Rhinos on Kilimanjaro

Around 10 days ago a friend of mine swam about a mile for charity. A great effort for a good cause. He's now considering a trek up Mount Kilimanjaro for the same charity, Marie Curie Cancer Care, and asked for thoughts about raising sponsorship.

Well, I thought about a few ideas - including adding an optional donation to the quotes/invoices his business sends out and/or finding an angle for press coverage - but I got distracted by the concept of sponsorship. The more I thought about it, the more I thought the recent Red Nose climb for Comic Relief had 'devalued' climbing Kilimanjaro as a challenge. We got the impression it was hard work but anyone who was reasonably fit could do it... which made it seem noble yet a bit silly. Another concern was the funding: this type of event isn't as clear-cut or as inexpensive to arrange as a sponsored swim. Because some of the sponsorship may go towards paying for the trip, not towards the charity's work, technically a sponsor could raise more money for charity by asking people to donate and then not going!

One alternative for the Marie Curie walk would be telling everyone that you're paying the organisation costs yourself - which has the disadvantage of emphasising the 'fun' aspect of the challenge and making it sound a bit like a holiday.

Of course, the big flaw in my theory is that sponsorship works. Even cynics like me will support their friends. It's all about the greater good, as Mr Spock once said. Although he didn't ever sit in a bath of baked beans.

Anyway, I wouldn't have thought much more about this if I hadn't just read a chapter in Douglas Adams's 'The Salmon of Doubt', a book he wrote when dead (yet is considerably better than anything I've yet managed while alive). He talks about campaigning with a team of people in rhino suits who were climbing Mount Kilimanjaro and summarises his thoughts thus:

...the deal seems to be this: "Okay, you are trying to raise funds for this very worthwhile cause, and I can see it's an important and crucial matter and that lives or indeed whole species are at stake and something needs to be done as a matter of urgency, but, well... I don't know... Tell you what - do something really pointless and stupid and maybe a bit dangerous, then I'll give you some money".

[Update: It was the London Marathon on Sunday - but Major Phil Packer isn't likely to finish for a couple of weeks. Now that's a sponsored walk. He quotes philosopher John Dewey on his website: "Without some goals and some efforts to reach it, no man can live".]