This picture looks like we should have our own tv show like Friends.

Sugar

I think the story was very good. The story made me think about how a doctor has to really know how to do his job in order to really help a person. In the story a 6 year old girl's parents brought her to the doctor and told them something was wrong with her. Jumping around, staring blank into space, (something you would think a 6 year old child does from time to time). The doctor looked at a normal child and was ready to send her off with some Tylenol and call it a day. It takes more then that. When becoming a doctor you have to know the right questions to ask and symptoms a person might have. A person can look at someone and not know what's wrong with that person. A doctor on the other hand has to really look at a person and ask questions about him/her. I think this story really gives me good idea how things really are in the doctor's office and make me think about the things they have to go through.

Today's reading

This afternoon we read two short stories, "The Unknown Assailant"and "Sugar".Which made me think about does the type of person someone is really effect how a doctor does there job? During our discussion the question of "would you treat the person who got shot and the shooter with the same amount of care?" And my personal opinion was that I would because it would be my job, and I'm not the one in charge of punishing that person. Also since I'm interested in medicine the story "Sugar" lets me know that even if your patient doesn't look like somethings wrong with them that you act upon them as if there was because you wouldn't want to be responsible for a bad outcome.

Wild out Wednesday

Yesterday was fun and exciting, first we had that very interesting sex education presentation from team Woodlawn. Good job team Woodlawn for acting so professional durning the uncomfortable moments with the banana and the condom. I wish we could have cooked at Common Threads. Dancing Merengue was very fun and I wish that Whitney and Imari would have been there. i love the whole idea of Common Threads and what they do. Everyone there had a great attitude towards their work and I think that was important. Maybe if I have time I would like to volunteer with them in the future!

Hey sspers, I letting everyone know that my first walking group is coming up Friday at 8PM and Saturday at 9AM. So i'm hoping that anyone that can come does!

scared whit

This is a story written by Whitney, I just posted it for her.



So it's been a long day. It was 10:05pm when I got in the house from outside. I was on the other side with the LAFA's. Every time I go back on my side with the GD's. They would always talk about me going over to the other side. They don't like it. I never really cared what they thought, I have friends over there and would keep going to go see them. By the time 10:40pm hit, I heard gun shot's. I was thinking about it. When I came back on my side my friend Mike said he was going to stop me from going over there, but I thought he was just talking like always. I didn't think today would be the day he would be for real.The gun shots weren't from my side. They were from the other side. I got my cell phone and called Jason. I heard yelling in the back ground, he said he was going to call me back, these n****'s wont war!! After that phone call I wasn't sure what to think. I was so scared I wonted to go back out but, I wasn't sure if that would be a good idea. I called my best friend Domo to make sure she was safe.She was. I heard the guys from my side of the block on the other side shooting at the LAFA's. I know they all jumped in Ham,Mike,and Sparks car to go over there. Clarissa (Jason sister) texted me and said I should try and get Jason to come in the house before he got hurt. I called his 15 times in counting. He wasn't picking up. I knew he knew that I was calling to get him to go in the house. He wasn't trying to hear it. When 11:40pm hit that's when every thing got crazy. I heard a lot of car chasing outside. This was from my block all the way to the other side. I heard the cars stop 2 blocks away. Then I heard yelling. I could hear Mike yelling at Ham saying "HERE THEY COME!!" Then I heard more cars rushing down the street and gun shots,Then driving off. After that I could hear people from the other side yelling out of their car,"YEAH Y'ALL N****'S DON'T WONT THAT ON Y'ALL HEADS!!" I was scared something bad had happend to Mike,I didn't hear him yelling any more. I texted his cell phone. He didn't text back. I left that a lone. Then at 12:12am I heard guns just going off. Non-stop. (-thinking to my self-No one stops to reload their guns anymore?)through all this, I wonted to hear why I didn't hear any police sirens and the police station is 6 blocks from the other side. That's why I hate cricket police. They don't care about anything. Then I didn't hear anything any more. It's 12:56am. I"m texting and calling every body I think that would have been in this. (From both side's). No one is saying anything back, or calling me back. I heard 2 cars around the corner from my house. My niece sleeps in the basement with her mom. She heard what I heard in the back yard. But I didn't get up to look. (Getting hit by a bullet that doesn't be long to you isn't anything to play with). She looked out the back door window and yelled "THERE'S SOMEBODY OUT THERE!!".I went to the room next to mine and cut off the lights and looked out the blinds slowly. I could see about 5 boys climbing over me back yard gate. I had never seen them before. I didn't know who they were. They started banging on the windows. They more my niece yelled, the more they banged. She stopped. When my mom called my brother and told him what happend he said come over to his house. When my mom felt it was safe to leave out she got us and we all hopped in the car and left. We didn't get there till around 2:30am. I didn't go to sleep till 3:40am. When I woke up at 6:30am to get ready for work my next door neighbor called my mom's phone and said our house might have been broken into. We left my brothers house at 8:40am and got back home at 9:18am. We looked around the inside of our house, we didn't see anything that could look like someone broke in. My mom rushed me to get dressed and off to work.

Essay

I came across this interesting essay in the NY Times about the history (and future) of diabetes in the United States.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/20/health/20essay.html?_r=1&hpw

Team South Chicago Cooks

Last week, (or maybe the week before that) Team South Chicago decided to cook lunch together. We were fortunate enough to have access to a kitchen in the clinic that had previously been used to teach healthy cooking classes. A few days before we were to cook, we looked through a diabetes friendly cookbook and found a delicious stir-fry recipe that we wanted to try out. After a long morning of working on our projects, we went grocery shopping for the ingredients in the afternoon. To our surprise, an entire meal for seven people ended up costing less than $20! Talk about smart shopping! Cooking together was a great experience. Luckily everybody had some previous experience in the kitchen so we split tasks: washing/chopping vegetables, marinating the meat, and cooking at the stove. Alex G. cooked the broccoli, Whitney took care of the peppers, and Imari handled the meat. After almost a half hour of hard work, we ate our creation and loved it! In fact, people were stopping in the hallway to investigate where the delicious smell was coming from. We were also lucky enough to have Nubia visit us and she agreed-we were definitely amazing cooks!

Having Fun!

Basic yoga

So two weeks ago SSP as a whole group took a yoga session. The instructor whose name is Cecily was very calm and relaxed at the beginning she asked rhetorical questions that took people awhile to comprehend she wanted us to just take mental notes for ourselves. I really enjoyed the soothing sounds that was provided it was like nature and some other things. Alex, Iysha, and I found it to be quite hysterical when out of nowhere Cecily began to shout and swing her arms at a fast speed. But apparently Tevin's the "yoga man," and Toussaint was so relaxed he fell asleep! I enjoyed the experience but was kind of bored because I would have like to try some more difficult poses.

(This is me wishing we could have tried harder poses!)

Grand Rounds

A few weeks ago the SSP-ers attended Grand Rounds. Grand Rounds is a weekly conference held at The University of Chicago Medical Center. Every week, different experts present about their research. This week, Doctor Schumann asked a few people from SSP to speek Getting ready for Grand Rounds was normal. I didn't feel nervous about presenting, but I did feel like I might miss something that I needed to talk about. I didn't think that there was going to be that many people that I didn't know. I felt kind of happy when I made all of the doctors laugh. Benny, Passion, and Becky also all did a great job with their short speeches, they didn't fall under pressure and presented very well. I was surprised of how mad the man in the back of the room was. I forgot why the man was so mad but I think the way he expressed himself was inappropriate for the moment. My final thoughts about Grand Rounds is that the lunch was very tasty and I can't wait to see Whitney and Imari with their speech in front of a room full of doctors.

Imari's project proposal

Background:
Topic; Survey/pamphlet
People with diabetes were the main reason why this idea was formed.
Diabetes is an important issue because many people seem to over look it because they feel it’s not as severe as other diseases, but its known that many people actually have type 2 diabetes. And it’s known that people with diabetes need a lot of health maintenance and that’s where my project comes into perspective.
The purpose of making this pamphlet is to inform this neighborhood about the good restaurants, gyms, clinics, etc around Commercial Avenue. This is important because it can motivate people that have been meaning to live a healthier life and shine a light on what’s already provided in their neighborhood. Also it would provide information about the best and closest options.


Objective:
What I’m hoping to get done is to come up with a survey and hand it out. From there evaluate people’s responses and make a pamphlet.

Plan of action:
My plan is to use the information from the survey to help me choose a couple of places to research about. Then after that visit some of those local businesses and ask some questions that aren’t advertised. Also talk to Doc. Jones and ask her for her ideas and suggestions. Finally put the pamphlet together.

Schedule:
Week 3- Make and complete survey.
Week 4- Hand out survey and see what I get from that.
Week 5- Research/ talk to doctor Jones.
Week 6- Put pamphlet together.

Trash Wars

Today, Alex, Imari, Whitney, and I donned disposable gloves, armed ourselves with big trash bags, and headed north on Exchange to battle litter. By the end of the block on which the Chicago Family Health Center is located, my bag was already sagging with the weight of various plastic bottles, ripped wrappers, an empty bottle of Grey Goose, plastic grocery bags, discarded flyers, and postage stamp sized bags that Alex optimistically suggested may have once contained jewelry. I was not really surprised by the amount of litter we encountered because we have walked many time around these blocks and seen the neglected sidewalks in the neighborhood. I was surprised, however, by the rate at which my bag filled. The trash bag, which had seemed cavernous and unlikely to be the limiting factor for the length of our service project, was ripping from the weight of its contents as we turned left on 90th street. I was lagging behind at this point which was a good thing. I was content to pick up stray wrappers (someone in the neighborhood consumes a terrifying quantity of blue raspberry taffy) and leave the larger items for Imari, Whitney, and Alex to fill their bags as quickly as possible.

As we made our way back to the clinic (having walked around one square block), we had four nearly full bags of trash, one for each street we had walked down. It made me wonder how many bags it would take to clean up the entire neighborhood. Any guesses? I'm going to count how many blocks are in South Chicago at some point soon!

During our service project, I was struck by three things. First, most of the trash we were picking up was food wrappers. We were seeing another effect of fast food culture in our community; fast food leaves behind a trail of paper and foil while fresh foods can biodegrade. Second, one of the students made the perceptive observation that the litter could have been avoided if there had been public trash cans available. Usually, I think that litter is a product of laziness and apathy, but in this case, I think she was right! There were no trash cans on these blocks, so there was no other place to put trash. Lastly, a lot of the trash we saw was actually inside people's front and back yards. Even if they weren't responsible for the trash in the first place, they had let all of it pile up. I think that is indicative of the pride people have in their community. If someone doesn't care enough about their yard to keep it looking nice, then it gives silent permission for other people to treat green spaces like big, grassy dumpsters.

Group Presentations

This past Thursday, South Chicago along with Woodlawn, and Greater Grand Crossing all had to present presentations. South Chicago's was about the basics of diabetes, Woodlawn's was about STDs and safe sex, and Greater Grand Crossing's was about stress. I think that each group did a good job talking about their topics and informing us what to do or not to do. Each group's topics were very important to anyone's neighborhoods because they were things people apparently overlook. Although a few of us were nervous or embarrassed, we presented our subjects with confidence. I personally was very nervous at first because talking to or around people I really don't know does that to me. I was mainly afraid that I would mess up, but once I laughed all the nerves went away. Overall, I always find it more fun when everyone's together because some people are very funny and cool to be around.

-Imari

Working in the Garden

I wasn't too excited about working in the garden because of how it appeared. There wasn't a sidewalk or a clean walking path to stand on. To top it off, how it looked was crazy. I wouldn't have known there was a garden there. It looked unorganized, so I wasn't so excited about working there to begin with. Once the girls (Imari, Whitney) and I started pulling weeds, we began to realize that it wasn't the most difficult work. It was dirty, but a soil-like dirty and not a harmful potent dirt. Imari, who had a big problem helping with the dirt and bugs was doing great. She was doing more work than anyone could have imagined her doing. Whitney was also doing a good job, and even though she didn't like bugs or insects, Whitney got in the dirt and tried her best to avoid them. With the five of us all working slowly, we all got a lot of work done for the community garden and for Miguel (who takes care of the garden). Overall, we didn't mind helping with the garden, and for me, Imari, and Whitney, it wasn't what we expected. I guess in some kind of way it was fun helping out the community. But I wouldn't want to volunteer to help again if there are other cleaner options.

-Alex G.