Although Gracious Dinner was not set to begin until 5 p.m., by 4:30 p.m., there was already a long line of students weaving through the first floor of Blanchard Hall. The students closest to the Dining Commons entrance — the ones who got there to camp out first — sat cross-legged on the floor and chatted as they counted down the remaining half hour until the doors opened.
Photo courtesy of Nafeesah Ahmed-Adedoja '23. The Muslim Student Association's booth, pictured above, featured dates, a prayer mat, and more.
Numerous colorful flags from countries around the world hung from the balconies in the Great Room in the Blanchard Community Center on Sunday, Nov. 13, during Mount Holyoke’s first-ever Deconstructing and Decolonizing Wellness Fair. Mount Holyoke Peer Health Educators hosted the fair in collaboration with some of the campus’ cultural and religious organizations. Peer Health Educator and Wellness Chair Nafeesah Ahmed-Adedoja ’23 led the event planning along with the other two members of the Wellness Team, Raven Joseph ’25 and Sean Fabrega ’23, as well as Be Well Area Coordinator Sarah Garijo-Garde.
Ahmed-Adedoja explained that Joseph had read an article about decolonizing wellness and shared the idea with the team. From there, they came up with the idea for the fair. “We felt it was important to highlight practices that may not appear in the mainstream and bring awareness to [them] in our community,” Ahmed-Adedoja said.
The team had been working on planning this event since September. They wanted to make sure that they were presenting authentic cultural traditions and wellness practices. In early October, they reached out to the following groups and organizations: Mount Holyoke African and Caribbean Student Association, La Unidad, Jewish Student Union, Muslim Student Association, Origami Club, Students of Hinduism Reaching Inwards, Asian Center for Empowerment, Counseling Service, Health Services, Daughters of Zion and FAMILIA.
“Firstly, we wanted to ensure that we were accurately representing cultures and spiritual [and] religious practices from around the world and decided to get organizations on campus involved to reach our goals,” Ahmed-Adedoja said. “We also had to do a lot of research on food, drinks and other items to make our event come to life.” Seven restaurants catered the event: Priya Indian Cuisine, Jamaica Spice Paradise, El Comalito, Oriental Flavor, IYA Sushi and Noodle Kitchen South Hadley, Bernardino’s Bakery and LimeRed Teahouse.
The Wellness Team wanted to publicize the event early on and tabled in Blanch for two weeks prior to the fair. They raised money for the Crisis Text Line and The Trevor Project by selling “flowers and tea” goodie bags. The team anticipated a 40-person turn out and were happily surprised to see over 100 people attend the fair and, as Ahmed-Adedoja stated, “learn about cultural and religious wellness traditions, make stress balls, spin the wheel and get a bite to eat.”
Joseph was also surprised to see how many people showed up and was “relieved” to see that students were having a good time and engaging with the booths. “This event was necessary because it acknowledged the disconnect we have with the origins of wellness practices seen in mainstream media today,” Joseph said. “Notably, the portrayal of wellness often reflects how it has been stripped of its history to become inaccessible and more profitable.”
Ahmed-Adedoja hopes that the Peer Health Educators host more wellness fairs in the future, especially because the team received positive feedback from students regarding the fair. “During and after the event people were hoping it would become a long-standing tradition which excited [Fabrega], [Joseph] and I,” Ahmed-Adedoja said.
Ahmed-Adedoja serves as the secretary and Five College representative for the Muslim Student Association board and enjoyed running the MSA’s booth at the fair. “Our booth included dates, prayer beads, sweets, quran, henna, prayer mat and zam zam water. As Muslims, we have many ways which we connect to Wellness through our faith and items that are of huge significance in Islamic history and our everyday lives,” Ahmed-Adedoja said. “We hoped to share and enlighten others of what some of these practices were and also provide other Muslims with a sense of empowerment and recognition.”
Joseph enjoyed getting to work with other student organizations on campus. “I’m glad we collaborated with them because we couldn’t have done this without their hard work,” Joseph said.
Ahmed-Adedoja enjoyed getting to work with Joseph and Fabrega and is excited to plan similar events with them in the future. “Working with [Fabrega] and [Joseph] has honestly been the highlight of my semester and I am excited to see what we do next semester as we work toward part two of the Deconstructing and Decolonizing Wellness Fair, [which will include] a speaker and more.”
Rushing against the crowd of the Dining Commons during the busy lunch hour, the search for a familiar face or simply a place to sit causes anxiety to slowly build in the pit of your stomach. Then, you see your holy grail: one student in the dining hall has a colorful sign stating “You’re Welcome to Sit with Me.” You build up your nerve and take up their offer, resulting in a new friend and a relaxing lunch period before your next class.
Photo by Ali Meizels ‘23
By Tishya Khanna ’23
Features Editor
It’s a fall afternoon. You’re wearing a light sweater, cool breeze blowing through your hair. Your classes have ended and now you have a day to yourself. You’re tired but you have time on your hands, so you lie on the Skinner Green for a while and read your favorite book. But it’s fall, and now it starts to get dark at 4:30 p.m., so you relish the short hour you had outside on the grass and decide to go to the Community Center. Let’s take a walk through Blanch together.
You climb the brick stairs and enter the building from the main entrance — suddenly the cool breeze has disappeared and you’re engulfed with warmth and chatter of a Great Room event. You peek in from the second floor and head right back on your way. There’s a new exhibition at the Art Gallery — new students showcasing their wonderful art. You recognize the names of the artists mentioned from classes you’ve taken and the meetings you’ve attended and savor the sweet surprise of finding out their talents.
You want to get some work done, so you decide to go upstairs to the third floor, home to the rooms of various student organizations and departments. There are people all over — some intently working on their assignments, some lying with their heads down on the table, some goofing off in the study rooms, some drawing and writing all kinds of things on the whiteboards.
You bump into familiar faces and sit down for a light chat until everyone has to tend to their million deadlines. You find a comfortable spot and get to work. There’s a certain quietude around — the particular taste of the 4 p.m. to 5 p.m. hour at Blanch when the Dining Commons is closed. At 4:50 p.m., there’s inevitably a long line to get dinner tables. Friends are gathering around, calling each other to come over, saving spots for one another. All the while, you’re on the third floor, immersed in an assignment that just won’t end.
After a while, you decide to go downstairs to eat and call your friends to ask if they want to have dinner together. You go to the first floor, which is glimmering with lively chatter. There are people sitting around the Scrabble boards. One group is actually playing it! The other board has the tiles arranged in curse words — you can hear the giggles, see the mischievous smiles of the people passing by. The event in the Great Room has ended and a new one is being set up. You notice that the Cochary Pub & Kitchen is playing some good music and your friend is sitting in one of the booths, equally frustrated with assignments. The familiarity dissolves the tension into easy smiles and warm, tight hugs. You spend some time in the cuddle puddle and both decide to finally grab some food together. You gather your things and walk into the Dining Commons. You grab a booth, browse through the hundreds of rotating menu options and then sit for a good meal to end the day over the usual banter.
Arriving at Mount Holyoke is incomplete without visiting the beloved Community Center. The three floors hold the essence of the community — all kinds of people coming together to do all kinds of things. From random whiteboards where people leave lists of their favorite LGBTQ+ movies to the colorful couches that are good for naps no matter how loud it gets, Blanch is often what keeps all of us together — holding us on tired days, offering junk food and giving us a space to show all our wild colors.
When they arrived on campus in the fall of 2017, the members of the class of 2021 became the last to experience Mount Holyoke’s traditional dining arrangements before the renovated Dining Commons opened in Blanchard Hall in January 2018. Before this, Blanchard served several different purposes for the College.
