For many years, Sandra Nijjar made it a habit to help homeless folks wherever she encountered them, offering food, blankets, and other necessities. Her maternal grandparents in El Salvador had raised her to help others, and after moving to East Boston in 1999, she could see the extensive need in her own new neighborhood. There were often resources for families with children, she noticed, but middle-aged adults living on their own in the streets, with mental health and substance use disorders, had fewer places to turn.
“So I started asking around among neighbors, to see if there was anything more we could do,” Sandra says. “But no one had time. No one could take responsibility, and neither could I.”
Raising two children with her husband, along with a full-time state job, left only a few hours for Sandra to devote to the community. But in 2016, she and 300 others were laid off in a major downsizing.
“One morning soon after, my husband and I were walking our dogs, and we came across a homeless friend,” she recounts. “We helped him with a little money, but as we were walking away, I told my husband, I want to do more than this. I’ve been wanting to create a space people can come and get more help. He replied, ‘Well, maybe now is the time to do it.’”
In May 2016, Sandra reached out to Pastor Don Nanstad at Our Saviour’s Lutheran Church and asked to use their space for a community meeting. Roughly two dozen neighbors came — some only to oppose the idea, saying the homeless were all addicts who wanted to stay on drugs. But others shared Sandra’s passion and began meeting every Saturday to plan. Just a few months later, in September, they launched the East Boston Community Soup Kitchen (EBCSK). By this time, Sandra knew she was headed back to work as seasonal staff, but didn’t know exactly when. In the meantime, she continued to work on creating a space to care for the local homeless.
“We quickly found a perfect space with a commercial kitchen, and it was opening day,” recalls Sandra. “But right as we started serving people, the manager came out and began yelling at me, saying, ‘We can’t have these bums in here.’ ”
“Pastora Britta from Our Saviour’s Lutheran Church was there and was shocked — frozen —by the manager turning on me and humiliating me this way in front of everyone. But then she said, ‘Let me ask Pastor Don and the consul at the church if we can help.’ Thankfully, we were up and running in the new location at Our Saviour’s Lutheran Church a week later.”
The day before the new opening, Sandra walked around Eastie distributing flyers in English and Spanish that invited folks to come for a hot meal. When she spotted a crowd of men sleeping near the Shaw’s grocery store, she rolled up a flyer and placed it in one man’s sneaker. The next day, seven men came into the soup kitchen together. As she brought food to their table, she asked how they’d heard about it, and one replied, “I found a flyer in my shoe when I woke up!”
“We laughed when I told them it was me who placed it in the shoe,” Sandra says. “They all look out for each other. If only one or two can make it to the soup kitchen, they take food back to the others. Any money they have, they go to the store to buy food and share it with each other. They are the least selfish people I know. A couple of times, one of them has heard kitchen staff saying we need more creamer, and they’ll be there, offering whatever they have. Even if they only have $1, they’ll say, here, take this.”
And the man who found the flyer in his shoe? “That was Dennis,” Sandra says. “He was a young guy who went to detox and relapsed a few times. His mother thought he would die or end up in jail. But now he’s married, fully recovered, and has a small landscaping business. He was my number-one volunteer for several years, first to arrive in the morning and last to leave.”
“Like Dennis, some of the guests come to us completely broken, but they find hope in our place,” Sandra continues. “We encourage them to talk to the social workers and recovery coaches who are here on Tuesdays. With the help of these volunteers, partner organizations, and our donors, we turn lives around for the better, get them back into the workforce, walking on their own again, reunited with their families.”
The kitchen serves more than 600 people a week, with support from an extensive network of community partners, including Channel Fish, Pine Street Inn, Elliott Human Services, NeighborHealth, Food for Free, Shaws Supermarket in Eastie, and local barbers. On Mondays, the team assembles and distributes bags of groceries, and on Tuesdays, they offer ready-to-eat hot meals. In addition, they distribute clothing, personal hygiene products, and pet food, and connect clients with vital services, including addiction recovery programs and help with housing.
“Of course, it’s exhausting — mentally, emotionally, physically — to run an operation that requires so much and has so few resources,” Sandra says. “Plus always being on alert to manage difficult personalities and situations, especially now with ICE troopers cruising past the soup kitchen line. It’s heartbreaking to see people risking everything to get food. But I have a lot of faith in God. And thanks to The Lenny Zakim Fund, I now have a mentor. I meet with Monifa twice a month, and her guidance has been invaluable. And [Executive Director] Allison responds in a heartbeat when I need her, always ready with advice for me. Funders, donors, volunteers, and clients really touch my heart every single day.”
Many of EBSCK’s volunteers are also clients who are food insecure. They come to work, then take their groceries home. One of them, Mina Akdim, occasionally helped translate for clients who spoke Arabic as she was standing in line for groceries, so Sandra recruited her to be an interpreter. Mina now serves on the EBSCK board of directors as well. This past year, with a nomination from Sandra, Mina was recognized with an award from the City of Boston.
Another board member, Joe Sultan, is a Cambridge real estate developer who lives in East Boston with his wife and pets. While some of the developers and owners of new condo complexes want nothing to do with old East Boston residents like Sandra, others are EBSCK volunteers and donors, looking to put down roots and get to know their community.
“We work with everyone,” Sandra says. “I don’t have extended family here in Boston, but all of these people — our guests, volunteers, donors, partners — are my extended family. I think I found my calling, and I think I will continue to do this for as long as I’m in this world.”
East Boston Community Soup Kitchen is currently seeking sponsorships, donations, and a venue for their annual fundraiser on September 27th. They also need volunteers to join their outreach committees and assist with grant writing and donations. If you would like to learn more or get involved, please contact Sandra Nijjar at founder@ebcsk.org or through the EBSCK website contact page.
