Guest Blog: Meal Exchange

You can find my guest blog at: MealExchange.com

 
I was born and raised in Ontario in Ottawa and Toronto where concrete jungles were my playgrounds and food came from packages at the grocery store and we hung out at the mall on the weekend. I loved shopping at the farmers market, biking to work and thrift shopping, but these things were money savers and I never considered my greater impact on the world I inhabited. When I was planning on returning to school I knew I was interested in the environment but I never realized that in a few years my entire life would be changed by studying it. I chose UNBC for its small class sizes, geographic location AWAY from home and because it had a Farmers Market that I thought would be fun to be involved with.

I began volunteering with the University Farmers Market and applied for a position as the Development Assistant. I didn't get the job but soon took on the role of Volunteer Coordinator that I was able to apply as an internship towards my degree. In my second year I was voted in as chair of the Market Committee. Now I am the Market Manager, in charge of the market that inspired my interest in food studies. Working at the farmers market provided me with connections to other things happening in the food system and allowed me to understand the bigger picture issues like food insecurity & food justice. 

I started eating local, ethical foods and thinking about my consumer behaviours. I spent an entire year eating only from the farmers market just to test my resolve and solidify my feelings towards food. This wet my appetite for other works surrounding food on campus. I became involved with the PIRG on campus and was hired as the Local Foods Coordinator organizing a monthly good food box  and sourcing local coffee and eggs. I started gardening at home and soon became the PIRG gardener on campus and started a market stand in the garden over the summer to sell fresh produce to the UNBC community.

I was hired as a coordinator with the Campus Food Strategy Project through Meal Exchange in 2014. I now had a network of food activists at my disposal and it was great to connect to something larger than our little campus. This has launched me into a research project on food insecurity that I am just sinking my teeth into. We were also able to start a food recovery program on campus rescuing food from the cafeteria and donating it to meal programs in the community. Since we began we have saved over 2000 lbs. of food and are looking at other strategies to build a campus food bank and expand the program to other campus's across Canada.


Who would have thought this city slicker from Toronto would morph into the die hard foodie she is today. Nearing the end of my degree I begin to worry about who will take my place here on campus. Having taken on so many roles I worry I will not be able to find interested students to continue the work that I have stewarded during my time at UNBC. But I know whoever takes over will have a wealth of information to take on from mine and my predecessors experiences and from the connections of our national network of dedicated students with Meal Exchange.

In good food,

Melanie XX

"Without food, we cannot survive, and that is why issues that affect the food industry are so important. " - Marcus Samuelsson

Trick or eat!

Mary Poppins & Bert

This Halloween was a little different than others for me, for a few reasons. Firstly, my Halloween costume was more DIY then it has ever been before. Because I have vowed to not shop commercially this year, buying pieces for my costume was not as simple as popping into Wal-Mart or Value Village. Instead, I used what I had at home and sifted through the variety of thrift stores in downtown Prince George to find tid-bits I could use. Not being able to find the perfect Mary Poppins hat, I crafted accessories out of buttons and elastic I found at St. Vincent De Paul's thrift store.  It may have taken a little more time than convenience shopping but I was thrilled with the end result, I also saved money and wasted less by using things I already had. Definitely keeping this up for next year!

#TrickOrEat 2014 

With my costume all set my next project was collecting food donations with my friends at Meal Exchange for Trick Or Eat. The concept is simple, go door to door like the kids do, but instead of collecting treats we collected food for our local food banks! This year we collected food for the UNBC Campus Food Bank as well as St. Vincent De Paul's in downtown Prince George. We have already collected over 1300 lbs of food in Prince George but it's not too late to help, if you would like to donate please visit my page HERE and help me reach my modest goal of $50.00 that will go towards foods banks locally.

David Suzuki at UNBC

What seemed like a great week already was made even better by what I am unofficially dubbing David Suzuki day (otherwise known as Saturday). The morning after Halloween a few of us dragged ourselves out of bed, wiped off the leftover costume makeup and made it up to the University to attend a lunch with David Suzuki as part of the Blue Dot Tour. As a volunteer I helped with the set up and took tickets in exchange for a sweet t-shirt and a photo-op with the man himself. We then got to listen to him talk about the movement he is starting to have the right to a healthy environment entrenched in the Canadian constitution and talk to community members about what we can do in Prince George. Later in the evening we saw him again at the main event at Vanier Hall with other guests like Roy Henry Vickers . It was a day full of inspiration and learning and it gave be butterflies to think of people working together towards the common goal of helping our planet. My favourite part of the evening was a poem 'Shoulders' by Shane Koyczan that you can see here, once you start it you will not be able to stop! (It gave me goosebumps).

Here's to a week of feeling inspired and giving back!

Melanie

"My heart is a protest that I let rally against my ribs"- Shane Koyczan