Saturday, Apr 29, 2017

Staying fit isn’t only for oneself. Often, people do it to be healthy for their families. And sometimes fitness goes beyond one’s circle when it starts to positively influence and impact the community. Fit people have tremendous power to help. And as such, we have the responsibility to make this world a better place for everyone. Personally, that is my advocacy. So this time, we highlight an individual whose immense contribution to charity is sustained by fitness.

Maria Conceicao is more than a fitness enthusiast. She’s a six-time Guinness World Record holder with numerous sporting achievements. More importantly, she’s an 11-time award-winning philanthropist, a role model humanitarian currently taking on five Ironman challenges in five continents to raise funds for The Maria Cristina Foundation (MCF), a non-profit organisation she founded in 2005 to break the chains of poverty through education and help children in the slums of Dhaka, Bangladesh.

Gulf News tabloid! chats with Conceicao to learn how one’s fitness can turn into something much more meaningful.

Tell us about your background before the charity work.

I was working for Emirates Airlines as an air hostess. It was an amazing lifestyle of travel and staying in luxury hotels but on one trip to Dhaka I found myself visiting a hospital and a slum area and felt compelled to help. I grew up poor, I was abandoned when I was two years old and raised by a widowed Angolan refugee who already had six children, but she still made sure that she raised me the best she could. I think she had a huge effect on my life. I was fortunate later in life to get a job with Emirates, but the lifestyle wasn’t really for me and after seeing the poor slum families, I wanted to help them and I really felt that I could make a difference in their lives.

How difficult was it raising funds initially, and how did fitness come into play?

When I started the foundation work it was easy to raise funds in Dubai. The story was big news, donations used to come to us without even trying. Emirates Airlines supported us financially as well. But when the [financial downturn] came the funding almost stopped overnight. We tried our best with fundraising events etc, but we just couldn’t raise enough funds and we had to shut down the majority of the projects in Dhaka. The education was something that I couldn’t let go. I myself have suffered for lack of education (I only went to school up to grade five) and it is even worse for these children in Bangladesh — no education means certain poverty for life. Also I couldn’t let years of hard work go to waste.

This is when I started the challenges, first the North Pole, then summiting Everest and then the marathons and ultra-marathons. This is what drives me, to ensure that we can continue our work. Education prevents poverty from continuing, but education is a long-term project that’s to be seen through to the end.

What role does fitness have in your life?

First of all, being fit and healthy helps you to succeed in life simply because it gives you drive and stamina to work harder and longer. But also it encourages you to continuously improve yourself and to keep aiming higher. I hope that people see my determination as a sign that I am determined to succeed at everything do, I also hope that the children in Dhaka are inspired by me pushing myself to great heights and that they should too, and not be afraid of the risk of failure or rejection.

What does fitness teach you?

Generally in fitness, you always have to have a goal otherwise it’s very difficult to get better — if you run every day with no specific goal you’ll probably not improve as a runner, but if you set a goal, maybe a 10km race or half marathon then you’ll follow a training plan to get you there. This goes for anything in life... if you want to achieve something, first set your goal what you want to achieve then make a solid plan to get there. If you just do the same things every day your life will just stay the same.

Also, don’t be put off if you don’t feel enough progress. Sometimes it is difficult to notice the progress but if you stick to the plan it will come, sometimes progress can sneak up on you and all of sudden you realise how fit you have become compared to when you started.

I have great admiration for individuals like Conceicao. A single person focused on helping many. To be able start a generous cause and keep it going is no easy feat. She’s taken on a much bigger challenge on her shoulders, but as long as she stays fit she’ll be able to carry on serving the children of Dhaka.

The details

Visit Conceicao’s foundation to know more and find out how you can help: mariacristinafoundation.org.

Dwynn Trazo, Senior Infographic Artist

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