We've often said that the business of the restaurant industry is to host a party for guests seven days a week. Unfortunately for the large portion of the world who are homeless, it's a party they can't often enjoy.
But a restaurant in India is starting to change all that.
Minu Pauline, owner of Pappadavada in Kochi, saw a homeless woman pick through her trash one night, looking for a bite to eat. She was moved by the scene and started a "leftovers" refrigerator outside her restaurant.
“Just imagine being in the situation where you should be asleep but you feel too hungry and you have to go out to find food.”
It's since bloomed into a donation center with food from her restaurant and other local establishments. Local residents have started donating food to the cause, too.
Minu told the Independent that one day she saw two kids outside the fridge. After they left, she went to go see what they were doing. She found that they left candy and some pomegranites.
And, according to Elite Daily, it's open 24-hours and never surveilled. It's affectionately called nanma maram, which means "tree of goodness," and feeds dozens of people a night.
It's a fine gesture that tackles two problems head on.
One, it allows the homeless to have a nice cooked meal to fill their stomachs. It also helps with the food waste problem. Approximately 30% of all food produced is lost, trashed or wasted in some form or another. That's a lot, and it's great to see someone find a way of turning that problem into a solution.
But outside of the food waste issues, it's just amazing human kindness.