I'm swimming 5k at the Liverpool watersports centre (aka Costa del Mersey) to raise money for young people - help wipe the fear and seaweed off my face!

Twenty years ago I visited Mostar, Bosnia, in my late teens - it was two or three years after the Dayton Peace Agreement. The work of christian charity Novimost International impressed on me the way it brings hope, reconciliation and a future to the ethnically diverse young people and their families, now in three cities across Bosnia-Herzegovina. Their work continues today, even though the media have long since moved on, their impact of changing lives and growing peaceful future leaders continues. The most fun part of their work as I experienced it - the sports summer camps - are just about to start! Just £35 will fund one teenager to go away for the week, maybe for the first time in their lives - and with others from different ethnic backgrounds that for generations have been at war with each other. May peace grow! www.novimost.org.

One year ago I got to know Jamghat, an amazing grassroots NGO in Delhi which is doing the ordinary job of offering a safe home and education for a small number of girls and boys, with a focus on arts and creativity. I loved being with them and seeing them grow in maturity, struggle through their exams excellently and dance for six hours straight on a long long crazy bus ride back from Jaipur. http://jamghat.org/

Inspired by Hannah, who is raising money for young homeless people in Liverpool, https://mydonate.bt.com/fundraisers/hannahmccowen1 I'm attempting to swim 5km around the docks - I've just made it to 2.5k and currently experiencing a new kind of tired!! I'd like to raise money for both these causes, so let me know if you'd like your donation to go to both, or one or the other! Thank you so much!