Imagine the thrill when the Salvation Army pastor received a message this week that said, "A donation of a semi-trailer of food will be delivered Wednesday to Prince George."
"Thank you, God. That's why we have faith," were the words uttered by Bruce Kirk who sees the gift from Save-On-Foods as a Christmas miracle.
The truck arrived Wednesday with 25,000 pounds of groceries including canned foods, cereals, pastas, snacks, baby food, pet food, and paper products.
"We really didn't know how we'd get through this next year even with the Christmas Kettle Campaign reaching it's goal of $232,000. We knew the goal should be set higher to meet the ever-growing demand, but we don't want to appear to be greedy either," said Kirk.
"This amazing gift could be that extra that we will need to get through the year."
Ted Pigeon, Save-On-Foods store manager at the Hart Highway store is delighted that Save-On-Foods has made this generous gesture.
"This is awesome. We've always supported the food banks in town and I know how they are struggling right now. This is phenomenal for the Salvation Army because they do such a good job with the resources they have," said Pigeon.
Kirk said Save-on-Foods has always been one of the army's steady supporters.
"I've been in this business for 20 years working with partners in communities, but none have been better than those we have in Prince George."
"We're thankful for this sharing community because the numbers of requests for help just keep rising," said Kirk.
"In November we gave out 3,154 bread and produce hampers as well as 388 emergency food hampers," said Kirk. The last normal month recorded was September, 2008 when the requests for help totalled 2,141.
Salvation Army has a sufficient storage place for groceries," but lately, donations haven't even made it to storage, but went right into needed hampers."
Even during the darkest days last June when funds ran out and food supplies were low, Kirk and his team "never lost faith"
"When the pressure was really on to make cutbacks, we didn't turn away anyone who needed help. "We decided to take it to the limit as long as we could with a lot of faith that God's work in God's way would receive God's supply," said Kirk.
"So we're thrilled about this gift from Save-On-Foods," said Kirk who has has sent the word to other Salvation Army food banks in the north.
"We want to share with some smaller northern B.C. communities which are struggling, on a proportional basis, if they are willing to come here to pick it up," said Kirk.
Save-On-Foods sent four trucks across the province Wednesday carrying a total of 100,000 pounds of groceries to food banks in Prince George, Kelowna, Greater Vancouver and Cowichan.
Teens add noir touch to classic Christmas tale
Not quite, but the High Point Central High School theater club has taken Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol” and infused it with a detective story and humor to create its own holiday masterpiece.
Tonight is the third and final performance of “A Christmas Noir.” The Central theater club spent nearly three months on the show, writing, rehearsing and building sets.
“It’s a great performance. It’s funny. It’s cute,” said Christina Caltagirone, Central’s theater teacher.
The play is like the familiar tale, but with several twists: Bob Cratchit is a girl, and Scrooge has hired a detective to find his missing briefcase full of cash. Oh, and there’s no Tiny Tim.
The actors-writers admit they were worried about how that last detail would go over.
“We didn’t want to write him out, but it made it complicated,” said Leslie Ann Blake, who plays Miss Cratchit.
Her fellow actors began to laugh. “Even more complicated,” she added.
Caltagirone likes having the students rewrite classic productions. Last spring, they revamped “Cinderella” with a 1980s soundtrack and set it in an all-girls school.
“It gives them such a sense of ownership, and I think that’s important,” Caltagirone said. “Plus it gets kids who wouldn’t normally work together to work together.”
Several cast members were on the writing team. Gabrielle Smith, a sophomore, said that as the team reworked the original script, there were plenty of arguments about what to keep and what to toss.
The scripting process even introduced the original story to some students. David McDonald, who plays Scrooge, had never read or seen “A Christmas Carol.”
“He was under a rock before this,” Smith joked.
Thomas Gooding, a sophomore, plays “Ace,” the detective Scrooge hires to find his missing cash. Ace joins Scrooge as the curmudgeon is visited by the ghosts of Christmas past, present and future. Through the process, Ace learns he’s on the same terrible path Scrooge has made for himself.
For added measure, Ace is torn between two women and tormented by the memory of the worst prom date ever.
For Gooding, a veteran of community theater, playing Ace meant finding humor in a humorless character.
“He says a lot of things that he thinks are smart, but they really don’t make sense,” Gooding said.
Caltagirone said the play is the best she’s seen this group of students put together.
Although there is no Tiny Tim, the teens say the spirit of the play is clear.
“Don’t be so self-centered,” Gooding said. “Money is important, but it’s not everything. People are more important.”
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