Photo Essay

"Food Not Bombs" Food Sharing

Tompkins Square Park, March 5, 2023

On Sunday, March 5, volunteers of the “Lower East Side Food Not Bombs” organization distributed free meals at the Southwest corner of Tompkins Square Park. This is a weekly event that takes place on Sundays, in which volunteers cook vegetarian food from groceries that would otherwise go to waste, and serve them to the people around the park.

A volunteer handing a plate of spaghetti to a man who passed by the park. “Food Not Bombs” was founded in the early 1980s during the Anti-Nuclear Movement, with the intent to protest wars by feeding the people with free vegan meals. To this day, many chapters of the organization continue to provide free food and groceries to people in their neighborhoods.

A man holding his plate in his hand, while enjoying the food that he had received. These free meals cooked by the volunteers serve a wide range of people, from the homeless people around Tompkins Square Park to people wandering through for concerts in the summertime, as well as the volunteers themselves.

For some volunteers, sharing food with others is a way of building community among the people in the Lower East Side.

“I think an important part of what we do is the idea of mutual aid,” said Isabel, a volunteer who refused to give her last name. “We’re benefiting the community, but the community is also ourselves. So it’s an act of solidarity, rather than charity.”