Cooking Up Culture Daily

At least three days a week, Loyola graduate and second-generation Korean-American James Kang carries bags stuffed with Korean cooking supplies and ingredients through Chicago’s Rogers Park neighborhood. Each day, he chooses a new friend’s house to cook up a Korean feast for anyone to enjoy. Kang said that through food, he can share his heritage with others.

“It’s really just about sharing [my culture] with others,” Kang said. “It’s not something special. It’s not a big event. It’s just people getting together and me just cooking for them. And I just hope to bring my culture into that. It’s like others are ingesting my culture and what I grew up with.”

Kang cooks traditional Korean cuisine, which means that he centers his meals around two of the country’s staples: rice and meat.

“Today I cooked a beef marinade with soy sauce, garlic, ginger, coca cola and onions and an assortment of things that I have in my house as staples along with rice,” Kang said. “Rice is very essential to my culture and my food. Usually I would also have kimchi, but unfortunately I don’t have that today.”

Like Kang, Loyola sophomore international relations major Sanjana Kantayya uses food as a way to share her Indian culture with friends, or anyone who is interested. Kantayya’s family is from southern India, so according to her, the customs and cuisine she shares typically stem from this region.

“I make chai, masala chai, which is black tea with spices in it with cardamom and cloves, and a lot of milk and sugar,” Kantayya said. “They use a lot of milk and sugar in it in India. But whenever people welcome people into their homes, they always offer coffee, chai or juice, depending on the season.”

Kantayya said that when she cooks ethnic food, she also uses it as a launching point for sharing even more aspects of Indian culture with her friends in daily life, such as the art of henna or traditional Indian fashion.

One of Kantayya’s close friends Alex Schorr said she often spends time with Kantayya in her daily life, and through doing so felt more in-tune with Indian culture than she would had she just attended one single Indian event.

“Instead of going to some sort of event or something, that’s just Sanj’s life and that’s just how she incorporates it in every day life,” Schorr said. “I think that’s definitely beneficial for learning about another person’s culture.”

18th Annual Christkindlmarket

Christkindlmarket Chicago brings German culture to the city through foods and holiday traditions. / Photo courtesy of DR04, Wikimedia Commons.

Chicago’s longstanding tradition of hosting the traditional German American holiday market Christkindlmarket has returned for its 18^th year of festivities. The holiday market brings European traditions with a focus on German culture to the city for the holidays.

According to its website, the Christkindlmarket was launched in 1995 after being inspired by Nuremberg’s Christkindlesmarkt that began in 1545.

The market boasts an array of German foods like traditional German beers and spiced wines, spicy sausages, potato pancakes and of course schnitzel.

Other than food, the market offers authentic handcrafted ornaments from Munich, woodcarvings from Altenhain, Germany and ceramic pottery from Strullendorf, Germany.

Visitors will also experience European cultures other than German culture, like Polish, Nepalese and Ukrainian cultures. The market offers a spread of leather purses from Ecuador, jewelry from Peru and alpaca scarves from Canada.

The holiday market will take place in Daley Plaza from Nov. 26-Dec. 24, and admission is always free for people of all ages.

To learn more about Christkindlmarket Chicago, click here. 

Balzekas Museum honors Lithuanian-American pilots

The Balzekas Museum in Chicago celebrates the heroic transatlantic flight by Lithuanian-American pilots.

Until Dec. 31, The Balzekas Museum of Lithuanian Culture will host an exhibit that honors Lithuanian-American pilots Stepon pilots (Stephen) Darius and Stasys (Stanley) Girenas, two icons of inspiration for young Lithuanians.

The exhibit commemorates the 80th anniversary of focuses the pilots’ 3,984-mile transatlantic flight in 1933 that took off in New York and crashed in what was Germany at the time—a mere 404 miles short of its destination.

At the time of the Lithuanian-Americans’ flight, it “ranked second in terms of distance and fourth in terms of duration for a single, continuous flight,” according to the museum’s website.

The flight also marked the first official transatlantic airmail shipment from the U.S. to Europe.

The museum is honoring the pilots not only for their accomplishments themselves, but also for their “heroic journey,” in which they “sought to advance civil aviation and bring notoriety to Lithuania, their ancestral homeland, just 15 years free from a century of Russian occupation.”

The Balzekas Museum is home to the world’s largest collection of artifacts relating to the two pilots.

To learn more about Darius and Giernas, click here.

The exhibit costs $5 for museum members and $10 for non-members.

For more information about the exhibit or The Balzekas Museum, call (773) 582-6500 or email info@balzekasmuseum.org.

Ken Ellis: Gathering

The Chicago Cultural Center will display quilts by Ken Ellis until Dec. 29, 2013.

Quilts by history buff and artist Ken Ellis will be on display at the Michigan Ave. Galleries in the Chicago Cultural Center until Dec. 29. Ellis is known for his ability to “embrace an impressive swath of cultural history” through artistic works, according to the Chicago Cultural Center’s website.

The quilts comprising the exhibit named “Ken Ellis: Gathering” explore histories of African-American and Native-American experiences, to name just a few.

Ellis is both a quilter and a painter, whose work has been informed by pop art and comics, Asian art, Haitian Voodoo and African-American craft. For previews of his quilting, click here.

The Chicago Cultural Museum is open Monday-Thursday from 9am-7pm, Friday and Saturday from 9am-6pm and Sunday 10am-6pm. The exhibit is open to all people and admission is free.

Bhakti Yoga Society

Music meditation is a key element of Bhakti Yoga. Photo by Leland Francisco.

Loyola University Chicago’s Bhakti Yoga Society is a new club on campus that encourages students to explore spirituality through meditation. The club has been up and running since the spring of 2013, when a handful of students reached out to a local Roger’s Park Hare Krishna temple for guidance in meditation. Since then, the club has met every Wednesday evening on the second floor of Loyola’s old student union, in the old Lake Shore Dining Hall.

Hear more about what an experience at Bhakti Yoga Society entails in this story:

https://soundcloud.com/jordanberger10/bhakti-yoga-society

Nassim Soleimanpour’s White Rabbit, Red Rabbit

The play White Rabbit, Red Rabbit will come to Chicago Nov. 5 and 9.

Through a blend of comedy and drama, Iranian playwright Nassim Soleimanpour presents a performance inspired by his own refusal to take part in mandatory military service in Iran, called White Rabbit, Red Rabbit. At the time of his refusal, Soleimanpour was 29-years-old and was not allowed to leave his country.

The play will take place at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago (MCA) on Tuesday, Nov. 5 at 6 p.m. and Saturday, Nov. 9 at 3 p.m.

According to the MCA’s website, White Rabbit, Red Rabbit “grapples with the social phenomena of power, obedience and manipulation.”

The Guardian describes the performance as “a thoughtful, playful response to oppression.”

Soleimanpour’s play is only spoken words, with no director and no set. Each night of the performance, audience members will also have the chance of watching various guest performers including Usman Ally and Fawzia Mirza. These performers will not see the script before taking the stage.

White Rabbit, Red Rabbit will be presented as a part of the Chicago Humanities Festival, which takes place this year from Nov. 1-10.

Tickets cost $15 for MCA members, $18 for nonmembers and $10 for students.

To purchase tickets, visit the MCA website or call 312-397-4010.

Inspiring Beauty: Ebony Fashion Fair

The Chicago History Museum will house the exhibition Inspiring Beauty: Ebony Fashion Fair until Jan. 5, 2014.

Take a walk through the history behind the world-renowned Ebony Fashion Fair, the first show to showcase the fashion and beauty sense of African American women, at the Chicago History Museum’s exhibition Inspiring Beauty: Ebony Fashion Fair.

The exhibition focuses on the Ebony Fashion Fair’s legacy, vision and creativity of Eunice W. Johnson, according to the Chicago History Museum website.

Johnson was the founder of the Ebony Fashion Fair, which was held across the U.S. from 1958-2009, a year before Johnson’s death.

Pieces from fashion’s biggest icons such as Oscar de la Renta, Patrick Kelly, Yves Saint Laurent and Christian Dior will be on display throughout the exhibit.

Visitors will experience the Ebony Fashion Fair’s history through three sections that mimic the structure that was used by the Fashion Fair: vision, innovation and power.

The vision section focuses on Johnson’s creativity and role in the Fashion Fair, and presents more than 30 costumes.

The innovation section features objects and costume groupings that exemplify the Fair’s boldness and experimentation.

Lastly, the power section presents the most luxurious and dramatic pieces through 19 garments by designers like Valentino.

From now until Jan. 5, 2014, visitors of all ages are welcome at the museum exhibit. Tickets are priced at $14 for adults, $12 for seniors and students and children 12-years-old and younger can get in free.

The Chicago History Museum is open Monday-Saturday from 9:30 a.m.-4:30 p.m. and on Sundays from noon-5 p.m.

The Cambodian Association of Illinois’ Killing Fields Memorial and Museum

The Cambodian Association of Illinois has installed its newest exhibit, Remembering the Killing Fields, and a permanent Killing Fields Memorial. Learn more about the Cambodian Association’s work to raise awareness about genocide and promote healing for Killing Fields survivors in this video:

Artists Respond to Ukrainian Genocide

From now until Dec. 1, Chicagoans can explore the Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art’s newest exhibition, Artists Respond to Genocide. The institute is located at 2320 W. Chicago Ave. and the exhibit is open to the public from noon-4 on Wednesday-Sunday.

The Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art (UIMA) organized the exhibit to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the Ukrainian Genocide-Famine Holodomor of 1923-33. The exhibit also aims to highlight and address other genocides that have occurred in the modern world, such as the genocides in Cambodia, Rwanda and Bosnia. According to UIMA’s website, as visitors walk through the gallery, they feel “a quiet, sad reverence to those souls that perished by the infliction of inhumane, brutal processes.”

The display features artist Larysa Kurylas’s Holodomor Memorial Monument, which is scheduled for installation in Washington D.C. in 2014. Kurylas’s piece stands alongside the work of 20 local, national and international artists including Klaus Eyting, Jason LaMantia and Pat Zalisko.

As visitors explore Artists Respond to Genocide, they can also view UIMA’s permanent collection, which consists of work produced by a host of contemporary artists. Sculpture, photography, ceramics and painting are among the many media found in the permanent collection.

All people are welcome to view UIMA’s exhibits for free, but donations are welcomed.

To view photos of the Sept. 4 opening of Artists Respond to Genocide, including some of the art displayed, click here.

Tour Chicago’s Chinese and Greek Cultures

On October 19, culture-loving Chicagoans will want to be at 70 E. Lake St. At 9 a.m., a tour of Chinese-American and Greek-American communities will depart from the Chicago Cultural Alliance, and will return at 1 p.m. The tour, organized by Experience Chicago Community Cornerstone Tours, will guide guests through Chicago’s diverse neighborhoods, highlighting the rich Chinese and Greek cultures embedded in the city. The route includes a visit to the Chinese-American Museum of Chicago and the National Hellenic Museum. Throughout the event, light refreshments representative of each community will be served.

This tour is just one installment in the Community Cornerstone Tours series. An African American Community Cornerstone Tour will occur on October 20 from 1-5 p.m.

The event cost is $40. Click here to register. For more information, call 312-846-6814 or email info@chicagoculturalalliance.org.