Acton cabaret night raises cancer cash

Dec 2 2009 By Paloma Kubiak

A GROUP of friends whose lives have been touched by cancer helped raise more than £2,000 during a charity cabaret evening.

Rani Shukla and a score of friends from Poet's Corner, Acton, held the cabaret night to raise money for Cancer Research.

Mrs Shukla said all the members had suffered and overcome various forms of cancer and they were motivated to put on the evening to bring the community together.

The 42-year-old teacher, said: "A lot of the members are involved in the arts; we have many talented people and professional performers and we wanted to do something for charity. There were 14 acts during the evening at the George and Dragon pub in Acton and the whole night was a huge success. We raised £2,038 and the venue was at full capacity with a huge waiting list of those wanting to join in."

The mother of three said she was diagnosed with breast cancer at the ago of 40 and said it was a real shock.

Mrs Shukla said: "It was completely out of the blue as I didn't tick any of the high risk categories. It was a very aggressive form of breast cancer in life-threatening stages and when I was diagnosed, I had surgery a week later which doesn't usually happen.

"I'm very lucky to have come through the surgery, hormone treatment and radiotherapy over the last 15 months and we all wanted to give something back to the community."

For more information about Cancer Research, visit www.cancerresearchuk.org