Local boys to fundraise in school holidays

FUNDRAISING: Kiani Hudson, 18, (left) and Jordan Hudson, 15, will be boosting their fundraising efforts over the school holidays to raise money for their touch rugby endeavours. PHOTO/STEPHEN PARKER

Two Rotorua boys will be spending some of their holidays working at tomorrow's Bay of Plenty Steamers game and helping around the house as part of their fundraising efforts.

Kiani Hudson, 16, and Jordan Hudson, 15, will be boosting their fundraising efforts to help pay for their various representative touch rugby endeavours.

Mother Noelani Hudson said both boys played for Rotorua, Bay of Plenty and Te Arawa touch rugby teams.

Next month Kiani would be travelling to Auckland to take part in the New Zealand under-18s representative touch rugby trials, representing New Zealand in January next year if he made it through, she said.

Kiani said he was "pretty nervous" about the trials in October, but was looking forward to meeting new people.

"We just grew up playing it [touch rugby] and it turned into a passion."

He said they spent a lot of time in school holidays throughout the year fundraising, training and playing rugby.

Both boys also had the Maori Touch Nationals coming up in December in the under-17s.

Mrs Hudson said Jordan had recently returned from travelling to the Sunshine Coast in Australia as part of the under-15s New Zealand representative team.

The trip had cost $3500, she said.

Jordan said competing in the under-18s Youth Championships in Australia on the New Zealand representative team had been good, though it was hot.

"It was a pretty hard competition."

Both boys would be working at tomorrow's Bay of Plenty Steamers game, ticket collecting and operating the scoreboard to help raise funds.

Mrs Hudson said her sons would be doing chores around the house such as mowing the lawns, doing the washing, and other housework.

They would also be helping to look after their four younger siblings.

She said they would also have a wood raffle coming up on Facebook and "the power of Facebook is awesome".

"It's amazing how many people buy tickets."

Jordan said they had worked at rugby matches for fundraising before, and it could be pretty busy depending on what day it was.

He said a lot of their friends and family got behind them and supported them in their fundraising efforts.