Road warriors are making a difference
Fundraising travels match their dreams to social causes, write Craig and Marc Kielburger.
Mark Quattrocchi rode up a rough, dusty path into the small village of El Trapiche on a bicycle laden with bags.
The 28-year-old Ontario teacher had peddled more than 20,000 kilometres from China to Nicaragua. A group of local boys on bikes watched the stranger approach, and fell in beside Quattrocchi as he headed down the last hill. Quattrocchi explained that he’d been riding his bicycle around the world to raise funds for new schoolrooms, to help kids just like them. The bikes skidded to a stop. The boys stared at their new companion in amazement.
For two years, Quattrocchi was on a journey spanning five continents and 40 countries. His initial goal was to raise $10,000 to build a schoolroom in rural China, where he’d once worked as a teacher. He connected with our organization, set up a fundraising page and set off. Soon, donations started pouring in.
“When I was at my lowest, I would get a donation from a school back in Canada. It really did keep the wheels turning and kept me focused on something good on the horizon,” he told us.
The wanderlust fundraiser is in good company in his desire to cross boundaries and connect with issues closest to his heart.
Benoit Lebel of Shawinigan, Que. started walking across Canada in March to raise funds for the Children’s Wish Foundation, fulfilling a childhood desire to see the whole country. Chris Cull is completing his second bike ride from coast to coast to alert more Canadians to the dangers of opioid addiction. The activist from Bowmanville, Ont. got hooked on painkillers about a decade ago and lost his house, his job and his partner as a result.
Then there’s Gwich’in First Nation native Brad Firth (who is also known as Caribou Legs.) He is running along the TransCanada Highway from Vancouver to St. John’s in an epic effort to get more people to pay attention to the issue of missing and murdered indigenous women.
Quattrocchi says by the time he had biked through China, he had raised enough to build a schoolroom. Rather than stopping at the border, he plotted a new route that allowed him to visit all of the other communities in India, Kenya, Ecuador and Nicaragua where he wanted to build schoolrooms.
“In El Trapiche, it blew me away that one kid had to ride up that 10-kilometre hill to get to his high school. They’re trying to build a high school in the community so kids don’t have to make the crazy ride every day,” he says.
Throughout his travels, Quattrocchi kept a log of acts of kindness he experienced. People would see him struggling on the side of the road and invite him home for a meal. He says their generosity was humbling. “If I was speeding by in an SUV, that kind of thing wouldn’t happen. The bicycle really is the equalizer.”
Quattrocchi believes we all have a dream that will connect us with a cause and the world around us. It’s an idea he’s cultivated over thousands of hours on the road alone and through the chance meetings that touched him to the core.
In El Trapiche, for instance, Quattrocchi met with a women’s group that told him about the bracelet-making project they had started. Most put the income toward their children’s education. One young woman was saving to go back to school herself.
For this wanderlust fundraiser, the journey isn’t over. He’s taking his message to schools in the Ottawa area.
“The world is not this huge, scary place that it’s sometimes portrayed to be,” Quattrocchi says.
“We really can make a big difference, each and every one of us.”