Story of Hassan – one of the LFT-Funded Food Assistance Project Beneficiaries
Hassan, a 50-year-old man, received a food package assisted by the Lady Fatemah Trust (LFT) under its emergency food assistance project in Afghanistan. Originally, Hassan is a resident of Bamyan province but currently lives in the west Kabul. He heads a family of 8 people that has been adversely affected by the ongoing acute humanitarian crisis rampant across the nation and is currently undergoing a famine-like condition.
As an illiterate and unskilled man who has spent years shepherding in rural areas, he has long been unemployed in Kabul which recently forced him to resort to beggary in the mosques as well as on the streets to get some money to feed his dependents. “I find some money by cleaning the mosque in my area as some people give me some pieces of bread, beans, flour, and sometimes 5 to 20 Afghanis (1cent to 4 cents),” said Hassan while talking about how our assistance rescued his and his family’s life.
“If it weren’t for your food package, my dependents would have starved without any food to eat. It gave us enough food in our meal times, especially the children who hadn’t eaten enough for a long time,” Hassan continued.
Long suffering from poverty, his family is the worst affected bringing it to the verge of famine. He has lost his two children in the past couple of years mainly due to lack of food, sickness, and malnutrition none of which he has been able to deal with.
Also, his dire condition in the winter season has worsened his family’s condition. For instance, he has not been able to afford to buy wood fuel or coal to warm up his home which has recently taken the life of his newborn baby due to a severe cold. Her mother is still sick, bearing the brunt of a catastrophe that took his newborn baby away from her.
His home is located on the top of a hill in a highly disadvantaged and poverty-hit neighborhood of western Kabul where almost all families are experiencing food insecurity. “Our house has no proper door, window, and carpet and due to extreme poverty and lack of fuel, we couldn’t keep the house warm. And, I knew that my baby was about to die but couldn’t do anything in such a situation, Hassan explained.
“Two weeks before receiving your food package, we, sometimes, went to people’s houses to beg and spnd the night and sometimes the neighbors brought us something with which we went by. But the assisted food rations (flour, rice, cooking oil, beans, and salt) gave us enough food for one month and saved us from collective starvation.”
Hassan thanks the LFT for reaching out to him and people similar to him in their greatest hour of need. He further indicated that it was the first time in his memory residents of that area received food assistance from a charity. Because of this, he was very happy and grateful to LFT for its support and sympathy for the poor in his surroundings.