Neighborhoods: Rogers Park

Rogers Park is Chicago's northern-most neighborhood. Since I first lived in Chicago on the south side, the area feels roughly analogous to Saskatchewan -- probably nice, very far away, maybe not worth the trip. Thankfully, there are enough things happening in Rogers Park that I've been there a few times and gotten more used to the long trek on the red line. Rogers Park is one of Chicago's most racially diverse neighborhoods -- although Chicago has plenty of diversity, it is intensely segregated.* Rogers Park is one of the few places where there is no obvious racial majority. It's also a family-oriented neighborhood in some places, with plenty of places that are kid-friendly. There are little parks dotted around, as well as lots of cafes and restaurants, many of which cater to the vegan/vegetarian/organic crowd. Loyola University has its undergraduate campus there, so there's a fairly large nexus of college students where Chicago meets its northern suburbs.

Rogers Park has lots of tiny theaters inside it, including Lifeline Theater. Lifeline only does shows which are adaptations of other works, usually of books. The first time I went to Rogers Park was to see their production of Zorro. The theater is this absolutely tiny space where you have to politely wedge yourself into a seat and try not to breathe on the actors, and yet the company managed to put an entire swashbuckling epic onstage, complete with chase scenes and (fake) horse-riding. It was fantastic, and a good reason to head back up to Rogers Park again.

*No, seriously, extremely segregated. Check out http://projects.nytimes.com/census/2010/explorer and search for Chicago; the map explains what any person riding the CTA from North to South can already tell you, but it's a good infographic.

Greektown, West Loop, and an Announcement!

First off, some personal news: I have been accepted to Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary and will start this fall! I'm going to get a Masters of Divinity, with the hope that I'll eventually be ordained within the Presbyterian Church. It seems like hubris to think that far ahead, since I have three years of grad school and plenty of exams to pass before ordination is even an option. However, I'm overjoyed to be certain about heading to seminary in the fall. This year has really helped me cement a sense of my own calling, and seminary will help prepare me for my future work within the church. Also, it'll be nice to be back in school; working without spring or summer breaks and being relatively free during the evenings has been somewhat confusing.

Now here's something from my backlog of neighborhoods I visited during seminary application time: Greektown. As I'm sure you can tell from the name, Greektown is a neighborhood filled with Greek restaurants, shops, and residents. The neighborhood is absolutely tiny, and marked off by pillars on either side of the stretch of restaurants that make up its main street. It's the best place to go for baklava or gyros, and has plenty of late-night diners and cafes to hang out in. The headquarters for ~H20+, a company that sells bath gel, is in Greektown. Their offices are concrete, rectangular, and soulless, except for the tiny mosaics of people in togas that dot the building -- apparently not even corporations are exempt from reflecting Greektown's shared heritage.

Greektown is a tiny dot in the middle of West Loop, a neighborhood with a much more boring name but equally fun things to do. Last time I was there was the weekend after Chicago's huge blizzard -- there were drifts to my shins on sidewalks, and I clambered around an absolutely beautiful park with a dog run and playground and mostly more snow drifts. There were sculptures in the park which looked like they were supposed to be fountains to play in, so I'll be sure to go back in a month or so and take pictures. The neighborhood is full of college students and the recently graduated; lots of tiny apartments and 24-hour taco stands and shiny new condos. It looks like a nice place to live, if a little new architecturally new to have much personality.