Running for the Kilimanjaro Porters Assistance Project

Update, March 1st: Wow, thanks, everyone, we're pretty much there! (Anybody want to take us over the top?) The race is in just over 10 hours now---10:30pm Saturday EST in the States, 6:30am Sunday here. I'll be sure to post some pictures!

So, you probably know that I’ve been running a lot these days, getting ready to run the Kilimanjaro Marathon in—holy cow—3 weeks!

What you probably don’t know is that now would be an extremely helpful time for our friend Karen’s organization, the Kilimanjaro Porters Assistance Project, to receive some funds to support their great work.

The porters who help schlep people’s stuff up Kili are seldom treated well by the companies they work for. Most are local farmers trying to make some extra money to feed their families, and with very few exceptions they’re grossly underpaid, overloaded, underfed, and ill-equipped for their difficult work. We’re talking half the established wage, 20 pounds over the legal limit, 1 meal a day, and little proper gear for protection at altitude.

Karen’s working to change all that, and finding remarkable success in getting foreign travel companies to exert pressure on their local affiliates to get their acts together.

So, to help them out, I’d like to ask you to consider sponsoring my running on behalf of KPAP.

I’ve set up a page at http://www.firstgiving.org/matthewtodd where you can make a donation with a couple of clicks. Firstgiving will direct your donation to International Mountain Explorers Connection, KPAP’s (tax-deductible) parent organization in the States, who’ll send it straight here.

Dollars become remarkably effective when you turn them into Tanzanian shillings!

Oh, and I think some sort of publicity stunt / way of saying thanks might be in order, like magic-markering all the donations on my arms before the race, something like that. Any ideas?