Just hours ago, my best friend Dick Hillenbrand (@rdhoosier) and I landed in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia and met up with Scott Harrison (@scottharrison) founder of Charity:Water (@charitywater) to dig clean water wells for the rural poor. It is a truly humbling project and we need you to help us.
Across the whole of Africa, 80% of all disease is due to a lack of clean, safe drinking water and basic sanitation. Even more shocking, 42,000 people will die this week because of unsafe water. Almost, 90% of these deaths will be children under 5 years old.
It is a staggering and hardly conceivable number. Almost 40,000 kids per week losing their lives due to lack of clean water!
Charity:Water takes donations from concerned folks like us, who realize how lucky we all truly are to have consistent access to pristine water, and channels them dollar for dollar into the construction of permanent water wells for villages in need.
Just $4,000 can build a well for a village of up to 500 people and serve them with clean water for 20 years.
That is where I want to team up with you. I have already donated wells this year, but I want to do another two. And this time, I want to work with my Twitter friends and see if we can't bring 1000 Ethiopian villagers clean water access for 20 years.
My proposal:
If my Twitter pals raise $4,000 for one well, I will match it dollar for dollar to build a second well. That's right. I will match every dollar you put up until we have two wells together. Plus, since Charity:Water's overhead is funded by a handful of private donors, every single dollar you contribute to the project will go directly toward building a specific well for which you will get GPS coordinates and pictures of its setting.
This week, Dick and I will be traveling the countryside visiting villages and looking for the folks who most desperately need clean water. From among these communities, we will be choosing sites in which Charity:Water and their local partners can build wells, and, in particular, the sites for the two wells you and I will build together.
With your help, we can be sure that two more villages, 1000 more people in total, will have clean water access for the next 20 years.
Next step:
Donate directly to Charity:Water through their site: http://bit.ly/JzAUk
When you give, please send me an email (csacca AT gmail DOT com) and let me know so I can thank you!
In the meantime, keep following my Twitter (www.twitter.com/sacca) and, to the extent possible, I will be providing updates from the field in Ethiopia. If times are tough, and you don't have any change to spare (totally understandable, I was laid off in 2001 and know what it is like), do us a favor and send this post along to someone who might be able to help.
For now, huge thanks for your contributions and your efforts. I can't wait to introduce you firsthand to the people you are saving!
Chris