Hello, all!

Thank you for taking the time to read something so important to me. Many of you know me (Chef Zach Berger) and know that I have been traveling the last few years to Southeast Asia and have begun to start a life in Thailand.

I was drawn to this area of the world by my love of food, culture, Buddhism, temples, magic and more. Never in my life would I have thought I would fall in love and begin a life with a Northern Thai chef based in Chiang Mai named Boonyanika (Lee).

As life has developed, so have certain hardships. Lee’s hard work, deep understanding of ingredients and techniques of Northern Thai cooking put her in a position as a chef where she was taken advantage of and overworked for little pay and high stress while opening, closing and working alone every day with tasks including bartending, serving, taking orders, cleaning, cooking and more.

With many bills including taking care of her two children, sick father and other family obligations that fall on her it was unfair to her to be overworked and underpaid.

After losing this job in May, she has been working when she can for a friends business as finding work has been quite difficult. The pay she makes for this part time job is laughable and just not fair to anyone.

Lee’s dream is to open her own restaurant where she can share her passion and talents with fresh authentic cuisine.

I’m here to help her make that dream a reality and dedicated to help her in achieving this dream. I plan to match at least half of your generous donations on this platform.

I humbly ask for friends, family, and strangers to please come together so we can make this dream a reality. I’m raising $10,000 for this to happen. this will allow her to get started and grow with her buisness while having a small amount saved for emergency usage for the rainy season when it is slower. I will collect the donations and send her them to open with my contributing half as well.

If you can’t donate, I would truly appreciate if you could share this to everyone you know. Thank you for taking the time to read this.