leftover langar....

[Balait_da_Sher]

So i was reading the discussion about langar in the other topic and remembered the sakhi of this sikh couple who would do seva in langar and then eat langar every day. I think they were told that langar became like a payment from the guru to them so they were advised not to consume langar all the time. I might be wrong as i was very young when i read that sakhi. Anyway, so in our gurdwaras usually there is langar leftover after everyone has eaten. There is mad rush to fill tomato tins, Tupperware etc with langar to take home.

As we know many people are struggling with expenses, should we be promoting langar to non Sikhs? There could be a list of people who sevadars could send the leftover langar. It would be better than us lot overeating langar. We used to do this at our old location, there was an old peoples home nearby and we used to send them the food.

[VanHelsingh]

Sounds like a great idea. But then you'd have to be careful of non-Sikhs disposing of leftover langar when they're tummies are full as I'm sure we've seen people do of their own dinners.

[Gurpreet14]

In India there r so many beggars that u dont need to prepare the list nor u need to call them...

Everyone comes automatically n nothing is left over....

[luckysingh99]

So i was reading the discussion about langar in the other topic and remembered the sakhi of this sikh couple who would do seva in langar and then eat langar every day. I think they were told that langar became like a payment from the guru to them so they were advised not to consume langar all the time. I might be wrong as i was very young when i read that sakhi. Anyway, so in our gurdwaras usually there is langar leftover after everyone has eaten. There is mad rush to fill tomato tins, Tupperware etc with langar to take home.

As we know many people are struggling with expenses, should we be promoting langar to non Sikhs? There could be a list of people who sevadars could send the leftover langar. It would be better than us lot overeating langar. We used to do this at our old location, there was an old peoples home nearby and we used to send them the food.

In all honesty there is nothing stopping someone eating langar every day if they are struggling financially.

I can't understand why the objection in the sakhi above unless it was greed and consuming so that another 3rd person got deprived.. ie.. if there is only enough langar for 10 people let's say and all the 10 that consume it are well fed anyway but another 10 get deprived of it because they were relying on it for survival.

I don't see anything wrong with promoting it to Non-sikhs either because as you know over here in the west the donations from sangat are HUGE.

Infact so much food and miney goes into the golak that surplus ends up feeding luxury lifestyles for corrupt committee members !!!

Because of this 'surplus' that is always present, i would rather it went to helping the underpriveleged instead of the gyani's or pardaan's mercedes.

As far as I have seen here, when homeless come in for langar off the streets they are told not to waste and to only pour or have poured what they can eat.

They are also advised that they may take away for another person if required but it is preferred tat they come and sit with the rest of sangat.

In all honesty, I have never seen any of these homeless street people abuse the situation or waste silly amounts,- Infact i see more of our 'well-dressed, banh tahnke auntijees' with their fancy handbags and jewelry wasting astronomical amounts of daal,sabzi and roti...!! :nono:

[Balait_da_Sher]

There are two gurdwaras in my town. Women spend the entire 3 days of akhand paths in the kitchen cooking and talking. Forget about the different variety of sabjiyan that get prepared, there are tonns of different kinds of sweets made as well, besan, gulabjamun etc

The point I was making was that a lot of people now days are relying on foodbanks etc so if each gurdwara ran a simmilar programme but for the langar then that would stop us sikhs from turning the langar into a all you can consume free meal. Check out the site below...

http://www.trusselltrust.org/foodbank-projects

[S1ngh]

Occasionally you will see rotiyan (chapati) out in sun on the roof of Sri Darbar Sahib Langar hall building. Those rotiyaan are leftover and sewadars put them on the roof for drying purpose and then they send it for animal feed. Where they send them or whether they sell them that i do not know but i know that its really HUGE amount of rotiyaan !

Langar hall leftover should be donated to ppl who are hungry and it can be given to animals but then again that is hard part in western world.

[S1ngh]

There are two gurdwaras in my town. Women spend the entire 3 days of akhand paths in the kitchen cooking and talking. Forget about the different variety of sabjiyan that get prepared, there are tonns of different kinds of sweets made as well, besan, gulabjamun etc

The point I was making was that a lot of people now days are relying on foodbanks etc so if each gurdwara ran a simmilar programme but for the langar then that would stop us sikhs from turning the langar into a all you can consume free meal. Check out the site below...

http://www.trusselltrust.org/foodbank-projects

Once we were about to try giving out free food in my local area but major concern for shelters/food bank is about the ethnic food. We dropped that idea as other food didn't sound feasible for us to try as our auntiyaan do not know the making process. So, maybe ask from food banks and local shelter to whether they will accept and respect ethnic food given to them as donation. If yes, then i think this will turn out as a very important sewa and step for sangat to take in their own communities.