We have been busy pulling together an exciting fundraising challenge over the last few months. We hope it will not only raise lots of money to help the first intake of students be as successful as possible, but that it will also create awareness, in many countries, about the Suubi School that will benefit Ugandan families for generations to come.
Many of you will have been inspired either by directly meeting, or reading about, the amazing work of Ssemwogerere David. He has worked tirelessly for his whole life to help improve the living standards of his fellow Ugandans; in particular since the 2008 inception of Suubi Centre in Lubanda Village. He truly is the driving force behind all the wonderful things that have been achieved to date at Suubi and is even more passionate about the success of Suubi Secondary & Vocational College.
With this in mind we decided to throw out a very different type of challenge to our good friend, David; a 7 day, 295km long ride, up and down the hills of northern Spain along the Camino De Santiago! A huge thanks goes to Chad and Brenton Brown, from Bike About Europe, who came up with this creative fundraising idea and very generously offered to provide David with a place on their Camino tour at the end of June this year.
David got hold of a pretty good bike by Ugandan standards!
The Suubi family have gotten right behind his efforts as he prepares for his challenging ride in Spain.
Never one to say something is too difficult, David immediately accepted the challenge and has been training hard on the dirt tracks around Suubi for the last couple of months. During this time we have been busy organising a visa for him to visit Spain, which has thankfully been granted today, so now it is full steam ahead! Plans have also been made to meet with past and future Setem Suubi volunteers, in Barcelona, prior to the ride. They are also organising for David to speak to other NGO's in the area so he certainly will be spreading the Suubi word far and wide.
The long dirt roads and hills surrounding Suubi are the ideal training conditions for the Camino ride.
David found these rides physically challenging and was exhausted after each session when he first began training a few months ago, but recently rode 35 kms with ease, on the same day as organising builders to begin at the school site. What an effort!
Through David's extensive network of international friends and past Suubi volunteers he will be getting the word out about the new Suubi School and asking people to sponsor him on the ride. This will give him the opportunity to raise money for the school himself, something that is not easily done in Uganda. As usual, he is putting in an unbelievable amount of personal effort to ensure the Suubi College is a success, so rather than simply relying on others to provide all the money, he is getting on his bike to raise whatever money he can! So please get behind him and either make a one off donation or perhaps you can get a group of family, friends or work colleagues together to sponsor him for each kilometre he rides! To do this you can simply go to the donation page on the HUG website and/or email David directly to let him know you have been inspired by his effort and would like to donate.
We feel sure this is going to be a hugely successful trip for David and Suubi. We'll keep you posted on how his training is going as the starting date draws closer. Happy riding and good luck to David!
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