Here’s the post I’d written for yesterday before the amazing video appeared!
So one hundred days from today – if everything goes according to plan – we will be standing on the summit of Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania. What an extraordinary thing. It feels in equal parts totally dream-like, and absolutely part of my every day life now. Ma wrote a post about the similarities and differences between having a baby and climbing a mountain some time ago, and one of the points was that “it’s in your head all the time in the build up”. That’s so true – I feel like it is part of what defines me at the moment, and the first thing I think of almost every morning. I’m so grateful for the support we’re getting from friends and family. It’s easy to worry that we could be driving people mad with our “obsession” but, instead, it feels like everyone is happy to embrace it. And even join in! What a treat that friends and family have helped out with the posts – giving Ma a rest, and the blog a fresh perspective, every so often. Do let me know if you’d like to join in too.
When I was at Ma’s recently she said she doesn’t like to get out of bed until she’s seen that that day’s post is safely up online (I do the posting). My lovely friend at work, Kate Gordon, says that she likes to “race” the blog up in the morning; Cousin Lou says reading it on the train to work is part of her ritual now; and friends everywhere I go mention something that, in some cases, I only learnt about my family and history a few hours or days before them, as they’ve read it on the blog. It’s wonderful, and a real privilege, to be part of people’s daily routine. Thanks so much to all of you who have taken the time to comment – either on the blog pages, or on the Facebook posts. I know Ma loves that feedback too – it’s a surprisingly collegial way to connect, and to know that she’s making people think, remember, giggle or smile.
How extraordinarily lucky we are to have so many donations to the causes we’re supporting. Catching Lives, where Ma cooks for the homeless, will benefit from 50% of what we raise; the Tanzania Porter Education Project (via Friends of Conservation) will get 25% of the funds to enable porters – both male and female – to safely make a living from the mountain; and the other 25% will go to small community projects that Baraka helps Exodus Travels run around the globe.
A huge thank you to everyone who has donated via our Virgin Money Giving page, and particularly to the donor who has offered to match fund every donation we receive before we set off – up to our target. It means each donation will go a very long way. If you haven’t had a chance to donate yet, but plan to, please do it before we head off!
Talking of fundraising, you may remember that “The Cornrow Five” (some of my colleagues in the Marketing Team at work) offered to sponsor me if I got my hair braided for the climb. That story has now escalated and the Product Team have turned their challenge on it’s head (appropriately enough!) by offering to donate even more if “The Cornrow Five” have their hair plaited for the same length of time as me. That could make for some very interesting photos on my last day at work before the climb!
So with 100 days to go, I looked back 100 days to see what we were up to and found this short post, with no pictures(!), about Ma starting to do her packing. She mentions, for the first time, her “Kili drawer”. How brilliantly organised she is. It’s a drawer that I know she’s been adding to regularly – with items she will need on the mountain, and with gifts she can give to the porters we meet there. It’s very typical of her to have both in there! And, unsurprisingly, she’s also been buying bits and pieces for Osc and me, to ensure we’re safe and warm on our adventure.
I think it’s a useful strategy in life to count your blessings, and I feel like this project has thrown a whole load of new ones into my world. One of those is the knowledge that Ma, Osc and I are surrounded by friends and relatives who will donate, click, read, write, braid, train with, and even go naked (thanks Jean!) in their backing of our madcap adventure. The Exodus “Kili Infographic” says that around two thirds of those who attempt Kili actually make it. We’ve been told countless times now that altitude sickness is a arbitrary master, and there’s no way of knowing how it’ll affect us, but if love and support could get us to the top, I feel like we’d be flying up. What a lucky bunch we are. Roll on those hundred days!
