It never hurts to ask.

A couple years ago I ran out onto the run way of the Nelson airport and stopped a small plane that was doing approach and landing practice. A close friend of mine from Syria was visiting and he had never been in a small plane before nor had he seen our Canadian mountains. With a little convincing, we were up in the air, and Ibraheem was getting the tour of a lifetime, for free.

In that same spirit, I am approaching small airlines to see if they would charter our family to Guatemala. As we tell people about what we are doing, so far the main concern we’ve faced, has been our safety getting there.

I wanted to share with the readers the adventure of going out on a limb and asking for help, even when it’s uncomfortable. Here is a copy of the last letter I wrote, to Pacific Coastal Airlines:

Hi there,

My name is Owen Dargatz and my wife and I are taking our 5 kids to Guatemala to volunteer for a year with street children and do social work. We will be blogging about the experience throughout our time there.

There is one other adult coming along with us. (Total of 3 adults and 5 children under the age of 11).

Before we book commercially, and I know it’s a long shot, I wanted to see if we could call on your Airline to help get us down there for around 5K.

Knowing that this would be a gesture of kindness, support and goodwill, in return we would advertise for your Airline on our blog throughout our year there.

To visit our blog please check out

www.thegivingexperiment.com

We live in the Trail area.

Honestly, this would make for the story of a lifetime and writing about it would be...incredible. If you, reading this, are in a position to pass it on to somebody that could make it happen we would appreciate it beyond words. Thank you.

Owen Dargatz

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Owen Dargatz is a Canadian father of five, husband of one, and writes about life as a family man. Having grown up with three sisters in Peru, he has a unique view and appreciation for Latin American culture, travel, and family values.