Holy Redeemer Lutheran Church
1948 The Alameda
San Jose, CA 95126
San Jose, CA 95126
"Approximately 15 years ago a little girl, Maria Yolanda, lay in a hospital bed. Her mother and father, Yolanda and Modesto, waited and worried. On Christmas Eve a lady showed up with a chicken dinner for them for which they were very grateful. They did not know who the lady was. The real sad part of this story is that Maria Yolanda passed away a little over a month later.
"For the next two years Yolanda led an effort to deliver about 200 chicken dinners to the hospital for the people that were anxiously waiting for their loved ones.
"Yolanda decided that more needed to be done. So the next year they delivered chicken dinners to the poor. Each year they delivered more and more dinners. In 2005 they delivered a total of 1400 dinners. The goal this year is to feed 2000 families or about 10,000 people.
"I will share my first experience with this family to demonstrate how this works. The family holds a breakfast, Desayuno De Pollo, in early December to raise money to by the food for the dinners. Even though dinners are delivered, Desayuno De Pollo has become the name of the effort. The breakfast is a lot of fun. The food is good, they conduct a raffle with many items donated by local businesses, and the whole experience is heart warming.
"The next big event is the gathering of the food. rice, beans, bread and oil are purchased on December 22 and 23 and the individual dinners are put together. The chickens are delivered early on the 24th. Yolanda prepares a piece of cardboard to identify each driver, where he is going, how many dinners, and the drivers’ cell phone number. Many drivers show up with their trucks and families around 7:30. Then the loading starts. Jorge Madina, Yolanda’ s brother, gets in the middle of the street and calls out the first driver’s name. The driver pulls his truck up and is quickly loaded by the many volunteers. He then parks his truck down the street and helps load the remaining trucks. Once all the trucks are loaded Yolanda’ s family and relatives, the truck drivers, their families and all the volunteers form into a large circle in the street. Yolanda issues the directions and then everyone joins hands. Yolanda leads the group in a prayer. Since the prayer was in Spanish I asked the person next to me about the prayer. She said “we all say a prayer for Maria Yolanda, Yolanda’s little girl that passed away 15 years ago.”
"The drivers, with several volunteers, then caravan out of the neighborhood and head off to their designated areas to distribute the chicken dinners.
"Once a truck arrives at a location the truck is parked and the volunteers get ready. The people in the colonia form into lines behind the truck. The dinners are the handed to each person. The people are orderly, courteous, clean, proud and very appreciative. It is hard to believe when you consider that most of these people live in one room shanties with dirt floors that usually do not have four full walls."