Aug. 12, 2008

Uhuru Foods wants to thank all of you who volunteered with us at the Reggae Rising festival!

Over the 5 days on site, we had an awesome crew of volunteers. You can all be proud of the successful fundraising and outreach work for the Uhuru Movement.

For nearly 20 years, Reggae has been one of the most important fundraisers of Uhuru Foods to support the independent movement of African people for freedom and liberation that is led by the Uhuru Movement. As we were flipping sausages and dropping fries, the Uhuru Movement was breaking out onto the international media scene with the question to Barack Obama, “What about the black community?” At Reggae Rising, we brought together the question of African culture and the question of solidarity with African freedom.

We found much support from the festival goers at Reggae with their donations and sign ups. We’ve already had the pleasure of working with at least one person who signed up at our podium.

Before, we get into specific thank yous, I want to re-invite everyone to the Uhuru Foods meeting, at Upaya Center , this coming Wednesday, August 13th at 7 pm. The address is 478 Santa Clara @ Grand Avenue in Oakland .

Here are a few of the highlights of the volunteer work that you all did:

Before we even get up to Reggae a lot of planning and work goes into our fundraiser. This is where organization plays a key role in our success. I’d like to thank Ron Stade, Uhuru Foods logistic coordinator and David “Redbeard” Reardon, our shop coordinator for the weeks of work making sure that the veggies, sausages and fries arrived on site without us having to lift a finger and that the equipment to cook and serve all of that food was packed on the truck (to the ceiling and back door)!

Thanks to Wendy, Collette and Tracey who set up in the drenching heat on Thursday: our booth looked fantastic. I’ve heard that it was one of our best looking booths ever. This crew also carried our first shift and many other shifts over the weekend.

Thanks to Emily, Travis, Jesse, Chong Wen, Alison Lee and her brother Jeffrey who brought lots of enthusiasm to our weekend and created a competition for donations on our front, after some of them floated on the river on the brightest pink rafts I ever saw.

Thanks to Sarah, Emma, Vik and Fernanda, who braved bad “camping” conditions and stuck it out in the booth, doing dishes, working on the line and front and cooking, too.

Thanks to Bill Canada, our Uhuru Foods volunteer coordinator (who made sure most of you got there), for coordinating all of the late night shifts and then letting his coffee lead him to the booth early the next day before our noon volunteer check in, only to start again in the evening.

Thanks to Redbeard and Pamela, who met Wendy and I along the highway on Sunday to get their wristbands and parking pass, and then joined a crew that was glad to have reinforcements arrive to keep food flowing out of our booth in the late Sunday night.

A special thanks to Maureen Littlejohn and Gabriel Craft, who were attending the festival on their own, but made it an important part of the weekend to volunteer with Uhuru Foods, joining in at critical times.

It was an honor to work with each of you at Reggae Rising ! I hope that you will consider learning more about the Uhuru Movement and Uhuru Foods and becoming a member of our team.

Here are some other upcoming events and opportunities:

Uhuru Solidarity Movement
Monday, August 25th, Humanist Hall, 27th Street between Broadway and Telegraph
Oakland

Grand Lake Farmer ’s Market – serving breakfast, Volunteers still needed

Art and Soul, Labor Day Weekend in Oakland, Saturday, Sunday and Monday
Volunteers still needed

Visit the Uhuru Foods online where you can now sign up for future volunteer opportunities right online. Keep checking back to see more pictures of Reggae on our site soon.