A Day in the Kitchen

My morning started off bright and early. By 5:00 a.m., two of us students were in the kitchen to help Connie, an MDS volunteer, prepare breakfast. During our time here, every student gets an opportunity to spend a day (or two) helping in the kitchen and cooking meals for everyone. Students who are assigned to help in the kitchen during the work week stay behind instead of heading to the worksite with the rest of the group. This not only gives us students a chance to take a day break from working outside in extreme heat, but it also allows us to give a helping hand to Connie and be able to provide service even while at our own living facility.

Connie MDS Volunteer Staff, Canada

Connie does an amazing job cooking for our big group. She starts her day even earlier than ours so that she can ensure that all the breakfast food is ready by the time everyone else gets up to eat and head off for a day’s work at La Posada. Morning kitchen help includes setting out dishes and utensils, helping prepare breakfast dishes, serving breakfast, and setting out lunch items so that students can pack their own lunch before heading out to the worksite. After breakfast, students help clean up the dining and kitchen area, wash the many dishes, clean up the outdoor bathroom trailers, and begin helping to prepare for dinner. Although it may not quite seem like it, preparing dinner takes a great deal of time and energy so having as much help as possible goes a long way.

Around noon time we take a break to eat some lunch and sit around with one another. I enjoyed this time because Be, another MDS volunteer, was able to join us and we were able to ask them both some questions about their own personal lives as well as sharing a little bit about ourselves too. After lunch we got back to business and continued prepping for dinner. At 6:00 p.m. everybody was able to join us to share this long awaited meal. It was great to be able to share some laughs and reconnect with the rest of the group over dinner. It made for a good end to a day spent in the kitchen.

When going into this experience I was not sure what to expect. I assumed the usual cleaning and cooking, but my takeaway was a little more than just that. Teamwork definitely makes the dream work as it helped us to make our experience a little more fun-filled while still making progress in the kitchen. During our time together, we were able to have conversations and get to know each other a little more than we would have otherwise. It was also refreshing to be able to take a little time away from the educational and working aspect of our trip and have an opportunity to connect with other people such as Connie who has been a joy to be around.

-Alexandria Flores, Goshen College Class ’23 Business major