Think you are alone when you look at your bank balance and realise that the gap year of your dreams is a million miles away? Think again. These live diarists are in the same position as you, but they are actively fundraising to make their gap year dreams a reality. Follow them through the peaks and troughs of fundraising and gain a little inspiration...

In this section:

<< Back to Fundraising for travelling and volunteering  Tori Oram     Tori's diary  Sarah Ford  Joe Ryan  Carmel Wiggins  Ruth Roadnight  Steph Carter

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Introducing fundraiser Tori Oram Serial gapper Tori is preparing herself for her trip to South Africa with i-to-i, where she'll be working with some big cats. Before she gets on the plane and cracks open the cat food, there's a serious sum of money for her to raise - over £5000 in fact... Name: Victoria (Tori) Oram Age: 21 Hometown: Kent Hey Tori, welcome to the wonderful world of the gapyear.com Fundraising diary! Give us a bit of info on what you're up to at the moment? Thanks guys! At the moment, I'm doing as much as possible to save money. I've completely given up the idea of a life. I have a tendency to "binge save", which is when I save 99% of my cash and give myself about a tenner a week to live on. It's difficult, especially as I have to pay housekeeping to my mum, but it's not impossible. At least living at home cuts down on a lot of bills! Sounds like you are serious about this saving up malarkey then? What's it all for - surely not to spend a year enjoying the delights of Kent? No, not at all. I don't think I could possibly spend a year doing that! The plan is that on July 17th, I'm due to be in Johannesburg airport where I'll be met by someone from i-to-i. They'll take me to the Lion Park that I'm volunteering on. I'm excited because I'll get to work with cats, okay, big cats but cats none the less. I grew up around cats as my mum's a registered breeder and I know quite a bit about them. I've handled births and weaning and cat sick and all manner of gross stuff. I know lions will be slightly different but the principal is the same. Aside from the lions, the game park also has Hyenas, Giraffes, Zebra, Leopards, Cheetahs and those weird pronged animals I can't remember the name of! I'll be generally working with the cubs as I'm a girl and apparantly sexism is alive and well in Africa. Still, if you volunteer, they will let you deal with the bigger animals. I'm gonna do it alone. People let you down. My last travel buddy gave me the absolutely pathetic excuse that "she was allergic to cats so she couldn't work with lions!" I was kind of offended that she hadn't thought of anything more plausible! After I've finished volunteering, I'm gonna overland Africa with Overland Club. I meet our trek in Johannesburg and we overland it up to Nairobi. We travel through eight seperate countries (South Africa, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Malawi, Tanzania, Uganda and Kenya) and I'm really looking forward to it! I have a map of the world on my bedroom wall, and I love getting back from a trek and sticking stars on all the places I've visited and big stars on all the places I've worked. I should finish my trek about the 20th September. Then I fly home. I'm planning a year in Oz for 2006 so I'm going to need to fundraise again after that! Click here >> for more on i-to-i Click here >> for a placement like Tori's Click here >> for more on overlanding Sounds like quite an ambitious and action-packed gap year you've planned yourself! But it must work out quite pricey - how much money do you need to raise to fund it all? I ideally need £5000. That includes everything from flights to insurance and £2000 spending money. I'm over-estimating my budget, which at the moment looks like this: - Trek: £800 - Volunteering: £1095 - Flights: £1000 - Insurance: £100 - Vaccinations: £300 - Spending money: £2000 - TOTAL: £5295 I don't believe that it'll cost a grand for the flights or three hundred pounds for the injections, but if I overaccomadate, I know I'll succeed! Plus there's no chance of me getting caught out by the odd thing that I may have to cough up for. Certainly looks as though you've got it all very well thought out. How much of the £5295 do you think you'll need to raise through fundraising? The standard answer here is, as much as I can! At the very least I'd like it to cover injections and insurance. At best it could cover the flights as well. If I aim for my fundraisers to cover the costs of the smaller things on my 'To pay for list', if I manage to contribute towards any of the bigger items, it'll be a bonus! How else are you boosting your gap year fund then? Slogging out a 9-to-5? I currently work at my local petrol station doing all sorts of hours (starting from 6am and some ending as late as midnight). I also do other people's shifts for them. Everyone knows to call me if they want to swop! I've given up on having a life in order to raise money. Think of me this festive season, as I'm working Christmas Day, Christmas Eve until midnight, Boxing Day, both bank holidays, New Year's Eve until Midnight and New Year's Day. Still, I'll get £13.10 an hour for all that! It'll be worth it. We're open 24 hours, so I work weekends too! So when you said you'd given up your life, you weren't kidding were you? You are literally spending every minute working to pay for your gap year. What an inspiration! So when you do manage to fit a spot of fundraising into your schedule, what have you got planned? My fundraising plans start in the New Year. I want to get Christmas out of the way first. However, I'm getting a little ahead because tomorrow I'm up at 6am to go to a local boot fair. I'm not selling anything, because I sold all I own for my last trip. Instead I'm face painting! I've been trained in it, twice. I'm charging £2.00 a face. I'll go along and ask people who have stalls for a corner of their table to set up my paints. I'll offer to pay the stall price of £6.00 and it'll improve their sales because while little Johnny is having his face done, the parents will browse the nearest stall. It'll take some wheeling a dealing, Del Boy style, but I'm sure someone will say yes! Click here >> for more fundraising ideas Sounds like a good way to kick off the fundraising - apart from all of that getting up early of course! Anything else planned? I'm also gonna sit in a bath of....ready for this? Live bait! Yeah! I'm gonna start writing to local bait shops to see if they'll supply the bait. My local paper and radio station have agreed to cover it and I'll get sponsors to see how long I can stand it! I'm also selling cups at 50p each and the customer gets to scoop up some bait and tip it over my head or down my back or wherever! That's planned for May when the weather is warmer. I also have other plans. I'm wrapping friends and families Christmas gifts for ten pound a time and I'm going to do some paintings to sell. Thank God for my art qualification! Other things will begin in the new year... when I've had a chance to put my thinking cap on some more! Ewww. Live bait sounds truly disgusting - but no doubt, it'll be worth a bob or two. So how much are you hoping to raise from that awful ordeal, as well as the rest of your events? I'm hoping to raise about a grand from all of this hard work. I'm not sure if I'll manage it, but I can try. A raffle may work as well, so there are loads of things that I can try to boost my funds. I'll let you all know how I get on in my diary! Wish me luck! Click here >> to send Tori a pm pledging sponsorship Click here >> to get a fundraising diary of your own

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