by Shirly Adams
Guest writer
Food is a fantastic vehicle for learning about people with different backgrounds. Music, according to Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, “is the universal language of mankind.” Members of Cultural Bridges and St. Joseph’s Somali community gathered May 21 at Resurrection Church Fellowship Hall to continue to build cultural understanding by sharing food (making sambusas, eating ice cream and homemade cookies and drinking Somali tea, making music (African drumming) and by acquainting the Somali families with summer activities for their children. Joan Thralow, a CB member, obtained a grant from Thrivent Financial to fund the refreshments for the gathering.
The sharing of cultures began with Liin Guure, a CB member and a member of the Somali community, and Thralow shopping together for the ingredients to make the sambusas going to a Somali owned store and to a locally owned store.
It continued with the Somali women teaching members of CB how to make sambusas which is not an easy task. It is a multi-step process. First you cook the meat stuffing (ground beef, onions, garlic, jalapeno peppers, carrots, fresh cilantro and spices.) Then you make the wrapper – a dough mixture of flour, water and oil rolled out and cut into squares and “fried” in a skillet. Next you shape the wrappers and fill them with the meat stuffing using a flour and water paste to seal them, the paste reminded me of what we made for paper mache projects. Then you deep fry them until golden brown. The final product is a crispy, triangle dough filled with wonderful-tasting meat. Well worth the effort!
Sitarah Gjerme, a CB member whose parents are from India, further added to the cultural understanding by sharing that sambusas are like Samosas, a traditional dish of South Asia and the Middle East. She explained sambusas are meat based, while Samosas are vegetable based and that Samosas are usually served with a spicy sauce, which she quickly made to go with the sambusas.
Dan Hudson, a CB member, shared with the Somali parents the opportunity for their children, ages 8-13, to attend camp at Star Lake Wilderness Camp, a 425-acre camp in Crow Wing County, for a week in July. He also shared with the kids the experience he had when he attended Star Lake, both as a camper and a counselor, and how he hopes they will have a similar, wonderful experience. He talked about the fun of tent camping, campfire cooking and learning about nature, while also enjoying drumming, crafting, canoeing, volleyball and hiking. Hudson is coordinating the camping project. Because of a generous anonymous donation, there will be no cost.
The gathering ended with Jeff Velline, a CB member, leading the kids in a short “drum circle” to give the kids a sample of what camp will be like. Velline supplied the African drums and explained that drumming connects us to our past and to our present. He explained it is about rhythm and we all have rhythm within us as our heart beats and that drumming circles are communal and improvisational and common both in the United States and Somalia.
To contact Cultural Bridges go to joetownculturalbridges@gmail.com or to learn more Cultural Bridges of St. Joseph, MN | Facebook.
From left to right; Kathy Haselhorst, Liin Guure, Sitarah Gjerme and Shirley Adams making traditional Somali sambusas at Cultural Bridges event.
