Big gift from New Yorker

Press, 16 August 1988, Page 3

Big gift from New Yorker

By

SUZANNE KEEN

The story of a little Christchurch girl in need of a life-saving liver transplant has tugged at the heartstrings of a visiting jewellery buyer from New York. On his arrival in Christchurch last Saturday, Mr Jack Advani read an article in “The Press” about the appeal to raise money to send Crystal-Lee Emerson, aged one, to Brisbane for the transplant surgery. “It was still in my mind when I went to Auckland the next day and when I came back I heard it again on the radio, so I decided to do something about it.” Mr Advani has given $lOOO to the appeal launched by the Wigram Lions Club. More than $84,000 has so far been raised.

During the last six years, Mr Advani has visited New Zealand many times to “relax and buy some jewellery.” He has three children of his own and admits this may have influenced his decision to give the money.

I “It’s surprising how some people will spend three or four hundred dollars on a meal at a pub and then they see someone who is needy and do nothing. I know my mother and father and all my family will be pleased — they all do things like this.”