Three local charity groups will jointly organize a feast for more than 30,000 homeless people and elderly citizens that live alone before the Lunar New Year holidays next month.
About 25,000 homeless people and senior citizens living alone in Taipei and about 6,500 people in 12 other cities around the country are expected to turn out for the meals on Jan. 11, said the Genesis Social Welfare Foundation, one of the event organizers.
The other organizers are the Huashan Social Welfare -Foundation and the Zenan Homeless Social Welfare Foundation.
The foundations expect the number of people attending the feast to increase by about 6,000 from an event the charitable organizations held in January this year, because the number of street people and underprivileged residents has been climbing. That event was the largest ever party for the homeless so far.
The event — the foundation’s 21st — had 2,000 tables and was held at the Songshan Tobacco Plant Cultural Park in Taipei City.
In the upcoming party in -Taipei, however, the organizers will arrange a food carnival, instead of traditional roundtable meals, because of difficulties finding a venue spacious enough to accommodate more than 2,500 tables, the foundations said.
Roundtable feasts would be prepared in the other cities, they added.
Each person who attends the parties will also receive a voucher with a face value of NT$100, the Genesis Foundation said.
On Monday, local band The Chairman (董事長音樂團) held a concert in Taipei to show their support and help the charitable groups raise funds for the cause.
Organizers said that the Land Bank of Taiwan donated NT$300,000.
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