This week, Wichian Rojanawon, Senior Program Developer and Policy Analyst at the UMB Gerontology Institute joined the efforts of area cooking instructors to make tsunami relief a little easier to swallow. On Tuesday, January 25, the Boston Herald, in partnership with Au Bon Pain and Legal Sea Foods, will host a unique benefit for Tsunami relief at Boston University’s Culinary Arts Program. While most benefits simply allow you to donate money to a cause, this relief effort will give something back. It will be providing expertly prepared food. The charity event, Cooking For a Cause, centers on an evening of cooking demonstrations by area chefs, and tasting of Asian foods. Rojanawon, a native of Thailand, has been teaching Thai cooking at both the Boston Center for Adult Education and the Cambridge Center for Adult Education for fifteen years. He is one of many area chefs who will lend their culinary expertise to the benefit, a cause he sees worthy of supporting both now and in the future.

Each chef will cook a first course of appetizers as well as a main course. Rojanawan plans to finish the night paying homage to his homeland by preparing a famous Thai dish of black sticky rice with wry mangoes.” People have to understand that this event [tsunami] has long term consequences …it will take at least a decade to rebuild what has been destroyed…we have these [fund-raising] events to remind people that this is an ongoing thing and we need to help them,” Rojanawan explains. As damages from the Tsunami continue to mount, Rojanawan is not only concerned with the physical damages but the economic ones as well. He cites the decimation of tourism and fishing, two of Southeast Asia’s leading industries, as among the area’s most critical recovery issues. He goes on to explain that the countries affected by the damage have little to no infrastructure set up to help rebuild their nation. More prosperous countries would be better prepared to recover from a natural disaster like the Tsunami. Rojanawon offers that, as a result, there is a great need for international aid. The minimum donation for the event was $150 and larger donations were encouraged with the hope of reaching a goal of $10,000. Rojanawon says that while this may not seem to be an incredible number, the value of US currency is extremely high in the affected countries. Even small donations make a difference. $1500 is enough money to build a house for a whole family. Two former UMass graduate students and natives of Sri Lanka, Ajith Silva and Priyanthi Silva, have also participated in the relief effort. They are helping to establish Rebuilding Sri Lanka, a charity set up to build houses in the tsunami-ravaged nation. The two hope their labors will culminate in the construction of 1000 new houses. Thus far, their efforts have resulted in the building of 349 homes in Sri Lanka. UMB Student Life has also begun to take part in the cause. Director of Student Life, Jain Rudivich-Higgins, says that the office is waiting for students to return to campus to bring their efforts into full swing and assess their ideas for relief. With the help of the International Student Office, Student Life has compiled a list of at least 80 students, most of whom are enrolled in the graduate school, hailing from areas of Southeast Asia that have been feeling the effects of the tsunami. According to Rudivich-Higgins this number does not yet reflect those students on campus native to the Western African countries that were also touched by the tsunami and are often overlooked. Rudivich-Higgins says that letters have been sent to those students, “reaching out to them individually” and offering help and support. Further, as UMass Boston’s representative to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts Employee Contribution Campaign, Rudivich-Higgins is involved with an extension to charitable payroll deduction availability at UMB. This program allows University employees an extended time period to make donations to the tsunami relief effort and, in-line with new IRS practice, elect to have the deductions reflected on their 2004 or 2005 tax return. More information regarding upcoming tsunami relief efforts will be available in the Student Life Office. A list of relief organizations provided by the American Public Health Association may be accessed from the UMB home page www.umb.edu. Donation information for Rebuilding Sri Lanka is available at www.rebuildinglanka.org .