Error occured during this request! Please try again later.
Kurdistan
Daner Dler ran a marathon around Erbil, raising donations for the Kurdistan Food Bank. Photo: courtesy of Daner Dler
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - A young Kurdish athlete raised more than $500 for an Erbil food bank when he ran around the city’s 100-metre ring road last week.
“I got the idea of running around 100m road but the idea to just do that wasn’t intriguing enough,” Daner Dler, 20, told Rudaw English. “So I thought of using the power of social media to run for charity and that idea sounded promising.”
Dler has been running for three years and took two weeks to train for this run. He used social media to announce the campaign and how to donate. His friends pitched in, helping him collect donations.
His initial plan was to run around the 100-metre road, but he added in other routes, including the 60-metre road, until he reached the full marathon of 42 kilometers.
Users on Instagram and Twitter showered Dler with support, before and after the run.
“We have gotten a good amount of donations to help people in need and we are still taking donations as for the future we will be running more similar charity events,” he said, hoping future events can be bigger and open to the public.
Dler is donating all the proceeds to the Kurdistan Food Bank (KFB), which was founded in 2017 and is run by a group of students. So far, he has collected over 800,000 dinars ($550) and four large boxes of clothes
“He [Dler] contacted us a few weeks ago and told us he was running for charity and wanted the proceeds to go to Kurdistan Food Bank, which we were very grateful for,” founding member Blnd Shukr told Rudaw English.
Starting as a small project in a basement, KFB is an online NGO inspired by a local food bank in the city of Oklahoma in the United States. It provides food for people in need, in addition to providing clothes and other basic necessities.
“As of now, we are a team of 10 members,” project co-founder Amani Abdelsattar told Rudaw English.
The food bank held its first fundraising event in 2019, which was followed by a collaboration with an online Kurdish apparel business that makes face masks. Donors to the food bank received a face mask in return, an example of young entrepreneurs in the Kurdistan Region who have been finding ways to support one another through social media.
“People have been very supportive, and we have luckily gained many people’s trust,” Abdelsattar said.
The donations they receive are good, but limited. So far they have helped about 1,300 families. “Opportunities such as these collaborations help us in gaining more publicity and support,” she said.
“Supporting each other can help all of us,” said Dler. “Everyone was willing to help with anything.”
“I got the idea of running around 100m road but the idea to just do that wasn’t intriguing enough,” Daner Dler, 20, told Rudaw English. “So I thought of using the power of social media to run for charity and that idea sounded promising.”
Dler has been running for three years and took two weeks to train for this run. He used social media to announce the campaign and how to donate. His friends pitched in, helping him collect donations.
His initial plan was to run around the 100-metre road, but he added in other routes, including the 60-metre road, until he reached the full marathon of 42 kilometers.
Users on Instagram and Twitter showered Dler with support, before and after the run.
“We have gotten a good amount of donations to help people in need and we are still taking donations as for the future we will be running more similar charity events,” he said, hoping future events can be bigger and open to the public.
Dler is donating all the proceeds to the Kurdistan Food Bank (KFB), which was founded in 2017 and is run by a group of students. So far, he has collected over 800,000 dinars ($550) and four large boxes of clothes
“He [Dler] contacted us a few weeks ago and told us he was running for charity and wanted the proceeds to go to Kurdistan Food Bank, which we were very grateful for,” founding member Blnd Shukr told Rudaw English.
Starting as a small project in a basement, KFB is an online NGO inspired by a local food bank in the city of Oklahoma in the United States. It provides food for people in need, in addition to providing clothes and other basic necessities.
“As of now, we are a team of 10 members,” project co-founder Amani Abdelsattar told Rudaw English.
The food bank held its first fundraising event in 2019, which was followed by a collaboration with an online Kurdish apparel business that makes face masks. Donors to the food bank received a face mask in return, an example of young entrepreneurs in the Kurdistan Region who have been finding ways to support one another through social media.
“People have been very supportive, and we have luckily gained many people’s trust,” Abdelsattar said.
The donations they receive are good, but limited. So far they have helped about 1,300 families. “Opportunities such as these collaborations help us in gaining more publicity and support,” she said.
“Supporting each other can help all of us,” said Dler. “Everyone was willing to help with anything.”
Comments
Rudaw moderates all comments submitted on our website. We welcome comments which are relevant to the article and encourage further discussion about the issues that matter to you. We also welcome constructive criticism about Rudaw.
To be approved for publication, however, your comments must meet our community guidelines.
We will not tolerate the following: profanity, threats, personal attacks, vulgarity, abuse (such as sexism, racism, homophobia or xenophobia), or commercial or personal promotion.
Comments that do not meet our guidelines will be rejected. Comments are not edited – they are either approved or rejected.
Post a comment