Shield of Athena

by Dan Laxer
The Suburban

The Shield of Athena is holding its annual membership fundraiser next week. This year they need support to rebuild the kitchen at Athena’s House, their emergency shelter.

The non-profit organization formed in 1991 to support victims of family violence. Founder Melpa Kamateros, along with others, initially began speaking to the community in church basements about conjugal violence. They eventually branched out into other areas.

“We developed a model – a model of awareness, and a model of intervention. This model that we perfected with one community we later parlayed into working with many other communities. And as a consequence, this organization, that was not designed to furnish services, presently has a network of services that includes two centres, an emergency shelter, and a soon-to-be fourth point, our second-step resource,” which will be a transition home for women.

The kitchen is the heart of its emergency shelter, Athena’s House opened in 2004. In the almost 21 years since it opened thousands of women and their children have lived been through its doors. Kamateros says they’ve noticed the length of stays getting longer lately. The average is about a month. But recently women and their families have been staying as long as five or six months, if they have four kids, little to no income, and nowhere else to go.

Athena’s House, particularly the kitchen, is showing the signs of two decades of wear and tear.

“We had to increase our intervention space. We had to increase the cost of meals.” And there was an increase in kitchen traffic. So, now the kitchen is in a state of disrepair, and needs urgent work.

“In our kitchen we’re very diverse. If one woman comes and she’s vegetarian we adapt the kitchen to her. If a woman comes and she needs kosher or halal, we always have that. The kitchen is adapted to the needs. The kitchen is essential because it’s part of the reason why a woman would stay at the shelter, not only to come, but to stay.”

There are always cooks of different cultures among the women who stay at Athena’s House, cooking together in the kitchen. “That’s the time that they share their stories, they share where they’ve come from, and bond. They break their isolation in that kitchen.”

Kitchen is community, Kamateros says. It’s where meals are prepared for the women and their children. It’s where some of the women cook meals. And some of those meals and stories make up the bulk of the book Recipes and Stories from Athena’s Kitchen. The book is “a glimpse of what happens in Athena’s Kitchen, and where these women were at, what their recipes are, and just hope for a better future for anybody that comes through that kitchen.”

The renovations will cost $100,000.

The fundraiser, A Seat at the Table, is being held on Wednesday, June 11, 5:30 to 8:00 p.m., at Portovino Ristorante in Decarie. There will be dinner and live music. Tickets are $150.00, with the money going directly to the kitchen renovation, “not only helping us feed people,” Kamateros explains, “but in essence, helping us nurture people during their time at Athena’s House.”

Tickets are available on The Shield of Athena’s Facebook and Instagram, or by calling 514-274-8117. Copies the book will be available, as well, although it can also be purchased on Shopify.