At school one Monday, Aiko and Mateo picked up each other's lunchboxes by mistake. Aiko sat down on her bench, opened the lid and found three golden empanadas with a note in Spanish. Across the playground, Mateo found two rice balls wrapped in seaweed, each with a pickled plum in the middle. For a moment, both of them were shocked. Then they became curious. Then they took a bite.
It was the best lunch either of them had eaten in weeks. At the end of the break they met at the bench to swap back, but neither of them really wanted to. "What if we did this on purpose?" said Aiko. "Every Friday," said Mateo.
Other children noticed and asked to join. Before long the whole class had a "Friday Feast," and every child brought a dish from home. One Friday the teacher tasted a classmate's grandmother's dumplings, and she nearly cried.