Wednesday, November 18, 1998
The University Daily Kansan
Section A·Page 3
Hunger Banquet leaves students full of guilt
Kelly Harvey, Jefferson City, Mo., sophomore, serves Chenoa Simmons, Wichita senior, during the Hunger Banquet. The banquet was held last night to make people aware of the unequal distribution of food in the world. Photo by Christina Neff/KANSAN
By Julie M. Sachs
Kansan staff writer
The majority of the participants at last night's fifth annual Hunger Banquet tasted what it was like to leave dinner still hungry.
Participants each received an identity of an individual whose lives they would lead during the banquet. The event was free, but participants could donate money.
This new identity propelled each of the 42 participants into a distinct social class. Fifteen percent of participants were members of the upper class, 40 percent were middle class and the remaining 45 percent were poor, said Corey Snyder, co-coordinator of Concerned Aware and Active Students and Toneka sophomore.
The social class determined how much and how well the participant could eat at the banquet. The purpose of the hunger banquet is to give participants a better understanding of the unequal distribution of the world's food, Snyder said.
Food for the banquet was donated by Alvin's IGA, 901 Iowa St.; Community Mercantile Co-op, 901 Mississippi St.; Glass Onion, 624 W. 12th St.; Liz Karr Catering, 512 E. Ninth St.; Paisano's Ristorante, 2112 W. 25th St.; and Teller's, 746 Massachusetts St.
Participants who received membership privileges into the upper class sat at decorated tables, and they dined on pizza, breadsticks and cake.
With the benefits of full stomachs, participants experienced guilt.
A middle class member said that she also experienced guilt.
Before the banquet, Christy Zimmer, Tecumseh sophomore, had been assigned to the poor
class. Her character was allowed to advance during the banquet, in order to illustrate how some individuals move up in the world.
"I felt guilty. I had plenty of food," said Zimmer.
nose who were the middle class ate from plastic plates and drank from plastic glasses. Although they left the banquet full, they ate only beans, rice, bread and carrots.
The poor participants dined upon beans, rice and water.
"It teaches you to attempt to understand world hunger in real terms," said Chris Hess, codirector of the Center for Community Outreach and Wichita junior.
Being catapulted into the hypothetical world of the hungry made some participants more aware of the situation of the world.
Lower turnout than in the past helped contribute to the education of participants. Snyder said that the low turnout provided an environment where the subject hit home.
Recreation task force ends survey
By Seth Jones Kansan staff writer
The recreation task force will submit its findings to Student Senate at tomorrow night's meeting, the last of the semester.
The group has been working for several weeks now, doing everything from phone surveys to presentations at residence halls to find out what students want, if anything, from a recreation center.
Scott Kaiser, student body vice president, has helped compile the information.
"We're not looking for any action tomorrow," he said. "We're simply
Marlon Marshall, engineering senator and task force member, would not hint at what the task force found out but said the group had made tremendous progress since it started.
presenting what our research has found."
"I remember at the first meeting when we were talking about what we were going to do," he said, "Since then, we've gotten a lot of feedback."
Kaiser bases the success of the first semester by looking at what Senate's goals were at the beginning
"We wanted to improve parking, and Park-n-Ride has been very successful," he said. "We've seen
progress made with online enrollment. None of this success is because of one person. It's because of a good Student Senate as a whole."
Julie Numrich, Student Executive Committee chairwoman, said the spring semester also should be busy. She said everyone, whether they are leaving or are running for re-election, wants to get things done.
Kaiser was also looking for the next semester to be productive.
"Next semester, students will have the opportunity to take a hard look at recreation on our campus," he said. "They'll also see a proposal from the campus safety task force on steps to improve safety at KU."
Kyle Ramsey/KANSAN
Celestial showers light up night skies
By Steph Brewer
Kansan staff writer
The Leonid meteor shower makes its annual appearance this week, but because of weather and location the Kansas skies will not provide prime viewing.
The Leonid meteor shower happens once a year when the Earth crosses the orbital path of Comet Tempel-Tuttle, said Barbara Anthony-Twarog, professor of physics and astronomy. This year was expected to be a particularly strong shower because of the proximity of the comet to the Earth.
Anthony-Twarog said that there was a prediction of a very strong pulse of meteors yesterday afternoon. However, Americans would not have been
able to see these showers because the occurred in daylight hours.
She said that showers might have been so strong that they caused damage to satellites but that she hadn't yet heard any news.
The best show that Americans could see happened yesterday morning, Anthony-Twarog said.
"It's going to start to pop out after tonight," she said yesterday.
Ryan Shanks, Atchison senior, watched the shower last night with his Astronomy 191 class at Clinton Lake. He said that while he enjoyed the show there, the best aerial display he saw was in town.
"All of a sudden, the sky lift up and I looked up and there was this gorgeous, blue-green trail," he said. "It was awesome."
Because of cloudy conditions, last night was not the ideal time for meteor watchers. Anthony-Twarog said.
"People are probably going to have to watch the news from other places because the weather is kind of shutting down here," she said.
Jennifer Peterson, Topeka sophmore, said yesterday afternoon that she planned to watch the shower that night.
"What I might end up doing is driving out to the edge of town," she said.
Watching meteor showers is a bit of a tradition in Peterson's family.
"My dad got us started when we were little on astronomy," she said. "When there was a meteor shower we'd camp out in the building and build a tower so we could see it better."