WHILE the front doors of his restaurant may be closed local chef Martin Anderson is still busy rustling up meals for hospital staff and other frontline workers.
What started out as a warm-hearted gesture by the Sonder Restaurant owner to provide for the older population has turned into a daily source of support for all those battling the spread of Covid-19.
Using funds provided by the general public, Martin is putting together dozens of lunch boxes, salads and fruit pots each day. He is then dipping into his own financial resources to package and deliver them to hospital and hospice staff, pharmacists, gardai and everyone else working at the coalface during the coronavirus pandemic.
The well-known chef said he was simply “paying forward” the goodwill that has been shown by the public in these trying circumstances.
“When the government first restricted movement I began offering complimentary soup and sandwiches to everyone over the age of 65,” Martin explained.
“We restricted our seating capacity and made an area for the more mature members of our population. But then it got to the stage where people were asked to cocoon altogether so that arrangement had to go.
“After that we began offering free lunches to all off-duty doctors and nurses, on-duty ambulance staff and gardai and basically everyone involved in frontline services. That escalated quite quickly and it got to the stage where financially we couldn’t keep it up.
“But then people started contacting me and offering donations. So I set up a Pay Pal account to allow people to buy a lunch box for €3 while I covered the cost of staff and packaging. And I have to say, the response from the public has been overwhelming, it really has.”
Rather than to just doctors and nurses, Sonder is providing support to porters, IT support, night-shift workers and all at Letterkenny hospital involved in dealing with the crisis situation. Food packages have also gone to medical centres, GP surgeries, pharmacies and mental health units over the past few weeks.
“We are still open to the public in that we are doing takeaways. But I now class myself as being a voluntary worker and I’m here at 6.30am or 7am getting most of the work done.
“But all I am doing is paying it forward. I am only the chef. The public wants to help but they can’t because of restrictions on movement. I have the ability to provide that help and that is all I am doing, paying it forward,” Martin added.
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