A Hampstead boy ran and cycled 75 km “to feel what many Ukrainians are going through”.
Quinn Wartchow, a year 5 student at St Anthony's School for Boys in Hampstead, challenged himself during the Easter school break to raise money for the British Red Cross and help Ukrainian refugees.
The 10-year-old's goal was to complete an average of 3.57km a day to cover the distance many refugees had to travel from Lviv to the Polish border.
He said: “This is the distance from the city Lviv to the Polish Border. All of the money I raised would go straight to the British Red Cross Ukrainian Appeal, that is supporting the crisis.”
Quinn’s parents are from America so they set up donation pages for both currencies, and raised more than £1,000 and more than $1,000.
“Knowing that people had their everyday life like us and then having to leave their normal life without doing anything wrong, I feel like we should support them to have their lives back," said Quinn.
“I thought if I could do something that could help them, even though maybe on paper you would think what a 10 year old is going to do to help these people."
Quinn ran around his block, cycled in Regent’s Park and concluded his challenge with a long ride in the Lee Valley over the Easter weekend, uploading his progresses to the fundraising page.
“I think the thing I most enjoyed was the last bike ride we did just because it was out in the nature," he said. "It was a nice day and it was a nice way to end what I have been doing.”
In a message for child refugees, he said: “I think just try to stay strong even when you are not 100% certain if you are going to see your family again because that mind frame would help them thinking that maybe they will get their lives back.”
Nicole Wartchow, Quinn’s mum, said: “We were very proud of him. He was very diligent making track of his kilometres and making sure he was going to do all of it and sending around the fundraising page to friends and family to get people to contribute.”
Support Quinn's fundraising at www.justgiving.com/fundraising/quinn75kmukraine
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