Hungry?

Were you hungry at all today?

I mean...really hungry?

I doubt it. But if you were, you were likely only a few steps away from satisfying your hunger. You had a few dollars in your pocket and the choices were endless.

Not so for many around the world. Here are the statistics:

• An estimated 923 million people in the world go hungry.
  
• In developing countries nearly 16 million children die every year from preventable and treatable causes. Sixty percent of these deaths are from hunger and malnutrition.
  
• In the United States, 11.7 million children live in households where people have to skip meals or eat less to make ends meet. That means one in ten households in the U.S. are living with hunger or are at risk of hunger.
  

If you weren't aware, today was World Hunger Day. I only learned about it because I happen to be listening to NPR this morning. They were sharing how so many people in the US are on Food Stamps (28 million). I wasn't aware, but food stamps provide about $5.00/day/per person for food. Can you imagine getting through the day on $5.00? Me neither. Which got me thinking...

Jess had to run out tonight, so it was just me and the boys. So I loaded them in the car and headed for the grocery store. I decided to combine a teaching lesson with a bit of fun. On the way there, I explained to my boys about Food Stamps, World Hunger Day, and how it must feel to live on only $5.00 a day.

When we got to the store, I gave each of the boys (and myself) a $2.00 pre-loaded card and told them to shop for their dinner (the equivalent of the dinner portion of $5.00/day).

The only rules: They had to buy nutritious food (not $2.00 worth of candy or cookies, although I was really tempted as well), and they had to try to maximize their $2.00.

What a great experiment! Understand, my kids, like yours probably, have never shopped for food. It has always been a luxury, a given, an expectation at different times of the day. But tonight, they had to shop for themselves. I was amazed and what they were looking for, how critical they were of the items they were considering, and how much they could buy for $2.00. And it took them quite awhile to find nutritious food.

At the checkout, here is what we had:

Gavin: 1/3 lb. fillet of shark (on sale) and a small can of mixed vegetables = $1.73
Eliot: 1 package of oriental noodles with shrimp dinner and a small can of beets = $1.98
Dad: 1 can of "Spam-like" meat, a package of dirty rice mix, and a small banana = $1.83

I was most amazed at what my boys learned from the experience. Here are a few of the things they shared with me:

• All the really inexpensive stuff was the most unhealthy; most of it was junk food
• We couldn't afford any brand name items
• It was really hard to try to find affordable food, and enough of it, for a meal
• It was really hard to find anything fresh

Shockingly, my kids loved the experience. They got more out of it than I was hoping. In fact, they both said we should do this once a week so we don't forget what hunger and poverty is like. They made me proud.

What did I learn?

That we are incredibly blessed and have far more than we need. That I need to be outward focused more than I am. That feeding the hungry is part of Plan A.