Students take swing at world hunger

Danette Goulet

CORONA DEL MAR -- Instead of spending the summer months frolicking

in the sun, as many soon-to-be seniors are doing, Sohana Ahmad and her

friends are fighting poverty and hunger.

The 16-year-old Corona del Mar High School student is the incoming

president of the school’s Youth Against Hunger Club.

On Saturday, the group has planned a tennis tournament to raise money

to ship food items and supplies to Third World countries.

“We wanted to help people,” she said. “Last year, [the club] didn’t do

too much -- not like the year before.”

So this year, Sohana decided to get a jump-start on making a

difference.

The tournament will be held from 10 a.m. until 2 p.m. at the Corona

del Mar High School tennis courts. So far, 26 players have signed up at

$10 apiece. While it costs nothing to attend and cheer on the players,

there will be raffles with gift certificates and cash prizes, Sohana

said.

Raffle tickets will be $2 each. Spectators could win gift certificates

to the Cheese Cake Factory, Tony Romas, Hobie Sports and many other local

businesses that have helped sponsor the event.

Once the students have raised funds to ship items, they will then go

out to the community to collect food, blankets, medical supplies and many

other items, she said.

To make the project more economical for the club, they will send the

supplies to the Latter-day Saints Humanitarian Center in Utah, which will

include the club’s donations in a shipment they are making.

Camille Packer, a 17-year-old member of a local Church of Jesus Christ

of Latter-day Saints congregation, recommended the Utah organization as a

means to transport the supplies.

“I learned about it through my church -- we’ve done blanket drives for

Kosovo and other projects,” Camille said.

The club did not have a specific monetary goal to shoot for. It just

wanted to raise enough to ship supplies; the rest they plan to donate to

the Orange County Homeless Shelter, Sohana said.

“We’re just curious to see where this will go,” Camille said. “We

think it will be successful because we have a lot sponsors throughout the

community.”