When looking at our class syllabus in September I felt a bit overwhelmed by the amount of work that we were expected to do. As I read about the community service requirement, I selfishly though that it would be a nuisance and take up some of my free time. I would soon find out however, that my service experiment would have an eye-opening and inspiring impact on my life.
This semester my service placement has been in the local soup kitchen. My responsibilities at the soup kitchen are to take orders of what people would like to eat, prepare meals in the kitchen, and help special education students who are also working in the kitchen. When I am at the soup kitchen I also sit and converse with the people eating lunch there, which I do because I have enjoyed getting to know these people, not because I consider it a responsibility.
My experience at the soup kitchen has been a positive one. In anticipation of my first visit, I was rather nervous. I was anxious about the interaction I would have with these people and I was weary about what their perception of me would be. I thought they might resent my help. I also thought that conversation with them would be rather forced and that I would have trouble relating with them. My prejudgments of my experience were proved wrong right away. The first day I got there the people that I served were so grateful and friendly toward me. As I made more visits to the soup kitchen, I began to sit down with the people eating and engaged in conversation. They really took an interest in where I am from, how school is going, and what areas I might like to study. I took an interest in their lives in return, learning about their jobs, children, and grandchildren. People coming into the soup kitchen started to look familiar to me each week and I looked forward to seeing them. I developed extensive relationships with several people and we both were happy to see each other each week. I also developed a very humorous rapport with several people, which meant a lot to me because I do not really joke around with people unless I am comfortable in the atmosphere. My silly jesting and hearty laughs with these people proved to me that we had reached some common ground. It was easy for me to relate to many people at the soup kitchen, as we found that we shared many of the same views on political and social issues. I also found through various conversations that some people eating in the kitchen and I have similar tastes in music, movies, and books. I have started to forget that I am serving these people in a soup kitchen during my past few visits.
My
experience working in the soup kitchen fits appropriately with the other
material that we have studied in class. After reading books about numerous
aspects of the homeless in class, statistics and case studies were brought to
my attention. These facts did not mean much to me however, until I met Kevin in
the soup kitchen. Kevin is a man in his mid-fifties who is homeless. I sat down
with him one afternoon while he was eating his lunch and we began to talk. We
started out just talking about the weather and other trivial things but then he
told me a lot about his family history. He grew up in
I have truly had a positive experience at the soup kitchen, as I have learned that social and economic divisions create unnecessary barriers between people. I learned firsthand that there is very little difference between people needing a meal in a soup kitchen and myself. I feel privileged and enlightened to have had this realization, as I think too many people are absorbed with social status and are forgetting what qualities are really important in a person.
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