I work for an amazing organisation called Translators without Borders (TWB). This year we have a huge goal to raise $150,000 for our Language is Life end-of-year appeal. As well as knocking on the doors of companies, foundations and all the usual places, I want to play my part by raising a small proportion (0.5%!) of the target directly.

I decided to run this fundraiser as a way of practising what I preach; I hope this will help to motivate and honour our amazing community of 80 staff and 30,000 volunteer translators who change lives with language every day across the world, as well of course as the people their work supports, from Rohingya refugees to people affected by Ebola in the DRC.

My small personal goal is to raise at least $750 by Christmas, with a focus on 5th December, which marks ten years since the death of my brother Jack, himself an ace wordsmith and linguistic supremo who was studying Italian in Sicily at the time. Just after Jack died the Haiti earthquake hit in January 2010, killing 150,000 people. It was in fact this catastrophe that inspired the founding of TWB as people struggled to get vital information from aid workers in Haitian French and Creole. I remember watching the horrific news and feeling how fortunate I was to be grieving in a developed country with food, water, shelter and surrounded by people who understood me.

________________________________________________________________

TWB believes in a world which knows no language barriers. They work with a global network of volunteers and harness cutting-edge language technology to give power and a voice back to communities in crisis, who lack access to information in their own language. Their work benefits people who are poor, less literate, and come from under-served languages, as well as enabling other non-profits to communicate effectively when supporting people around health epidemics, disasters, women's rights and safety. Please support me to spread the word about the campaign and the importance of language in humanitarian and international development settings.