Brownstein: NDG restaurateur donating profits to Ukrainian relief


“We all have to step up to help. We have to show humanity at times like this and appreciate just how fortunate we are.”

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Vitaly Kudish insists that his wife’s decision to donate her restaurant’s net proceeds from Tuesday nights to Ukrainian relief efforts for the foreseeable future has little to do with his roots.

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Nor does her decision have anything to do with her own roots. Vilay Douangpanya is the owner and chef of the popular Pick Thai restaurant in NDG, and while the rest may serve up Thai delicacies, she is from Laos.

Although he has lived here since 1987, Kudish, an anesthesiologist, is of Ukrainian stock and most proud of it.

“But I could have been from any part of the world, and Vilay would still be moved to make this kind of donation,” Kudish said. “This doesn’t surprise me at all. Money is secondary to her. She’s all heart.”

Regardless, this is quite the magnanimous gesture. The last two years have been hellish for most restaurateurs. And with her indoor dining shut down most of the time, Douangpanya barely subsisted on takeout.

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“If the ban on indoor dining had lasted another few months, we likely would have had to close the restaurant down for good, but we managed to make it through and I’m so grateful,” Douangpanya said, while putting the finishing touches to her specialty pad kapao in the Pick Thai kitchen. “Food prices may be going up all the time and staff may be hard to find now, but no matter what kind of inconveniences we’ve had to endure here, it’s nothing compared to what Ukrainians are having to endure now.

“How can anyone not be moved watching hospitals and homes and families being bombed? Who does that kind of cruelty to women with their children in their arms and the elderly, while they’re running for their lives? Watching these images is heartbreaking enough, so I just can’t imagine what it would be like living like that.

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“We all have to step up to help. We have to show humanity at times like this and appreciate just how fortunate we are. Really, this is no big deal on my part.”

Some might disagree.

After covering costs, from food to alcohol to labour, Douangpanya, who moved to Montreal in 1980, has pledged to donate all her net profits from Tuesday night sales to Ukrainian relief through the Red Cross “for however long the crisis continues in Ukraine.”

Vilay Douangpanya, owner/chef of Pick Thai resto, and her husband, Vitaly Kudish.  The two met when she was a nurse at the Jewish General Hospital.
Vilay Douangpanya, owner/chef of Pick Thai resto, and her husband, Vitaly Kudish. The two met when she was a nurse at the Jewish General Hospital. Photo by Dave Sidaway /Montreal Gazette

Prior to starting Pick Thai nine years ago, Douangpanya worked for 14 years as a recovery-room nurse at the Jewish General Hospital. That’s where she met Kudish.

Douangpanya hopes other restaurateurs will follow her lead and come up with similar donation initiatives.

“I can only hope good things will happen and pray that humanity will prevail in Ukraine,” she said. “I still have to remain positive that peace will come to Ukraine, and that one day I will be able to visit the country.”

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Kudish is not quite so optimistic about visiting any time soon, or about peace. He has a pretty good idea what his fellow Ukrainians are up against.

“I was one of those who believed that this would never have happened,” said Kudish, who is from the now heavily besieged Kyiv. “Our peoples are so closely related. Our families are so intertwined. We’re seeing captured Russian soldiers with Ukrainian names, and Ukrainian fighters with Russian names.

“There is no rationality to this. You have to be a real monster to start a war like this. Ukraine has never presented any danger to Russia. Putin just couldn’t tolerate Ukrainians living happy lives.”

As others do, Kudish fears Putin will perpetuate false rumors about Ukraine using biological weapons as a pretext to launch his own biological weaponry.

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“The atrocities taking place at maternity and cancer hospitals are so horrific, but Putin denies it all, saying it was all a deliberate setup that the Ukrainians staged with actors,” Kudish said. “So many lies, and Russians have no idea what’s going on because they have no access to events on TV or the internet.”

Regardless, Kudish has no doubt what the final outcome will be.

“Russia has lost already — morally anyway,” he said. “I don’t know how long this will last and how many people will die, but as a country Russia will not survive. And once its people learn what has really happened, what their army was doing, there could well be civil war from which Russia might never recover. What is it really worth, all this blood?

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AT A GLANCE:

Pick Thai is donating net proceeds from its sales on Tuesday nights for the foreseeable future to Ukrainian relief efforts through the Red Cross. The restaurant is located at 5221 de Maisonneuve Blvd. W. Reservations: 514-316-9696.

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