Christmas Cracker 10k

     Well I did it, braving sub-zero temperatures and dodging icy puddles for a time of 52:16, on the left you can see me just after I finished wearing the Camps International t-shirt. It was a challenge but successful hour of endurance. Thanks to all who have donated through this event.

     Another, related, fund-raising event recently was selling programmes of the ESAA cross-country competition at my school last weekend. Hopefully that's another £30!

     There probably won't be another post before Christmas, so I wish you a merry one!

Bag Packing Sucess

     Today I along with 8 other members of the tour party went to Sainsbury's near Rugby to do bag packing! We were there from 10:30-14:30 and managed to raise over £400, meaning over £50 each! Every little helps, wait: that's Tesco... Thanks to everyone who came along.

     Things have been moving on at school, the bags2schools collection was yesterday. Seeing all the blue bags packed onto the buses was both amusing and encouraging! We'll soon be getting the results from the company as to how much it has raised.

     Now it's not long 'till the 10k on 10th December, can't wait! This time I'm being prepared and have been training for the last 2 weeks, 48 minutes. The real challenge will come if this unseasonable weather shifts (last year it snowed 11cm)! Still the idea is for it to be a challenge, and I'm sure it will be fun and rewarding. 

     As ever I will keep you updated as things progress....     

New Fundraising Plans

     Since I've been back at school things have moved on quite a bit. We were given a talk by a representative from Camps International and now the group is updated about all the projects happening in Tanzania. Projects include the home building project for those unable to build houses themselves and the water capture scheme on the local school. I am encouraged by all the photos too which have been put up, you can see them and many more on their Flickr page.
     I've been offered the opportunity to go bag-packing at Sainsbury's next month. This should prove to be a great fundraising experience as I found when I went bag-packing previously in aid of my scout group. Also at school we've organised the collection of old cloths, rags and textiles for recycling and reuse through the company 'bags2schools'. Collections are on 16th November and the greater the mass the more the cash for the trip.
     Finally, today I registered for the Moreton Morrell Christmas Cracker 2011 10K Race, taking place in mid December. I hope this will be as enjoyable and worthwhile as the Regency Run last April. I hope to beat my time of 55 minutes, and am keeping my fingers crossed for no snow, wish me luck!

New School Year

     The new school year approaches! And with it brings opportunities for more fundraising at school. Hopefully this year I will have even more successes to tell you about, both individual and as part of the whole school team.

     As I said before the holidays I am going to write more letters to companies for fundraising and providing equipment. Just before I went away I was rewarded by the success of baselayer kindly donating one of their specialities. There is now a column down the right side of the page where donor companies are listed, I hope my next batch of letter writing will add to that list.

     During this week a milestone passed, it was time to pay my first instalment of 40%, which makes 50% in total now. Luckily I am on track and have raised 44% through fundraising, hopefully next time I will have made it all.


     As ever I will post updates as they develop.
 
      

    

Garden Party Sucess

     Yesterday at the Liberal Democrats' garden party I managed to raise almost £50 from the kind donations made while I played the piano. I would like to thank all those who made donations and I hope that they enjoyed my performance.

     Today I am finalising the letters which will be sent to companies later this week, I hope that this hard work will pay off!

     As ever I will post more updates about developments when they happen.

Summer Plans

The 'Kurryoke' night last weekend was a very modest success with a small gathering of people, and all who were there had an enjoyable time.  There was some great singing and the curry was delicious!
     For my next fund raising event I will be playing the piano at the Liberal Democrat Garden Party on Sunday the 17th. 
     Over the summer I also plan to write to companies who can help me with fund raising and providing equipment for the trip.
     Group fund raising plans at school have been making good progress. 
    
     I will be posting more updates soon as these plans develop.

Finalised Arrangements for our 'Kurryoke' Night!

     Here, as promised, are the details of the next fundraising event for my charity trip to Tanzania!
     If you would like to attend our 'Kurryoke' Night on the 2nd July from 18.00-22.30, the donation is £15 for adults and £10 for under 18s, which includes a curry meal (veg and meat curries, rice, breads and beverages). Use the Paypal button on this page and please make sure to include your name and telephone number, but you can also contact me directly at chriswp95'at'gmail.com if you need more information. Booking is essential to plan food quantities, etc., therefore you must book in advance, places are limited.
     As for the karaoke, it's £1 for each song sung. If you would like to view the 8000+ song list to pick your favourites visit this link. 
     Once you have booked you will be sent an email with extra information. Contact me if there is anything else you need to know!
      
    
 

Curry and Karaoke Night

     On Saturday 2nd July as a fund raising event I will be holding a Curry and Karaoke night. There will be karaoke provided by luckyvoice : www.luckyvoice.com, so if you want to look at the song selection go to the web site. Closer to the time I will post updates for more exact arrangements.


     More updates soon, Chris

New Fund Raising Ideas

     After the resounding success of the piano marathon and funds being raised of about 15% of the total I have now began to organise other fundraising ideas. 
      Other plans for events include a Curry and Karaoke Night with raffle which will hopefully take place sometime in the months of June or July. I hope the event will prove to be fun as well as lucrative for the cause.
     Grass cutting during these months and the rest of the summer is another scheme I wish to pursue. As these fundraising ideas develop I will update the blog and will try and keep you posted about new projects.

More Updates Soon...

The Marathon Is Done!

     At last the 12 hours are over and I've had some time to recover!   

     I'm glad it's over now, despite how much I enjoyed it (in parts at least). My arms/shoulders/neck ache but surprisingly my fingers are in perfecting working order. Still the transition from the piano's keyboard to the computer's is tiring, so I'll be concise. Thanks so much to everyone who has been involved, through the many different media and the large time span since February.

     Now I suppose I'll have to start work for my next fundraising event! I don't think I could gain as much experience as this event: publicising, finding donors, organising technology, and preparing for the 12 hour endurance; it's pushed me outside my comfort zone at times but overall this has been incredibly rewarding and enjoyable. 

     Though for my next event I'm still up for a challenge, it may be some time. I'll keep you posted...

Piano Marathon Tomorrow!

     Today sadly we were forced to abandon the camcorder kindly lent to us by Trudi, due to a lack of money, time and will to take apart the desktop, read the motherboard and install a fire-wire card! I hope you still can appreciate the live stream at the bottom of the page, even with the lower quality webcam!

      Don't forget to tune in to BBC Coventry and Warwickshire at about 8.45AM tomorrow! I really appreciate the all the support from the community, with cables being donated, kind messages being left and a general positive attitude towards the whole thing. It really has helped. Now all that's left is to do the marathon, the preparation has been almost as challenging and rewarding as the real thing.

     Thanks once again to everyone who's helped so far.

More Publicity!

     As you may already know there has been interest by three newspapers in the upcoming piano marathon: The Leamington Courier, The Rugby Advertiser and The Rugby Observer. Well today I was called up by BBC Coventry and Warwickshire Radio 94.8 FM | 103.7 FM. I will have an interview at about 8:45, before the start of the piano marathon. So do tune in.

     In other news we now have an excellent camera kindly lent to us by a friend so the sound and picture quality should be much better than my web cam. However there seem to be technical problems relating to fire wire cables not being able to be plugged into PCs. I hope a trip to town to buy a different cable tomorrow will solve this. I'll keep you posted. 

     P.S: I did get the double ended mini fire wire DV cable, it works, but now we have issues with audio. We hope putting a memory card in it may work since we've tried everything else! 

The Regency 10k is Done!

     After so much training for the endurance event of my piano marathon, I somewhat neglected training for the 10k, completely. However I was still quite pleased with myself for completing the run in 55.57 minutes despite the high temperatures. I was surprised by how much I enjoyed it. 
    
     Thanks to everyone who sponsored and supported me for this event. Maybe next year, with better experience and conditions, I will be able to run it quicker and get more sponsorship.

     I hope you're all still looking forward to the Piano Marathon this Saturday, I certainly am. Once again I am very appreciative of all the support from so many people in these last few months. I just hope I'll manage to pull it off, there's lots of practice still to do in four days!

It's All About Cameras!

This week is all about cameras! 
     
     Firstly, today a photographer from the Leamington Courier came round and took a picture of me at the piano. After that I had a telephone interview with one of their journalists. Hopefully it will be published in the paper this week, but it's not too great a shame if it is in next week's edition.
     
     Secondly, as you probably will have noticed, there is a YouTube upload below (removed temporarily due to marathon), as I said last Wednesday. I decided to use an old video from December (hence the fleece), but I still think it's all right. Anyway I don't have too much time to try and record another at the moment, but I'll see what I can do.

   
     Lastly, my camera was used to take a photo for the Rugby Advertiser today as well. I'm not sure when they will be publishing the article, but I'll keep you posted.  

Recent Fundraising and Future Plans

     The piano marathon preparation so far has been going well, and with exams out of the way next week I will be able to concentrate on keeping you informed as well as other preparation such as for the 10K, which I am running with members from my scout unit. 

     Hopefully I will be able to upload a video to YouTube and also posted into this blog, with you as my witness I will have the determination to do this soon.
    
     Plans are moving along for T-Shirts sponsorship and further cake sales at school. A big thank you also to all the neighbours so far who have given so generously to the piano marathon.
      

Piano Marathon Date is Decided

      The piano marathon is now taking place at my house on 16th April from 9am until 9pm. Remember, you can see it live on this blog. 
     
     So, what will I be playing? The majority of my pieces are going to be classical/romantic works composed by: Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, Schumann and Rachmainoff. Among my favourites: Rachaminoff's Prelude in C sharp Minor, Chopin's Nocturne in E flat Major, and Schumann's Träumerei.

     Thanks to those who donated for the 10k Regency Run at the Scout bingo night on Friday, I managed to raise over twenty-five pounds!   

Cake Sale Results

     The cake sale yesterday went well with almost a hundred pounds being raised between our group at school. Thanks to everyone who bought and hopefully enjoyed a cake. Also on the same day there was a more low key cake sale at my step-mother's University. There she managed to sell several pieces of her coffee and walnut cake contributing more money, thanks to all the donors there also. Still even more money was raised on the same day with four leftover cakes being sold at my Explorer-Scout group. 
     
     The cake sales were good fun and I hope to be doing more in the future. I'll inform you as to when these will take place, as well as my finalised date for my Piano Marathon at home.

Piano Marathon Update

     A few days ago, as you may have noticed, a donate button and a live stream web cam and chat widget were set up on the blog. The donate button is an easy way for you to safely donate money via any card payment method (you do not need a Pay Pal account). The web cam and chat widget will become live during the Piano Marathon itself, streaming the action live to this blog (technology withstanding). 

    

     The prospect for my Piano Marathon being held at the school isn't looking so good any more. Consequently I will most likely be holding The Marathon at home sometime around Easter. Hopefully by then I will have had time to practice some pieces as my piano exam is out of the way this Friday; which incidentally is the same day as a cake sale at my school! Despite the hectic schedule this week I hope I'll manage to sell enough of my 'millionaires' shortbread' and raise more funds.

     

     I hope to be able to give you more definitive information about The Marathon in my next post.

     
    

The blog is launched!

     Today is the start of this blog which will document my progress towards my trip to Tanzania in August 2012. 

     When my school announced that this trip was going to take place, I was immediately interested. I jumped at the opportunity to travel to Africa and take part in projects involving wildlife conservation, community projects such as building schools, and to learn about the people of Tanzania and their unique culture.

     This evening I went to a fantastic gig at the Stretton-under-Fosse village hall. There I spoke with Ken Nicol (who was playing with Ashley Hutchings - both of whom are British folk rock legends) who was interested in my plans and made an announcement during the performance about my fundraising event. Event, do you ask? Yes! In the near future I will be playing the piano for 12 hours straight, which will be streamed live to this very blog.

     The event is being developed now and I'll be posting updates. So thank you for visiting my blog and a special thank you to the generous people at the Ken and Ashley gig tonight who are already sponsoring my piano marathon. If you would like to help too, please contact me. A payment facility will be in place soon.