Frozen Onions and Senior Centers

Q: What do frozen onions and senior centers have in common?
A: City Harvest.

Explanation:
This morning the eight interns got a tour of City Harvest's 45,400 sq. ft. warehouse facility, which includes a zero-degree freezer for food that has started to rot and is waiting to be composted. Yay for no waste!

the Food Rescue Facility (warehouse) view across the East River to the Manhattan skyline

ice in the freezerrrrr

The shelves are mostly bare because the workers move quickly to get the produce distributed as soon as possible.

We split up in the afternoon and each visited one of the grocery stores where we'll be leading our tours. I went to the one in Queens, to a store called Mi Tierra where I'll be able to do tours in Spanish (!!!). Of course I got ridiculously off-track on the subways getting there from the warehouse (which is also in Queens) but I was in no rush so it was fine.

After introducing myself to the store manager, I walked around the neighborhood for two hours checking out community organizations nearby who could be good potential partners for recruiting tour participants. I spoke to several social worker-type people, like a social worker at a senior center and the Director of Parent Involvement at an elementary school (I made up that title but you get the picture). Also wrote down names and addresses of many churches and other social organizations in the area.

I limped home, feeling successful but exhausted, in my cute little flats which had rubbed my feet raw in four places. In Tarboro I can just go barefoot :(

Continued my third straight evening googling things to do, places to see, and bars and restaurants to visit. Can't wait for this weekend! I have plans to visit museums and gardens, see an outdoor short film screening, get a free tour of the Brooklyn Brewery, check out an arts festival, visit a City Harvest mobile market, listen to Walt Whitman being read in a park, see a Puerto Rico Day celebration parade, and hear live jazz. Can't wait to jump into all the fun and exciting things this city has to offer!

Introduction to City Harvest

I love my job. Love is a strong word — and it's only the first day — but from what I've seen in seven hours of orientation, I love this organization. I love what they do and how they do it, and I love the role I get to play in it.

Founded in 1983, City Harvest is the world's first food rescue organization — which means they gather leftover food (food that would otherwise be thrown away) in places of surplus and deliver it to places of need. City Harvest acts as the middleman to make extra food from grocery stores, farms, restaurants, hotels, special events and food drives available to low-income communities that have a deficit of nutrient-dense food.

I especially love that City Harvest has a heavy focus on nutrient dense food; they're not just out to feed people, but to feed people well. More than 60% of the food distributed in the past year was fresh produce. That's the biggest difference between a food pantry and a food rescue organization: food pantries are limited to nonperishables and therefore cannot provide their beneficiaries with fresh produce.

Not only is the work of City Harvest impressively practical in saving food that would otherwise go to waste and admirably selective in its focus on nutrient dense food, especially fresh produce — the organization's approach is also on an immense scale and awesomely holistic. In addition to its food rescue work, which will collect 46 million pounds of food in 2014, City Harvest also runs many outreach programs. These range from mobile markets and cooking demonstrations to awareness events for hunger in NYC. The program most pertinent to me is the Cooking Matters At The Store (CMATS) grocery store tour, which is designed to teach small groups of people how to shop for healthy food on a limited budget.

This summer, I will be organizing and leading at least 10 tours in grocery stores in low-income neighborhoods of NYC, along with an intern partner. The next couple of weeks are booked up with training and information sessions, but I'll start to establish community partners (organizations to help me find tour participants) as early as tomorrow!

Also, the internship coordinator's obvious enthusiasm and passion for the job makes this already appealing deal even more exciting. I couldn't be happier about where I am this summer.

stacks on stacks of supa cool informational handouts

Day 1 in the Big Apple

I like looking for themes in my life, and I couldn't resist this one.

But really, what is it with me and apples? When I named this blog, I didn't realize it would become a motif in my life. I originally chose the name of an apple variety because:
1. I like eating fruit, especially apples.
2. I like learning, which apples symbolize.
3. One of my favorite student organizations at UNC is a service-learning program called APPLES.
4. Apples grow on trees and I like climbing trees (a stretch I know; just go with it).

And now the Braeburn Blog has made it to what I wonder might be its peak: the Big Apple. The stars have aligned, and here we are.

My incredibly convenient train from Rocky Mount arrived in Penn Station last night. After dropping off my stuff in the apartment (which I was immensely relieved to know existed) (my housing search is a long, painful story not worth recounting), I went to dinner with my roommate Ellie and her mom. Ellie is a friend from Duke whose room I shared in the spring of sophomore year when I was at Duke for my Robertson "Semester Switch." I am very happy to have a flatmate this summer who is not only already my friend but also someone whom I already know is easy to live with!

We dined at a small, classy Spanish-inspired restaurant very close to the apartment. I ate every bite of my deliciously flavorful mushroom fettucini (and also enjoyed getting to know Ellie's mom and catching up on what the two of them had been up to this weekend). Ellie's enthusiasm for the city definitely augments mine and helped settle my initial (and typical) arrival fears/worries.

This morning I slept in then went for a beautiful run in Central Park. Living the dream 100%.

feels surreal

This is how close my apartment is to Central Park.

After a couple of grocery shopping trips, I spent most of the afternoon online researching things to do in the city this summer and organizing Google docs of music festivals, outdoor theater performances, and cafes and restaurants to check out. Maybe I do have a career in trip planning after all... At least for now, I've got my hands full planning my own summer plus my grandparents' upcoming weekend visit. (Hopefully by then I'll be familiar enough with the city to be their tour guide!)

my bedroom. creepy lighting because of the lamp, but it's actually a really cozy room — and the window is 70% sky!

living room (I took down all the uncomfortably personal photographs left by the original tenant.)
the doorway on the right is to my bedroom

cute little kitchen (Ellie's room is off to the right — and we each get our own bathroom!)