I had an amazing time helping out at the Sacha Sauda meal sharing last weekend, where we distributed hygiene packages and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches to the houseless in Downtown. It was such a great learning experience for me because it taught me how to work on a team and be committed to what I was doing.

With the help of a group of students we organized a hygiene drive at our high school, NP3. We also sold donuts at school to help fundraise for this drive. It was difficult in the beginning to spread awareness of why we were doing this drive and what the cause was. It was a challenge to get all the students to participate at school so we decided to do a competition between classes to make it more exciting and get more people to participate. This hygiene drive lasted for 3 weeks at school and we ended up collected around 1,300 items, which was a big deal because we all worked so hard from setting up the boxes to organizing the sales.

After we had the items we decided to have a Sacha Sauda Meal Sharing and go out in downtown to distribute the hygiene packs along with the sandwiches. We prepared the food at West Sacramento Gurdwara on Sunday around 2pm, and then went to Downtown to give it out to people. It was such a great feeling to hand out the stuff to all the people and seeing them happy to get their basic needs of living. The people there were so nice and they all thanked us for coming out in such cold weather and helping them out.

After seeing the lives of the houseless, it motivates me to do more and helps me realize how fortunate I am to have these little opportunities in my life to help others. I have always wanted to do something for my community and I am always looking for a big opportunity. Working with Jakara has made me realize that these little things are just a start and I have so much more to offer to my community. I cannot wait to organize another one of these events and work together with these amazing people in the organization.

Gagan Kaur is a junior at NP3 Charter High School in Sacramento. She is also a member of the Sikh Honor and Service Society and Misl Sacramento.