Paul Salopek, his walking partners, and other collaborators have collected stories from many cultures along the Out of Eden Walk. The following stories highlight practices and rituals surrounding food in various regions. They explore culture through a food lens, describing how food is acquired, prepared, and consumed and how it connects people from around the world.

The articles, regular dispatches written by Paul throughout the journey, are available at several reading levels. There are also multimedia resources from the walk: “milestones” are snapshots Paul records every 100 miles on the trek. These contain videos, panoramic photographs, and brief interviews with the first person he encounters at each location. Walking tours include interactive maps with photos and narration that guide readers through key locations along the route. Consider assigning different articles to groups of students in your class for analysis and discussion. Students can also locate the regions Paul and his walking partners visit using National Geographic Mapmaker. Other cooperative learning activities such as stations and jigsaw would also work well for exploring these resources (more specific activities and tools are included in the next section).

• Gona: First Kitchen: (article) Paul visits Gona, a site in Ethiopia that is 2.6 million years old and contains numerous stone artifacts used to prepare food. He interviews a Harvard professor who discusses the benefits humans received from using controlled fire to cook meat.
• Trail Notes: The Prince: (article) A member of the royal family of Saudi Arabia joins Paul for lunch at a remote stop along the walk. Paul and his walking partners discuss how to host a prince with the food and supplies they have brought on their walk.
• The Prophet’s Mosque: (article) Thousands of Muslims share a meal at a famed mosque in Saudi Arabia to break their fast during Ramadan, the holiest month of the Muslim lunar calendar.
• Aftertaste: (article) Groups of Palestinian women cook traditional meals together at a cooperative in the West Bank. They teach cooking classes and are writing a cookbook to help preserve their cultural history. Paul and his guide join the women to prepare a meal and learn about their mission.
• Pistachio Mafia: (article) Pistachios are a staple food and a source of great pride in Turkey. Paul meets pistachio farmers and guards protecting the orchards.
• What Powers a Walk Across the World? A Bowl of Mont Di, To Start: (article) Mont di is a national noodle dish still made by hand in villages in Myanmar. Paul observes a local cook as she teaches others the challenging multi step process of making the beloved rice noodles.

As your students explore the Out of Eden Walk, use the Learning Tools below to look more closely at what these stories can reveal about the cultural significance of food.

• Use the See, Think, Wonder Learning Tool with the video from the “What Powers a Walk Across the World?” article or a striking image from one of the other articles. You may want to assign different images to different student groups, then have groups share. Collect student questions and categorize them to identify topics for more exploration.
• Break students into small groups, assigning each group an article or dispatch to read and discuss. Have students use the Save the Last Word for Me discussion protocol to examine the text closely. As they read, ask them to choose their passage based on what it shows about food patterns and traditions in the region or culture.
• Conduct a structured group discussion with your students to analyze the links between stories. Use the Socratic Seminar format from the Conducting Powerful Conversations Learning Tool to help students think critically about and make connections between the varied stories of food from the Out of Eden Walk and other resources you may be using in your classroom. Use the guiding questions below to begin the discussion. Encourage students to speak to each other and use examples from their texts:
  • What was the most surprising thing you learned from these stories? Why did that surprise you?
  • What are some of the similarities between the stories about food preparation and traditions we have seen? What are some of the differences?
  • How have the stories about food in the Out of Eden Walk reminded you of food traditions and practices in your own community? Explain.

You may want to “fishbowl” your classroom discussions to allow smaller groups to discuss while the larger group observes. See the Learning Tool for more details on this practice.