<font face="arial,helvetica,sans-serif" size="3"><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt"><span style="font-family: Arial">My mother, Beverley, tends to ‘take off’ alone but this time she’s taking my Mini Cooper. Not without me! It’s my car! So I applied for extended leave, with fingers crossed, and permission was kindly granted from work. We’ve chosen the route, completed our visa applications and our wheels are being ‘vamped’ to take on 10,000 plus miles of roads through desert, mountains and pot-holes. We are Team George.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt"><span style="font-family: Arial"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt"><span style="font-family: Arial">While it is fun, the first £500 we raise goes to the Christina Noble Children’s Foundation in Mongolia, which is the official charity of the Mongol Rally 2011. </span></p><p><strong><span style="font-family: Arial">BUT</span></strong><span style="font-family: Arial"> we both want to raise money for ‘Options Project’ - Captioning for deaf children - an off shoot of the Mongolian Educational Alliance, as our chosen charity. We have a really good reason for doing this.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt; tab-stops: 270.0pt"><span style="font-family: Arial">My name is Georgina. I was born profoundly deaf and qualified as a solicitor in 2005. One of the greatest influences in my early years was ‘subtitles’ on TV which happened in the 80s. Being in a position of always trying to ‘catch up’, I was able to understand – for the first time ‘what the heck’ was going on! </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt; tab-stops: 270.0pt"><span style="font-family: Arial"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt; tab-stops: 270.0pt"><span style="font-family: Arial">We discovered that approximately 5.5% of Mongolians have varying degrees of deafness, which is huge, (in the UK, it is under 1%). For the <em><span style="font-family: Arial">lucky few</span></em> who attend school, Deaf children are educated separately from hearing children. Subtitles (captions) would enable deaf children in Mongolia to feel less isolated and excluded. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt; tab-stops: 270.0pt"> </p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt; tab-stops: 270.0pt"><span style="font-family: Arial">Captioning, we believe, boosts literacy and increases <em><span style="font-family: Arial">nationwide</span></em> access to education. Captions connected me in a way I had not previously experienced. Being able to join in and talk about everyday news, gossip and <em><span style="font-family: Arial">soaps</span></em> is underestimated! </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt"><span style="font-family: Arial"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt"><span style="font-family: Arial">TV is a popular medium and, despite what many may think, you cannot lip-read off a screen! Think of cartoons. Often speech is too fast, or there is a narrator in the background, or the image jumps from face to face. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt"><span style="font-family: Arial"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt"><span style="font-family: Arial">It changed my life – why not for deaf children (and adults) in Mongolia? To this end, we are working with the Mongolian ‘Options Project’ for Deaf people and they have just started captioning on the Dream Channel (a children’s network). They are looking to roll out captions nationwide, including the Mongolian National Broadcaster (MNB). Working through Deaf Child Worldwide, funds are needed to transcribe, translate and caption.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt"> </p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt"><em><strong><span style="font-family: Arial">WE HAVE SPONSORED THIS EVENT OURSELVES, and my beloved my Mini Cooper is being auctioned for charity in Ulaan Baatar.</span></strong></em></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt"> </p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt"><span style="font-family: Arial">YOUR DONATIONS VIA <strong><em><span style="font-family: Arial">'JUST GIVING'</span></em></strong> WILL GO DIRECTLY TO THE TWO CHARITIES. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt"><span style="font-family: Arial"></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt"><span style="font-family: Arial"></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt"><span style="font-family: Arial"></span></p><p><span style="font-family: Arial">Georgina</span><span style="font-family: Arial"> and I would like to thank the following:</span></p><p><span style="font-family: Arial">David Couch – a previous fellow Mongol Rally driver – without whose continuing support and wisdom we wouldn’t have got this far!</span></p><p><span style="font-family: Arial"></span><span style="font-family: Arial">Tony, Paul and team of Mini Motor Sport Centre for their TLC of our mini cooper. Their website is : www.minimotorsportcentre.com </span></p><p><span style="font-family: Arial"></span><span style="font-family: Arial">Linda Sills for her <em>personal experience </em>of Mongolia. <span> </span></span> </p><p><span style="font-family: Arial">Last but not least, Sam Chiene for dropping us, willingly, into this adventure.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: Arial"></span></p></font>
