Generous Gifts from the Community

Call it providence, karma, serendipity, or what you will, but sometimes just what you need shows up just when you need it . . .

The Kamloops Food Policy Council has a couple of projects on the go at the Public Produce garden and  the Community Garden in McDonald Park. We had an RBC “Day of Service” scheduled at the park, and I was on the lookout for some plants so the team could fill some empty spaces in the Public Produce beds. While I was at the park the day before thinking about where I should go to find some good, inexpensive veggie plants, a guy drives up in a van and shouts out the window, “Hey, do you want some tomato, eggplant, and pepper plants?” “Seriously?”, I replied?

He opens up the back of his van, and there are several flats of beautiful, healthy-looking, vegetable transplants. Neto, and his daughter, Giovanna, help me carry them over to a shady spot where they can sit until the next day. “You made my day”, he says. “I didn’t know what I was gonna do with all these plants and I couldn’t bear to just throw them out”. Then they drove off, smiling and waving.

I made HIS day? I was just left standing there in amazement at what just happened. There were enough plants to fill the spaces in the beds as well as some extras to pass on to our friend Barb Lundstrom who grows a garden for the SHOP kitchen at ASK Wellness.

The RBC team showed up the next day as planned, and as well as planting all those veggies, they prepared and planted two “Three Sisters” beds with corn, beans, and squash, and cleaned up and weeded a couple of vacant Community Garden plots. All this in the 30 degree plus heat of the afternoon! On top of all that, they donated $1000 to the KFPC!

Thank-you so much RBC for an amazing program and an amazing team! You have made a real difference – none of that work would have gotten done without your efforts!

And thank-you Neto, for your kind gesture and your community spirit!