We know corn and its many by-products including tortillas, and dukunu and are Belizean staples but, really, how Belizean are they? That's the question that a new exhibit at the house of culture answers. It's called seeds of change and it looks at things like potatoes and tomatoes and traces their origins. Director of the House of Culture Froyla Tzalam says that the exhibit should educate visitors on what they eat.
Froyla Tzalam, HOC
"The exhibition is the introduction as to where foods that we consider as traditional have their historical origins. For instance we talk about tomatoes. Tomatoes came from the Americas and yet we would almost say that no Italian dish would be Italian without tomatoes. How about potato? Potato came from the Andeas yet we talk about Irish potatoes and it being the main dietary staple in North America but it is not. So the exhibition is really to get people to start thinking about where their food comes from. Our aim, as an organization, is to really get to the roots of cultural behavior. You hear people say you are what you eat, is that true. The exchange that happens to the Europeans, to the Old World and the New World had positive implications and has a lot more cultural implications than we really think and I think this exhibition is another step in that direction."
Later on, in our Halloween segment, we'll tell you about another cultural display at the House of Culture, an altar to the dead.
