By Kendal Walters
Carrboro Commons Writer
More than 30 people gather in a room above Weaver Street Market on a Sunday afternoon to watch ¡Salud!/Health, a movie about the Cuban Health Care system. The video draws viewers like Chapel Hill resident and local family practice doctor Carol Klein and Dina Castro, who has experience working in a community health program in Peru. Others in attendance are simply interested in the social, political and economic implications of international health care.
The movie screening is just one of a variety of cultural events put on two Sundays a month by the Chapel Hill Institute for Cultural and Language Education, better known as CHICLE.
These events are free and open to the public and typically consist of films or talks on cultural and political issues. They are meant to provide a forum for debate, promoting discussion on important topics, as well as “creating an awareness of more than what’s going on in North Carolina,†says Marina Jones, a German teacher at CHICLE since 2005.
The idea for showing this particular movie about health care was provided by Jorge Izquierdo, a consultant for the Pan-American Health organization who now works in UNC’s School of Public Health. The film was also shown recently at the Latin American Film Festival, which CHICLE employee Sharon Mújica helps organize each November.
CHICLE’s business director, Jane Stein, says that events that deal with Cuba tend to be the biggest draw, but that some of the most dynamic discussions have started after speaker and movie events about the political situation in Venezuela. While many of the Sunday events have focused on the Latino community and on Latin America, there have also been discussions on Palestinian issues as well as a talk about Nepal.
The dialogue often goes far beyond when the official event ends. Even when the doors are locked and everyone leaves, “normally the discussion just moves downstairs,†comments Donato Fhunsu, who works at CHICLE as an interpreter, translator and French and Spanish teacher.
The institute benefits from a staff with extensive international experience and diverse backgrounds. Fhunsu, for example, was born in the Congo and also lived in Europe and South America before moving to the United States.
Located in the heart of Carrboro, CHICLE was started in 1999 in “response to the rapid increase of immigrants to our area.†Program director Miriam Palacio says that from the time she moved here in 1995, she started noticing the changing demographics, especially with the growth of Latino immigration.
Another response to this dynamic has been an ever-increasing demand for translation and interpreting services offered by agencies like CHICLE. These services are frequently used by businesses and agencies in order to reach new markets and to communicate with Spanish-speakers in questionnaires or surveys, explains Palacio.
One of the overall goals of the institute is “to meet the language needs of the Triangle community.†As its name implies, CHICLE’s programs expand beyond the language needs to also meet the cultural needs and promote understanding in the context of our changing community.
Palacio says that although it is a for-profit business, CHICLE also has a social purpose and is community oriented, frequently collaborating with nonprofits.
For instance, CHICLE partnered with nonprofit groups to put on a forum about immigration at Carrboro’s Century Center, has worked with the local police department to teach officers Spanish and is contracted with the county health department to supply interpreters.
Along with regularly hosting Sunday cultural events and offering translation and interpreting services, CHICLE provides adult and children’s classes in various languages, summer camps, cultural trainings for businesses and an intensive language program for Spanish teachers during the summer.
The next Sunday cultural event, a talk entitled “Access to Abortion for Victims of Sexual Abuse in Guanajuato, Mexico,†is scheduled for January 28. CHICLE staff is also planning a series on immigration for the spring.
For more information about CHICLE and for a schedule of upcoming events, visit www.chi-cle.com.