Who is in your ripple?

We woke up on April fool’s day, got ready and ate breakfast, and attended a beautiful church service offered by First Christian. We were welcomed by open arms, tons of people saying “God Bless You”, and beautiful music throughout the service. The message of the service was all about our ripple effects. Who do we affect when we say or do things? We continue to spend a lot of our trip contemplating who is in our ripple. After the service we split up to visit different connection groups with the church members. They all came together to discuss the message of the service. Ken, Stacy, Megan, Roland and Ahbib sat down with with one of the church elders after the service. They heard his struggle to spread the Word and spent time praying with him about their future aspirations.  Amanda and I managed to sneak in to play with the two and three year olds, as well as the nursery where I found Jeremiah, a ten month old little guy. All of our other AWOL members found different groups and heard the stories of many.  After everyone left the church, we had the privilege of going on an ethnic food tour with our pastor here at the church, Steve. Steve took us first to the Hispanic “Little Village”. Here we found many shops, restaurants, bakeries, and clothing stores. We split into two groups and each visited a Hispanic restaurant. We ate sopes, tamales, tortas, guacamole, and many other delicious foods. 

As we were walking down the street, we had a young man yell at us from his car window. He made many of us feel uncomfortable as he said, “Welcome to the neighborhood, white people. Hope you enjoy your “urban” experience… we kill people up in here.” We discussed how we felt later that night at a reflection. Megan mentioned that we felt very unwelcomed, that it would be easier to just hop in the van and head home rather than face negative attitudes like he had, yet we all knew that we wanted to dive in further. The man definitely wanted a bigger rise than we gave him; we ignored him, kept on walking, and didn't acknowledge his presence. We got into the van and encouraged each member to continue feeling positively, and finding good things in every situation. How are we supposed to know what made him say what he did? We don't know his story - we only know ours. 

A few of us were shaken up but were reminded of the many reasons we came to serve in Chicago. We then headed over to Chinatown. Here, you guessed it, we ATE MORE! We went to a restaurant where we ate wontons, chicken, rice, crab rangoons, and drank lots of hot tea to warm us up from walking around in fifty degree weather all afternoon.

 Pastor Steve then took us on a drive through many neighborhoods in Chicago. We got to see some rough areas that invoked feelings in many of us. Dominique talked to us the whole way; she explained different cultural representations, graduation rates, and what violence might occur in the different neighborhoods. We saw many storefronts that were protected with bars, chains and gates. We saw areas covered in flowers and stuffed animals; Dominique told us a woman had likely died there within the week. We arrived back to the church and had a reflection and discussion with Pastor Steve. He told us all about the church’s history and the last sixteen years of the neighborhood racial changes, family differences, income, and the amount of children the neighborhood now sees in schools. We all snuggled into our blankets that night, feeling lucky for warmth, food in our bellies, and the many blessings that have been bestowed upon us. 

* A Roland Moment: We made it through the whole day without any April Fools. However, we were all settling down into bed when Roland came by to tell us that Carol wanted to chat. We all walked to the other end of the church to find her to see what she wanted to talk to us about. We all sat around for awhile before I yelled out, "Hey, Carol! What did you want to talk to us about?" She told us that she had nothing and that Roland was playing a joke on us the whole time. Needless to say.. Roland got chased and tickled after that. Good thing we love you, Ro-Po!