The annual Maovember campaign features quirky events for good causes. Learn more about Maovember here. How to support it here.
And our 2022 event list here.
Be a ‘Walk Star’! Go the extra mile for a good cause and join the Ritan Park Mao-a-thon on November 26 to raise money for Maovember, the annual Beijing-born event that donates 100 percent of its fundraising total to local charities.
The idea is simple. Participants will gather at Ritan Park and walk 5 laps, 10 laps, 20 laps or—the ultimate—50 laps. Go solo or enter as a relay team, with each participant footing part of the load.
Each 1.5 km lap raises money for Maovember’s 2022 designated charity, The Library Project, which funds reading rooms and more in rural schools.
Here are the key details for the Ritan Park Mao-a-thon, organized by the Metro Beijing branch of Entrepreneurs Organization (EO).
What time does it start?
Any time you’d like! For an average brisk walker, each 1.5 km lap will take 15 to 20 minutes to complete. That means 10 laps (15 km) will take from 2.5 hours up to–for slower walkers–5 hours. If you start at 9 AM, you can finish at lunch time. If you start at 2 PM, you can finish late afternoon.
Those doing more laps can pick the time that best suits them. Some planning to go for 50 laps (75 km) will put their shoes on the ground when Ritan Park opens at 6 AM.
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How are the laps counted?
Every time you complete a lap, you’ll take a selfie with your lap number. There will also be a rest station stocked with water, snacks, a place to store your bag… and of course plenty of encouragement. Jia you!
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How do I raise money?
Each Walk Star asks friends, co-workers and acquaintances to be their sponsors. For example, if a friend sponsors you RMB10 per lap, and you walk ten laps, you collect RM100 from your friend.
In short, each walker finds sponsors, does a bunch of laps, collects the sponsors’ money and donates it directly to Library Project. We suggest each walker try to raise a minimum of RMB1000.
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How do I donate the money?
Once you collect the sponsor money, send it directly to The Library Project using our dedicated QR code below. After the money is transferred, you will see your name and donation listed. You will also receive a certificate showing your donation total and the number of years of reading it funds.
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Why else should you join?
Aside from the warm fuzzy feeling of helping a good cause–and getting a good workout!–there will also be medals for the Walk Stars at the end, free foot massage vouchers for the first 30 people who raise over RMB1000, and an afterparty where the first beer is on us.
I’m in! How do I participate?
Join our Ritan Mao-a-thon WeChat Group here:
It’s as easy as a stroll in the park. You can get further details and ask questions about the Ritan Park Mao-a-thon in the group.
Oh no, I’m out of town or busy that day, but I would like to help the Library Project!
No problem, you can still donate to Maovember and The Library Project and help us fund reading rooms across China by using the our dedicated QR code. Check out the projects we funded in 2021 and funded in 2020.
This is the third Maovember event involving Ritan Park. In 2017, Mike Wester of The Beijinger walked 900 km during November, including 75 km (50 laps) in one day in Ritan Park.
And in 2019, a group of walkers and runners completed up to 28 laps (42 km) each in Ritan Park to raise money for Maovember.
The sixth annual Dog Pub Crawl kicked off the tenth annual Maovember campaign. This year’s “Paws for a cause” visited four venues on October 29, including Peach by Hulu, Paddy O’Shea’s, Jing-A and Pi Bar, with the dogs–most in Halloween costumes–fueled by snacks from Penny’s and the humans enjoying a drink at each stop. The day also included lucky draws with prizes from Peach, Paddy O’Shea’s and Jing-A as well as a “virtual dog crawl” for those pups who could not make it.
The dogs gathered at Peach Sanlitun, where the humans enjoyed mulled wine or sodas and the dogs got their snacks from Penny’s. Peach also gave everyone a gift certificate for the restaurant as well as one for new sibling restaurant Fork, which is set to open. This is the second year Dog Pub Crawl started at Peach.
The tour then headed to Paddy O’Shea’s for Tsingtao, sodas and coffees. Paddy’s mascot / pup Frankie was there to greet his fellow canines. This is one of many Maovember events hosted by Paddy O’Shea’s over the years, including some raucous closing parties.
Stop number three was a veteran on the Dog Pub Crawl circuit: Jing-A. The dogs enjoyed water at their dedicated “open bar” while humans enjoyed craft beer. We also held our lucky draw here, with beer, key chains, glasses and t-shirts from Jing-A and beanies, coolers, hot water bottles and gift certificates from Paddy O’Shea’s.
Our final stop for a third straight year was Pi Bar, where owners Young and Vico welcomed the dogs and we enjoyed a choice of four kinds of wine. The dogs chilled out in the relaxed airy vibe of Pi before it was time to go home for a good long sleep!
Thanks to all who supported us, including Peach, Paddy’s, Jing-A, Pi Bar and Penny’s, and the trio of dogs who joined virtually–Naughty, Darla and Olive–courtesy of donations from owners Young and Meredith.
This year’s DPC raised 28,470 mao (元2,847). Adding in 32,880 mao (元3,288) of donations from all about China, including from Corinna, Sarah, Don, John, Zekun and Dustin, and 8,100 mao (元810) from a wine tasting supported by Wine to Asia and Hulu by TRB, and the opening weekend of Maovember 10 totaled 69,200 mao (元6,910).
This year’s Maovember, our tenth annual campaign, started last weekend with an event–the Dog Pub Crawl–that captures our spirit of fun and fundraising.
Maovember started as a spur-of-the-moment fundraiser and evolved into a yearly ritual with a shifting and eccentric lineup of events, from beer pong, corn toss and poker tournaments to live music, dance and wine tasting parties to walk-a-thons and bar crawls featuring themes such as wine, craft beer and BYOD–Bring Your Own Dog.
The focus is on giving 100 percent of revenue to a good cause, with admin costs covered by volunteers. And to good causes that can show visible results that we, in turn, can show to our donors. That has meant everything from funding a delivery van for a bakery that employs people with osteogenesis to funding cataract surgeries for the elderly in rural area to funding reading rooms for schools in need across China.
This year’s tenth-anniversary Maovember logo is gold and silver. The design was fine-tuned by Andres Vargas, with Claudia Masueger of CHEERS printing it for our stickers and Jasmine Kho of Kakikopi and Mulu funding several giant versions. Thanks to them and to the many others out there who have helped Maovember to help good causes.
As a new Maovember campaign gets underway, here is an update on our 2021 efforts to support The Library Project.
One challenge each year is finding a mix of projects to match the funds we raised. Nichole He of The Library Project created a plan that aptly did this. We focused on schools in the Baoding area of Hebei province, just a few hours’ drive from Beijing, and ultimately decided on three projects.
Maovember funded 10 reading corners
for 元34,510.00 or 元3,451 each
Lantian is in Yi County, with a population of 550,000 people, and is the largest of the three schools, with 1,469 students. Last year, we had enough money to fund 12 reading corners for students in grades 3 and 4. This year, we added 10 more reading corners, this time for students in grades 1 and 2.
Maovember funded a reading room for 元39,506.01
This school serves eight villages with a total population of 6,000. We funded eight reading corners at Fugang in 2019. As a shift in local education strategy saw some students and books move to another school, we upgraded to include a reading room with books, tables, chairs, shelves, a globe and more.
Maovember funded six reading corners
for 元20,706.00 or 元3,451 each
This school, for students from grades 3 to 9, covers 15 villages and has a strong need for books covering grades 3 through 6. That will be the focus, including a set of STEAM (science technology, engineering and math) materials.
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Overall, we had modest expectations for Maovember 2021 given the ongoing COVID situation, but easily surpassed them, with the highest donations per event in our history. All while keeping to our tradition of stressing the fun in fundraiser with quirky events–see the full list here.
Maovember is quite decentralized and depends on goodwill and generosity, in terms of time, creativity and donations, from many people. Thanks to all who supported us in 2021 and fingers crossed for our this year, our tenth campaign!
Each Maovember is unique and the 2021 campaign, which raised 94,772 rmb or 947,720 mao, is no different. While we faced uncertainty due to the COVID crisis, this year saw the highest revenues per event since Maovember started. On top of that, Maovember stayed true to its philosophy of holding fun quirky events, including (click links for details and more photos):
As per tradition, Maovember donates every single mao it raises, with any admin costs covered by our volunteers. This year’s funds went to The Library Project. Of the money raised, rmb 89,522 was donated via our unique QR code with Library Project (donors can use the QR code in the poster here to see their submission) while rmb5200 was donated directly via The Library Project’s main account.
Many thanks to everyone who made Maovember 2021 possible and I encourage people to check out the event links to see just how much fun we had while raising money for a good cause!
Jing-A Brewing hosted a boozy one-of-a-kind party on November 28, featuring beers and wines made with Marselan, which some people call “China’s grape.”
Attendees enjoyed two Marselan beers made in 2020 with grapes from Grace Vineyard in Shanxi, then aged one year in Chardonnay and Cabernet Sauvigon barrels, as well as a barrel-aged Farmhouse Ale. This event was a follow-up to last year’s Maovember Marselan party at Jing-A.
They also tasted a lineup of Marselan wines donated by Grace 怡园酒庄, Martin 马丁酒庄 from Hebei, Man Zhou Xiang 满酌香 from Shandong, and Stone & Moon 望月石酒庄, Xiao Pu 小圃, Mountain Wave 海悦仁和酒庄, Charme 夏木酒庄 and Lansai 蓝赛酒庄 from Ningxia.
The event raised rm6558 in attendance fees, with Tom Hsu, director of VIA Faith Hope Love Public Welfare Foundation and executive director of Domaine Franco-Chinois in Huailai County, the first winery in China to plant Marselan grapes, supporting with a rmb5000 donation. That brought the event donation total to rmb11,558 or 115,580 mao. Those who missed the event can get the Marselan beers by bottle at Jing-A and the wines from the respective wineries.
Beer Pong became Buf Pong with a raucous sixteen-team tournament at Great Leap #12 in Beijing on November 28.
Teams paid rmb500 each and were divided by lottery into four divisions of four teams, where they played round robin, with the top ping pong ball tossing team from each heading to the semi-finals and, for the winners there, to the finals. This year’s champs, the Pretentious Philanthropists, won the weight of one player in Buf2, a total of 11 cases of 24 cans of BuF2 each!
Players also enjoyed free-flow Buf2, in three flavors, throughout the event. And many played the bean bag toss to win tickets in a raffle that includes prizes from Buf2, Great Leap, Peach, Arch and more.
By the time the last ball was thrown, Bufpong had raised rmb15,046 or 150,460 mao, including rmb11,251 in team fees (and additional donations), rmb2295 in raffle ticket sales and rmb1500 in bidding to shave the Maovember mustache of chief organizer Dill. Check out the pics below!