WEEZ WALK 2023
It was great catching up with Tony Bruno who just launched one of the biggest events to take place in Hong Kong this January 2023. He is the man behind WEEZ WALK 2023, an event that advocates for and raises awareness of mental health and suicide prevention.
Thank you for joining us. Could you please kindly introduce yourself (& your team) for those that haven’t heard of you and your charitable events in aid of mental awareness.
“I’m Tony, the organizer of WEEZ WALK, I’ve lived in Hong Kong for 26 years. My wife and I formed The Weez Project about four years ago as an organisation that advocates for improved mental awareness and suicide prevention in Hong Kong. We do this primarily through improved education in schools with young people. We partner with Kely Support Group who work to improve youth mental health and wellbeing and equip young people with the skills, knowledge and opportunities to support themselves and each other.”
How did you get involved in organizing WEEZ WALK?
“During the middle to late 2020, when Hong Kong started to lock down, Weez Project and Kely faced some difficulties as we weren’t able to do many of the events we wanted to do. So I thought, why don’t I do something to raise some funds and awareness for Kely? I had done the Hong Kong island Coastal Trail with friends a few times before, so, in February 2021, I did the walk again and set up a Just Giving page, to see how much money I could raise. I also managed to get a few people from Hong Kong Football Club involved. In the end, we raised approximately HK$300,000.00. This was pretty much by simply setting off one morning, emailing friends, posting on social media, and trying to get the buzz going. I think we did quite well for something that was quite casual.
I completed the route in a “record time” of 12 hours and 58 minutes, at least that’s my record time. With the level of success we had, a natural next step was to stage an organised event and WEEZ WALK 2022 was officially created. The event had to be in virtual format because of covid restrictions in force at the time. We had an event period of about a month, we attracted some corporate sponsorship and some organisations helped us with gifts for participants. We feel the event was very successful , with 720 participants, HK$2.1 million raised, and lots of press publicity and social media activity. The next obvious step was to organise on a multi-year basis, and so we’re onto the third edition, WEEZ WALK 2023.”
We are delighted that you are organizing this event again next year, how did you (or will you) get the public involved in WEEZ WALK 2023 event?
“We have marketing teams promoting the event and using social media extensively. Various partners, who are really committed to the event are helping to promote the event also; for example, we have ‘Design Hong Kong’ promoting to their database, ‘TRAILME’ promoting the event to the local running community, we have sports clubs in Hong Kong that are keen to participate and get involved, and we have a lots of corporate organizations who recognized the importance of mental health awareness and education who are promoting the event to their staff as well. Another important channel is through educational institutions for older students at colleges and universities.
There’s also another part of this as well, in the past few years we have had volunteer street artists to do some artwork for us; in 2021 we had a great piece of art in Wong Chuk Hang painted by local artist Stern Rockwell. In 2022 we had temporary artwork at the AIA Vitality Park in Central. For WEEZ WALK 2023 we have a great mural in Sai Ying Pun, at 120 Connaught Road West. We’ll also have other artists volunteering pieces placed at various locations along the route. These pieces of artwork all reflect mental health issues and will be highly visible to people who are participating in the event.”
How did you feel when you completed your first fundraising challenge?
“Elated, a little emotional because of the background and the reason why I’m doing it. But at the time all I wanted was a beer, a big pizza and a hot bath. “
Any messages for the public about WEEZ WALK 2023 event?
“One of the key antidotes to mental health issues is getting exercise, so I am encouraging people to get out and walk; for people who can’t get much exercise, walking is a great thing. The event has a competitive element for elite runners and ambitious people, but it is also for people who just want to do it for fun as a family group. Please get out there into the fresh air and do some exercise with your family and friends and help us raise money for mental awareness.”
Any last tips for the events participants entering the last week of preparation for this event?
“I cannot give any tips for the elite runners; they could give me tips! For everyone else, just get out there and enjoy it, and spread the word! Don’t put any undue pressure on yourselves. There’s lots of beautiful places to explore along the Hong Kong Coastline, there’s so much to see and observe. So, my advice is to take your time, take it easy and enjoy it.”
https://www.trailme.com.hk/events/weez-walk-2023
