Sally's Page

Sally's Page

Sally from N. Ireland, age 25 -at the end of a 8 month trip in Central and South America

I guess it makes sense to start with a little background as to what this is all about; (don´t worry it´s not my life history)

Basically I got chatting to Steve in our hostel in Buenos Aries and the conversation turned to some work he´s been doing related to volunteer tourism. "Oh yes "volunteer" tourism - that farce where you pay a small mortgage to give your time and skills for "free"" was pretty much my response.

I say this having tried to find some postions while backpacking in South America recently and coming up against a corporate brickwall where at every turn someone in cyberspace tries to take your money in return for organising a place for you in an organisation that they are affiliated with thats desperate for your help. I travel on a budget and would willingly give this desperately needed help but object whole heartedly to paying some corporation for the opportunity. Especially when I am convinced a more than fair proporton goes to paying web designers and organisational presdents wages who are based somewhere in the Western world!

I have had several similar conversations in recent months with other backpackers frustrated in their desire to help out but finding their meagre pesos insufficient to fund such projects. Perhaps help is at hand... Steve is currently living in Argentina and researching volunteer projects which he is criticing aiming in the future to set up real volunteer tourism where hopefully we will be able to volunteer our time and skills rather than our money!