YOG, LOUSY FOOD AND VOLUNTEERS

If you haven’t noticed, the Youth Olympic Games is in town. Despite the fanfare surrounding the event, I’m pretty neutral about IT. You probably won’t catch me at the venues or tuning in fervently for updates. However, there’s this piece of news this morning that really got my attention:

Source: http://www.straitstimes.com/BreakingNews/Sport/Story/STIStory_565714.html

Look at that! Rice, a dry piece of fried chicken fillet and six pieces of long beans that look more like cigarette butts. It is simply appalling if you ask me. Then, I read that the food is provided by SFI - the soldier boy’s “favourite” caterer. Ah! That explains everything.

While serving my NS many years ago or more recently during in-camp-training, trips to the cookhouse were always depressing. The food was always bland, devoid of colour and lacking in variety. I'm pretty sure things aren't very different now. In addition to the lousy food, the beef with SFI is also inconsistency. When I was training to be a section commander at Pasir Laba camp, that little SFI-run cookhouse at the parade square actually serves good food. Perhaps, there were high-flying officers frequenting that cookhouse - somebody important, just like our foreign guests.

In an article from Yahoo, they reported that athletes at the YOG village are treated to a nice buffet spread everyday.

Source: http://sg.yfittopostblog.com/2010/08/11/food-galore-for-yog-athletes/

At least aesthetically, things don’t look too as bad. The report did not explicitly say that the food is from SFI, but inferring from this piece of news (link), it appears to be so. I agree that guests should always be treated to nicely but come on, this is ridiculous.

Since we are talking about of volunteers, it brought to mind those at the Barclays Singapore Open. For four days, they were served proper food. And to thank them, the organisers thrown in a free game at Serapong the following Monday.

Now that’s the way to treat volunteers.

 

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