A six-day safari for two in Kenya is among the items that will be up for bid in an auction Saturday, Nov. 15, sponsored by students in the Cornell School of Hotel Administration to benefit Ithaca-area charities and a Hotel School scholarship fund.

The silent auction begins at 4:30 p.m. in the Carrier Ballroom of the Statler Hotel, which will be followed by a live auction at 6 p.m.

The evening's festivities, billed as "A Taste of the Islands," also will feature Caribbean-style hors d'oeuvres and the sounds of Latin America courtesy of DJ Ed Chan.

The charity auction has become a traditional fund-raiser and outreach project for Hotel School students. Last year the auction netted $25,000 for area charities. This year the auction, sponsored by the students in the Masters of Management Hospitality Class of 1999, will benefit:

• the Dream Factory, the Ithaca chapter of Make-A-Wish Foundation, which seeks to make the wishes of terminally ill children come true;
• the Child Sex Abuse Project of the Task Force for Battered Women;
• the Ithaca Fire Department, in the name of Hotel School student and volunteer fire fighter Paul Joyce, who died this summer;
• Mary Jo Fink Memorial Scholarship, named for a 1994 Hotel School graduate, to benefit minority students and students from developing countries in need of financial aid.

In addition to the safari, other items up for bid include a two-room hotel suite for seven days in Buenos Aires, tower suite accommodations for two nights and breakfast for two at the Statler Hotel and a three-day stay at any Courtyard by Marriott in the United States. A preview of the auction items can be found online at ,

For additional information on the auction, contact Ilan Marcoschamer at <im34@cornell.edu> or (607) 275-3730.