Progress Report
So where exactly are we in terms of preparation for this epic journey from London, England to Ulaan Baatar, Mongolia you ask?
Good question.
1. Visa’s have been arranged, though not officially applied for. (That will come in May and we are assured we won’t have TOO difficult a time organizing it). At least, for those team members that have their official documentation prepared.
2. Still no car as of yet. We ARE looking at some prospective models but it relies entirely on what our final team count turns out to be (which should be decided this week). Once this is sorted we will immediately begin the search for OUR CAR!
3. Our official sponsors are currently The Quinte Sports Review and PartSource in Belleville, Ontario. I have also been agonizing over potential sponsorship packages to send to companies and, while it’s been time consuming I believe the time is drawing near for me to send out as many letters as I physically can in hopes of even a few of them trickling back to me in the form of funds and aid.
4. In terms of funds raised, we have a total of $475 in online donations and about $1,000 (maybe a little more) in donations from the WONDERFUL patients of Dr. Mason at The Urgent Care Medical Clinic. A big thank you goes out to Kate-Ann Follwell, Bruce Diamon, Joan Young, David Dancy, Margaret Mason, Don Raycroft, Dave Elmy of the Quinte Sports Review, Kristin Scowcroft, Walmshields ltd. Mark Walmsley, Brian Dawson, Bob Jamieson, Clara and Marilyn Walker, The Scharf sisters and the Universty of Ottawa Alumni Associationfor their generous donations so far - (More names soon to come! I just don’t have them all in front of me). I cannot stress enough how much these donations, regardless of how big or small, have helped this rally to come to fruition.
5. Lastly, as I mentioned in an earlier post, our charitable donation procedure has changed. We had issues with canadahelps.org and ultimately ended up having to switch online donations to justgiving.org, a UK based online donation facilitator. While we are excited to work closely with justgiving.org, and Mercy Corps Mongolia, it means that at this point in time we are unable to generate Canadian Tax receipts (because it is a UK based company/charity branch). We are of course concerned with the potential this has for deterring donations and sponsorship, but have no choice but to press on. If you are interested in making a donation you can go to our JustGiving page here. We appreciate any and all help!
I think that’s it for now…
A.
