How to travel and volunteer for a very first timer?

July 12, 2009 7:49 AM

My current volunteering gig is standing still, how do I search for a new one and be able to travel?

I am a 26 year-old female living in Canada throughout much of my life. I have never traveled anywhere except moving from one province to another. In 2007, I obtained my BSci in Chemistry, then I decided to pursue something I truly want which is Nutrition and Physiology. Since last year, I have been volunteering @ this NGO with the hope that I would be “shipped off” somewhere to do humanitarian work. However, this NGO will NOT send any volunteers oversea and being a French (especially) and/or Spanish speaker is a plus for this fairly big organization. At the office, I perform mostly secretarial tasks such as being a webmaster for its website, using Illustrator CS3 to design icons for training modules, etc. In spite of meeting some wonderful people in the office and doing something I enjoy on the side, I get very very bumped out every now and then. Why? Because what I wish to do is to volunteer with regard to global nutrition, not doing clerical tasks that are identical to my job @ school. In addition, it is also a personal reason. I have spent the past 8 years always worrying/stressing about money and student loans (I receive zero contribution from my parents), such that I never get to enjoy much of my summer or life rather. Instead of just moping around, I really want to make some changes NOW. Therefore, I really need some step-by-step advice as to where to start:

1) Is everyone volunteering for NGOs always multilingual? What other organizations can you recommend to me that will emphasize more on my education background (I don’t want to teach English or get some random jobs just for the sake of “seeing the world”, I want to help the underprivileged), rather strictly based on what languages I can speak?

2) Starting in September, I plan on taking some Spanish classes @ the YMCA. In the meantime, I want to get a head-start in the next few weeks before school starts so that I can become more familiar with the language. I honestly don’t expect to grasp a new language overnight, but if I keep this up, do you believe I will have the adequate background to converse semi-fluently by the end of April?

3) Like I mentioned earlier, I am a total noob when it comes to traveling, thus I don’t want to shop around and try to learn everything any person can possibly know about cheap airfares, restaurants, etc. I decided Argentina is where I want to go. With this focus in mind, where can I find the best site (e.g. blogs?) that is not only there to discuss about the country’s hot destinations, but is also informative as to HOW to travel for a clueless person like me?

4) Money is a major issue for me. Trying to support myself throughout the school terms and saving for the trip can be challenging. Hence, I need to set some sort of a goal to get myself motivated. How much money do you think I need to save prior the trip? Is $4000 CDN enough?

4) Is anyone here familiar with Idealist.org or has had participated for this organization? What are some of your thoughts about it? Pros and cons?

posted by pixxie to travel & transportation (6 comments total)

I can't help you with regards to the financial concerns, but when I read about "nutrition" and "volunteering", I immediately thought of WWOOF--World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms. You can pick your region and volunteer for a period of time on an organic farm. I haven't done it myself, but have had friends who have done it and then traveled around by finding the absolute cheapest train fares and used Couchsurfing for free lodging.
posted by Dukat at 8:05 AM on July 12

With regards to #2, learning Spanish--I don't know where you are, but the quickest way to get good conversation skills is to practice good conversation skills, by speaking to native Spanish speakers and listening to Spanish soap operas/radio/etc. Is the YMCA Spanish class conversation-focused? I imagine that would be the easiest to pick up. Unless you were very devoted, I wouldn't imagine (from language study of my own) that you'd be able to talk about anything really significant, apart from being good at getting around, in under a year of just taking classes. You'd be surprised how much more you can learn "on the ground".
posted by Dukat at 8:09 AM on July 12

To address your questions point-by-point:

1 and 2. If you want to volunteer in another country, it is usually expected that you will know the language of that country. One great way to learn a language is to go to a country where that language is spoken. For instance, if you want to learn Spanish, I would recommend going someplace like Guatemala, where you can take 1-on1 Spanish lessons for next to nothing and get full immersion. To be honest, unless you are an absolute genius when it comes to language, I think this would be a more effective route than taking classes at home. Those classes at home will give you a good base, though.

3. Why Argentina? It seems like for someone interested in nutrition and huminatarian issues, there are a lot more "worthy" places to go. But the first thing I would suggest doing is going to the travel section of your local enormous bookstore and browse through all the books they have on Argentina. Also see if they have a book called The Practical Nomad. I read this book when I was planning a big multi-month trip to Asia and it helped a ton. You can also look through the travel narrative books, which will hep give you a sense of what day to day life is like when you're traveling in another country.

4. This is impossible to answer without know more about how long you want to go for, whether you will have something set up before you go, etc. But a good rule of thumb is to look up the standard cost of lodging (say, in Lonely Planet) and multiply that times three to get a good sense of your daily costs. Then add on another 1/3 to account for unexpected expenses. So if you're going somewhere for 4 months, and typically costs $10/night for a hostel or guesthouse, you'll want to save $4800 ($10*4 *30*4). Of course, if you'll be volunteering, your costs will be lower than if you're moving around a lot, but this is a good rule of thumb. And it never hurts to have some extra cushion cash when you're in a foreign country.
posted by lunasol at 9:00 AM on July 12

I'm not certain where you are in Canada, but there may be a local organization that works with refugees or recent immigrants. My college roommate worked with a similar program and learned a lot of conversational and medical Arabic in the process.

You might also benefit from talking to a VSOCAN recruiter.
posted by aint broke at 9:36 AM on July 12

Have you talked to people at the place where you're currently volunteering about this? Even if they can't send you overseas, can you get some advice and information from people there about ways you can achieve it?

As an aside, don't discount the work you're currently doing as not important. Sure it's not out in the field making a direct impact, but all that backroom stuff is vital to making NGOs work. Also, I don't know if the NGO gave you the impression that doing admin work for them could lead to overseas opportunities (if they did, then this was bad of them), or if you made this assumption (not necessarily bad on your part), but it's always good to have pragmatic expectations of what you will get out of it, they're often not a guaranteed route to bigger and better things. If you get more, great!, if you get much less, talk to someone, or go and do something else. Just something to bear in mind if you're going to be doing more volunteering in the future.
posted by Helga-woo at 3:31 PM on July 12

Sorry to all the wonderful people who responded, I haven’t had the time to answer back you questions until now.

Dukat: I am actually a member of WWOOF Bulgaria. I got very interested in this organization last year, but was not able to go due to financial issues. :(
The YMCA Spanish class is indeed conversation focused, as well as written. I do plan on posting an ad to do language exchange with a Spanish-speaking person. I also found some good suggestions as to which soaps/radio are good when it comes to picking up the language (from Metafilter). I hope I am as devoted as I promised, I don’t know what my school loads will be like for next year.

Lunasol: I don’t know if I am a language genius, but I did do German correspondence in high school and the teach praised my pronunciation and dedication (every week I would send in tapes to her so she could dictate my progress). I think with me as long as I like the language, I will be very committed to it. Same goes for Mandarin for me (took it in university). As for French, I hate it with a passion. I don’t know why, I took it and did well, the teacher encouraged me to continue to the next level and I decided not to (this was 4 years ago exactly). So yes, I have has many experiences when it comes to learning new languages. Oh, I also took a beginners linguistic course before which I very much enjoyed. The part I like the most about new languages is learning their syntax and grammar; I see it as solving a “puzzle”.

I chose Argentina because I was told it is relatively safe in comparison to other SA countries. Remember, I am not vey familiar with travelling, hence I don’t want to start off with a place that might pose danger in my eyes. I do plan on going to my local “enormous” bookstore, and just sit there to read more information. I will keep my eyes on The Practical Nomad.

I plan on being there for 4 months maximum. It is a very good rule of thumb, I will keep that in mind. But the $4800 is only living expenses, not including the airfare.
Aint broke: I am checking out VSOCAN and canadaworldyouth.org right now. Thank you so much.

Helga-woo: Before I left my volunteering office today, I addressed my travelling interest to one of the supervisors and she said she would try to help me out. :(
posted by pixxie at 3:12 PM on July 13