Community Lunches – Morecambe

Polish and English people were invited to our first community lunch at Trinity Methodist Church on August 7th. Twenty people attended including students learning English at Trinity’s ESOL classes, members of the Soroptomists and people from the local community – both Polish and English.

Food was brought by people from the different communities and highlights were a delicious Polish poppyseed cake; bigos a traditional Polish meat dish; a vegan dish called Farinata and Polish crisps, bread and sweetmeats.

Culture was shared and games played to help break down the barriers sometimes caused by language.

Director Liz Neat said, ” Whenever I talk to people about getting to know another community, they really want to but don’t know how to. Sharing food and having fun together is a great way of breaking down barriers.”

Woitek Supinski from the Polish community said, “This is a great way to practise my English. Can we have more?”

Ian Chamberlain who organised the event as part of the TAK project said, “Language confidence is raised when people have fun together because they find other ways of communicating and forget their fears about not speaking “perfect” English.”