Weekend Argus (Saturday Edition)
How Yasmine brings relief to the poor
YASMINE Abrahams is known as a local Mother Teresa to residents of Parkwood.
She feeds more than 300 children from five schools on the Cape Flats every day, and has been running a food kitchen without government funding since 2000.
World Hunger Day on May 28 – when organisations raise awareness of the estimated 800 million people in the world who don’t have enough food to eat – chimed with Abrahams’s year-long efforts to bring relief to the poor. She said every day was “hunger day” for many children in her community.
“Someone told me about
‘I know what it
to go to bed without food and wake up without food.
“I saw the need to feed the children years ago, because our children have had a lot to deal with at home – from crime to drugs and difficult family dynamics.
“Imagine having to worry about that, and where you’re going to get your next plate of food from,” she said, as she prepared food to break her fast this week.
She attributes her work’s longevity to the benevolence of the greater Cape Town community, which has helped by way of donating food and providing funding.
She also prepares food for children to take to school.
Quite often she has to dig deep into her own pockets to keep the centre going.
Abrahams encouraged charities that organised special events on World Hunger Day to do so on a daily basis.
She said this year she had seen a huge demand for food, last experienced to this degree in 2002. Unemployment was the greatest cause of poverty.
More than 700 people gathered at her Jabulani Centre every evening to break the fast during the Holy month of Ramadaan.