Caritas

This is the Caritas soup kitchen. Located behind Rome’s central train station it is run entirely by volunteers and funded by the Vatican. I assist every Thursday from 17:00 to 20:30 during which time we provide food to over 500 people. My official job is patrolling the dining area, refilling people’s pitchers, cleaning the tables and helping with any problems that arise. I am fortunate to be able to spend some of this time meeting the people for whom we provide food. Every Thursday I am given the chance to sit face-to-face with the poorest and most downtrodden people in Rome; I get to listen to their stories, tell them my own and help them wherever I can. For the amount I learn, the amount of direct help I give, and the courage it builds inside me, volunteering for Caritas is the most meaningful service I do.

The most important part of working in Caritas is the relationships I have formed with the people there. The second largest group after the Italians are African immigrants, most of them illegal, homeless, unemployed and living on one meal a day. I spend most of my time with them. Perhaps it is due to my interest in Islamic culture and the opportunity to practice speaking French and writing in Arabic. Perhaps it is due to the stories they tell or the fact that they are generally the most easygoing, sociable crowd.

Though I don’t always meet super-intellects like Ali—who speaks French, English and Italian, has a university degree and knows heaps about Islam—I have never had a boring conversation with anyone there. I have heard countless stories; of travelling through deserts for a fortnight, of being crammed onto crowded boats for unthinkable fees, of being promised papers and shelter on the other side yet receiving neither. It is humbling to see how positive they are after the hardships most of them have gone through. I have met people that have been in Rome for two years, sleeping in the street, with no documents, and unable to get a job, and yet they have a bright view of the future and are content with what they have.

Telling stories of my own life is where I learn the most. Initially I felt embarrassed to even mention that I was going to go to university, because of some subconscious fear of being judged on my comparative wealth. I quickly realized that just as I wanted the best for them, they wanted the best for me. And though they had nothing to give physically, I received the most unexpected and encouraging advice. After Mahmoud from Ethiopia told me about his two week journey through the desert and his subsequent adventures from Sicily up to Rome, he asked me what I wanted to be. I said I wanted to be a writer, expecting a comment about how that was not a way to make money, and yet I got the complete opposite. He became immediately excited and promised to write me down his story so that one day I could publish it.