Retirement, but work remains on the menu

Sydney
3 February 2002

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Retirement, but work remains on the menu

Maria Vicano and Sr Benigna Cairns By Chris Hook

Sr Benigna Cairns has always known what's cooking. And retirement won't change that part of her life.

Her regard for colleagues as friends rather than just as employees has been a major ingredient in her recipe for success.

That's why news of her retirement has brought heartfelt tributes.

Sr Benigna Cairns is proof that if you can stand the heat you can stay in the kitchen.

She's been there for more than 50 years, cooking for those to whom the Little Sisters of the Poor tend in their nursing homes.

Now she's able to retire, handing over to Keith Carpenter, a lay person who has worked with her since 1975.

"Sr Benigna is not just our boss, but to me, over the years, I have regarded her as one of my best friends and confidantes," Keith wrote in a newsletter of the Little Sisters of the Poor.

Their friendship began when Keith was only 16 and developed over the years. Sr Benigna was a guest at his wedding; she saw his son just hours after he was born.

Helen Vicano, who has worked with her for 34 years, is also grateful for the blessing Sr Benigna has been to her.

"Through all the years I have worked with you I respected you not like my boss but also as my mother," Mrs Vicano wrote, "because I spent most of my life together with you and you always made me feel so special."

Sr Benigna joined the Little Sisters of the Poor in New Zealand in 1946, then entered the novitiate in Sydney. She began working in the kitchens at Mt St Joseph, Randwick in 1948.

After final vows taken in France, she returned to the kitchens of the Little Sisters of the Poor, this time at Drummoyne. In 1967, she went back to Mt St Joseph, Randwick.

Sr Benigna will still be busy, even in retirement, covering for absent staff, remaining a good friend and support to her friends in the kitchen.

And her companionship duties with the residents of Mt St Joseph are far from over.