How three women came together to feed residents in Barton Hill

The streets are quiet in Barton Hill and the shutters are pulled down at Cafe Conscious. The cafe sits on Avonvale road, several shops away from the junction where Banksy’s Valentine’s Day painting remains on the wall of Marsh Lane, protected with plastic. While the crowds of selfie-takers have come and gone from Barton Hill, the local community have rallied together to help the most vulnerable residents as Bristol moves into tier three.

Before the second lockdown, this Jamaican restaurant and community cafe (also known as Cafe in the Hill) was a hub of activity.  “We had loads of stuff going on here,” cafe owner Deniece Dixon explains. “We had our wellbeing group on a Friday, the bingo and Coffee Pot group on a Wednesday, we had autism support and did a lot of work with young people.”

It is a cold Sunday afternoon but inside the cafe feels warm. A dispute over what music to play dies down as Deniece puts on reggae. While her husband finishes up with the cooking, Deniece sits down with two other women to take a break, all masked up and sitting two metres apart. Together, the three women –Deniece, Samira Musse and Debbie Benjamin – have started a brand-new community project called Sunday Kitchen.

“I only met Samira and Debbie a month ago, but we just made a connection,” Deniece says. “We are all very different, but we are all on the same page. We have all been doing a lot of stuff in the community for years. We all have our roles and our different skills, and it works really well.

“We knew there would be people who would appreciate a hot meal and between us we were able to reach the most needy. We don’t see ourselves as any different from the people we are helping. Any one of us could be in that position in the future.”

The volunteers pack food for residents, catering for 64 families in Barton Hill who are vulnerable or self-isolating. Photo by Yvonne Deeney

Samira provides the bulk of the contacts. As founder of volunteer-run Barton Hill Activity Club, and a local resident who lives in a tower block herself, she has a good awareness of who needs help in the community. “I already know which families are vulnerable and self-isolating,” Samira says. “I also get some referrals from Somali Resource Centre and some of our contacts have come through Deniece, from the wellbeing group.”

Each week they plan on cooking a meal from a different part of the world. It is their second week, and today they are cooking Caribbean food that will go out to 64 families in Barton Hill who are vulnerable or self-isolating. The numbers are growing steadily each week.

“People are really happy and grateful for a hot meal,” says Samira. “There’s one family where the father is disabled and the mother struggles with walking. The mother asked, ‘how much is it?’ – I told her it was free, and she couldn’t believe it. There was another woman I spoke to and she told me she was vegan. She was so surprised when I told her we even had vegan cake.”

Debbie, who lives in nearby Newtown, provides the cakes. She had been getting them for coffee mornings she was running for elderly residents before the pandemic struck.

“I get loads of cakes donated from Cakesmiths so we give everyone a cake with their meal,” says Debbie. “And if there are any left over, I give them to my neighbours.”

The trio are supported by other grassroots community groups locally. They work with Barton Hill Activity Club, the Somali Resource Centre and Baggator. They receive donations from Pak Butchers and Cakesmiths.

For their first week of Sunday Kitchen delivering meals, they received help from Super Supper Club at Baggator, when they were unable to cook at Cafe Conscious because Deniece and her family had to self-isolate. “I had to stop everything and stay at home with my four kids for two weeks, but with the support of the community we could still do Sunday Kitchen,” says Deniece.

Samira has set up a fundraiser to support the Sunday Kitchen project, where she explains that they have “come together collectively” to feed the community.

“Many families have been out of work for many months, with little support and limited access to services. We just need donations of any amount to help feed our community,” she says.

The fundraiser ends with a plea for donations of gifts that “can go to children this Christmas or elderly residents in isolation”.

The initial plan was to provide clothes, toys and books for local families in addition to hot meals and cakes. Due to the current restrictions the trio have not been able to do that yet.

“We want to start doing the clothes as soon as things start to open up again, but we will have to pay to get everything cleaned before we can start giving anything away,” says Deniece. “We’re all just mums trying to do our best. None of us are getting paid for this.”

With the help of an additional volunteer, the women in their masks, aprons and gloves begin to pack the food into boxes. They laugh over the difficulty they have in closing the lids while wearing oversized gloves – the three women have become “great friends”, Deniece says: “We absolutely love each other.” Soon enough, all the meals are packed up and ready to be given out to residents.

“We’ve all been brought together for a reason; this is our life,” says Debbie. “If you can help, just do it. It’s not about ego. We are real people who want to help, we’re not here for any glamour or publicity stunt.”

Main image by Yvonne Deeney

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