On August 3rd, Rowan and I completed our first marathon at the San Francisco Marathon. It felt great to cross the finish line after hours of running!

THANK YOU to all who supported me in numerous ways: with your presence on the day to cheer me on, your generous donations to this project, and your kind words of support.

We met our marathon fundraising goal! Your financial support will provide the necessary seed funds to help bring this important documentary to life.

ERICA'S CHALLENGE
I run to raise funds for a documentary on a young woman named Erica Murray. Erica has been facing even larger hurdles in her life with determination, strength and a great sense of humor. Yes, Erica has already run a marathon. But what she's facing is an arduous path much longer than 4 or 5 hours. Erica is living with leukemia, and for the past 2.5 years has persisted through indescribable lengthy and painful treatments of chemo and radiation. She's 29, just like me, and this roadblock in her life is simply unfair. Just weeks ago, Erica received a necessary bone marrow transplant for her life. As a bi-racial individual, the search for the right donor was a difficult process, because very few minorities and mixed-race people have registered to donate their bone marrow stem cells.

MOTIVATION
My personal motivation to run a marathon is my uncle Hiroshi, who ran his 50th marathon on his 70th birthday last year. At 70, he is healthy, happy, active, and still excelling in his career (launching a new bio-tech company). He looks (and acts) like he is 45. Since I have some of his genes, I wanted to at least be able to run one marathon at age 30! He has shown me how important exercise is to health and wellbeing.

In addition, my father has become very active ever since retirement. During the week of 8-8-08, while the Olympians competed in Beijing, he completed The Oregon Bike Ride, a 500-mile endeavor! Go Dad! I'm proud of you!

Erica cheers Naomi at the 21-mile mark!

PLEASE DONATE TOWARDS MY DOCUMENTARY ON LEUKEMIA!
Please support me as I run the San Francisco Marathon and raise money for a documentary that intimately reveals what it's like to live with leukemia as a young, passionate and driven woman -- and how you can help.Erica herself is co-producing the documentary with me, as I direct our shoots.

My goal is to raise $2000. 100% of the money will go towards the making of this documentary. Please help me achieve that goal by making a donation through this site.

THE DOCUMENTARY
Through the story of Erica's journey with leukemia, we aim to bring awareness to the desperate need for bone marrow stem cell donations for leukemia patients, and specifically to compel people of mixed race and minority descent, to register to donate their bone marrow stem cells. This is now a VERY easy process that can save the life of someone with leukemia.

In order to continue with this documentry, we need financial support. Any amount will go a long ways during this initial stage! Thank you very much for your donation to Global Narratives towards the Erica Murray documentary project!

Thank you,

Naomi Ture
Producer/Director