The Oxfam Hunger Banquet, held Tuesday evening, Nov. 18, is part of Elon Volunteers! annual Hunger Awareness Week. Approximately 100 students participated in this event alone. Here’s a description of the event from Oxfam’s web site:
“The Oxfam Hunger Banquet is one of the most popular Fast for a World Harvest activities, engaging participants in a dramatization of the unequal distribution of resources and wealth in the world.
“Each guest draws a ticket randomly assigning them to the high-, middle- or low-income tier and is served a corresponding meal. The 15 percent in the high-income tier are served a sumptuous gourmet meal. The 30 percent in the middle-income section eat a simple meal of rice and beans. The majority 55 percent in the low-income tier waits in line for small portions of rice and water.
“The Oxfam Hunger Banquet is a powerful tool that brings to life the inequalities in our world and challenges us, as the more economically fortunate, to realize how our decisions affect others in the world. Few leave a Hunger Banquet with full stomachs, but all leave filled with a greater understanding of the problems of global hunger and poverty and the motivation to do something about it.”
Elon students Myra St. Clair and Alicia Cambria are the coordinators of Hunger Awareness Week, and they have been assisted by many other student volunteers. The Nov. 18 event generated more than $75 in donations for local organizations that deal with hunger. Other events during this week include volunteering at Caring Kitchens (a soup kitchen in Burlington), a 30-hour famine (scheduled this Friday and Saturday, Nov. 21-22), and a “donate-a-meal” campaign. Aramark has pledged to donate $1,500 to Oxfam to support students donating meals for this event. Aramark also donated the food for the Oxfam Hunger Banquet.
Anyone interested in participating in these activities, or other service events coordinated by Elon Volunteers!, can contact the EV! office in Moseley 230 or x7250.