First Fridays provides food, family

The Neal-Marshall Black Culture Center will have its First Friday celebration from 6 to 8 p.m. Friday in the center’s Bridgewaters Lounge.

NMBCC Graduate Assistant Muhammad Saahir said the First Friday events at the NMBCC started two years ago when Stephanie Power-Carter became the director of the center.

“First Fridays began with the intent of having more of a community program,” Saahir said. “It’s a way to make a more inclusive environment for all students, so we decided to try to do it once a month.”

From a national perspective, the First Friday celebration is an African-American tradition that started in the late 1980s to create opportunities for young professionals through social, political and artistic networking.

This event provides students and professionals the chance to exchange and share ideas on professional, educational, political and social issues.

First Friday celebrations take place all over the country, from Los Angeles to Detroit to Richmond. Every First Friday event is different, however. The events vary from art shows, block parties, music performances and dinners.

Saahir said this month’s First Friday at the NMBCC is a family dinner.

“We will have some sort of traditional soul food type of menu,” Saahir said. “The overall theme is to try to have that family atmosphere as if you were eating at home, and that’s pretty important if you are at a collegiate setting. It could be their first time away from home and this could be a way to relieve that missing feeling of home.”

Mark Baker, the owner of local mobile trailer restaurant Pitt Boss, is providing and preparing the food for the event.

“I’m providing ribs, rib chicken, red beans and rice and salad,” Baker said. “The red beans and rice I make from scratch. I do a lot of catering events.”

Baker said he hopes to reach out to as many people as he can with his food.

“I wanted to give out my food to as many people as possible and I feel like this is an event that really shared the way I cooked food with the audience that I will be serving,” Baker said.

Baker said this is his first time going to a First Friday event.

“I’m looking forward to going there and seeing what it’s about myself,” Baker said. “This is my first one and I never have been a part of it. I didn’t know of it until recently.”