This final post of “The Borders of Boston” takes us through our M.Arch thesis project, the synthesis of our months of exploring, eating, volunteering, and reflecting. ‘A taste of home’ is a thesis that explores the food landscape in Boston through the lens of the immigrant experience.

In this post, the authors each sought out volunteering opportunities with local free food provision organizations to see first-hand a different kind of border many people across the city encounter—that of food scarcity.

The excitement of the nearing mid-autumn festival thrums streets away from the Boylston T Stop. As one moves west from Boston Commons, there is a sense that another world is nearby. The buildings huddle closer to each other, and crouch shorter to open up their front windows. Tables emerge on sidewalks, ushering passerby through a maze of bright red banners and stringing lanterns that guides one to the gate of Boston’s famed Chinatown.

Nothing exposes you more quickly to another culture as stepping into an ethnic grocery market. From Vietnamese to Ethiopian to Colombian supermarkets, these stores scattered throughout Boston offer such a variety of food products most Boston residents would never see otherwise.