A few weeks ago, the Puerto Rico Chamber of Commerce of the Gulf Coast, Inc. (Tampa) held a Food Drive at the Green Iguana. The event was well attended and everyone brought canned goods and food donations that the Chamber was collecting to donate to Metropolitan Ministries in Tampa for their annual Thanksgiving Food Drive. Metropolitan Ministries collects food donations every year to be distributed to those families in need during the Holiday Season. The Chamber of Commerce held their food drive the week before Thanksgiving to coordinate with the mass effort of Metropolitan Ministires to distribute thousands of pounds of food to local families in the Tampa Bay area.

As president of the Puerto Rico Chamber of Commerce, Elizabeth Saldaña Kobel felt there was a need for the Chamber to use its resources to help with this effort. Many of the Chamber members brought several bags of groceries to the food drive. Mrs. Saldaña Kobel also felt that it would be even better if she volunteered a few hours to help with the effort. So she and her husband went to Metropolitan Ministries the Wednesday before Thanksgiving to volunteer.

It was absolutely overwhelming to see the set up there. We helped direct traffic and made sure that people dropping off donations were pointed in the right direction and that those who were picking up their packages were also sent to the correct area. Car after car after car slowed down on the main street and asked, "Where do I drop off donations?" I am not talking about a few canned goods here. We saw pick up trucks with their trailer beds full of groceries, small sports cars with their back seats overflowing with food and I'll never forget the station wagon with a load of over 40 turkeys in the back. "Where do I take these?", the driver asked. We sent him to the right place.

Inside the donations were picked up by volunteers with shopping carts and taken inside where more volunteers sorted the food into each category, turkeys went over here, canned vegetables in this bin, dry goods in that storage area. There was enough food passing through this system to stock a grocery store. But it was being given to those in need. Families who are having a tough time making ends meet and might not have had all the fixins' for a nice Thanksgiving Celebration.

I applaud Metropolitan Ministries for the sheer amount of effort that is put into this annual event. I praise the people of the greater Tampa Bay area for their time, their efforts, their donations. It was an overwhelming thing to see. Such simple gestures by people helping other people. Don't worry if you think you missed this opportunity, they do it through Christmas too. You can find out more about making donations or volunteering and you can even make a donation on-oline. Visit their website: www.metromin.org