide them with jobs and education and feeling that they are part of ... our larger community."