Restore anniv- good response!

So The 5th  anniv of restore went on well..very well indeed..
We wanted our customers to thank and honour the farmers who produce our organic safe food..also wanted the staff to be recognised..They were honoured too.. There was a good crowd and true joy all over..
The Kasturba Nagar (part of the town where restore is ) res association came forward and gave us their hall for free..
We did have many farmers coming and all those who helped us along the way and who were part of the journey and any customers came..They were all happy to be there and it was fun interacting with all of them..
(I received calls from some farmers across the state  conveying their happiness n excitement at hearing this idea of having honoured farmers at our anniv)

We also had the (re)introduction of the book written by sangeetha one of the founder-volunteers of restore.. this is an amazing book on "Story of Green Revolution" ( பசுமை புரட்சியின் கதை) done with lots of research.. this tells the real story, often ignored or forgotten truths of the green revolution..also of agri situation then and now..the mistakes and possible corrections..
As always, any restore event has millet meals/snacks given away and today too it happened. Terra ladies cooked them for us.. hats off to them for not only preparing such fantastic food ( Barnyard millet upma kozhukattai, foxtail sweet pongal and a very innovative juice- malta lemon and puthina  with palm crystals) but also ensuring there was enough for all (more people than expected) and they were there all the while smiling and serving every one..


the sincere folks that we are, we ran our regular saturday veggie bazar too, this being a saturday:-)

Infact restore was started as fully volunteer run, 5 years ago and then we had staff coming in (4 now)..so it was volunteers who will go to the bus stands and parcel yards and collect the veggies, bring them to the bazar, clean, sort, weigh and arrange..then another bunch wud man the shop - weighing, billing and engaging with customers..This day, we all did a repeat of that..it was all done by Volunteers and staff were given a day off and asked to join only the celebration..(they enjoyed the idea and had loads of comments and smiles to offer..though we had not lost touch, things had changed..these days we handle 5 times more veggies than 5 years back..they also enjoyed the whole program including the honouring and the dinner outing with their whole family along with all volunteers)

and people didnt fail us.. they all showed up in loads...