Passports with Purpose 2010: The Travelblogger's Fundrasier

On the Passports with Purpose website, we have a little tagline: We believe in the power of travel to make change. We really do believe -- "we" being the four bloggers in Seattle who founded what we fondly call PwP for short. We didn't know that you believed in it too, as much as we did, more even.

Now that we're in our third year and have added a fifth critical person to our crew (Meg Paynor, PR), we have solid evidence that you believe travel creates change -- there's a school in Cambodia now, the Passports School, where a few hundred kids learn and get a meal on school days. And there's a nurse to check out their skinned knees and belly aches, and there are books, and hey, did I mention, there's a school where there wasn't one before because a bunch of bloggers believed they could make the world a better place.

This year, we're working with LAFTI, an organization that helps the Dalit (untouchable) population gain access to land. In addition to farm land reform, LAFTI helps Dalit families build homes -- homes for people who have never had the hope of home ownership. Our goal? To raise 50,000 US dollars to build a LAFTI village in southern India, to build a community that will house 25 or so families.

We have great sponsors on board. As of today (October 21, 2010), our sponsors are BootsnAll, LiveMocha, Round the World With Us, HomeAway, Traveller's Point, Hosteling International, and Raveable. We're honored to have their support and they give us a fantastic head start on our fundraising efforts.

But it's the community of bloggers that makes this effort go. We need your participation too -- it's not to late to sign up to host a prize, to blog about our efforts, to spread the word to your network -- your readers, Twitter followers, Facebook friends, etc... and to get people excited to give. Yeah, there's some good stuff in it for you -- you might get a great stay somewhere, or a cool piece of travel gear, or, oh, I'll just say it, there IS another ukulele this year -- but that's nothing compared to what you can give. All the money we raise (minus paypal transaction fees) goes directly to LAFTI to cover the costs of building housing for homeless families. It's a great cause, it's travelblogger driven. Don't you want to be a part of this?

Find out more at Passports with Purpose.