Feeding the Hungry

“If you’re sick, you go to a doctor, if you are hungry you go to Twist”.

That’s what County Galway man, Oliver Williams, told me when I went to make a short film of the soup kitchen he set up in Galway city.  The former businessman said he saw a dire need to help the hungry of Galway, and he decided to fund ‘Twist’ himself.

Now, 3 months on, it caters for up to 100 people a day, and, according to Williams, these numbers will grow.  He has already set up 2 more soup kitchens in other locations in Ireland, and there are plans for a third.   He says they depend solely on volunteers, and donations from local businesses.

It is a sign of our times, says Oliver, and with the rate of unemployment currently at 14.8% (the 4th highest in Europe), deprivation rate at 22%, and 20% of lone parents at risk of poverty*, it is clearly a service in demand.

Thank you to all who took part
 

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Video: Film-maker reveals Ireland’s new poor relying on soup kitchens

Garreth Murphy – 18 January 2013

“IF you’re sick you go to the doctor, if you’re hungry you go to Twist,” says Oliver Williams, the founder of Twist soup kitchen in Galway City. His charity kitchen and its regulars is the subject of Róisín O’Hara’s arresting short film, Feeding the Hungry.

Armed with only her camera, O’Hara, a former RTE video journalist, interviewed some of the kitchen’s regulars. Their stories were all depressingly familiar – people who lost their jobs and homes when the Celtic Tiger went belly up and people who were on the margins of society.

“I wanted to do an intimate journal of stories of people who found themselves by the wayside – for whatever reason,” says O’Hara. “In my experience, people want to tell their stories but a lot of the time they think that nobody wants to listen. I found that because it was just me on with my camera, they were more inclined to do that.”

The interviews make for stark viewing. With Twist catering for up to 100 people a day, O’Hara was surprised at the cross section of people availing of its resources.

“There was any number of people there – everyone from women with young kids to men who were in their 30s and 40s. They were the sort of people who you’d never expect to see at a facility like this. They’re the new poor – the people who just can’t afford to eat.”

The reaction to the video has been positive so far.

“I’ve only had it up a few days but there’s been a lot of interest in it. Friends have told me that they’ll get their kids to watch it. Oliver Williams doesn’t get any state funding for Twist so if it brings some awareness to his work, that’d be great. It’s shocking that he thinks every city in Ireland will need one of these kitchens.”

O’Hara plans to continue working on intimate video pieces for her website Irelandreporter.com

“I feel there is an appetite for these types of stories, which tell the stories ‘behind the news’ and put faces to the statistics.”