By Kelly S. Trejo, Staff Writer
students complain all the time that we only get 40 minutes for lunch, but usually only because they don’t want to go to class or because they want to hang out with friends. Many students come late to 5th period because it takes time to get to a store, order food, and sit down to eat it. But the truth is that most students don’t really have a legitimate reason for coming to 5th period late.
But what about students who need lunch to be longer because it’s impossible to find food they can eat around campus. What if the only option they have is to take the bus to find a place to eat in order not to starve everyday?
Ever since the summer before freshman year I made a choice to become vegetarian. It wasn’t so bad because being vegetarian is really just a less strict version of vegans. As a vegetarian, I could eat dairy and other stuff as long as it wasn’t meat. But half way through the year, my whole family and I decided to become vegan. This now meant that finding food was much harder now since I couldn’t eat dairy which is what most foods contain.
As a vegetarian, I could easily just go to First Cup Cafe and get a bagel or a sandwich, but as a vegan, now that wasn’t an option. Many people wonder why I am vegan, but it isn’t a religious reason or anything. It’s just the fact that I believe that animals are as important as us humans and they deserve to be respected not killed or eaten.
After becoming vegan, before we went into distance learning, all I survived on were Starbucks drinks. Mainly refreshers and iced coffee with soy milk. Sometimes I’d just starve all day and wait until I got home. Now you may ask yourself, “why not make lunch?” Lunch isn’t really an option. I live in the Excelsior district which means I live a good hour and 15 minutes away from school. I already have to wake up early to make sure I leave my house on time to catch a bus and also do things at home.
As the oldest, helping my mom out with my younger siblings is like a job, and also having to walk and feed my pets before going to school is crucial. No one is home throughout the day so making sure they stretch their legs everyday and have food for the rest of the day is very important, because just like me, I wouldn’t want them to starve until I got home.
Although SFUSD offers to provide food substitutions for students who require it, they don’t do anything about it. In their website they give you an email link to let them know your needs and say it will take 10 business days for them to take a look. My younger brother who goes to an elementary school in the same district tried doing that but the school never offered him anything, so school lunch wasn’t an option either for me.
So with all of my difficulties getting lunch, I feel like it’s a little hard to blame me for being 15 minutes late to my 5th period. In order to find some vegan food so I don’t starve myself until I get home.
