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ORBIS Ireland Supporters Run 10km at 10,000 feet

When I joined ORBIS Ireland as development manager in October of this year, my first project was to organize and accompany twenty-three ORBIS Ireland board members and supporters to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia to take part in the Great Ethiopian Run on November 23, 2008.

The twenty-three runners came from various walks of life; a number of them are ORBIS Ireland board members or their friends, and some supporters heard about the run through an advertising campaign. The participants all had one thing in common–-a desire to support ORBIS Ireland’s commitment to eliminate blinding trachoma in the Gamo Gofa, Konso and Derashe regions of Ethiopia by the end of 2012.

Each participant was asked to raise €3500 for the projects in Ethiopia. Over many months prior to the trip they all rose to the challenge and currently ORBIS Ireland looks to raise more than €50,000 from the campaign. This amazing figure was achieved through individual donations and creative fundraising events such as bag packing in supermarkets, a curry night, a sausage sizzle, a race night, a comedy night…I could go on. All in all every single person put forth a huge effort into raising significant funds, proving their dedication and passion for ORBIS.

The 10km road race - at 10,000 feet above sea level - is known as the largest mass participation sports event in Africa,with over 30,000 people taking part,including world renowned athletes Haile Gebrselassie,Richard Nerurkar,Sweden’s 2004 Olympic Heptathlon champion Carolina Kluft and the United Kingdom’s 5000m specialist Mo Farah.

A Moment in Time: December 11, 2007

Just one year ago today, the ORBIS Flying Eye Hospital landed in Phnom Penh, Cambodia for the first time and conducted the 100th program of the ORBIS DC-10. Even still, those two milestones weren’t the only significant events that occurred.

Cambodian Dr Phara Khauv—one of only eight ophthalmologists in the nation—became the third FedEx Fellow. The FedEx Fellows program designates two ophthalmologists per year to complete one- to three-month fellowships at some of the world’s leading eye institutes. This past spring, Dr Khauv completed his fellowship in pediatrics at Indiana University (IU) School of Medicine in Indianapolis, Indiana, USA.

Dr Khauv received training under the mentorship of ORBIS volunteer faculty Dr Dan Neely; the two have been collaborating on pediatric cases for years through ORBIS’s telemedicine initiative Cyber-Sight. At the end of his two-month fellowship, Dr Khauv returned to Cambodia with expanded training and knowledge of pediatric eye care; skills that he will be able to pass on to his colleagues and use to treat Cambodia’s growing youth population.

You can read more about Dr Khauv’s journey in our 2008 Annual Report, “Now I Can See,” which will be mailed out to our donors in the coming weeks. To request a copy, email blog@orbis.org.

A view of Dr Khauv's story in ORBIS's 2008 Annual Report