How to Volunteer Abroad and Actually Help People
Fear of “voluntourism” shouldn’t stop you from doing something great. We’ve all heard it. Those “voluntourists” going to Africa think they’re helping, but they’re actually going for a holiday, wasting money, and strengthening dangerous stereotypes (刻板印象). I am, though, against the idea that we shouldn’t volunteer abroad at all. How would the world be a better place without people devoting their time and resources to help others who need it?
I chose my organization well. As a student, there are so many options for volunteering abroad. I travelled with Cambridge Development Initiative, a student-run project that works on sustainable development projects in Tanzania. There were four branches and I was on the business team. We were trained on the dangers of voluntourism and on best volunteer practices. We learned about the culture and even learned some basic Swahili, the local language, before travelling. When we were in Tanzania, we stayed in the same accommodation alongside our Tanzanian team members, ate the same food, and spent our free time in the same places.
When I told my friend I was travelling to Tanzania to volunteer for the summer, he said, “Oh, you’re going to have one of those summers where you go away for a couple of months and it totally changes your profile (头像) picture.”
I didn’t change my profile picture, but I did help 23 young people start their own companies. They brainstormed ideas, surveyed target communities, improved their designs, came up with business plans, and collected seed capital for their startups. They came up with creative ideas, such as a “mini-grid” (微型电网) providing electricity to an off-grid village and a plastic-waste recycling company.
Before I went to Tanzania, I was “this close” to taking an internship in a company instead because I worried I would be contributing to the negative practice of voluntourism. Here’s how I made sure that didn’t happen, and why I think the benefits of volunteering abroad far outweigh the benefits of taking some questionable moral high reasons back home.
【小题1】What is voluntourism?| A．A study in a developing country. |
| B．A trip to a developing country to help out. |
| C．A cultural exchange in a developing country. |
| D．A traveling to a developing country to help out, but doing more harm. |
| A．By not trusting any organization. |
| B．By learning about the local culture and language. |
| C．By providing electricity to an off-grid village. |
| D．By making trade with the team members. |
| A．The writer came up with ideas to solve off-grid problems. |
| B．The writer helped establish young people’s own start-ups. |
| C．The writer gave up a corporate internship. |
| D．The writer went to Tanzania as a volunteer. |
| A．The writer would have a moral high experience worth showing off. |
| B．The writer was able to change the profile picture after the trip. |
| C．The writer should help the locals as much as possible. |
| D．The writer should volunteer because it would be life-changing. |
