Before me was a huge X etched into a piece of
granite and under it a sign that read “Welcome to our safe house.” I had just
entered the Greater Boston Food Bank facility. Not your usual cruise ship
excursion. Six of us, including one of the ship’s photographers from the
Crystal Serenity, had boarded a large van at the dock and been transported
about twenty minutes away to the huge warehouse that is this organization’s
central distribution center. The center serves more than 394,000 people of
Eastern Massachusetts.

But why was it called a “safe house”? I read the
explanation beneath the X. As a young child, Kip Tiernan, the founder of the
food bank had watched her grandmother during the Great Depression feed many
homeless, helpless, and hungry men who came to her back door in New Haven, Connecticut.
When seven-year-old Kip asked her grandmother how the men knew to come to the
door, she told her to watch them as they left. Kip noticed the next man leave
and pause a moment out on the sidewalk. He picked up a piece of charcoal and
marked a large X, the hobo symbol for a safe house. It was her first experience
of community organizing.
“It is no secret if you are scarred by struggle
you can be transformed by hope,” Tiernan said, “And my grandmother gave them
that.”

So we entered the “safe house” and were introduced
to the volunteer organizer who gave us a general introduction to all of the
organizations that the food bank serves. A large group of young people from a
local business joined us as well as regular volunteers and we walked past huge
shelves filled with non-perishable foods and entered a room full of boxes of
potato chips.

The group organizer for that project set us up to
take empty boxes, put four bags of chips in each, replace the top and stack the
boxes to be set on shelves for distribution later. In about an hour, we had
repacked all the chips and sent them on their way.
Next, after proving ourselves with the chips
project, our leader had volunteers bring in frozen meats and poultry for us to
sort and redistribute in boxes for distribution. That job took about an hour as
well.
A little tired but feeling satisfied that we had
contributed some help to their wonderful organization we returned to the
orientation room and received a report that our total group of about 30 people
had successfully sorted and repacked over 4,000 pounds of food making meals
possible for more than 107 people.
This is the first time I’ve ever seen a cruise
line organize the opportunity for its guests to contribute in this sort of way
to a charitable organization. We are often asked to give money but never our
time. It was quite enjoyable and satisfying and I hope to see more of those
opportunities in the future.