Cambodia Blogger Challenge

In summer 2013 Coca-Cola ran a campaign called ‘Share a Coke’ with 250 of Great Britain’s most popular names written on bottles. People were encouraged to find a bottle with their name or the name of a friend and ... surprise surprise ... buy it!!. I bought a bottle with my name on, got given a bottle with my name on, and gave others bottles with their names on. Clearly the campaign worked on me! It worked on others too, leading to an reported 870% increase in traffic to the Coca-Cola Facebook page.

Coca-Cola managed to create a personal connection with their public.

A personal connection makes all the difference.

For me a personal connection with injustice was created when I took part in Slum Survivor 7 years ago – wow that makes me feel old! The experience involved living in a makeshift slum for 5 days and facing challenges which aimed to replicate those faced by the 1 in 6 people worldwide who live in poverty. Our hard work making paper bags was met with demoralising rule-changes, our careful shelter building met with pouring rain and our comfortable ‘I’ll be home soon’ met with a heartbreaking realisation that for a billion individual human people, THIS. IS. REALITY.

In 2012 I visited Tajikistan with Christian Aid. I met people whose lives have changed for the better, whose lives are changing for the better, and whose lives are waiting for change to come. Most moving of all I met some who didn’t realise that change is possible. One encounter which is as fresh in my mind as the day it happened was with a young woman called Muzdah.

As a newlywed 8 months previously her husband had gone to Russia to find work and she hadn’t heard from him since.

Women are frequently oppressed and unaware of the legal rights in Tajikistan; Muzdah’s voice and individual identity were not recognised in the local community and she was living as a slave with her husband’s family.

Christian Aid’s partner project was just beginning to work with this community and I knew that Muzdah’s story would soon reach its turning point, and become one of hope like the many others I had encountered in Tajikistan.

I returned with more than a duty to tell Muzdah’s story; I returned with a passion and a compulsion to tell her story. And as I did, I saw the difference that good story-telling makes. As I told stories, and related them to the listeners, I saw that moment of personal connection take root in people’s hearts. Through hearing my words and seeing the light in my eyes that came from those firsthand experiences, they were inspired.

A personal connection is like a stone dropped into a pond.

It creates ripples as we ...

Buy Fairtrade
Sponsor a child
Live Below the Line
Petition those in power
And pray to a God who listens

leading to an ever bigger influence through the creation of turning points in life after life after life.

Stories of hope, and opportunites to be a part of it. People who heard the stories I told, in person or in writing, bought into the mission against injustice just like people bought into the Coca-Cola name experience. Because of that gem - a personal connection. They discovered a story or moment that touched their hearts, and caught on to the power that is in their hands; power that can change lives.

As Albus Dumbledore says, words are our most inexhaustible source of magic. They can bring the furthest lands to your mind or they can raise an army. I am good at words. And I want to mold words into shapes that create moments of personal connection and inspire people to change the world. This is why I would like to take part in the Cambodia Blogger Challenge.