Tweeting around the World

This one is for all you naysayers who try to argue against social media when I preach it: I don’t care that you wore red socks today (twitter), how is a picture of me doing a keg stand client-appropriate (facebook), it’s creepy that you know who else is in the restaurant (foursquare). Well here’s an interesting story that would not have happened without social media, and it’s how I met @travoholic.

It started with one simple tweet from Kirsty (travoholic) about what to do in Kigali, and @rtwdave offered me (@nleary) as someone to reach out to as he knew I spent 3 months in the country. We tweeted back and forth and then exchanged emails, and I found out she was looking for a place to live. Turns out, so were my old roommates. As chance would have it, she not only moved into my old house, but my old room (seriously, how small is Kigali). And now, I get to follow another person’s adventures through Kigali and contribute my experience to her upcoming new blog. You can read an interesting recent post on the attitude of travel bloggers here – wait, who wrote that 8^th comment? Tell me more about her.

In sum, I’ve met a lot of travelers on twitter, so I guess I haven’t met them per se, but you get it. Some of my favorites (other than the two mentioned above) are: LunaticAtLarge (actually met), AdventureGirl (actually met), Amateurs Africa (would like to meet), rtwnobag (would like to be), among many, many others.

Now, while I have your attention (though I probably don’t since I included about 25 links in this post and I’d completely understand if you were now wrapped up in the lives of the travelers above): take this pledge with me! Donate 1% of your salary, come on, I know some of you are investment bankers and lawyers and “consultants” – if my PR salary can do it, I know yours can. Oh looking for a place to donate? Well I know juuust the place: Generation Rwanda (ORI changed its name). I’ve managed to not guilt you all in to donating before, but if the billionaires can give up 50%, we can give up 1%. Now feel really bad about all the money you spend of frivolous things and sign up.