I first met “Anil” on the morning of October 12, 2000. I know the exact date [...]]]> I talked to a former colleague last week who’s from Nepal. First conversation we’ve had in twelve years. We were both English teachers in rural Nepal in 2000. He was not only a teacher but a farmer by trade.

I first met “Anil” on the morning of October 12, 2000. I know the exact date because I wrote about our meeting in my paper journal at lunch that day:

“Met the English teacher @ my school. His name is Anil, and he will be coming by again later today to show me the kids’ English book.”

(use a paper journal on your trips, it will become a treasured artifact!)

In true Nepali fashion, Anil showed up late to school on my first day of teaching.

Anil helps welcome me at my school in Nepal (that’s red dye on my face — part of ceremony)

Later that same week he also provided a quick demonstration of local classroom discipline:

He brought a kid into the office and rapped him hard with a yard-stick on each hand — for stealing something, or perhaps for hitting someone. (Fortunately, the kid was playing and laughing outside minutes later with friends)

During the next three months living and teaching in our village, my friendship with Anil introduced me to other eye-opening things:

1. I met my dinner for the first time ever. 

While at Anil’s farm-house one night, we sat outside drinking rice wine and chatting. One of Anil’s family members walked up to the table with a couple of live chickens for Anil to have a look at. An hour later we were served dinner. “Um, Anil, are these the same chickens…”. They were indeed. Gulp.

2. PETA hasn’t taken over the world just yet.

Another visit to Anil’s house. Again more rice wine and b.s.-ing. This time, I noticed a burlap sack across the front yard, baking in the sun, with some lumps moving inside it. Turns out those lumps were female puppies purposely left in the bag to die (only males were desired by locals). I’m hardly a dog lover, but this gave me a jolt.

Anil’s Farm House in Chitwan, Nepal

Fortunately though, the other 98 percent of my experiences and memories of Anil are overwhelmingly positive.

Which brings me to this photo — one of my all-time favorites:

Farewell party in Kathmandu in December, 2000 (Anil on left)

The photo was taken in Kathmandu in December 2000, just a few days before I flew home after 3 months volunteering in Nepal. Anil (far left) and “Darshan” — the head of my host family — accompanied me back to the big city to see me off to America.

It was just the three of us, staying for a few days in a hotel without heat — standard in Nepal even though the winter temperatures get into the 30′s F at night. Hence we had to stay bundled up in winter coats and hats in the room. Oh and no hot water either — so taking a shower was a rather cold adventure.

It’s really something what a photo can capture. The look on Anil’s face is priceless; so are his quasi-cowboy boots which I loved. I still get a kick out of seeing Darshan’s kissing me on the cheek (so did the guy who took the photo — a random staffer at the hotel.).

For me, the photo captures simply one of the happiest moments of my life. For sure, kids, life has a lot of disappointments (for everyone), but you’ll be lucky if you can occasionally have nights like the one I had in that Nepali Hotel — sharing laughs and cheap beer and stories, having a true cosmic connection with people who care about each other.

I’ll certainly be staying in better touch with Anil. He’s been in the US for a bit now, currently working at a ranch in Wyoming. I wonder if he’s got new cowboy boots.

My client-volunteers do too mostly, but not always. Maybe this will help one of them:

I got an email last month from a young woman named Emily who wanted to volunteer in Ghana with children for just a couple of days. She was [...]]]> I’m learning lessons all the time in this business of volunteering abroad.

My client-volunteers do too mostly, but not always. Maybe this will help one of them:

I got an email last month from a young woman named Emily who wanted to volunteer in Ghana with children for just a couple of days. She was already traveling abroad, taking part in the Semester At Sea program where students live and study for four months on a boat while visiting a dozen countries.

I rarely respond to these emails anymore. In over a decade in this field, not even one person contacting me “from the road” has ever ended up joining my programs and volunteering — including paying a program fee as required.

Rasta Man !

But on the morning of Emily’s email, my green smoothie for breakfast must have been particularly invigorating and refreshing, because I decided to not only answer her but offer her a great deal.

Here’s how our emails in early April went:

• Can me and 2 friends volunteer in Ghana? 
• Yes.
• How much? We’re on a boat and we’re poor
• You go free. Friends pay $315 (60% discount)
• What do we get?
• Volunteer work, meals, home-stay, donation to school
• Great. We will “for sure” do this

I then immediately contacted one of the schools I work with in Ghana’s capital city Accra. The principal was definitely on-board with having Emily and her friends volunteer. He emailed me the next day, reiterating that his students were eagerly awaiting their arrival. (His school educates kids from the slums of Accra, Ghana’s capital city. I met him in Ghana in 2011.)

Well, five weeks have passed. The Semester At Sea boat is long gone from Ghana. But I still haven’t heard from Emily at all.

I suspect they ended up volunteering at the school. How do I know? The sound of silence. Not from Emily but from the school principal.

At first he replied that “some volunteer girls” had shown up on the dates Emily specified to me. Was one named Emily, I asked? No answer. That’s actually the last I’ve heard from him. Kids, when doing business in the third-world, silence usually equals lying.

The school

Maybe I’m assuming too much. Maybe Emily and her friends never ended up at this school. I never gave her any details about the school — not its name, address or the principal’s name or cell. I did send her a link to an album of photos I took of the school, but there’s no identifying info in them. Perhaps it was word of mouth? Ghana is a small world, and the principal did mention to me that the “volunteer girls” who arrived heard about the school from “their friends”.

So what, right? At least SOMEONE volunteered at the school, no? Agreed — this is a good thing.

Also, I couldn’t care less about losing the program fees that Emily’s friends would have paid me.

No, the real reason I’m even bothering to write about this (non)-experience at all is that it offers some lessons for Emily and her comrades and anyone else who wants to volunteer abroad:

1. Get Perspective

Don’t email from the deck of a $23,750 boat ride telling people you’re poor. You want poor? Those kids in Ghana you want to help are POOR. Many will go to bed with empty stomachs tonight.

2. Be Courteous

Would it have killed you to send me a one-line email, saying you’re not joining my program? Did you notice the common courtesy extended to you by locals in Ghana? It made your visit more memorable, right? Try it yourself.

3. Unintended Consequences

You just cost that school principal many thousands of dollars. But not because you decided to not join our programs, but because you forced the principal into lying to me. As a result I will never send him another volunteer. We’re not talking peanuts here — for example one of our volunteers raised $10,000 for an orphanage in Ghana. (I’m aware that he and his school were doing fine before they met me, but that’s not the point)

So bon voyage and best of luck in your future travels…

On the streets of Accra

But what if, during you next traffic jam as you’re ready to explode behind the wheel, you thought the following instead:

I’m not STUCK in traffic. I AM [...]]]> Being caught in a traffic jam stinks, doesn’t it? All those idiots getting in your way, slowing you up, making your commute even longer and more miserable.

But what if, during you next traffic jam as you’re ready to explode behind the wheel, you thought the following instead:

I’m not STUCK in traffic. I AM the traffic.

Things look a little different that way, right?

Me on the back of a motorcycle in Vietnam:

But why are we like this? Why do we usually consider only our own perspective much of the time?

Turns out that I’ve known the answer for many years. It was floating around my head during all of my 20+ visits  to developing countries since 2000. The thing is though, I couldn’t articulate it very well because I didn’t really have a theory to apply to it — until yesterday.

Yesterday I came across author David Foster Wallace’s “This is Water” commencement address in 2005 at Kenyon College. In his speech he said that we humans have a:

“…natural, hard-wired default setting [my bold] which is to be deeply and literally self-centered and to see and interpret everything through this lens of self.”

Following our default setting is a bad thing.

It makes us go through life thinking that we are the center of the universe. Where we truly believe that everyone around us — family, friends and strangers alike — should be ultra-sensitive to our needs and feelings at all times.

Fortunately, the solution to battling our Default Setting is very simple:

GET OVER YOURSELF!

That’s right. Consider others before yourself.

When you step off that plane in that far-flung country to be a volunteer, know that you are facing a truly invaluable opportunity to challenge and even permanently change your human default setting.

You are in for a total cultural immersion. The combination of volunteer work, a home-stay, and daily living will make you an insider. You will not be some tourist zipping around the popular sites and venues, talking only to other foreigners and shopping.

Instead, you will be exposed to both the wonderful AND the ugly in a local community.

Your host mother who got upset when you came home at 2 AM from partying?

She’s not a nag; she knows all too well the local dangers for naive foreigners like you — and it’s her duty to make sure you’re safe.

That orphanage director who didn’t show up to welcome you on your first day of volunteering?

Maybe she was having an emergency meeting with a potential donor so the kids will have food next week.

The taxi driver at the airport who overcharged you?

You just got off a flight to Ghana that cost you $1,800, an amount of money that will take him the next twelve months to earn.

Your favorite student in your class at the community school in Kenya?

She is so quick with a smile and hug for you everyday. Yet at the end of the school day she walks back to the slum where she and her mom and four siblings share a shack and have only filthy water to drink.

You should must learn that there is an “other” out there in the world that exists outside of you and your little world back home. Get to know people abroad; ask them questions; take a genuine interest in their lives. Learn as best you can what it is like to be them. Walk in their shoes.

And — do all of this without judgement.

Recently I met with a couple of families who are thinking about sending their daughters to Africa this summer through my company. Towards the end of our dinner and conversation, I told one of the teens — whatever happens on your trip, you will NEVER be the same; the experience HAS to profoundly affect you — even if the effect is that you end up hating the place and vow never to return (I’ve seen this happen only to one client in my 12+ years in this business).

On your next volunteer trip abroad, hopefully the effect will be a permanent change to your default setting.

I took the photo below in 2005 in India, on a dirt road on the outskirts of Bangalore, quite literally and figuratively on a road less traveled.

Just weeks [...]]]> It can get lonely on the road less traveled. But sometimes things happen there that remind you it was the right choice for you.

I took the photo below in 2005 in India, on a dirt road on the outskirts of Bangalore, quite literally and figuratively on a road less traveled.

Just weeks before the photo, I had quit my cushy corporate job in Philadelphia to try making a living full-time with my volunteer-travel business called “Cosmic Volunteers.”

I was in Bangalore as a new solo entrepreneur, visiting an unfamiliar city to meet business partners and volunteering placements for future clients — wondering if I could find enough of the latter to pay my bills.

One of my new Indian Coordinators was hosting a party at his farmhouse on the outskirts of Bangalore for his local staff and foreign volunteers. He invited me and I accepted.

After a couple hours at the party, my social energy was spent. So I left the party for some fresh air — and ended up walking a while on an empty dirt road. No lighting except the moon. Out of the darkness, I nearly walked right into the gentleman in the photo; or maybe he into me? Anyway we scared the hell out of each other. He didn’t know what to make of me, looked at me as if I were a space alien.

We quickly discovered that we didn’t share a common language. But we stood there for 10 minutes and learned a lot about each other’s lives and families — gesturing and doing charades the entire time. I believe that he was coming home from working on a farm. He was quite amiable. He even invited me to his little shack of a home for a drink. I gladly accepted and had a quick drink of some strong local spirits.

Of course out on the road I had immediately noticed his skin discoloration. It would be years though before I researched the exact name and nature of the condition. It’s called vitiligo, and it’s most prevalent in the Indian population. As this article explains, it’s not contagious, painful, itchy or dangerous. It just gives a person white patches on the skin.

Having a skin condition myself, I immediately empathized with this man. I was born with a condition called Epidermolysis Bullosa (EB) which is a rare genetic skin disorder that causes the skin to be very fragile, leading to severe blistering — inside and outside the body.

If you ever see my elbows or knees, you’ll notice major scarring from the blisters and cuts I used to get weekly as a kid. My skin in those areas is as white as the man’s hand in the photo. And if you serve me food that’s really temperature-hot, I’ll have to wait until it’s almost room temp; if not, the inside of my mouth will get scorched and become raw from the heat.

In terms of other people with EB though, I got off easy. I got only the simplex form of EB. Some newborns have such severe cases of EB that they die at childbirth while going through the birth canal. (The non-profit “Debra of America” advocates for EB, by the way).

Anyway, the photo above is one of my all-time favorites. Part of it was our nice chat and the kinship from our respective skin diseases.

But the next day, when I really looked at the photo — I noticed the curious expression on his face. To me it’s a combination of surprise (even though I got his permission before snapping), with a deep humility and perhaps even dignity in his pose. He’s not even trying to hide his skin condition. In fact his hand is front and center.

It’s certainly a photo and a meeting that I’ll always think fondly of. A real moment on the road less traveled.

(P.S. If anyone in Bangalore knows this gentleman, have him get in touch with me. I’d love to send him a printed copy of the photo.)

We are indeed just as “complicated,” if not more so, than any other place.

True, we didn’t have 652 bombings last [...]]]> I’m afraid I disagree with Rafia Zakaria’s article The Tragedies of Other Places – That the tragedy in Boston (and Americans’ reactions) shows that America isn’t as complicated as the rest of the world.

We are indeed just as “complicated,” if not more so, than any other place.

True, we didn’t have 652 bombings last year like Pakistan did. And poverty abroad looks like: life expectancy of 57 in Ghana; inability to read a book (a billion people worldwide), and per-capita monthly income of $106 in India.

Poverty in America itself often looks (and is) less-severe than elsewhere, because our standard of living has been so high for so long. Most households in even our worst neighborhoods have cell phones, cable TV, air conditioning and access to clean water.

So what then are our “complications”?

For starters, America had 31,672 deaths by firearms in 2010 alone.

How about our immense wealth too? Check.

Innovation? Check.

Hunger? Check.

Inspiration and Hope? Check and Check.

Corruption? At all levels.

Kids without two parents. Millions.

And – Dropping bombs on brown people decade-after-decade while waving our flag with pride? And acting shocked — and pissed off — that sometimes they bomb us back? Another nauseating check, unfortunately. (Don’t smirk, Africa, you’re next)

Speaking of starvation – we’re the fattest nation on earth, yet just a few kilometers here from my middle-class neighborhood in Philadelphia, there are tens of thousands of people who literally don’t have any food to eat today.

Is it complicated in America? You betcha.

So what’s the difference here in America?

Well – Things just don’t SEEM that complicated to us.

Why? Everything’s fake here. We live in a fantasy world. And – we love it.

What’s fake? Everything. Our food, our wars, smiles, TV shows, the news, our nails, boobs, and noses. (I just found out too that wrestling AND American Idol are both fake too?? Ugh!).

We don’t see our meat until it’s in a clear plastic package at the 100k square-feet grocery store. The first time I saw an animal slaughtered was on the streets of Kathmandu in 2000. A butcher suddenly and unceremoniously beheaded a goat on the sidewalk in broad daylight. I was so shocked and physically nauseated that I had to walk away and sit alone to calm down. Don’t get me started on Disney World either. I cringe when I read that even adults love going to America’s ultimate fantasy camp (I know, there’s one in Hong Kong and France too).

Where does America’s fake-ness come from? From all of us. We’re all in on it. From the “We” in “we the people”, to the media, Hollywood, our teachers, politicians, sports teams, even our cuddly grandparents. It’s like we’re all living in our very own Land-of-Oz, constructing a reality that ain’t real.

Cultural narratives fit into this for sure. Narratives to help us avoid the messiness of reality. Narratives about how to live, what to aspire to be, what’s “evil”, what we stand for (as individuals and as a nation). And narratives of course to tell us what to buy! Because if it ain’t making money, we in “A’murka” ain’t doing it. That’s the real goal here, no?

Narratives need actors, and we’ve got plenty here. An old friend from Australia always remarked how well everyone in America handles being on TV, even little kids. She’s right. Stick a camera and microphone in any of our faces on the street and we’ll perform well. Try that in Pakistan and you’ll probably get the back of a hijab. Here in America though, we’re all hams. A depressing number of us even admit that being famous is a genuine career goal. We know all the scripts, all the narratives that certain situations call for. All of America’s a stage indeed.

Even the Marines are in on it. They can turn (stage) a statue-toppling war event in Iraq into a made-for-TV propaganda reel for the folks back home. But don’t blame the soldiers (too much). Instead blame my fellow dumb Americans who just WANT to believe, HAVE to believe, that our country and our leaders (government and corporate) are doing noble things around the world.

We Americans simply don’t want to know about reality – whether at home or abroad. It reminds me of the old joke: “Are you just ignorant or apathetic? Answer: I don’t know and I don’t care.”

But if that only describes how we feel about the world, how did we actually get here (and stay here) in this state of perpetual know-nothingness?

Distraction. Endless distraction. We’re simply obsessed here in America with leisure and entertainment. Pick your medium, and a distraction is at your finger tips 24 hours. TV, movies, sports, alcohol, drugs, eating, sex, travel – and that’s all before the Internet era and our electronic lives and selves  (cell phones, surfing, chatting, gaming, porn). (Hmmm, maybe this article is just another distraction? So sorry :=) )

This theory of distraction isn’t a new one. In 1985 educator Neil Postman wrote the book “Amusing Ourselves to Death.” It’s a lament about TV and its detrimental effect on human intellect and our understanding of reality(s). He also said later, in 1995, that he worried that personal computers would harm our socializing with each other. Think about that the next time you’re on public transport and everyone under 25 has ear buds in (full disclosure: I got ear buds too!)

Of course we Americans have real feelings too. There is genuine grief and sorrow felt by all us normal Americans when we see events like the bombing in Boston. We’re not robots. We’re human beneath our Facebook profiles. Seeing the photo of that boy who was killed while waiting to greet his father at the finish line is too much to bear. I saw it on CNN briefly out of the corner of my eye (looking up distractedly from my laptop) – and I can tell you that I’ll never-ever look at that photo again.

But the horrible reality of lives and limbs being lost in Boston doesn’t sell any ketchup. It just makes us sad and angry and despondent. Unless… It’s packaged and re-packaged ad-nauseum until it becomes a heroic struggle against evil, with all of us buying in (sometimes literally)…..Maybe I’ve said enough for now.

But wait,there’s more!

These days, the Wizard of Oz that has stood behind the curtain orchestrating our American culture and reality (with our participation) is in the uber-painful process of being exposed. Things like our housing crash, Wall Street meltdown, budget deficits, health care disaster, and endless wars are not just potholes along the yellow brick road. They are a collective sinkhole from which many Americans may never escape. Our narratives may get lost as well. Our greatest one – Work hard and you will succeed – has already died for millions of Americans (even with advanced degrees and experience).

Hmmmm…..Now what?

7 Tips on Passing the Time on Your International Flight

1. The Obvious. Sleeping, reading, movies, music, writing, drawing. Also, more and more airlines — especially outside the US — are offering in-flight Internet access.

2. Mimic your destination’s time zone. [...]]]> So, you’re finally on-board your international flight for your volunteering trip abroad.

Hmmmm…..Now what?

7 Tips on Passing the Time on Your International Flight

1. The Obvious. Sleeping, reading, movies, music, writing, drawing. Also, more and more airlines — especially outside the US — are offering in-flight Internet access.

2. Mimic your destination’s time zone. Stay awake and sleep according to the time zone in your destination. This will help you recover from any jet lag symptoms, allowing you to adjust more quickly to the local time zone.

3. Get Up — Often. Walk around and exercise your calf muscles at least every hour, in order to prevent Deep Vein Thrombosis and avoid potential body aches and stiffness. My favorite is to walk to the back of the plane — to just chill out, do some stretching, chat with passengers, and occasionally sneak an extra snack or beverage from the galley.

4. Talk to fellow passengers. Shy? Intimidated by all those accents, saris, hijabs, or African headdresses? Get over it. Smile and say hello to people. Perhaps you’ll make a new friend, and maybe learn about your destination – especially if they are a local returning home.

5. Look out the window! You are 30,000 feet above the earth! Isn’t is amazing to see the clouds, stars, the moon, the ocean, even other planes from this perspective? You’re traveling perhaps half-way around the world in less than 24 hours. These things were unfathomable to humans not even a century ago. Consider yourself very fortunate.

6. Take photos and videos. Some of you, some of the scenery out the window, maybe even some of a new friend(s). You might not realize it now, but in 5 / 10 / 20+ years these photos will become part of your indelible memories of this special trip.

7. Drink Water. It’s easy to get dehydrated on-board — from the salty food to the dry micro-climate. Dehydration can lead to fatigue, crankiness, constipation — you name it. How much to drink? Everyone’s different, but try a couple of tall glasses of water per hour and see how it goes.

I was glad to see that I’ve read a few of them, like On The Road (1957), The Innocents Abroad (1869), and A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy (1768).

What’s Google Glass? It’s a new computer designed by Google that you wear on your head. Among other things, it gives you the ability to easily record video without anyone knowing.

Google’s servers will then be [...]]]> I just composed and released what I believe is the world’s first Google Glass policy.

What’s Google Glass? It’s a new computer designed by Google that you wear on your head. Among other things, it gives you the ability to easily record video without anyone knowing.

Google’s servers will then be able identify, tag and store FOREVER the identity and words of everyone in the video — all of which will be available via simple searches on Google.

The obvious ethical implications are just too much to ignore.

In my field of volunteering abroad, it’s especially true. My programs rely on high levels of trust between myself and the local people who invite us foreigners into their lives. I don’t think it’s asking too much of our volunteers to get permission before making any recordings of them.

What do you think?

I made it to Elsamere a little over a year ago for a one-day visit with a good friend (who’s a former client of mine).

Elsamere [...]]]> I don’t think a trip to Kenya would be complete without  a visit to the Elsamere Conservation Centre (with a “tre”!) – especially for those volunteering in wildlife conservation.

I made it to Elsamere a little over a year ago for a one-day visit with a good friend (who’s a former client of mine).

Elsamere is the former home of Joy Adamson and her husband George. It’s located on the southern shore of Lake Naivasha in Kenya’s Rift Valley.

Arriving in Kenya for the first time in the 1930′s to escape Nazis in Austria, Joy ended up becoming one of the most famous wildlife conservationists the world has known.

Joy Adamson

As the Director of a company that has sent lots of wildlife volunteers to Kenya for many years – I of course had never heard of Joy until I stepped foot on Elsamere’s grounds on my visit in 2011.

No worries though. My friend arranged with a staff person at Elsamere to give us a personal tour of the place. Elsamere isn’t a big place (you can walk around in 10 minutes), but it’s packed with history — most of it the history of Joy.

The View from Joy Adamson’s front yard at Elsamere in Kenya

Who was Joy Adamson?

On the journey to Kenya in the 1930′s, Joy met a man who would soon become her second husband. Fast-forward to the mid-1940′s though, and she had already moved on to husband number three — George Adamson, a British game warden in Kenya. 

One day George shot and killed a lioness because she charged him and a colleague. Only afterward did George learn that the lioness was only protecting her three cubs. Pitying the plight of the cubs, Joy ended up hand-raising one of them. She named her Elsa.

From there, the rest was both Hollywood AND wildlife-conservation history:

• Joy published a best-selling book in 1960 called “Born Free” chronicling her experiences with Elsa.

• In 1966 the book became and Oscar-winning movie — also called “Born Free” – which educated and influenced people worldwide on lions and wildlife conservation.

• The film inspired its co-stars – the husband-and-wife team of Bill Travers and Virginia McKenna – to start the “Born Free Foundation” which remains one of the world’s most important wildlife conservation and animal protection organizations.

(The actors insisted on doing all of the film’s scenes themselves with the lions, to make the film more authentic)

The Movie

When I returned to Philadelphia from this trip to Kenya, right before Christmas 2011, I made a point of watching the film “Born Free”. It was easy to see how this movie has become one of the great tear-jerker family movies of all time (yep I cried too — sue me).

Aside from the Kleenex moments though – the movie presents an incredible look at Kenya’s countryside and habitats, as the entire film was shot on location in Kenya. And although the 1985 film Out of Africa is perhaps Hollywood’s most famous tribute to Kenya, Born Free is a classic that you need to see before you even think about traveling to Kenya – whether as a volunteer or just a tourist.

Tragically, both Joy and George were murdered in Kenya in separate incidents – Joy in 1980 in Kenya by one of her fired Kenyan assistants; George in 1989 as he saved a tourist from poachers.

At Elsamere, they have on display the actual jeep (called” Nightingale”) that George was driving when he was shot and killed. You can even see the bullet holes in the jeep’s exterior.

The “Nightingale” Jeep of George Adamson at Elsamere Conservation Centre

Joy the Painter

As Joy was also an accomplished painter, Elsamere has smartly decided to display some of her paintings.

Her most important paintings were the hundreds of vivid portraits of tribe members from all over Kenya. These portraits are considered so important, both as an historical record and a source of national pride, that many of the painting hang today at the National Museum of Kenya in Nairobi.

Portrait on the wall at Elsamere Conservation Centre

I did manage to snap a photo of one of the handful of Joy’s tribe portraits at Elsemere. But our tour guide quickly informed me that photography and video inside the main building was strictly prohibited — so the photo above is the only one of I took of a portait.

Online Gallery of portraits by Joy Adamson

Let’s rock!

If you do get to visit Elsamere, be sure to watch the documentary they run a few times a day. It provides all of the background on Joy and George, with interviews with them and locals in Kenya who worked with them all those years ago. The video clips and photos in the documentary bring the story to life.

The first thing that struck me about the documentary played at Elsamere was the theme song — “Born Free”. This too has become a big part of the “Born Free” franchise. 

Before this visit to Elsamere though, my only association with the song was the fictional character Al Bundy from the sitcom “Married with Children”! In a 1989 episode, Al ends up singing “Born Free” as he mops up a bar to pay his bill for the night. 

Yes, it’s also good to go the electronic route — via posts on a blog, Facebook, and Twitter. But we seem to be in the age of over-sharing, which can get annoying and even downright depressing. Surely there will be at [...]]]> I strongly recommend having a paper journal on your volunteering trip abroad.

Yes, it’s also good to go the electronic route — via posts on a blog, Facebook, and Twitter. But we seem to be in the age of over-sharing, which can get annoying and even downright depressing. Surely there will be at least some things abroad that you don’t want to share, right? That’s where your paper journal will come in handy.

Years after your trip, your paper journal can (and should) turn into one of your most prized artifacts of your volunteer experience overseas.

Look at the photo below. That’s my journal from my very first trip abroad — to volunteer in Nepal in 2000. If my house here in Philadelphia caught on fire tonight, I would jump out of the bedroom window clutching this journal — that’s how much I value it.

My journal from Nepal (2000)

Having a paper journal was basically my only option on that Nepal trip. I didn’t have a laptop with me, and neither did my family. Also I was living and volunteering in a rural farming community, with the nearest Internet cafe a 30-minute bus ride away — or a painful one-hour bicycle ride on bumpy dirt roads. It helped that I had no distractions at all. No TV, no phones, no cultural attractions or shopping areas nearby. The nearest neighbor was 100 yards away too!

So, I sat in my room 3-4 nights a week and just wrote out my thoughts and experiences. Page one from my journal:

Dorothy was right indeed — we are not in Kansas anymore! I’ve been on the ground 24 hours, yet it feels like weeks, perhaps a month already.

Last week I bought a faux-leather-bound journal at Staples for just five bucks. It was discounted at least 50%. I’ll be using it on my next trip abroad. This is a great time of year to buy a paper journal, because stores have major discounts on paper calendars and journals after Christmas.