Social work is manifested in the work that persistent hands do not stop doing for others.
And then the solidarity task is manifested in a proposal that is born from the heart, and is installed for the well-being of the people who need it most.
It is in Palpalá, where this action is carried out thanks to the guidance of Facundo García, a Navy Infantry non-commissioned officer retired in 2019, who began the solidarity work just the year in which the pandemic began to wreak havoc on the world.
With his restless personality, this man from Jujuy is predisposed to carrying out community tasks every week, focused on helping through the “Under the Tree” dining room and – therefore – with the premise of investing his time in social action. When remembering the beginnings of this task that keeps him active and directed towards solidarity, he said: “I retired in 2019 and like every soldier anxious to continue working, I was motivated by the idea of continuing to help. I was in several countries, I met Haiti and saw What people suffered made me think that if I was saved, I had to help in any way I could,” García recalled.
VOLUNTEERS | WILLING TO HELP ANYWHERE.
This is how the dining room that was born in defiance of the pandemic and that -initially- fed ten people in the Multipurpose Room -SUM- in the Constitución neighborhood, originated. “Then they took me out of there and since I didn’t have a fixed place, I settled under a tree; from there I distributed the food and the name arose,” he highlighted.
Currently, the dining room serves one hundred and eighty people who wait for the food to arrive once a week. García finds in the street that need of people that is visible to the naked eye; That is why, as a good connoisseur of this reality, he gathers non-perishable food, along with help of all kinds that he himself is in charge of rationing to the people he has registered in the Antártida, 2 de Abril and Las Tipas neighborhoods. “You have to go out for a walk and work with health agents or social workers, they are of great help. People who do not have resources need to trust,” explained this man from Jujuy who, through his values, establishes a special connection with the vulnerable sectors.
“People come to me with donations like milk or noodles, I also distribute them to families who are going through a bad time. I know ‘little surgeons’ who don’t have anything to eat and in Palpalá seventy percent of the grandparents are abandoned” García said that he visits different places, observing the cases that come before him and with which he collaborates as he did during his service in the militia. “My orientation now is humanitarian. I would like the authorities to pay attention to the grandparents who are unprotected by the State. The other day, a grandfather’s ears were being eaten by ants,” she recalled sadly.
To feed the families, fifteen packages of noodles are necessary as well as the meat, condiments and firewood that he is responsible for providing with his team of volunteers. “I prepare lentil stew for two hundred people. We meet the day before and cut everything, so the next day we have to cook it. I am a fan of people who help people and we can all cooperate,” said García, whose wish is have land to set up a containment center that can be a dining room and where people can wash themselves, especially children and older adults. And in different sectors of the steel city these age groups urgently need help. “There are many people who come to me and need; Mrs. Nelly, for example, is seventy years old and her children are not going to see her. She had curled toenails and a viral move was made to help her, but I wonder; ‘why go to that?'” he reflected.
Drugs are another scourge that is perceived and made visible through a complicated panorama. As a result of this situation, the mothers write to García to request collaboration. From his place, the Jujeño teaches good principles to his children and thanks to solidarity activity, he shows them that it is possible to feel empathy and do something for others. “Thank God my kids turned out well and from this activity that I have been doing for five years, they learn to help and that, even if it costs, it is possible,” said García, happy to generate smiles in children and grandparents thanks to his noble gesture.
