By Svoboda (Liberty) Radio – December 13, 2013.

Source: http://www.radiosvoboda.org/content/article/25199839.html

Svoboda (Liberty) Radio Has Visited the Euromaidan Kitchen. The main kitchen is located in the dining room of the Trade Unions House. Here, people deliver food and supplies, and volunteers sort and cook the food for protesters – hot meals twice a day and sandwiches, tea, and coffee continuously.

Strangers are not allowed inside because of food contamination. Around the clock, female volunteers work in aprons, rubber gloves, and hairnets. The floors are washed constantly. They sing Ukrainian folk songs.

Opposition provides the kitchen with basics – water, bread, and utensils. Food is supplied by largely sympathetic Ukrainians who determine the daily menu. Hot meals include sausages, potatoes, porridge, and cooked grains. Sandwiches, however are the main offering. Ladies make them non-stop.

Lyubov Stepanivna has worked at sanitary and epidemiological station at Ukrainian Railway for 25 years. She is retired now. She is at Euromaidan’s kitchen every day for food quality check and expiration control. She is also responsible for cleanliness and sanitary conditions of the kitchen. Obviously, she is a volunteer.

“There are people who bring supplies that cannot be cooked under these conditions. We will not take liver sausage or liver paste, mushrooms, dried fish or blood sausage. All homemade meals are routinely checked, and sometimes we will not serve them to people because they spoil fast. Stuffed cabbage, for example, is once again reheated in the Euromaidan kitchen. We want to make sure there is no food poisoning,” Lyubov Stepanivna says. Everybody in the kitchen listens to what she has to say.

The turnaround of food supplies is impressive; food is actively replenished and then vanishes just as fast.

Цитрусові

The turnaround of food supplies is impressive; food is actively replenished and then vanishes just as fast.

There are men in the kitchen as well.​

There is a constant line of volunteers in the food service window. People in line are volunteers of all ages. They bring trays of prepared food and drinks out to distribution points throughout Maidan, as well as more distant “revolutionary objects”, like the Presidential Administration.

A girl with a loudspeaker manages the process and relays latest news from the streets. “The number of people has increased dramatically”, “Tagnybok is on stage,” “Do not make any more sandwiches for Administration, they are now full!”

The work goes on. Girls cut sandwiches, fruit, and sing Ukrainian folk songs. Everything stops for Ukrainian hymn, a prayer, and then back to work.