Caritas

Walsh Global 4

Noah Drlik

            I have now settled into life here in Italy and the Catholic experience Walsh offers.  Part of the Catholic experience Walsh offers is the ability to volunteer. Us students get an opportunity to volunteer at a non-profit soup kitchen known as Caritas. This past Monday was my second trip to Caritas and it was a completely different experience from the last.  My last trip I had the job of separating the unfinished food of those eating there, it was not joyful. This week I got to sit behind a glass window and check food passes.  This job was far cleaner, which is what I liked.  The job did however bring in a challenge that was not in my last, and that was the language barrier.  This job included more human interaction and communication.  The people that wanted food had to bring me their pass, and I had to verify their information on the card as well as have them sign in.  This involved learning a few key Italian words, so the patrons could understand what they needed to do. A majority of the visitors would also try and talk to me in Italian and of course I could not understand them, so my response was always, “no parlo Italiano.”  I felt bad for not being able to interact with the visitors because most of them are homeless and see very little human interaction.  For some, the soup kitchen is all they have in terms of talking to others. Therefore, they would come to me expecting to carry on a small conversation, but because of my little knowledge of the Italian language I could not deliver.  Another eye-opening experience working at the check in desk was observing the fact of people not be able to read and write. I come from a town where illiteracy is non-existent, this was my first exposure to it.  A majority of the people could not sign their name, they would just make the same shape as the time before and that was there signature. The shape had no meaning to the letters in their name it was just a random writing.  One man for example simply wrote two horizontal lines as his was of signing his name.  Another man could not understand me when I would say Noviembre as the place to sign. The page said Noviembre in bold letters, but he could still not understand, I had to point to the exact place he needed to sign.  It became frustrating for me at times, but I had to take a step back and realize what kind of people I was dealing with.  These people had little to no education, so I should not have expected everyone to understand what they needed to do. With all of that being said, I really enjoy working for Caritas and serving the less fortunate and cannot wait to see what the next few weeks bring.