Mary Gould contacted me about this book project – to collect stories of volunteer tourism and collate them into this book.
Our goal is to touch the reader’s heart and mind through stories.
“Transformative Tourism: Stories from Volunteers” is a collection of short stories written by people who participated in volunteer tourism trips. This edited volume will contain the transformative, enlightening, uplifting, and challenging stories told by the men and women who serve as volunteers around the world.
The Call for Stories has gone out – Contact Transformative Tourism
- They are wanting 500-1500 words
- 250 word abstract/story proposal by 1 March
Hoi An is a UNESCO world heritage site, what used to be a thriving port, is now a quieter tourist town with heaps of opportunities to explore the older history of the area. We are taken out to My Son, centre of the old Champa Kingdom, a visit to a traditional pottery making village, a Cooking School on a boat for lunch and a visit to LifeStart Workshop. The next day I am desperate to see the sea, but we are running out of time to cycle there, so Jenny and I hop on a moto for the trip $5US each, including time to walk on the beach. The surf looked messy and dangerous, but I could see how you could easily spend a day here swimming, eating and walking. Read more
I have just come across the phrase Conscious Travel today – and was excited and intrigued. This is definately a movement I want to be part of and see where it takes us.
Conscious.Travel is both a movement and a learning program that enables places to attract and welcome guests in a manner that doesn’t cost the earth. Read more
Thinking of traveling abroad? Would you like to do more than sample new tastes and soak in cultural landmarks? Suppose you could make a difference to other women whilst traveling through another part of the globe? Well, you certainly can, and you’re spoilt for choice!
As Shirley Chisholm, the first African-American female congresswoman, has said, “Service is the rent we pay for the privilege of living on this earth.” And, perhaps, for an enriched traveling experience upon it.
Opportunities exist to engage in meaningful volunteer work particularly in the field of women’s health, enterprise, justice and social programs across the globe. Here are a few (of many) not-for-profit and charity organizations which offer on-the-ground, functioning programs where you can contribute your skills and passions to a worthwhile cause: Read more
“How many times have you been travelling and visited a school or community or local charity that you would love to help? The school needs books, or a map or pencils; an orphanage needs children’s clothes or toys. All things that, if only you’d known, you could’ve stuffed in your rucksack. But once you get home you forget, or you’ve lost the address, or worry that whatever you send will be stolen before it even gets there…” Read more
The idea of volunteering in another country has long been considered the province of students and recent graduates; images of intrepid twenty-year-old Peace Corps workers in a remote Sierra Leone village might spring to mind. Today, however, the idea has reached far beyond that to become accessible, and highly popular, among travelers of all types and ages. Volunteer travel has grown so popular that a term has even been coined for it: Voluntourism. Read more
Mark Baldwin saw the potential to match cash strapped travelers with people who need a hand and has set up Helpandhost.net Read more
Have just been searching You Tube for Women travel pieces – and discovered this YouTube Channel – Women Travel for for Peace,
Women Travel for Peace brought five intrepid women to Senegal to work with local farming women. Together we built a well for the women’s farming plot. As a result of our contribution, the local women now have water year-round to farm their crops, and they are able to work a shorter workday. When you work 365 days a year under the African sun, a shorter workday makes a vast difference.
The cost of travel is high – both financially for our own pockets and also increasingly we are counting the cost of travel in terms of the planet and the social and environmental impact of travel.
There is no easy solution – simply to stop travelling will have enormous economic impact on small communities for whom travellers provide a major economic boost to the local community. In New Zealand – tourism is set to overtake exports as New Zealand’s top export earner. There is also the potential to put an economic benefit to forests not being cut down, because of the benefit in terms of tourism.
Read more
