Think you’re too old for trick or treating? Think again.
Enter Trick or Eat, a cross-Canada campaign by Meal Exchange. Meal Exchange is a student-founded, non-profit association dedicated to helping 2.4 million Canadians who go hungry daily. It began in 1993 at Wilfrid Laurier University and has since expanded to include over 50 universities.
Despite its breadth, the organization’s focus is still very much on addressing local hunger issues in individual communities. In Nova Scotia alone, at least 38,000 people per month receive some kind of food assistance as counted by Feed Nova Scotia, the provincial food distribution centre.
Erica Szegedi, co-ordinator of the Meal Exchange program at Dalhousie for this semester, emphasizes the importance of local, community-based organizations like this one.
“There are always going to be people who need help in your own neighbourhood,” says Szegedi. “You don’t have to go far to help somebody.”
Meal Exchange’s largest event each year is the Trick or Eat initiative. Groups of costumed students take to the streets on Halloween in cities all across Canada and ask for donations of non-perishable food items instead of candy. The organizing committee here at Dal was hard at work as early as September, planning route maps and making flyers to distribute to houses in the south end.
Students sign up online in groups and are given a pre-determined area to cover. Local grocery stores lend shopping carts for the evening to collect food. The area stretches between Robie Street and Oxford Street, and as far north as Quinpool Road.
Don’t worry – you won’t have to cancel your wild night of partying. Canvassing takes place early and only lasts about an hour and a half. Once the food is all collected and taken to a base on campus, organizers count and sort the items before they are picked up by Feed Nova Scotia.
Last year about 20 groups signed up at Dal and organizers are hoping for more this year. The overall goal is to raise $400,000 worth of food and $30,000 in online donations across the country.
If dressing up and hitting the streets isn’t your thing, you can help by making a donation online at the same address, or by assembling a bag of food items to donate. The most urgently needed items include diapers, peanut butter, canned or powdered milk, canned vegetables and cereal.
In the end, it doesn’t matter which option you choose; you’re helping to make a difference to people in need in our own city.
“Helping people this way, you can really see how you’ve bettered their lives and strengthened your own community,” says Szegedi. “It’s very rewarding.”
So gather your friends, plan your costume and head to www.trickoreat.ca to register your group online.
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