It RAIN(ed) humanity during Covid crisis in Sydney

Sakhis (a 256-member group), was supplying home-cooked food to the families down with Covid. It was a big relief for those suffering from Covid in some areas of Sydney

PRAVASISAMWAD.COM

Moved by the people’s sufferings during the peak of Covid-19 in 2021, a group of women decided to serve food to the families who were left with no option to go out to buy groceries and were down with fever and other symptoms of the virus. They were not in a position to cook at home as well.

Options for food were online orders on Swiggy or Ubereats, but they were not sustainable.

India Link did an interesting story about a family of three, where all were down with Covid-19 in Sydney’s Kogarah.

“Ekta Sharma found herself in a 10-day isolation situation after she and her husband received positive PCR test results just after New Year’s Day. With no time to buy groceries after testing positive, the Sharmas had no food or supplies at home. It was then that a friend of Ekta’s, on a Kogarah community WhatsApp group ‘Sakhis’ pointed her in the direction of warm home-cooked relief,” wrote Bageshri Savyasachi on India Link.

The family got in touch with Sakhis (a 256-member group), supplying home-cooked food to the families down with Covid. It was a big relief for Ekta and her family because there was an uninterrupted supply of food all through their illness.

“It was immense mental and psychological relief because we could find a group of standing by us. With whom we can share, ask and get delivered our needs, primarily food,” said Ekta.

“It all started during the Sydney lockdown of 2021 when Manisha Shirodkar, a member of RAIN (Resourceful Australian Indian Network) who also managed Sakhis (a 256-member group), noticed that many Indian community members who were isolating were in dire need of a reliable source of nutritious food,” Savyasachi wrote.

“The Covid put us in a critical condition, but the connections we got during our illness will remain forever with us. We vowed to serve others who were in a situation like us,” said one beneficiary of Sakhis and RAIN

The only problem for food supply was distance, “because the RAIN’s food collection point in Penshurst proved too far for some isolating households in the South Sydney suburb. As more messages poured in from other Kogarah residents who needed the tiffin service, Manisha Shirodkar requested a bulk delivery to the Kogarah India Bazaar and the problem got sorted.”

The group was charging for food tiffin, but it was so reasonable and pure that everyone would have loved it.

“The Covid put us in a critical condition, but the connections we got during our illness will remain forever with us. We vowed to serve others who were in a situation like us,” said another beneficiary of Sakhis and RAIN

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