Shabnam Kazmi, Cindy Sauber, Sarah Bhutta, and Farvah Shah, all West Windsor women, are coordinating a benefit for Darfur victims. The event will be held at OHNOSOHO, Sauber’s store in Southfield Shopping Center, on Thursday, March 22, 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Kazmi and Sauber came up with the idea for the fundraiser and asked Bhutta and Shah, the organizers of the successful event last year for the Pakistan Earthquake victims, to organize this one too. The group raised more than $4,”000 last year.##M:[more]##
“I am very proud to participate in this worthy event,” says Sauber. “It is important that we remember that many people suffer as we live in peace with plenty here in the US.”
According to the UNICEF website, “More than 3.4 million people have been affected by ethnic and political conflict in the Darfur region of Sudan. UNICEF is working with its partners to provide desperately needed food, shelter and medicine for children and families living in overcrowded, makeshift refugee camps.”
“We hope the community will help give to the people of Darfur by coming to the store and choosing to purchase an item of which 20 percent of sales will be given to UNICEF for Darfur,” says Sauber. Checks payable to Unicef will also be accepted.
Shah and Bhutta, who both have family members in Pakistan, will be selling items including colorful pashmini shawls made from cotton, silk, and blends; small handcraft items made of marble; throw cushions; embroidered cushion covers from Pakistan; artwork from Lahore; and other exotic works.
Shah, born and raised in Pakistan, was educated in London for several years. Her parents met in England when her father, who is from Pakistan, and her mother, an Austrian, and working in Pakistan for an American company, were introduced. She came to the United States for higher education in 1983, graduated from college in Austin, Texas with a bachelor’s in fine arts, and received a master’s in fine arts from Columbia Teachers College.
She met her husband, Imran Ali Shah, when they were living in Pakistan. “We’ve known each other forever,” she says. Her husband and Bhutta’s husband, Afzaal Akhtar, own IBB Consulting Group.
The parents of four children, the Shah’s have lived in West Windsor for 12 years. Taimur, 15, is in ninth grade at High School North; twins Anum (the only girl) and Shehryar, 13, are eighth graders at Community Middle School; Tipu, 10, is a fifth grader at Village School.
Shah, who has worked part time as an assistant toddler teacher at the New Horizon Montessori School, also gives art lessons to three to six years old. “My degrees are in art education and when time permits I try and get some art work done,” she says.
“It is a collective effort from all of us and we would really like to bring this cause into the public eye,” says Sauber.
Benefit for Darfur, UNICEF, OH NO SO HO, Southfield Shopping Center, West Windsor, 609-897-9046. Sales from unique items and Pakistani handmade crafts benefit Darfur victims. Shop all day, reception from 5 to 8 p.m. Thursday, March 22, 10 a.m. to 8 p.m.
