THE PEOPLE HAVE VOTED.

SHAVE IT WINS!

January 1, 2008: A new year, a clean face, the start of a school!

Happy New Year everyone! After only a month of raising money, we reached so much more than my initial goal of $1,000. In the past two days, another $700 was donated, every dollar of which I'll be matching. That means the school we're going to support in Cambodia is a tenth of the way there, and we've only just begun!

It was an incredibly close race, but in the end, shaving the moustache made a strong comeback on New Year's Eve to win. The number of donors on each side was almost even, with 33 donations coming in for "Shave it" and 28 donations coming in for "Keep it." As I've said here so many times before, I'm so grateful for all of your generosity and I hope you all have a wonderful 2008.

Though you can no longer affect the fate of the moustache, we'll still be collecting money toward the school in Cambodia. If you're interested in learning more about the project or donating, you can do so here at Jewish Helping Hands.

I'll be heading off to Cambodia in just a few weeks with my camera. Sometime in the spring, I hope to have a short video put together about our experience there, and about the work we'll be doing. I'll let you all know when that's up on the site for you to see. Again, thank you all so much, and Happy New Year!

PS For those of you who may stumble upon this site for the first time after January 1, 2008, here's the story of the past few weeks. At Thanksgiving, I grew a moustache. In hopes of raising money to help build a school in Cambodia, I e-mailed all my friends, and let them choose whether I keep the moustache or shave it. But they could only vote by donating to the project. Now, only five weeks later on New Year's the polls closed and shaving the moustache won. We've raised close to $2,500, and the school is almost a tenth of the way there. I couldn't have done it without everyone who supported me, or without this hirsuteness my father handed down to me...