I would like to invite anyone interested in donating, to help me raise a small sum of money for the Indian NGO, 'Gram Vikas' via a water funding campaign being run this month by 'charity:water'.

Gram Vikas' mission statement is "to promote processes which are sustainable, socially inclusive and gender equitable to enable critical masses of poor and marginalized rural people or communities to achieve a dignified quality of life."

This donation will go towards helping pay for the work being done by a village community in Odisha (Orissa) state in India that has unanimously adopted the 'Gram Vikas' model of total sanitation. $450 USD (my current campaign goal,) 100 percent of which will go to a village working with Gram Vikas, is said to pay for the supplies a family needs to bring 3 taps into a single household (kitchen, bathroom and shower) and to help them maintain these for 3-5 years to come.

Though all are invited to donate (that means you!) I just so happen to be holding this campaign as the alternative to me getting gifts this year for my upcoming birthday. So you few who fall into that privileged circle, I'm talking to you too! The idea with these birthday campaigns is that I try to get friends/family to donate my age (to be) in dollars. So if you would like to do that (though any sum will do) here's how old I'll be, just for the record: 29. Prime!

In about 18 months time, 'charity: water' will show me and any donors (potentially you) which projects exactly we have funded, including the location and name of the community we helped.

Thanks!

[Please excuse my lack of knowledge of the Oriya language. The above title I have typed in Hindi, not only because that is the only Indian language that I have a basic understanding of, but more importantly because I think those words sound nice together, that's all. They read: "paani aur pratishthaa."]