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If you’re new, lost and lonely on the UIUC campus, Please be lost on the right Street:
Three Oh Seven East John Street. Knock not the door, and walk in Straight.
Look not for a signpost; for the real one is inside not at the gate:
Dozens of ethnicities, foreign and local, working for peace and happy to meet.
Smiles and gusto welcome you and shower you with friendly questions,
Questions reminiscent of home, which make the new alien haven your home.
If by chance you’re there on a Thursday night, you find friends of similar experience.
First shy, they still neither grasp nor trust the human warmth they experience
But soon realize they were fool enough to take that reality for a veneer, an April’s Fool.
They’re not wrong though, as previous addressees who could not grasp the ‘alien’ accent
Turned impatient, with a “sorry about that” to their queries, suggesting review of accent.
At Three Oh Seven, enjoy world cultural share, coffee, for free. Stay from seven to nine.
And even a little chat with new friends beyond the time will still be fine
And won’t disrupt Felix’s smile, nor impede Daniela from winning should she dine
In a contest with Anand who loses and bears a dyed hair-line.
On a Sunday night, a few dozen cents entitles you to a foreign culinary enjoyment,
The one that no restaurant is wealthy enough to offer even with the sweetest dessert pie.
Once admitted, be lavished with gains that no bank coffer is stuffed enough to buy:
Social interaction, racial grayness, the high eat near the low, the green near the blue,
All concerned with one thing: Understanding with true humility how the others do things,
And striving humbly and anonymously to make a difference for a distant community life
If you’re new and feel lost in the Chambana, be lost at the right place, adjust to new life.
And you’ll feel like a sibling of this “weird” community where doors are always closed.
You won’t have the impression that the houses you see are not inhabited,
You’ll concede that fear and aloofness is the result of lack of peace, human interactions.
You’ll admit that peaceful nations make humanity, the one dreamt for future generations.
You’ll simply rename Three oh Seven East John Street into 307 Cosmo Street!!!
Batamaka Somé is a PhD Student of Anthropology, President of the African Student’s Association, long-term friend of the club and organizer of two African coffee hours this semester.
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