UF student Jeena Kar will use henna to decorate students’ hands with flowers, swirls and Greek letters.
Kar, a UF arts in medicine graduate student, will set up a henna booth on campus to help three Dance Marathon captains this semester. Each design will cost $5 and all of the proceeds will go toward the Dance Marathon teams.
Dance Marathon is a 26.2-hour event held in March where students dance to raise money for Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals, like UF Health.
Last year, dancers raised more than $2 million.
The 22-year-old reached out to Dance Marathon captains Thursday on the Design by Jeena Facebook page.
"It seems like Dance Marathon is very big on campus," Kar said. "The whole campus is working on it together."
She said when she made the Facebook post, she didn’t know the type of response she would get because some people don’t know what henna is.
Henna is a temporary design painted on skin using natural stains from dried henna leaves.
While Kar usually paints spiral and floral designs, she said she can illustrate Dance Marathon team names and Greek letters.
"I didn’t know how much interest that would be (in my henna post)," she said. "I wasn’t expecting it to be too crazy."
She said she’s done henna for campus organizations and cancer patients but never as a fundraiser.
UF nursing junior Isabela Leon, captain for the family relations Dance Marathon team, is raising part of her team’s money through the henna booth she and Kar will run, she said.
She said she hopes to raise $110,000 for her miracle child, Lucy Jane.
Lucy, now 3, and her family will be telling their story at UF’s Dance Marathon.
Leon, 20, said she learned about the post after her friend texted her about it.
"I’ve been really nervous about whether or not I’m going to reach my goal," she said.
She said she got tired when she danced, or participated, last year for 26.2 hours.
But every hour, a miracle family would tell the dancers their story. That put it in perspective.
Contact Caitlin Ostroff at costroff@alligator.org and follow her on Twitter @ceostroff
Jeena Kar, a 22-year-old UF arts in medicine graduate student, practices her henna drawings on Natalie Bonilla, a 21-year-old UF health sciences student, in the University Auditorium. Kar will donate her skills and time on campus to help three Dance Marathon captains. She will charge $5 for her designs with proceeds going towards Dance Marathon, a 26.2-hour event benefiting the patients of UF Health Shands Children's Hospital.
Paula Brito, a 20-year-old UF environmental science sophomore, models Jeena Kar’s henna artwork. Kar makes her own dye using dried henna leaves.
