The parcel was one of thousands handed out by a small campaign aimed at helping local people left without income by the COVID crisis.
The campaign is privately sponsored by Aiyarin and Jakob Pedersen, “with the support of Tony, Sophie, Panida, Henrik, plus Chernglay Kitchen, Supalai, Andaman Island Group and Ask Ava,” Mr Pedersen told Khao Phuket.
“We are mainly a group of close friends from the neighbourhood. We will give away 5.000 boxes of free food between April 12-30. We have given away close to 4.000 boxes already,” he added.
“We might continue afterwards if there is a need. We are working with the local government to coordinate it all and also provide lunch to local temples and volunteers,” Jakob explained.
“Our goal is to give meals especially to those affected by job loss during these times. We start daily at 10am at Chernglay Kitchen on Soi Pasak.
“We all meet each morning to cook and pack the food before people arrive. The local community has also started sponsoring rice, eggs and ingredients to help us out, which is really nice,” he explained.
As for the B1,000 gift tucked into one of the food parcels, Jakob explained, “We added a B1,000 note in one of the food boxes to a lucky person. The day after a poor neighbour came by to ask if one of us accidentally dropped a note in the box since they found it.
“We were shocked by the honesty, especially in these hard times, so we have since that day kept adding B1,000 to a box, but now with a written note,” he said.
“We heard a Burmese worker got one as well, he had been depressed after losing his work and saw this as a blessing to keep up the hope. Small stories like that really keeps us going,” Jakob added.
Jakob invited any people wanting to support the small campaign to contact him through his Facebook page.