Thanks everyone for your support. Please checkout the logo @winelirious made for us and shoot him a tweet to tell him you like it. We have the venue confirmed and we’re working on getting the cause approved and spreading the word. In case you’re wondering we’re planning on raising money to support two orphanages on the border, Baan Dada & Baan Unrak. More details including blogs pictures etc are coming. We need your help! Spread the word and plan to be there the evening of September 11th!
[Goal] 100,000฿, allowing us to initiate more than one of the projects you nominate
[Event Details]
Lush, Bangkok’s Twestival Local Event
Friday, September 11th, 2009
Frasier Suites Sukumvit Poolside Bar
5th Floor, 38/8 Sukumvit Soi 11
[Cause & Participation]
Many of you have been already actively participating in charitable initiatives either through fund raising at tweetups, by becoming volunteers, and several in-kind donations. For twestival local we will setup a line item list of projects we want to see completed and you will be responsible for reading the details, voting for the project you like the most, and getting involved with the successful implementation of the projects you select. If you would like to make a suggestion please notify @insearchofsanuk as soon as possible (For example, @yourname suggests we use 5,000b for school uniforms at an orphanage in Songklaburi). I’m working hard to have this available for voting as soon as possible, so we can make an announcement at the August 15th tweetup (see bangkoktweetup.com).
@winelirious is already working on a logo for us
Please contact us to volunteer your time or resources so we can make this not only a great event, but produce life changing results for Thailand’s needy.
These days sometimes it’s hard to tell good from bad, or real contenders from pretenders. Who really cares about charity: water or the children in Africa? Some just claim Twestival or charity: water for the sake of their own PR? Haha, maybe, and we jumped on board partly for that reason too.
Since there’re few twitterers in Thailand, hardly anybody here ever heard about charity: water, and it’s too short a notice (we joined just 2 weeks ago) to get big sponsors to support. So instead of hosting it in a private place where just twitter geeks do join and nobody else in Thailand, where Twitter is still relatively unknown, would care to learn about Twestival. We applied for space on Khaosan Road, the world-renowned backpackers’ hub of Bangkok.
Yet again it’s not easy to convince the authority about some foundation they never heard of. We finally got green light on the very day of Feb 12. That’s why we can’t confirm you Thai Twitterers early enough. We rallied everything, staff, volunteers, equipment, etc. with in just half a day and drive out, then still unsure how it gonna be.
Bang! There we’re overwhelmed. Twestival Bangkok was a drum roll and hip hop performance. Hundreds of international passers-by, American, British, Australian, Russian, Israeli, Thai, Korean, Japanese, Chinese, you name it, got the message of charity: water. We got donations from almost a hundred people, heartful salute to you all. The amount is not much, but according to charity: water, it’s enough to let 4 people having clean water for 20 years.
So what’s my point about pretenders? Last night, I tried something I never did before. I walked with our team along Khaosan and Rambuttri Road for almost 2 hours, sweatingly crying “t-shirt for charity: water please” or “donations for charity: water, sir.” Seeing all the faces; watching them looking for, picking up money in their wallets, and putting it in the donation box (most of them are Thais). All are imprinted in my mind.
Why do they donate (obviously they give more to our girl staff, less for me ^-^)? How do they give money to strangers who could be a fake? Should we trim our costs off the donations we got? Questions rang in my head.
The answer is we don’t want to be another pretender. So we put up with all costs (no other sponsorship) and please rest assured that all of your donations just go to charity: water. Anyway we still have to earn a living, that’s why you see our QuikPal’s name, a small media company now testing our Twitter channel (dubbed as “Thailand insider news”). But in earning a living, we hope to do something special back to the society as well. Time will tell.
We hope to support your activities too, just let us know. We’re even happier to do it anonymously.
After some hiccups, Ta-da! we may do it at Khaosan Road. To be confirmed ASAP, this may be the hippest Twestival of all time, pls follow us @quikpal!!
Update: Confirmed!! we will do it at the T-junction of Chakrabongse Road and Khaosan Road, in front of Chana Songkram Police Station (location on Google Maps here). It’s really a miracle, we tried for almost a week and just got the green light for space now (5pm). I’m not a Christian but just now feeling God won’t forsake the endeavoring minds. Full house people! Come on!!! We’ll start around 7-8pm, just call us (08-1563-2880) to confirm!
T-SHIRT will be on sales too, please kindly support us!
I will visit all runners-up within a couple days and will select the joint with the best support to us. Furthermore we may be able to have a press conference at FCCT, to be confirmed. The 2 things are a bit related since if the news gets out, it might become a boom! Then instead of hosting it in my 30 sq.m. apartment with my couple die-hard pals half-drunk half-naked webcasting back to London, we may have to turn to some big place to host tens or hundreds of people. Well, how about the Government House (remember the PAD party huh)? Hehe just a joke, I’d rather keep myself clueless at that political mess.
RAFFLE . AUCTION . MUSIC or anything you think it’s great, please brainstorm by leaving your comments here (and great if you got some stuff to share that night too). No matter whether Chivas will give us free bottles or not, I’ll bring one of mine for you @sugree
Note: The Lexus poster above has nothing to do with us, just a lame teaser, oops.
Our friend in Atlanta seemed to give up already. With this short notice, we’re pretty afraid how Bangkok gonna be. Thinking why bother to do something for someone thousands of miles away? This event in fact is not just about Charity: Water, Twestival, or anything remote.
IMHO it conversely ties with each of us, thousands of tinie minie around the world. Apart we’re nothing, together we can do a miracle. Yet we never heard about any plan can be agreed upon within 24 hours in the magnitude of 40 cities around the world! And now it spreads to 100+ cities.
We jumped on the bandwagon to be a part of this history. We hope you do join too. At least a comment from you is good enough for us In the near future we hope to do some great things for Thailand also.
PS Thank @modeling22 you’re the first on board. To other Tweetizens in Bangkok, could you pls help us spread the word?
Time is running out and we’re just a small team. We’re already busy talking with the press, prospective venues and sponsors. If you could lend a helping hand, no matter in which area: PR, organizing, brainstorming, etc. You’re more than welcome. Just leave me a note here, email quikpal@gmail.com, twitter @quikpal or http://quikpal.hi5.com
Two of the runners-up are in RCA. One is Old Leng, a pub with wooden Chinese teahouse atmosphere. Don’t judge it from the look, it’s a watering hole for a lot of media & advertising veterans in Bangkok. Although a few of them are a bit “senior” as the name of the joint suggests. Arguably rock stars do favor this place too, as in pic below. Well, Jimmy, we’re not saying that you’re not too young
Interested to join on Feb 12th? Please book in advance so we can estimate the facilities we need.
To support Charity: Water, there may not be much better host cities than Bangkok. The city was called “Venice of the East” in the past and is still famous for her beautiful canals and rivers. Thank Amanda and her team for creating this world phenomenon of Twestival, let’s see how much we can do with 2 weeks’ time (we’re probably the last city to join but not the least, I can feel it!)
Being a new host just minutes ago, we’re going to check all the interesting venues and report to you all soon. Your comments are dearly welcome ^-^
Twaah— Tweee– I know it’s a mouthful, right? But since I first heard about Twestival, I have loved the concept. For those unfamiliar, click here for a look at the background and structure of what makes this twitter-festival exceptional.
Be A Part of the Unique Age
“We now have the capacity to organize and take collective action together to deal with a problem or an injustice… this makes this a unique age in human history…“ ~British Prime Minister Gordon Brown
