January 22, 2002

DHL 
International e-newsletter

DHL Sponsors World Walk
Polly Letofsky raises funds for breast cancer


You've really got to love walking if you're going to hang around with Polly Letofsky.

The 39-year-old is just past the mid-point of an 18,000-mile, four-year adventure that will cover 20 countries on four continents. And she's doing it all to raise money for breast cancer research, donating all of her proceeds to San Francisco's Breast Cancer Fund and to cancer research in the countries she visits.

DHL has been helping Polly since last year, during the third leg of her adventure that began in August 1999. So far her travels have taken her from her home in Vail, Colorado to the West Coast, over to New Zealand and Australia and then to Southeast Asia. Polly is currently about ready to leave Thailand for India and she's still got Europe to go before coming back via the East Coast.

Every few weeks, Polly takes a break from her 20-mile days to receive a box of supplies via DHL from her dad in Los Angeles.  Delivering new shoes and socks, vitamins, letters and food Polly can't get anywhere else, DHL always finds Polly at a local service center along her route, thanks to Region 6 Service Director Tony Mazza and Administrative Asst. Dawn Koeller. Dawn keeps tabs on Polly through email newsletters and messages.

"Polly can't live without her peanut butter," jokes Dawn, who hopes to meet Polly when she returns to the States. "I've been really amazed at what she's done, and I like hearing about her travels."

While in Singapore last summer, Polly was amazed by DHL's presence throughout Southeast Asia. She stopped by a DHL office to say hi while picking up her care package, and some of our Kuala Lumpur employees even walked with her when she passed through their city.

Wherever she goes, Polly bangs a drum for breast cancer prevention and early detection. Polly lost a close friend to cancer as she was planning her adventure. Her friend was only 26. Although she had already decided to embark on the long-distance journey, now Polly had even more purpose.

"While meeting and talking with women that have been diagnosed with breast cancer I've found that there are some real parallels between the walk and such a serious diagnosis," Polly says on her GlobalWalk Web site. The "why walk" question is one of the top queries she has received since she began her journey. "You can't look at the whole picture at once or you're likely to become overwhelmed, so we choose smaller goals and day by day, or step by step, we overcome them."

We'll catch up with Polly next time she's near an internet cafe, but in the meantime, you can read a bit more about her travels by clicking  http://www.globalwalk.org

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