Cultural Kitchen with Christopher House

Hostelling International Chicago is a wonderful place to stay, with a great staff, clean and comfy rooms, and an unmatchable location in downtown Chicago. In addition to these advantages, HIChicago offers several education programs for Chicago students. One of these programs, appropriately named "Cultural Kitchen", challenges students to explore cultures outside their own and then spend a night at the hostel.

A typical Cultural Kitchen begins outside the hostel, when one of HIChicago's education staff visits a classroom of students at the their school. After learning about the program, the students vote on one country to study. In the following weeks, they study the culture of that country, researching topics like religion, geography, food, dress, traditions, and more. Although it is very educational, this part of the program is only the beginning of the students' learning experience.

After researching, the class travel downtown to Hostelling International Chicago. While at the hostel, they cook a typical meal from the country they studied, share the meal with hostel guests, present their research, and finally stay overnight. Most students learn a ton, and their reactions demonstrate the importance of intercultural experiences.

A Cultural Kitchen happens almost every week, but the group that came on March 31 made a unique impression. The group was not from a Chicago high school, which is the usual case, but from a community organization named Christopher House. The youth studied the country of India and then cooked a wonderful Indian meal -- Vegetable Curry, Potatoes and Spinach in Cream, Chicken Tikka Masala, and Coconut Bars (Nariyal Burfi) for dessert. The food was delicious, but it was topped by their presentation afterwards.

After dinner, the Christopher House students presented a slide show about India. In addition to painting a beautiful picture of this country and its culture, several students shared about their own cultures and backgrounds. The hostel guests learned even more about Nigeria, Ecuador, Puerto Rico, Mexico, and even Chicago. The presentations were very interesting and fun, as was the game afterwards, but it was most rewarding to hear the reactions of the students. In the end, Cultural Kitchen was not just another research project for them, but an opportunity for each student to get to know world cultures more. They themselves responded by saying things like "Learning about other cultures opens our minds to new things", "Cultural understanding helps build peace in our world", and "Learning about other cultures is good practice before we travel". On top of that, they all got to explore their own heritage more and become more familiar with their own cultures.

It is very rewarding to see this kind of influence that cultures, travel, and hostels can have on the youth of today. Most Chicago youth rarely get the opportunity to leave the country, but they are able to "travel" to new places by studying them, talking to travelers, and staying at the hostel downtown. Cultural Kitchen is an excellent program that offers so much for Chicago youth. And those guests that sign up to attend get some excellent food, learn more about other countries, and may even get to learn about the heritage of students in Chicago! What a program!

-Ben Wickstrom, HI-Chicago education intern

Volunteer Spotlight: Emily Johns

World-traveler and world-class travel educator!


Tell us about the types of volunteering positions you've had at the hostel.
I've done a number of things at the hostel since I started volunteering two years ago. I started off as a Chicago guide, which I still do sometimes. I especially like going to concerts in Millennium Park. It's nice to go to something I was planning to see anyway, but taking along a bunch of interesting people and showing them the city. I've also done a few lectures about how to travel and places I've been. The most fun was the Taste and Travel last week--after talking about Brazil for half an hour I got to go and talk with other travellers and volunteers while the chef at Whole Foods made one of my favorite Brazilian meals! My favorite volunteer activity is Cultural Kitchens, though. I love cooking and I love interacting with the funny, bright teenagers who always seem to be in the kitchen!

Do you stay involved in the international community in any other way?
I have a lot of friends in different countries all over the world, so that's my main outlet to international affairs other than the news. I haven't been able to travel as much lately as I'd like, but I have a trip to Uruguay coming up in March!

What is your most memorable traveling experience?
There have been a lot of great travelling experiences, but one of my favorites was in Tallinn, the capital of Estonia. After trudging around the beautiful old city all day I went back to the hostel, only to find that I was the only woman staying there that night. No big deal. But I was quite surprised an hour later to find myself sitting on a couch, surrounded by boys, eating warm homemade linzertorte and watching the latest Reese Witherspoon hit (not my selection).

What's your favorite place in Chicago?
My favorite place in Chicago is the Cultural Center. I've always loved it--when I was a kid I would walk through the rooms and plan where my furniture would go when it was my private home. I think it's the most beautiful building in the city (and one of the best I've ever seen in the world) and I love that it's open (and free!) to the public, full of great lectures, concerts, and art galleries, and right across the street from one of my other favorite places in the city!

Come party with us, for a great cause!

HI-Chicago has been bringing the world to Chicago since 2000. In that time, we've hosted 100's of thousands of travelers and served over 4,500 youth with our strong educational programs. In addition,a million travelers voted, and HI-Chicago won "World's Best Large Hostel" for 2009 by hostelworld.com

Please come party with us in recognition of our achievements and help us raise money to reach more youth in Chicago with our programs! Funds raised will support the hostel's meaningful cultural awareness-building programs, including Cultural Kitchen, Exchange Neighborhoods, and Community Walls. Through these programs, students become more open-minded, caring world citizens.

Who: Friends of hostelling!
What: $30 for all you want of domestic beer, cocktails, wine, sangria
Where: Waterhouse Tavern and Grill (at Paulina Brown Line stop)
When: Friday, Feb. 26th 8pm-Midnight
Why: To have a great time and support education at the hostel

Please invite your friends! Respond to: rsvp@hichicago.org

Rachel Miller: Adventures in Education

Each week we highlight one of the hostel's fantastic volunteers. This week it's Rachel Miller, who has been working at the information desk since September 2009 and has also a hand in Cultural Kitchen.

Q. What sort of volunteer work do you do at the hostel, and what's your motivation for doing it?

A. Once a month, I volunteer with the Cultural Kitchens program. I got interested in the Cultural Kitchens program because it combines two of my favorite things: experiential learning and cooking! After signing up for CK, I also started working at the Information Desk once a week. I grew up in Chicago, but have just moved back after being away for six years. The Info Desk was a good way for me to get reacquainted with the city, while also helping other people get to know my hometown.

Q. Can you elaborate on some of your previous international experience - traveling, studying, or working abroad?

A. My first international experience was a family trip to Ontario when I was ten years old. I immediately decided that Canada was fascinating. In high school, I took a trip with my sister around Europe, which was our own "Grand Tour". It really confirmed in me a sense of adventure, and I knew that I would somehow get myself out into other new countries. In college, I studied abroad for six months in London as I worked on my Anthropology degree. After college, I decided that I wanted to live abroad again, but in a more challenging environment. Through a series of fortunate events, I ended up teaching English in southern China for two years. It was an incredible immersive experience in a very complicated culture, and I doubt I could begin to understand contemporary Chinese events without it. During that time I was also able to travel to many different parts of China, as well as various countries in SE Asia. Finally, my girlfriend and I extended our return trip home to America and traveled for six weeks through northwest China, Turkey, and Bulgaria. Currently, I'm mostly interested in traveling to the western and northwestern U.S., although I have been invited to a wedding in Rio de Janeiro in 2010.

Q. How has your time spent in China shaped how you view travel?

A. I think my time spent in China confirmed for me what I already suspected about travel, which is that slower is usually better. The first thing I want to do in a new place is to see the sights. This can be done fairly quickly. But "seeing the sights" is only the tip of the iceberg, and as incredible as it is, it still leaves you with just the same photos as anyone else. Travelling slowly allows you time to help carry someone's kids up a hiking trail, hear what the your hostel owner thinks of the other guests, and find out what it is you've been doing the past few days that locals find terribly rude. Travelling slowly isn't always feasible, but it allows more time for you to develop respect for the area, and importantly, for the local area to develop a little respect for you (hence the importance of embarrassing lessons on social faux pas.)

Q. What's been your most memorable experience at the hostel so far?

A. I think my favorite moment happened at a Cultural Kitchen dinner table one night. Students from Curie High School had cooked us up some stellar Romanian food a few days before Thanksgiving. At my table, a student from Chicago and a student from rural Poland shared stories of their families' holiday traditions with two visitors from Chile and Spain. The group compared their respective local holiday costumes, dances, foods, and traditions. It was a really crazy, serendipitous moment in cross-cultural connection. That Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, I went into the hostel to work at the Info Desk and brought a few pies to share. I ran into Marta (the visitor from Spain) in the dining room, and she greeted me like an old friend. "Oh, hello! How was your holiday? How was your grandmama's Thanksgiving dinner?" "It was wonderful," I replied, "It was nice to be home this year. Would you like some pumpkin pie?"