DAVID ADAMS speaks to Rodney Olsen, one of 24 riders who have cycled across the vast Australian continent to raise money and awareness of the work of Christian child sponsorship and development organisation Compassion Australia in lifting children out of poverty…
When Rodney Olsen and a group of 23 fellow riders arrive in Newcastle on 16th October, it will be the culmination of a 4,000 kilometre bike ride across Australia and come some 32 days after the group first hopped onto their bikes at Perth’s Cottesloe Beach on 15th September.
And the first thing Olsen says he’ll be doing is giving his wife Pauline a “huge hug”.
“Absolutely looking forward to seeing her after four-and-a-half weeks on the road,” he says. “And then I’ll just be celebrating…We’re all going to be absolute emotional wrecks…Tears will flow, hugs all round, just to realise we’ve done this thing.”
The group have undertaken the monumental feat to raise awareness of and money for the work of Christian child sponsorship and development organisation Compassion Australia.
On the road. PICTURE: Jennylynne Andrews/Facebook.
While they’d set an initial fundraising target of $250,000, when Sight spoken to Olsen in the middle of last week, they were approaching a figure of $330,000.
“We would love to see that continue to rise and get to around $350,000 before we roll into Newcastle on Tuesday,” says the 55-year-old father of two, who works as a relationship manager with Compassion in Western Australia.
The money raised through the ride, known as Coast to Coast, is being specifically directed toward Compassion’s “Highly Vulnerable Children’s Fund” which is used to support kids who are at greater risk of things like exploitation and trafficking and may include children whose parents have left in search of work or where there has been a long term medical issue in the family.
“People were very keen to know why we were crazy enough to ride across the country – it gives us a great platform for fundraising…and an opportunity to meet with people along the way, to talk with friends and family, to get the message out…”
– Rodney Olsen
In addition to the money raised for Compassion’s work, about 85 children have been sponsored along the ride.
Olsen, who formerly worked as an announcer at a Christian radio station in Perth, joined Compassion in 2013 having earlier become aware of their work through a number of encounters including a trip to Haiti and the Dominican Republic to see what they do firsthand. He’s since visited Compassion projects in about seven of the 25 countries in which the organisation operates.
While Olsen is now very familiar with the physical poverty those Compassion is helping are facing – “I’ve been in a small, dirt floor home in Ethiopia where a mother told me through tears that neither her or her son would still be alive today were it not for Compassion…”, he says – he’s also seen the difference addressing the lies poverty tells children – that they’re worthless, that they’ll never amount to anything and that no-one wants them – can make.
“We believe that is unacceptable and so we will speak out for those children – we want them to get a healthy understanding of who they are.”
A road train passes the cyclists. PICTURE: Jen and Andrew Faulkner/Facebook.
The cycling group, who have nine support people travelling with them in four vehicles including a bus where riders can take some brief respite from the road if they need to, rode from Perth across the Nullarbor Plain across to Adelaide and then through north-west Victoria into New South Wales.
The riders, who have all taken time off work and their “normal” lives to take part, range in age from 18 (he turned 19 during the trip) to 65 and come from a range of riding backgrounds and abilities.
While Compassion run an annual cycling event in Western Australia – the 500 kilometre, week long route runs from Albany to Perth – it’s the first time a group have taken on a cross Australia ride as a fundraiser.
“This has been in the planning for a number of years…” says Olsen, who organised the ride with Compassion colleague Rose Daniels after he had previously took part in rides across Australia with another organisation.
“I guess that’s where the idea came from…I’d seen the value of it in being able to tell a message [about] what we’re doing. People were very keen to know why we were crazy enough to ride across the country – it gives us a great platform for fundraising…and an opportunity to meet with people along the way, to talk with friends and family, to get the message out…”
Leaving the Nullarbor Roadhouse. PICTURE: John Carter/Facebook.
In most of the communities where they’ve paused for a night on their journey, churches have not only provided a meal and “a floor to sleep on” but also helped organise a meeting so they can tell the locals what they’re doing and why.
“Sometimes it’s two or three, other times it might be 50 or 80 people,” says Olsen.
He says there have been challenging days on the ride as they faced some very strong headwinds and exposure to the elements, including some very hot days.
“Each morning we do gather around and we talk about what the day is going to present [and] immediately before we ride off, we read out the story of another child who is benefitting through Compassion and then, as one, we say that it is for this child and others like them that we ride. So right at the start of every day there’s that reminder that this is not for us ticking off a bucketlist, this is not for us to say ‘Hey we’ve cycled across Australia’, but it is for the children we serve.”
A devotional thought shared with the team at Hay Baptist Church of Hope before setting off. PICTURE: Rose Daniels/Facebook.
While each day is busy – there’s preparing for the rides, meeting with people they encounter along the way, and , of course, the cycling itself, Olsen, who attends a Church of Christ in Perth, says he has also seen it as an “opportunity to connect more strongly with God”, away from the usual distractions of daily life.
“To be able to put those things aside for a moment and focus on the things that matter…” he says.
And it’s the thought of those children they’re helping out, says Olsen, that has kept them going when it gets hard.
“[I]f we’re feeling a bit low, if the muscles aren’t quite doing what they’re meant to be doing, we don’t just say ‘Oh, look, I don’t want to keep doing this anymore’. It’s a case of ‘I’m doing this for the children and I’ll keep going as long as I can’.”
~ www.compassion.com.au/events/ride-for-compassion
