Submitted by Second-year Michael Carwile

The artist Andrij Kowalenko endured the chaos of the First World War, the oppression of Stalinism, and the uncertainty of a post-war displaced persons camp before making it Chicago's Ukrainian Village. In comparison, Anna and I had it easy: an hour on various CTA buses and trains to put up with and we landed at the intersection of Oakley and Chicago, where the thirteen copper domes of the St. Nicholas Cathedral met us on our right, and the one large gold dome of Sts. Volodymyr and Olha flanked us on our left. The Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art, holding a retrospective on Kowalenko's career, was just up the block, and all up and down the street the light posts were flying chamber of commerce banners in Ukrainian blue and gold.

Chicago's Ukrainian Village is like none you'll find in Ukraine. Its streets are as rectilinear as any in the city, and come with such names as Leavitt, Thomas, Walton or Iowa. Its housing stock is the same sturdy workers' cottages developers planted in immigrant neighborhoods throughout the city. And its main Orthodox church, St. Volodymyr, is a convert from Lutheranism and looks it. The Ukrainians were not the first group to populate this section of the city's West Side, and are no longer the largest, but somehow they've held on, and have been holding on for over a hundred years now.

If they didn't build the place, they've made it their own: in a two block stretch we passed by such establishments as the Ukrainian Self-Reliance Federal Credit Union, the Ukrainian American Club of Chicago, Ukrainian Delta Enterprise, and a few storefronts advertising only in Cyrillic. There were clusters of people on the street speaking their language among themselves, and the first thing anybody said to us in the neighborhood, at the check out counter of a convenience store where Anna and I were buying a Ukrainian chocolate bar, having passed up the Ukrainian soft drinks, Ukrainian dairy products, Ukrainian magazines and Ukrainian who knows what else, was, "Oh, you don't speak Ukrainian?"

And they did build it too--at least some of it. The thirteen domes of St. Nicholas, the neighborhood's oldest Ukrainian Catholic Church, gleam in homage to the eleventh century St. Sophia Cathedral in Kiev. But they could easily stand for the thirteen-day shift the church made to its calendar in 1969, a switch from the Julian to the Gregorian calendar, which so outraged a group of parishioners that they crossed the street and put up a church of their own. Thus two of the 74 American parish churches of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church stand 600 feet from each other.

If you went to the Christmas liturgy at St. Nicholas on the 25th and wanted to repeat the experience at Sts. Volodymyr and Olha on the 7th of January, you could walk no slower than two feet per hour. Maybe it would be a pleasant experience, to leisurely watch the comings and goings of the neighborhood, to see the schoolchildren rush in and out of the cathedral school, and maybe even see the bishop step outside for air. You might piss off the motorists, though.

As long as there is instability in Ukraine, Ukrainian Village will survive, so believes Marta, the woman working at the Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art when we paid our visit. The neighborhood is not a recent phenomenon - the onion dome over Holy Trinity Cathedral was raised in 1903 - but neither is it self-sustaining. Inevitably, as children grow up, the insatiable suburbs draw them out of the urban village. Our host recounted this well-known tale with a resigned wistfulness about her, but added on an up note, "There are always special occasions that bring them back."

Fortunately, there have always been new immigrants to fill the village on ordinary occasions; like clockwork, or Halley's Comet, they pour into Chicago in waves. Every 20 years, our host reckons. She herself is a member of the immediate post-war wave, the child of one of many families of professionals, artists, or other undesirables of a workers' republic who fled the Soviet Union in the confusion surrounding the Second World War and washed up on the shores of Lake Michigan.

A new wave, coming with the fall of the Soviet Union, has yet to ebb, and our host, in trying to downplay the tension between the two groups of immigrants, managed to exposed it. "They don't really speak a different language," she defended against no one in particular,

"Well, it's not that there aren't differences, differences of time, regional differences, it's an issue of dialect, really," and as she trailed off, I could hear entrenched middle-aged Ukrainians accusing the new riffraff of russophony.

Coming to Chicago turned the earliest Ukrainians into Russians, in the same way it turned Sicilians into Italians. The oldest orthodox church in the neighborhood, Holy Trinity Cathedral, a Louis Sullivan take on the orthodox vernacular, is Russian Orthodox, and was even financed in part by Nicholas II.

Yet while the Tsar put his weight behind Russian Orthodoxy, His Apostolic Majesty in Vienna was pushing Ukrainian Catholicism, and soon Chicago's Ukrainian Catholics demanded a church of their own. In 1913, the thirteen copper onion domes of the St. Nicholas Ukrainian Catholic Cathedral rose from Chicago's grid, just five blocks away. A second wave of immigrants from the region arrived in the neighborhood after the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and the Russian Civil War, these unequivocally Ukrainian, having tasted, briefly, Ukrainian independence in the chaos of 1917. Against Moscow's directive, these Chicago Ukrainians contributed a pavilion to Chicago 1933 Century of Progress exhibition, the only national pavilion not the work of a nation-state.

The generation of Marta's parents solidified the Ukrainian hold on the neighborhood, creating such unifying institutions as the Ukrainian Selfreliance Federal Credit Union and the museum whose lobby we were standing in. Though there is also a Ukrainian National Museum, specializing in embroidery and Easter eggs and the like, this museum is full of strong lines, bold colors, and abstract expression--making it unabashedly modern. Human figures reduced themselves to arresting silhouettes, or else thick masses affected human form. A wire skeleton of a cylinder seethed with potential energy like the unbuilt Monument to the Third International. It was the kind of Ukraine not just a tradition to look back on, but a tradition to carry forward while the home territory was momentarily held back.

The Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art, we saw, was not just showing a retrospective on Andrij Kowalenko but also the work of a younger generation. Accompanying the icons Kowalenko fashioned from scraps of newspaper and bottle caps were pieces from the children of the St. Nicholas Cathedral School made with an even wider array of materials. Floppy magnetic disks became flying saucers over a computer's silicon innards. An empty plastic jug wore a Yankees cap.

And we got to meet one of the artists! Andrij Kowalenko is twenty years gone, but Sophia was there with her mother to look at her class's work. The two were walking around the exhibition space, pointing, taking pictures, and discussing the artwork in Ukrainian. We approached them, but only the girl responded in English when we asked if she had made anything on display. She showed us what she had, a butterfly.

The Ukrainian restaurant Marta had recommended to us for dinner has recently been ceded to the Jamaicans. Mr. Brown's Lounge had its grand opening the Tuesday before our visit, replacing Sak's Ukrainian Village Restaurant in the position opposite Sts. Volodymyr and Olha. We had another place picked out, but to pass the time before dinner, and wait for Alex and Ricardo to join us, we headed to Cafe Ballou on Western Ave. I had been to the cafe before, my only previous foray into Ukrainian Village, and two years ago I sat there almost alone in a wooden chair I couldn't quite manage to get comfortable in, under maps and black and white photographs hanging from the cream-colored walls and lamps hanging like a pearl necklace from the ceiling. Yowling swing and subdued orchestral recordings completed the milieu. It felt like Vienna in the twenties, the refuge of a culture already defeated but not quite yet departed.

Perhaps that was a prescient intimation, for today the place is under new ownership, and while not everything has changed, its double as colorful, the radio plays contemporary fare, and there were actually customers. We sipped our Moroccan mint tea, lounging on floor pillows thrown around a knee-level table, where once doilies had covered a table twice as tall. Uncertain times had turned our Viennese cafe into an opium den, or maybe this was now the palace of some Tatar khan of the Crimea. Or the hip syncretism of a 21st century American metropolis.

Dinner was served at an establishment with fewer pretensions, Old Lviv Ukrainian Buffet. Here, soup comes in clay jars that narrow at the rim and the rest of the food in trays under heating lamps. The cafeteria-style presentation is not the most appealing, but I can assure you the food is without exception delicious. Thick, heavy, meaty, gruely and delicious.

We had the spread to ourselves, being the only patrons, but we were hardly alone. Upon entering the restaurant, we were greeted by a fairy princess, or a girl dressed up as one, and when Anna tried to tell her she was the cutest little girl in the world, her mother apologized that she probably couldn't understand. There was an abortive attempt to get the girl to sing the alphabet, the Latin one, but she preferred to stick with Ukrainian, which the family spoke among themselves.

Still, she seemed as content watching a Batman cartoon as the Ukrainian children's program that followed, a Rankin/Bass-like stop-motion production, with half the frame rate and realistic lighting for winter at the north pole.

Our server was the teenage son, who says they've been living in the United States for about ten years now, first in Ukrainian Village but now in the suburbs. He'd like to return to Ukraine, at least to visit, but so far it hasn't been possible. When asked whether he thought of Chicago or Ukraine as his home, he said he didn't really know, but whether he said so out of real ambivalence or adolescent diffidence I can't say. As we left the restaurant, the little pixie blew Anna a kiss, which only confirmed her status as absolutely the cutest little girl in the world.

Maybe one day she'll become a docent at the Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art, or be exhibited there, and maybe she will one day worry about what the next wave of Ukrainians is doing to the neighborhood. Or maybe it will all remain a childhood memory, a realm that in the early 21st century lingered half way between her parents' world and her own.

University of Chicago Medical Center's Haiti Earthquake Response

01.20.10
To: All UCMC & BSD Staff
From: Carolyn Wilson, RN, COO
Funmi Olopade, MD, Associate Dean for Global Health

We continue to work closely with the University and various relief agencies to gather resources for the people of Haiti and to assist those of you who want to contribute your clinical skills directly or through generous donations to the overall relief effort.
Medical Assistance in Haiti

A group of 12 UCMC staff (surgeons, anesthesiologists, emergency medicine physicians, and nurses) is preparing to travel to Haiti, or possibly the Dominican Republic, in partnership with a non-governmental organization (NGO) based in the region. Deployment will happen as soon as we receive the go-ahead from one of our NGO partners.

At this time, medical relief agencies can only accommodate volunteers with significant surgical or trauma training and experience. They are seeking: surgeons, especially trauma or orthopedic surgeons; full surgical teams, including anesthesiologists, scrub and post-op nurses, and nurse anesthetists; and emergency medicine doctors and nurses.

Since we anticipate continued need for medical professionals in trauma-related fields going to Haiti on a rotating basis, we encourage others who are interested in contributing to this effort to please email us at haitianrelief@uchospitals.edu. Emergency medicine physicians Chrissy Babcock and Christian Theodosis can also provide guidance to medical personnel searching for the best way to play a role in this crucial medical and humanitarian effort. Please note that the work time spent away from the Medical Center serving in this Haitian relief effort will be fully compensated.

If you are a medical professional in one of those fields interested in offering your service, please include the following information:

* Clinical specialty
* Emergency/post-catastrophe experience
* Language skills (especially French or Creole) and level of ability
* Your availability--dates and length of time

Financial Assistance

The University of Chicago Medical Center has agreed to match gifts by Medical Center and University employees and faculty to the Haiti disaster relief fund up to a total of $250,000. Funds collected though this system will be donated to the Clinton Bush Haiti Fund. In order to make a gift that is eligible for this match--which doubles the value of your contribution--please follow these instructions carefully.

To make a gift online:

* Go to http://alumniandfriends.uchicago.edu and select the Give Now box (below the big picture).
* On the next page, select the Give Now button again to be taken to the Make a Gift Online form.
* Under Your Gift, go to the Area of Giving drop-down menu. Select Other, which is the last selection available at the bottom of the list.
* Complete the form in its entirety, including each line of the billing information section. Please do not check the box that states "Same as contact information."
* In the box labeled Comment, under Special Instructions, please type in "Haiti Relief."
* You will receive an electronic confirmation message from the University, and a receipt that can be used for tax purposes will be sent to you via U.S. Mail. You will also be sent periodic email updates about the University of Chicago Medical Center's efforts to help the victims of the disaster in Haiti including updates about contributions made to the Disaster Relief Fund and matching gifts made as a result of your contributions.

To make a gift via U.S. Mail:

Please make you check payable to the University of Chicago and write "Haiti Relief" in the memo section.

Your check can be mailed to:

Disaster Relief Fund
University of Chicago
1427 East 60th Street, Suite 120
Chicago, IL 60637

A receipt that can be used for tax purposes will be sent to you via U.S. Mail.

As an alternative, the University Community Service Center has assembled a Web page with guidance for those interested in donating to the relief effort and links to international relief organizations. That page, as well as the Office of Multicultural Student Affairs Web page, has information on student-led initiatives. As new efforts arise, those will be added to the lists.

Dear Faculty and Staff,

UChicago for Haiti is a consolidated effort from a variety of organizations around campus who want to provide long-term support for victims of the earthquake in Haiti. Below this email is a letter containing more information about this collaborative effort, which has been a remarkable success. In only three days of tabling at the Reynolds Club, we have collected $2,500.00. Students have also said that in their entire time at the University this has been the largest, most efficient, and quickly established joint effort among student organizations on campus.

We would be even more successful if other members of our community would lend their support. If staff and faculty members would be willing to make a donation of $50.00 or more we could reach our goal of sending at least $5000.00 to Haiti. The money will be sent as a University of Chicago certified check, sanctioned by our advisor, Wallace Goode. This check will be sent directly to Partners in Health, an NGO that has worked in Haiti for a number of years. We welcome further collaboration with any other interested party and support from University faculty and staff members. Please support us by forwarding this message to your colleagues.

For further information, please feel free to contact Adama Wiltshire (adama@uchicago.edu / 773-318-0416) or Judith Kituku ( kituku@uchicago.edu). Any help would be appreciated.

Thank you.

UCHICAGO FOR HAITI

In an attempt to consolidate the efforts of student organizations concerned with supporting relief efforts in Haiti, UChicago for Haiti was formed. This group incorporates the efforts of Beats & Pieces, ACSA, PRSA, Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity Inc, F.I.E.R.C.E, OBS, PAECE and a number of independent students from both graduate and undergraduate divisions. The primary objective of UChicago for Haiti is to provide opportunities for the campus community to support long-term relief efforts to the victims of the recent earthquake in Haiti. We believe that through collaboration, we can effectively share resources, manpower and conduct joint advertising campaigns for all events on campus. We hope that through these events our organization will promote awareness of Haitians' plight and the need to support members of our UChicago community who are most affected by this tragedy.

We hope to use a series of events, fund raising drives and arts programs to collect monetary donations, clothing, medical supplies, food and water. UChicago for Haiti will co-ordinate a massive campus wide network of collection sites to provide opportunities for all members of the University community and the surrounding neighborhoods to donate items to support relief efforts. We hope to begin this project on Friday January 22, 2010. Groups have already agreed to man collection posts and be responsible for the timely transportation and storage of items. There will also be collection posts during many cultural events on campus.

We welcome further collaboration with any other interested party and support from the University administration. For further information, please feel free to contact Adama Wiltshire (adama@uchicago.edu / 773-318-0416) or Judith Kituku (kituku@uchicago.edu).

Thank you for your support!

Adama Wiltshire

Member of UChicago for Haiti

Below is the University's initial response to the earthquake in Haiti. For more information on the University's response, how to donate funds, items, volunteer or other information, please click the links to the right.

To: Members of the University Community
From: Kimberly Goff-Crews, Vice President for Campus Life and Dean of Students in the University
Re: Haiti earthquake response
January 15, 2010

Each day the scope of the disaster in Haiti and the enormity of suffering become more apparent. Our hearts go out to all those touched by this calamity and those who await word on loved ones.

In a special way, our thoughts are with members of the University community who may have family, friends or colleagues in Haiti. Since news of the earthquake first broke, staff members in my office have been working with colleagues across the University, as well as government officials and private citizens, to locate members of our community who may have been in Haiti at the time of the earthquake and to ascertain their well-being. So far the news has been good, but because communications are so limited, we do not know when we will be able to answer that question definitively. In addition, we are offering support to students, staff or faculty who have family members in Haiti affected by the disaster.

Many of you want to help the people of Haiti. The University Community Service Center has assembled a web page with guidance and links to international relief organizations: https://blogs.uchicago.edu/chicagostudies/2010/01/disaster_in_haiti.html. That page, as well as the Office of Multicultural Student Affairs at omsa.uchicago.edu, have information on a student-led fundraising, clothing and toiletries drive, with drop-off sites at the Reynolds Club and at OMSA's office at 5710 S. Woodlawn. As other new efforts arise, we will make note of them on the University's website.

A special space has been set aside in Rockefeller Chapel for those who want to pray or grieve or leave remembrances of those affected by the earthquake. Members of the University's many faith communities will remember the people of Haiti at their regular gatherings, and special prayers will be included in Sunday morning worship at Rockefeller at 11 a.m. An interfaith act of remembrance will take place at the Chapel on Tuesday, Jan. 19 at 5 p.m., a week after the time of the earthquake.

If you have questions or suggestions about the University's response to the disaster in Haiti, please e-mail ucsc@uchicago.edu. Please write to that address with any new relief efforts or observances at the University, as well, so that we can share them with the broader community.

by Anne Groggel, Staff Writer for the University Community Service Center Newsletter

For undergraduate Leyla Gutierrez, last Saturday began as usual, with breakfast. However, this time she shared her morning coffee with over 1,200 second and third-year students and 300 alumni, who gathered in the Loop for 'Taking the Next Step' (TNS). TNS is an annual forum where alumni give back to students, offering practical career advice and the opportunity to re-imagine their career potential beyond the scope of their program of study.

Fields in the non-profit sector, and the importance of volunteerism were highlighted at this year’s TNS, which drew alumni for diverse panels, ranging from Banking and Financial Services to Education, Teaching, and Policy. Gutierrez attended a session on NGOs, Policy and International Relations. It was "a great networking opportunity—I walked away with a great contact to help me seek internships," she said.

Taking the Next Step is " an effective way to interact with professionals," according to Scott Morris AB ’86, MBA ’92.

Whether attending panels, lunch roundtables, or taking in the message of keynote speaker David Medina AB ‘91, students like Collen Belak, class 2012, found solace in hearing about alumni experiences. "It was reassuring knowing that they were once where I am now," Belak said.

Medina currently serves as the Peace Corps' Director of Public Engagement and External Relations. As Director he manages national Peace Corps initiatives that promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of Americans. Medina also builds and maintains partnerships between the Peace Corps and non-profit organizations in the United States. Growing up 15 minutes outside of Hyde Park he "wanted to devote my life to helping the poor and I knew U of C would do just that.”

Medina recalled talking about his shared experiences of South Side Chicago. Medina's CV is not only impressive, it speaks to the importance of student involvement early on in areas they are passionate about. While he stressed that "learning how to think critically and collaborate with individuals from many different backgrounds" as something he gained from the University of Chicago he urged students to gravitate more toward community service. During a panel session he explained that extracurricular activities are one of the things he considers when interviewing candidates. “It was interesting to hear their stories about community service because it shows how to find a balance between getting a career and serving others," said fourth-year Evette Addai.

Daniel Peiser, AB '84 recommended that students volunteer. "For a career in the not-for-profit field, volunteerism offers students an excellent avenue for both entering the field and faster career advancement. " He currently works as a consultant in not-for-profit management and development. Peiser shared his experience with students having spent over twenty years working for non-profits in Canada and the United States.

Peiser introduced volunteering as a functional entry for students to learn areas in organizations while giving students "a chance to do good” through volunteering for an organization that may relate to their chosen career field.

“The SummerLinks program, [for example], is a great opportunity for students who are contemplating a career in community service - one which I wish I'd had back when I was in The College," he said.

Our thoughts go out to the people of Haiti, Chicagoans, UChicagoans and all those around the world impacted by the disaster. Chicago was founded by Haitian Jean Baptiste Point du Sable; in many ways we owe our existence in this location to Haiti.  Chicago's Haitian-American community numbers in the tens of thousands.

• Information on Financial Contributions
• Information on Volunteering
  
• Information on Donating Items
• Additional Information
  

***UPDATE***02/03/10***

• The effort of UChicago for Haiti raised more than $10,000! Thank you to all who donated and volunteered to make this possible. Thanks to the UCMC for matching the more than $5,000 raised by the effort!
  

• Students Unite to Provide Relief for Haiti

• University of Chicago medical team in place for Haitian relief effort.

• 2/12/10 -  Traffic Light Party for the benefit of the Haiti Disaster Relief Fund - The International House Residents' Council will hold the largest Valentine's Day party on campus- the Traffic Light Party on February 12 - for the benefit of the Haiti Disaster Relief Fund.  We welcome your in-kind donations at the International House at 1414 E. 59th Street. For more information, please contact George Vassilev at georgevass@uchicago.edu  
  

• Tues, Feb 9, 6 pm, 5710 W. Woodlawn - Teach-in on Haiti - CLAS, CSRPC, and OMSA Host a Teach-in on Haiti. Featuring a panel of UChicago faculty, students, representatives from the Haitian Community and the UofC Medical Center. 

• Friday, Feb 5, 1:30 - 6 pm - "The Many Faces of Haiti" Collage. Reynolds Club Marketplace. This week come out on Friday to make a collage of pictures of Haiti and rejuvenate your commitment to standing up for Haiti!! The collage will be a 40" x 60" impression of Haiti before and after the earthquake.The pictures and everything will be on the table, just bring your jolly self and your two friends and put your impression on "The Many Faces of Haiti."  The collage will be housed in Reynolds for a few days as testimony to our hard work and will be permanently housed in one of the hallways of the Office of Multicultural Student Affairs(OMSA).

• Local French and Creole Translators Needed for Haiti Relief Effort  American Red Cross needs French and/or Creole translators to support shelter operations for Haiti evacuees. January 28 - February 20. Shifts Daily: Evening Shift:  6:30pm - midnight; Overnight Shift:  midnight - 6am; Daytime:  anytime between 6am - 6pm. Shelter location near O'Hare Airport. Email cooperm@usa.redcross.org with name, email, cell phone & desired shift (date & time)

***UPDATE***01/21/10***

• Letter from UChicago for Haiti - Student/RSO-led relief effort
  

***UPDATE***01/18/10

• Hot chocolate ($2) and tea ($1) are being Tuesday to Friday, Cobb 10am to 2pm, Reynolds Club 9 to 5pm and Saturday at the International Food Festival. Organized by the African and Caribbean Students Association (ACSA).  All proceeds go to victims in Haiti.
  

***UPDATE***01/15/10

• Letter to Members of the University Community from Vice President Kim Goff-Crews
  
• Fundraising by RSOs has raised more than $1,300 for relief. You still have an opportunity to give cash donations on Tuesday in the Reynolds Club Marketplace from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.
• A special space has been set aside in Rockefeller Chapel for those who want to pray or grieve or leave remembrances of those affected by the earthquake. Members of the University's many faith communities will be remember the people of Haiti at their regular gatherings, and special prayers will be included in Sunday morning worship at Rockefeller at 11 a.m. 
• An interfaith act of remembrance will take place at Rockefeller Chapel on Tuesday January 19 at 5 p.m., a week after the time of the earthquake.
• Sun-Times list of local benefits/fundraisers for Haiti Relief
  
• If you have any new relief efforts, observances at the University, questions or suggestions about the University's response to the disaster in Haiti, please email ucsc@uchicago.edu.

***UPDATE***01/14/10
You can make donations to the Red Cross and Partners in Health at tables in the Reynolds Club Marketplace. The tables are organized by RSOs Beats and Pieces, African Caribbean Students Association, and Puerto Rican Students Association.  Tables will be staffed Thursday, January 14 through Tuesday, January 19. 

From the White House's webpage:
"You can also help immediately by donating to the Red Cross to assist the relief effort. Contribute online to the Red Cross, or donate $10 to be charged to your cell phone bill by texting "HAITI" to "90999." Find more ways to help through the Center for International Disaster Information."

International Relief Organizations:

• American Red Cross
• Medicins Sans Frontiers/Doctors Without Borders
• Partners in Health
• Yele - http://www.yele.org/ (Thanks to Vanessa Fabbre, see comment below for more details.)
• There are many more relief organizations doing great work in Haiti. This list is not intended to be comprehensive and may be updated from time to time.  Here is the InterAction List of Organizations responding to the crisis in Haiti.
  

Chicago Area Organizations/News

• Haitian American Community Association
• Haitian Congress to Fortify Haiti (Evanston)
• Chicago Organizations Join the Relief Effort
• Chicago Area Haitians Respond
  

What about donations of food, clothing, or other supplies?
While usually done with the best intentions, in-kind donations can often be more complicated for organizations both where you are and where you want to send the items. From the CIDI "Guidelines for Donating":

• "Financial contributions allow professional relief organizations to purchase exactly what is most urgently needed by disaster victims and to pay for the transportation necessary to distribute those supplies. Unlike in-kind donations, cash donations entail no transportation cost. In addition, cash donations allow relief supplies to be purchased at locations as near to the disaster site as possible. Supplies, particularly food, can almost always be purchased locally - even in famine situations. This approach has the triple advantage of stimulating local economies (providing employment, generating cash flow), ensuring that supplies arrive as quickly as possible and reducing transport and storage costs. Cash contributions to established legitimate relief agencies are always considerably more beneficial than the donation of commodities."

We will update this post as more information becomes available.

A different take what Chicago legends are:

• See John Hodgman's Four Dubious Fables of Chicago from the Chicago Humanities Festival. He insists that Chicago is mythical, although there may be Chicagoans...
  
• A recent Trib article pointed out some strange anachronisms on Google maps (thanks to the Map Room blog for the reference).
• Chicago Home for Incurables (thanks to the Library for the Info).  I've been on staff at UofC for almost 10 years now, and the online zoning map labeled my office, the Court Theater, the Smart Museum, and the Young Building as the Chicago Home for Incurables. For better or worse, the city's zoning map is now updated, at least for the 5500 block of South Ellis.

While we're on the subject of Chicago legends, this Sunday and next, Doc Films is screening "The Front Page" and "Scarface" (1932 version with Paul Muni). Scarface is the story of an Al Capone figure's rise and violent fall. The Front Page is based on the play by Ben Hecht, former Chicago Daily News columnist.  Check out One Thousand and One Afternoons in Chicago - a new edition published by UofC Press last year.

It's hard to keep an ear to the ground when it's so darn cold out, so I'm trying out a new feature: a regular re-cap of interesting news items of city-wide, local and campus importance.

City news—Is it warm out here? Chicago weather will hit above-freezing this week for the first time since Christmas Day's unseasonable 43 degrees. Not exactly reason to break out a tank top, but maybe now my hands won't turn into icicles every time I fumble to retrieve my CTA card from inside my wallet.

South Side news—3 months after Chicago lost the Olympic bid, and still no word from the city on what will take the place of the Olympic Village in its massive reconstruction project at Michael Reese Hospital. I wrote this story for the Chicago News Coop last week, and my fingers really did turn into icicles when I attempted some man-on-the-street reporting up in Bronzeville.

Campus news—52nd Street has a new bakery, the Chicago Weekly reports. Sounds like a yummy way to keep warm (Note to self: don't write a blog post right after running across the snow-capped quadrangle to get to work.)

The Sustainability Council is sponsoring a free Winter Gardening Workshop on Tuesday in Swift Hall:

Julia Govis (Master Gardener/International Organic Farm Inspector) will demonstrate and explain ways in which you can grow your own organic meals indoors this winter. There will be a Q & A session after the demonstration and materials will be available to take away to try the techniques presented during the workshop at home.

A friend of mine once joked that you had better bring a contamination suit, signal flares and an armored bear or two back to Chicago with you for Winter Quarter—"You'll be happy to have the bear along when you still encounter those English majors getting their nic fix outside of Cobb," he said. He wears open-toed sandals year-round, which as far as I'm concerned discredits any advice he has to give about winter survival. But I'm clad in Gore Tex-equipped, North Face snow boots, and I've come up with five or so ideas for making winter easier on the student, (short of hibernating in a dorm room through January):

Shoes —a sturdy pair of heavy winter boots is essential this time of year (especially if you need to make a quick get away, what with all the armored bears around), and even more so if you plan to spend January frolicking through the snow than falling on your ass the ice.

Fortunately, not all ice exists to trip you up—and though you probably won't be resorting to skating to class anytime soon (unless the alternating periods of warming and freezing get really extreme), there are several locations in Chicago designed just for such ice-friendly footwear: namely, Midway Rink, which is probably located just a few blocks away from where you live, and the Millennium Park Ice Rink, open through March 14.

Fitness—Speaking of exercise, Winter doesn’t have to be a bane for hardcore runners like myself; I take the sleet as an invitation to cross-train, which can sometimes mean pool workouts and yoga at Ratner, but also leaves a lot of room to go exploring indoors: the north and south sides both have fantastic rock climbing gyms, one at the Formula Fitness Club's Red-line/Division location. The other, ">Climb On, is right across the street from the Homewood Metra Station. Many Chicago gyms like FFC and Equinox offer free, week-long trial memberships with complementary group fitness classes. Nothing says Winter like aerobics classes that sound like they came from a cereal box ("Cardio Crunch" much?).

Transit —Winter can be a frightening time to be a biker or El commuter, and this year is no different. With more than 1000 employees scheduled for layoffs this February, and other CTA workers being fored to take up to 18 unpaid days off of work in early 2010, factor serious delays into your travel time. Biking is also an option, if you have the right mindset, equipment, and built-in wind resistance, as this Columbia College article suggests.

Food—For the first time this year, The Green City Market is open year round, and Jan. 16 is the next date. While you probably won’t find the summer’s gorgeous Sun Gold tomatoes, take advantage of the organic jarred jams, tomato preserves and all manner of berry compotes and nut butters to remind you of the fleeting taste of summer.

Arts—In the spirit of indoor exploring, many of Chicago's museums are attracting locals in the tourism off-season with a slew of free admission days, including the Art Institute and Shed Aquarium, though you may have to wait until February to take advantage of it. The most up-to-date list I've seen can be found here.