Buddhist temple food pantry a lifeline for Nepalese students

Food pantry run by a Buddhist temple in New York City serves free food for immigrants and students

New York: Inside the temple in the New York City borough of Queens, monks clad in maroon robes chanted and lit incense and candles at an altar before a golden statue of Buddha. Earlier, on the sidewalk outside, people with face masks, shopping baskets and reusable bags stood in a socially distanced line stretching two city blocks, waiting to cart off badly needed rice, fruit and vegetables to get them through hard times due to the pandemic.

“It’s really a big help because you get all fresh, organic,” said Jyoti Rajbanshi, a Nepalese nursing student at Long Island University who has lost work and resorted to running up her credit cards and relying on the weekly pantry. “And then at least you don’t have to spend some money on buying the groceries.” The United Sherpa Association launched the food program from scratch last April as the coronavirus was ravaging the borough and other parts of the city.

The Buddhist temple and community center serves all comers, including immigrants living in the country without legal permission and the swollen ranks of the unemployed, but it has become a particularly important lifeline for Nepalese college students living thousands of miles from their families.

Some were forced by lockdowns to leave dorms where previously they got most of their meals. They don’t qualify for federal stimulus checks. Their student visas generally don’t allow them to work full-time or off-campus to support themselves. And there’s often little help from home, with families in their heavily tourism-dependent country struggling mightily during the pandemic.

Early on in the pandemic, residents of the immigrant-rich Jackson Heights, Elmhurst and Corona neighborhoods of Queens were hit hard and tested positive for the virus in greater numbers than in other parts of the city. The United Sherpa Association closed its temple and canceled its sports programs, cultural activities and Sherpa and Nepali language classes.

It also sprang into action to help those who were struggling, with members calling contacts across the world to import masks, gloves and hand sanitiser that were often out of stock at local stores. The association gave $500 stipends to more than 30 students and mobilised an army of volunteers to make home deliveries of personal protective equipment and boxes of food.

When the pantry launched, word spread through social media and students volunteered to pick up food and distribute it every Friday outside the temple, housed in a former Christian church.