Last week I wrote a blog post complaining about volunteer sending organizations trying to “sell” their 17 year old volunteers to NGO organizations. I then got a very well thought out response from 16 year old Naya Herman who is considering volunteering abroad and so I decided to answer her two questions in two new [...]
UGH! I am SO fed up with these “pay to volunteer” organizations making money and taking in young gap-year kids and then “offering” them to us as employees where we “only need to cover their living expenses.” REALLY? You want me to take your unskilled 17 year-old, play babysitter for a few months as they [...]
I recently wrote a piece about PEPY Tours on World Nomad’s website. I am reposting it below as it relates to a lot of the themes of this blog: Responsible Giving, voluntourism, Cambodia, etc Fast Five Profile: PEPY Tours One of the PEPY riders on her bike for Cambodian based PEPY Tours 1. Who are [...]
I recently tried to post a comment in response to this listing on Trip Advisor which encourages visits to orphanages while traveling in Siem Reap. As my comment was not a review of the area, it was not approved, so I am posting it here. — I am writing in response to a post stating [...]
I wrote a guest blog post for Canada’s adventure couple, Dave and Deb about voluntourism, why I work, in part, in this field, and some ideas for how we can improve what we do. For those who don’t have time to read the whole post, here are the five key areas I would consider when [...]
I try to avoid spending much time on “bar street”, a place in Siem Reap which is full of, yep, bars. The main reasons I avoid it now are no longer just the noise, the embarrassing displays of lack-of-clothing on gap-year tourists, the drunken fools, nor the begging, though those reasons alone should be enough…. [...]
Most of us who criticize, publicize, support, or question “voluntourism” follow that word on google alerts, and so we were all alerted when Abercrombie & Kent (a high-end tour operator) announced their philanthropy tours. Alexia, aka Voluntourism Gal, put up a post about this topic which sparked a lot of discussion and asked for my [...]