 Aloha and welcome to Hawaii Together on the Think Tech Hawaii Broadcast Network. I'm Kelea Akina, your host, and while I do this program bi-weekly, I have the most fun when it's something that's spontaneous and exciting and done with friends, and that's what's happening today. I've got two very dear friends with me who are doing wonderful things throughout the islands. We're going to talk about a very important program today called Malama Meals. Since the coronavirus struck Hawaii, terrible things have happened in terms of the lives of individuals in terms of a disease that we have confronted and shutting down of work. And that shutting down of work has resulted in the loss of jobs for many people and the shuttering of people in their homes, which has resulted in their inability to get food. But in the midst of this, something wonderful has happened. And that is people have banded together to help one another. And one of those examples is the program called Malama Meals. Every day, Malama Meals serves 13,000 or more meals for the individuals across the islands. And that's a staggering amount of work. To date, since the start of the coronavirus crisis, Malama Meals has served nearly 300,000 meals. This is to Kupuna, to people who are shut in, and people who simply cannot afford to get the meals that they need at this time. And I'm so very proud to be associated with the program and just to be a small volunteer helping the people who are on the ground. And you're going to meet a couple of them today. We have with us today the founder of the program or one of the key founders of the program, Ahmad Ramadan. And along with him, the coordinator for our program, the volunteer on the island of Molokai, Iwana Alafa. Let me introduce each of them and let them say hi first to Ahmad. Ahmad, Aloha, my dear friend. Thank you for coming back onto the program. How are you doing? And tell a little bit about your own background. Aloha, thank you so much for having me on your program. My name is Ahmad and my business usually is spot. But since the corona COVID situation has happened, we kind of see tears and have been really pushing Malama Meals and making sure that all our Kupuna and Kiki and people that we need are able to get through that they need on a regular basis and we're just trying to do the best that we can right now. Well, thank you so much, Ahmad. You've been a dear friend for so many years and I'm so pleased in what I've seen in terms of the development of your business model and your success. But even more pleased now to see what you're doing during this time of crisis for so many people. Another dear friend who joins us today is actually on the road. And this is the exciting thing about today's show. He's right there. He got Molokai Airport in her vehicle waiting for the plane, the plane, the plane, the plane. The plane. We've been seeing 1,800 meals to be distributed very rapidly. I'll get to that in a little bit. But first tell us a little bit about yourself. She does so many things. One of them many of you know is she is the coordinator of the Mrs. Hawai'i pageants. But my dear friend, Luana Alafa. Luana, welcome to the program. Let people know what you do. Thank you so much for having me. I am thrilled to be here, especially from filming this from the island of Molokai, my second home. I have been here since the 1970s with my father and my stepmom. And we fly back and forth between the islands. So I have a lot of family roots here at the same time. I've also on the island of Wauhu, I'm a single mother of four. I have done everything under the roof from producing events as an event planner. One of them is of course the Mrs. Hawai'i State and Miss and Team Scholarship pageants, along with many other events that I coordinate, especially for communities and doing promotional or personal development work. It's a wonderful feeling for me to give back to those who I'm all about empowerment of women. And this is something that I find very passionate about and I will be doing here on the island of Wauhu, has landed. And they have the trolleys that are going out right now to collect all the foods and bring it to us. And so would you like for me to go outside and do a quick little challenge to all our volunteers? I'm going to switch back to Amad while you do that. And then in a minute, show us everything going on outside. This is very exciting. And while we're going to be out of the car, tell us how the Malama Meals originated. You and a couple of other visitors have a great idea. Yeah, so, you know, we started Malama Meals. Just through the pandemic of COVID and we realized that a lot of the tuna were just not able to leave their homes. You know, it would just, you know, cause them to be susceptible to COVID. And so we wanted to create a program in where we'd be able to take care of them in a way that it would feel safe, secure, but still get everything that they needed to have, you know, to get through their day. You've done a tremendous job. And you're in how many locations island-wide now? Over 100 locations right now, mainly low income housing, senior facilities, and areas of need throughout the islands. Well, that's terrific. And I remember when you asked me for help in terms of opening up some neighbor island locations, one of the places I thought that would really be meaty and where we have some friends is the island of Molokai. And so we're going to go back to Zawana, who's helped us to actually get that program initiated. She's brought some great volunteers together. So we're back with you, Luana. You're out there on the airfield. Show us something that's happening there. Well, first of all, I just wanted to share that, you know, the Malama Meals couldn't commit some more profound time in our lives. You know, 90% of the population here are poverty. There are not many jobs available. And so the people definitely are in dire need. And we are so, so thrilled with Malama Meals to be able to do this wonderful service to us. And to thank you all, I'm going to just switch the camera. I'm going to show you something. Everybody, here we go. Say aloha. Say aloha. Did you see that? Did you see that? We did. We see your crew there waiting for the plane to unload. Yes. So there's a lot of cargo. So the big thing for them is thanking you folks because this is what it's all about. And we want to be sure that all the people back in Oahu and everyone else knows the people from Molokai really, truly appreciate you. And all the things that you've done is feeding our people as well as everyone here on Oahu and throughout the state. So we can't thank you enough for what you're doing. And I'm so, so blessed to have such awesome people here who have put together their teams of volunteers to make sure that the food goes out to all those who are in need. And I tell you, we can't get any better than this. It's the most amazing because everybody say, yeah. That's exciting to see happening now. Now we're going to go back to Ahmad and let me ask you just briefly, what kind of operation is needed to make Malama meals work? Food is produced by Oahu package, flown like a military out to the neighbor islands. And it involves all kinds of things from quality control to safety procedures and your charge of all of that Ahmad, tell us how it works. It's a very tedious, tricky task. And Luana has actually made it amazingly smooth with her help in getting everything coordinated on Molokahi. I mean, it's been absolutely like perfect. Everything they do is very spot on and it's just been going super smooth. As far as on Oahu side, it requires us to be up at 2, 3 a.m. in the morning prepping and getting all the food ready and getting it in camberos and plating, boxing and delivering to different locations. And we have a team of about 100 people here and about 45 volunteers from different organizations like Catholic Charities, Kanu Hawaii, a lot of different organizations throughout and putting our hands together and trying to make things happen to get the food out to the people in need. Well, that's wonderful. You know, Luana, your counterpart on the island of Hawaii was on our program during the last episode. His name is Kamie Aloha. And I'm so glad that with Kamie Aloha's help, we were able to get Ma'alama meals started there and they've been distributing up to 12,000. It's given you 1200 or more meals in a single day on the island of Kauai. Now, what is your goal today? How many meals are coming off of that plane right now and where are you going to distribute them to? So today we have 1,800 meals coming off of the plane and we have everyone in place as you saw. Well, there's one in particular that I want you to meet because she can give you a little bit more of a background of the people that we're serving and give you a little bit of some statistics so it'll really help you guys understand what's going on here on Moloka'i. So I'd like for you to meet Rosie Davis coming over and then here you are, Kisir. I don't know. Aloha, Rosie, love your mask. I'm the authorized representative for the Moloka'i Homestead Farmers Alliance. Can you hear me now? Yeah, absolutely. Okay, so I'm the authorized representative for the Moloka'i Homestead Farmers Alliance. Oh my God. Let me just cut. Just cut. No, no, no. Aloha. Rosie, you can keep talking while she works on the video. Well, we'll get them back in just a moment. That's what happens when we're flying by Seymour fans but we're gonna make it happen. Ahmaud, what has been one of the biggest challenges that Malama Meals has overcome in this whole process of delivering food all across the island? You've had so much to do and so much to learn. I'd love to know how you dealt with one of your challenges. Our biggest challenge is really, we see this major need and just having to kind of go through a system in still being able to have the right protocol and security measures to make sure that what we're providing is safe and adequate in all following all the different types of regulations that are required through the state of Hawaii. And I think what we've been trying to overcome and is really the need, it's just enormous. Like right now we have over 6,000 people waiting to get meals that are still not completely vetted through the system and so working on that process has been something very tedious but at the same time important to make sure that we have all this information provided for wherever it may be. How we plan to overcome it is we've created some software that will be able to like provide information to people on how they can receive meals and what the requirements are and just kind of going from there. You know, one of the things that I really respect about the program is a real commitment to providing not just food but a meal experience that is enjoyable, that is satisfying, that is tasty and that comes packaged with aloha and malama care from people. Now, can you tell us a little bit about your meals, your actual menu? I mean, when I've seen what you've done, it looks more like restaurant-grade meals than anything else. It's not peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Yeah, we definitely- What do we serve and what do nutritional value? So right now, we are serving every day a chicken, fish, beef, vegetarian and pork option which constitutes a protein, a starch, some type of a vegetable. And we try to keep a very balanced type of a meal that will nourish and help make people feel good in the day, but at the same time, we're really creative with our menus and we try to switch it up as much as possible. I wanna say that we try not to make the same menu twice. And so, we're constantly doing different types of food but at the same time, focusing on comfort foods that people have throughout their life and here in Hawaii. So a lot of different local items but still giving them varieties and different types of ethnic foods like we'll have, sometimes we'll have Thai food or we'll have Japanese food or we'll even have sometimes like some North African stuff. So we kind of switch it up, but at the same time still follow through with trying to go with the local favorites. Like we'll have mochiko chicken or katsu or teriyaki so chicken or different things that you typically find on a local menu too. Well, that's so wonderful. It's tasty and Kameh Loha when he was on the program with us last time, our coordinator on Kauai talked about the fact that a hot meal does more than simply nourish the body. It also feeds the soul and feeds the heart of the individual who's receiving the hot meal. And so it's doing a lot, especially in some of the care homes that you deliver to. Now, such a program is not free. It has taken the sacrificial contributions of a group of businessmen who had no promise of ever being able to find any partners to help out, but it has attracted a good number of donors. And so can you tell us a little bit about how Malama Meals has funded and how people can help out if they'd like to do that? Absolutely. So Malama Meals, we started off kind of just doing this on our own and we've been getting tremendous support from different organizations throughout the islands. We recently received a vehicle from Windward Dodge and this helps to get meals throughout the island delivering anywhere between 300 to 400 meals per delivery and four or five times a day. We also received another vehicle from Cutter Fort. Heather, and she was amazing in also helping us to do that. But also Toyota, they were able to provide us forklifts. As you know, prior to this, our locations, we weren't pushing as much food as this. And so now we buy chicken and proteins and different types of products by the pallets. And so we actually needed, rather than boxes at a time, we needed a couple of forklifts. And so Toyota Serb Co was able to provide that to us. And there's been a lot of help, Central Pacific Bank, OHA, a lot of different organizations throughout the islands that have been able to help secure different funds for us. In fact, people can go to malamameals.org, that's malamameals.org and make a contribution. Is that right? We've had more than $50,000 come in. Now let me take a short break, very momentary because we want to get Luana back on. So this is a technical break. Welcome back. We're broadcasting at the Luana from the island of Olaqai, Oman and Ashola. So what you're doing right now is the convoy is getting ready to deliver those meals all across the island. Wow. All the trucks, everyone has their meals in the boxes that goes to the respective trucks, the people. We have a special guest, I know we would be lost here, but I want her to come back one more time. One more time and, oh my gosh, and see if this thing is still on. There she is. This is what you were talking to her earlier and I want her to quickly explain to you folks what the programs are like here in Olaqai and she is an expert in it. She knows exactly what's going on and this is Rosie Davis once again. Rosie, Aloha Rosie. I just wanted to share with you a few statistics. I'm with the authorized representative for the Olaqai Homestead Farmers Alliance and we do a lot of programs for the community. Right now you folks are serving about 20% of the population on Olaqai. Our population here is about 7,200 and I'm with the 1,800 plate you folks have sent over and we are also 200% the federal poverty level. And so you guys are doing a great job sending that over to the Kupuna, the children in need and the displaced and unemployed families on the island. Wow. So we really appreciate that. Rosie, thank you so much for what you're doing out there and all the volunteers on this Olaqai. Aloha, we're getting ready to wrap up and I wanted to give you a chance before you jump on the road again to give us a last minute word or any summation you'd like to. And let me ask you, is there any special story of anyone who's really been touched by the Malama Meals? Well, you know, Kili, we've had so many wonderful testimonials and I know Rosie, you've heard them from the field as well, the people. I think you had a few people that wrote to you or and I've expressed their appreciation. This is just amazing opportunity for these people to know that they are cared for, that people are thinking of them outside of Moloka. Go ahead, Rosie. You know, a lot of it has come from email and text. It's just, it's amazing, the emojis that we never thought we would receive. But they're very thankful, very grateful on this time of need as you well aware, I'm sure of the unemployment, you know, the filing system that wasn't able to be operated. So I just talked to someone that said, oh my gosh, I got three claims filed, but at least I know I'm getting a meal for today. You know, yes, we have a lot of, we're rich here in Moloka, as far as resources, but then sometimes we can get some of the only has one day barage from young brothers now. I mean, and also they find themselves struggling. So it's not just our community, it's also a lot of other services that we don't have. So the people look forward to this, I've been getting texts in the morning to say, is the meal coming today? What time should we be there? And even though it's been posted on the flyer, they just want to make sure to make time to come and pick that up. Because we also have people that don't have vehicles, so they send others to pick it up. So we're really, really blessed with a lot of, we probably have about 48 volunteers. And so we use them on different projects. This program runs so smooth. The minute it's picked up, it's taken the volunteer divided on the table and they start coming and we check off their name. So mahalo to you, I'm gonna have to say aloha, because they're waiting for the meal. They're waiting for the meal, so I gotta dig. You go, you go. Aloha. Rosie, thank you so much. Thank you. Luana, thank you. Mahalo to you, Luana. You're doing a great job. Oh, my pleasure. Have a wonderful day, everyone. Thank you, Ma. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you guys so much. Godspeed, Godspeed. Amad, that's so wonderful. And you must have such a sense of satisfaction when you see an over 100 locals. You know, I feel like we have to do more after hearing what they said. It's just, I can't even believe that. I, we gotta do more. I love that. What you're saying. Close us with a picture of your vision. Where are we going now with mahalama meals? We, we had a huge goal. Picture of my vision is, is everyone, you know, you know, working together to, you know, be one big Oana. And ultimately, everyone just helping each other to get through this pandemic and being able to really thrive through it and come out on top and find the best in ourselves. So, you know, we're going to keep pushing and doing our best. Absolutely. Absolutely. You know, and we want to get to the place and it sounds incredible when Amad first told me that this was the goal, but it's part of what attracts me to the program. Amad wants to see that we get to the place where we're feeding 100,000 people in meals. Hope that that time of need will not last very long, but while it's here, mahalama meals wants to be out there in the front, taking care of people, caring for people as the word mahalama means. Amad, I thank you so much for what you and your colleagues and the other founders have done. And this is just so exciting to see each island eventually getting the same kind of service that we have on Oahu. Much aloha to you and thank you for being with us today. Aloha. Aloha. Thank you so much, Kili. I really appreciate everything. Aloha. My guest today was Amad Ramadan, a founder of mahalama meals along with Luana Alapo, one of our great volunteers who's coordinating the work on Molokai. And if you want to support the work of mahalama meals, would you go to the website, go to the website and just explore it, see the faces and read the statistics. It's just wonderful. And then go to the button to donate and click mahalamameals.org, that's mahalamameals.org. A very good thing for Hawaii at this time. I'm Kili Akina, your host on Hawaii Together. Until next time on the Think Tech Hawaii Broadcast Network, much aloha to you. Aloha.