Arts and Culture Day

Some of the food at Soul Veg. It's BBQ Tofu!

Mariah Ryce

Week two of SSP has been amazing. I have enjoyed getting to know my team and exploring the South Chicago community. But the day that stood out to me the most was Wednesday. On Wednesday all of the teams, (GGC, Woodlawn, and my team South Chicago) all met up at the Museum of Science and Industry to start our day. We did a check in to see how everyone was doing. Everyone shared their name, team, year in school, and spirit animal. It was really cool to hear the different types of animals. Both David (who is a  team leader of GGC) and Rebecca (who is a team leader for Woodlawn) were sea otters. Another animal was a half giraffe and half bunny. Then after check in we all piled onto the bus to head to South Shore Cultural Center. I used to attend SSCC for an after school program from third to eighth grade. So I was very familiar with some of the rooms we visited, such as the ballroom, the solarium, and the Paul Robeson theater. Being there was very fun and brought back some great memories from when I was younger. It was also nice to show my peers where I have performed most of my dances in the past. I would like to return to SSCC in the near future to swim in the beach and relax with my friends.

After the Cultural Center everyone got back onto the bus. One of the team leaders from GGC Joanna had us play a fun bus game. You had to sit with someone you didn’t know and talk to them to get to know them. Then once the bus stopped at a red light the person sitting on the outside of the seat would switch seats. This way it gave everybody a chance to get to know one another. It somewhat felt like speed dating. While I was sitting with Joanna it was very cool because we drove past the block where I live so I got a chance to show her. It was also cool to talk to Joanna about dance because she enjoys dancing as well. We continued to play the game until we arrived at Soul Vegetarian.

As we are getting off the bus there is a fruit cart outside of the store. There were oranges, apples, bananas etc. And the first thing you see when you walk in the restaurant is more fruit! There was also refrigerated items. This part of the restaurant is where people bought smoothies. Then we were led back to our seating area. And just like on the bus you had to sit next to someone you didn’t know. Except this time you didn’t have to switch seats. At first most of the high school students sat together. But then we separated even more and sat in a mixture of high school students, medical students and college students. Then chef Yoanna came out and gave us an overview of the menu and what we would be eating. She told us how everything was vegan. And they don’t eat anything from an animal. In the buffet there was salad, spicy buffalo tofu wings, barbeque tofu wings with a twist ( the twist was peanut butter ), greens and soy macaroni and cheese. I really enjoyed trying all of the food. For dessert, we got a choice between soy almond and pecan ice cream, strawberry heaven smoothy, or oatmeal raisin cookies. I chose the soy almond and pecan ice cream. It was very delicious. And it was like normal pecan or almond ice cream since the almonds and pecans were ground up into the ice cream. It was very different but I enjoyed it very much.

Once we finished our dessert then we went back to the bus and drove to the Dusable Museum. I have never been to the Dusable Museum before so I was very excited to go. Once we first walked in there were beautiful marble collage walls with different events in history. We had to check our bags because we weren’t allowed to have them past that point. Then we got a tour of the museum. We saw a carving of African American history. It showed from the slave trade all the way up to the civil rights movement. It was very interesting to see the detail the artist put into the carving. It took him 6 years to make it. Then we left the exhibit to go see about the museum structure then onto African culture. We learned how salt was very important in Africa because it helped preserve foo. we learned tha it was even more valuable than gold. We saw different warrior masks and spiritual artifacts. Then the next exhibit was the different types of wars. We saw one of the very first pieces to ever be donated to the museum. We saw the different types of uniforms and learned about Harriet Tubman role in the military. We learned that she was a spy and went to different camps to learn of their strategies. The museum was very informative and I got a chance to learn a lot about my culture.