BL7A.'s blog

I won't go to IOI 2018...
By BL7A., history, 6 years ago, In English

Hi Codeforces!

As you all know, IOI'2018 is coming up soon, and teams are getting ready to travel to Japan.

Fortunately, I was able to make it this year to the team representing my country.

And to make it even better, the IOI this year will be held in any otaku's heaven : )

My excitement to go to japan had motivated me to train for long hours and do my best, changing the process that was tedious to me before to a very fun one : )

But unfortunately, we have had some trouble with the flight expenses. Even worse, the ministry of communication (which should have been the main sponsor) has just told us that they can’t afford our flight so most probably we won’t be able to find a sponsor. Therefore 2 members of our team would be traveling on their own budget. The other two (including me) won't be able to make it. So I was wondering if any of you have suggestions to what could we do to attend IOI 2018 on time?

Thanks in advance

UPD : we started a gofundme until we work sth out with the government (https://www.zoomaal.com/projects/65455)

UPD 2 : 1335$ already collected ... any tiny bit of help would be appreciated

UPD 3 : we reached half the goal and our second milestone ... 2060$ raised so far

UPD 4 : already 145% of the goal has been raised ... thanks to you, we are going to JAPAN ... that would have been impossible without ur help, thanks cf community.

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Comments Comments (29)
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6 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +25 Vote: I do not like it

I'm really sorry to hear that.. But you still have time to find a new sponsor, try contacting Masr ElKheir as they were my team's sponsor during WRO'16 and paid our flight expenses to India, I guess you may quickly make a deal with them.

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6 years ago, # |
← Rev. 3   Vote: I like it +14 Vote: I do not like it

Until the EOI director figures something out and try to get them their sponsorship back. You're free to support them in-case it comes to the worst and he fails to do so.

They need to book the flight ASAP so: https://www.zoomaal.com/projects/65455

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6 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +17 Vote: I do not like it

any reason why you are providing a http link while a https link is available? If not, please update your link to https link

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6 years ago, # |
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I am sorry to hear that... I cannot help financially but I hope this observation will help:

According to (https://www.google.com/flights) A flight from Tunis to Tokyo is 1000$ which is more than 1000$ cheaper than a flight from Cairo (August 31st -> September 8th). So if you can get a cheap flight from Cairo to Tunis the trip will be much more tiring, but cheaper.

UPD: I thought that Egypt was one of the 97 countries and territories that can visit Tunisia for up to 90 days without a visa. But it isn't. And I think if you buy separate tickets you'll have to go through customs and immigration which will not be possible.

Sorry for the inconvenience.

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6 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +4 Vote: I do not like it

Do a little bit more of exposure to your gofundme. I'd suggest creating a separate blog for that so people can share it easily without going through a long post.

BTW — It's definitely doable to raise the money needed, it has been done several times for Egyptian teams going to ICPC, good luck, and hope you represent us there!

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    6 years ago, # ^ |
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    I think the problem here is the sudden notice. You don't just tell them 2 days before the flight date that each has to get 2000$. It's really retarded. But ye, Egypt..

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6 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it -78 Vote: I do not like it

Well, you have two (2) kidneys.

Or just take out a loan you won't pay off within your lifetime. University students in USA do that all the time...

Gofundme equivalents are a viable option, but kinda late. Try to get a little bit of money from as many sources as possible.

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    6 years ago, # ^ |
    ← Rev. 2   Vote: I like it +41 Vote: I do not like it

    Xellos is telling it in his own unique style, but he's right. If you want to go, the only reasonable course of actions at this moment is 1. getting a loan, 2. buying the tickets, 3. after the contest, looking for sponsors to refund the money you owe. Your chance of getting enough donations in advance is almost exactly zero.

    That being said, why didn't any of you ask about the tickets sooner? Buying them three days in advance is way too late anyway.

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      6 years ago, # ^ |
      ← Rev. 2   Vote: I like it +43 Vote: I do not like it

      Yes I agree that 3 days is way too late tobuy the tickets. However, if you look at the link 1235$ is already collected. One hour ago, when I donated it was 15. I think they still have a chance to go but measures must be taken so that this can never happen again

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        6 years ago, # ^ |
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        Wow, that's way better than I expected. It was at $15 when I last checked. Hopefully they can make it somehow!

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          6 years ago, # ^ |
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          We're so close to 2000$ now ^^

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            6 years ago, # ^ |
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            Hypothesis "Faith in humanity" not rejected!

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6 years ago, # |
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I'm really sad to hear that.. I hope you can still make it in time.

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6 years ago, # |
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CALL 8800-555-35-35
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6 years ago, # |
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Did you get a loan (or personal funds) already to pay for tickets now, since it looks like you won't get the zoomaal money in time unless I missed something (from Zoomaal FAQ)?

When does a project owner receive the funds?

You receive the funds only when the project campaign deadline is reached and the funding goal is completely reached. It usually takes a maximum of 2 weeks to get the funds transferred to the project owner.

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6 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +7 Vote: I do not like it

Why did you wait until now? You didn't have your flights paid 1m, 3w, 2w, 1w ago, didn't it disturb you?

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    6 years ago, # ^ |
      Vote: I like it +73 Vote: I do not like it

    They were told that their flights will be paid for by the government representatives until uhm YESTERDAY. The government basically screwed them.

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      6 years ago, # ^ |
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      How naive should you be to still believe in your government when it's three days before departure and no flights are booked yet?

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        6 years ago, # ^ |
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        Before going to ejoi last year, my government bought tickets 1 day before the contest. So there is hope.

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6 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +33 Vote: I do not like it

Congratulations, I hope you can make it now.

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6 years ago, # |
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Cool, good luck to you all!!!

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6 years ago, # |
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It has been announced that IOI 2021 will be held in Egypt. I'm wondering how it's possible that this year there was no money to send a full team to IOI, but only after a couple of years there will be money to host an IOI (which is very expensive).

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    6 years ago, # ^ |
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    They can always organize gofundme to a few days before...

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    6 years ago, # ^ |
      Vote: I like it +13 Vote: I do not like it

    I'm assuming private sponsors. Of course, it's much easier to get local companies to sponsor "a big international event happening here!" than sending a team somewhere like every year.

    Or maybe it'll just be other olympiads getting budget cuts for 2021.

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    6 years ago, # ^ |
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    Probably off-topic, but does anyone know how much does hosting the IOI cost, approximately?

    Is it the most expensive of the olympiads, in terms of money per contestant?

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      6 years ago, # ^ |
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      "IOI’15 was fully supported by the Government of the Republic of Kazakhstan. About 2000K was reserved/allocated for IOI’15 from the Ministry of Education and Science of the Republic of Kazakhstan, $1556K was spent for the main event, including purchase of facilities $652K and $97K for IT Infrastructure works/HSTC/Technical staff. In total, guest fee was $93K"

      Link

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    6 years ago, # ^ |
    ← Rev. 3   Vote: I like it +18 Vote: I do not like it

    Actually Egypt hosted IOI 2008 before. It was just a problem of communication (someone wrote something wrong so they needed to redo all the paperwork from the beginning but they were very close to the deadline) and the government paid the other flights (that weren't covered by the crowd fund campaign because it doesn't refund non-government-issued tickets) in the end.

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      6 years ago, # ^ |
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      1. This is the first time we as contestants hear that the problem is a problem of communication. All The info we got about the problems of the flights were from the EOI Director, including that the problem was in funding.
      2. We haven't been told till now that the flights will be paid by the government, the government has only booked the tickets for only 1 of us and the rest paid for themselves until they get the money from the crowdfunding campaign.

      Assuming that the government paid for our flights, We are surely ready to refund the donations if there is any feasible way to do so.

      About IOI 2021, I think it may be sponsored by private co-operations like AAST which organizes the Olympiad in Egypt.

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