Food-Centric Volunteering (10/11–21/18)

OK, this is not concert oriented. But free things exist out there that are not performances. In a sense. Over the last week and a half I have participated in (in no particular order) a fundraiser, two New York City Wine and Food Festival events and one International Star Chefs event. Re ‘in a sense’ there was a whole lotta performing going on.

Also in no particular order, I saw Anne Burrell, Sunny Anderson, Marc Murphy, and Elizabeth Falkner. (Yes, I'm an ex-FoodTV junkie.) I had no real interaction with Ms. Burrell nor Ms. Falkner, but I did at least moderately interact with Chef Marc. And I did point Chef Sunny in the direction of Onion sorbet. (She liked it, and so did I.)

Organization for the four events was a bit iffy. At one, there was little to do, though I guarded a table of signed books diligently. At one, I had to force them to use me for more than the two-hour window that they set as my schedule. Two hours is really not worth my time, even as a volunteer. Especially when each portion of the round trip is about one hour. Fortunately, my shift ended up being longer than two hours—though the logistics and details were still a little wonky.

At one, I was told that I could not take part in sampling the items on display for the patrons. Fair enough; that’s sort of standard in volunteer world. When I was given a fifteen-minute break, I was told to feel free to sample the vendors’ wares. Huh?!? But no wine or booze.

At another, I was told that there would be no sampling but then I was told that sampling was OK on break, and sake, beer, and booze were OK in moderation. I understand the concept—they don’t want volunteers taking advantage of the event. But mixed signals are very strange, especially when the eventual situation boils down to “Enjoy yourself, in moderation.” I know that all volunteers are not like me, so there have to be some safeguards in place.

There also have to be better guidelines and better communication with volunteers in place. In one instance, I got an email at 8:14am asking how quickly I could be there. That is an extreme lack of organization.

There. Off my ’Meister soap box now.