Let's give some school, food, and warm things!

Dearest Friends, 

At the end of July, I will be running (read: crawling) 250km through the Gobi desert  over 7 days, carrying all my food and clothes.  I've taken it up as a personal challenge, to see what it is like to commit to something that requires so much dedication and planning (the latter not being my forte), to push my physical and mental boundaries, and to explore a land of incredible beauty and history. 

I would like to run this in honour of the people that live their lives with the kind of dedication, service and bravery I can only hope to strive for.  I would SO APPRECIATE YOUR HELP in supporting their incredible work. I have personally fully funded all aspects of my trip already and want to see if we can match this amount to give to two incredible charities.  If you want to give $1, $10, $100, $500 or anything in between, literally every cent counts and will be appreciated :)

If we raise can raise US$ 4250, we would be able to:

1) Sponsor 15 wonderful orphans in Uganda for a year, covering school and food at the Stanford Foundation for Orphans and Rural Development  (SORD) ($3900 required)

2) Get hot water bottles and warm slippers for 30 women at Bethany Home   -  a place of rehabilitation for abused women and their children in South Africa ($350 required)

Some more detail below: 

Supporting SORD:

I personally know Moses, who selflessly runs SORD to take care of Uganda's orphans, as well as Lau and Rich Stanford who are deeply involved with this wonderful organisation.   The cost of sponsoring a child for a year is minimum US$ 260.  (US$ 260 * 15 = $3900) You can find a full List of SORD's 30 orphans here   

So, you can either

 - Donate any amount at all, tiny or big

- Chose to sponsor a child for the full $260 either via this campaign or directly (you can contact me directly for the latter)

It would be AMAZING if we could go above and beyond what I have asked here to get all these future stars sponsored for a year - please get in touch if you want to spread some love! 

Supporting Bethany:

For those of you that know South African winters, they are BRUTAL because homes don't have any insulation.  Bethany is an incredible home that provides a safe space and opportunities for previously abused women and their children in Johannesburg.  Again, I personally know the organisation and Bridget Edwards who runs it.  To get hot water water bottles and slippers to help keep these wonderful women keep warm, we need $350, broken down as follows: 

- 30 hot water bottles at R90 each = R2650 (South African Rands)
- 30 warm slippers at R80 each = R2400
= R5050
= $350 

Besides the expected bruises, raw skin, sunburn and cramps I expect to come back with, I also expect I'll feel a deep sense of fulfilment.  It would make me incredibly happy to know that this wasn't just a personal mission but that it could help catalyse support for these two organisations that are changing South Africa and Uganda one life at a time. 

Thank you so much in advance for your support! Much love to you all

P.s - to be clear to all donors, my beautiful friend who is a US citizen and has a US bank account (a prerequisite for withdrawing from Go-Fund-Me) will help me get the funds to the two charities.  I will take personal responsibility for this and can get the charities to upload a letter of receipt :)