i just copy and paste this email sent to my good boyfriend, cos i want him to come along! this is my thought process when writing an email to him about volunteer vacation, hmmmm..... planning when??? that 10 day holiday that i've been aiming for, my budget? US$1000 flat.
Points to be aware of & Proposed Solutions
Exclude those organization that only selects volunteers based on nationality if they dont have malaysia linked (you're Canadian, i'm Malaysian, many european and north american program do not include Malaysia)
Application Fee - exclude those that involves 'membership fee', its like you have to sign up as a member before you're allowed to volunteer with the org,
Volunteer Fees - US$1,000 for a week is maximum, the best is US$500 per week, actually i found FreeTheBears in Cambodia being the cheapest (AUD300), but you dont work directly with the bears, i'll elaborate later. If it exapanded to 2 weeks for only US$1300 then it make sense to do a 2 week trip.
Time - the project has to has flexible timing, some has volunteer seasons, but some you can start anytime you can.
Cost - establish org such as i-to-t or UK based org is expensive to contact, the other option is to actually google directly the location of the schools / villagers that is link to this volunteer site, like, to by pass the organization, THOUGH i dont think we can find a contact anyway, but it will be very much a plan for us, cos if we just walked in and volunteer our service, which is what some ppl do in China with the schools to teach english. For example, when we're in cambodia, there's actually a children hospital where you can just volunteer by just walking in, and the same rules applies ANYWHERE, and its much cheaper,cos you bypass the administration fees, its just this organization are there to make ur application & life easier, and also the acoomodation will be all sorted out.
Genuinity - this is very very very important, we have to scrutinize the website, email, call them and cross reference on other testimonials or something if we've decided on a program.
The project - usually i try to find out how hands on can we be at the project site esp with animals, (with humans its definitely interactive), you see, some animals conservations doesnt allow you to go directly to the site, you might be stuck in the office doing data recording or planning the equipments and food for the permanenet staff to bring out to the animal location, so if any animals are involved we need to see really if thats what we want to do.
Objective - what is ur objective? i hope its not because of Fei, but we also must know, even tho we're not contributing directly within 7- 10 days, but we are part of the process to making it smooth rather than feeling small because of the insignificant things we do, and not afraid to get really dirty.
The term. - 10 days is our maximum, but if we need to do like 14 days, i dont mind, but of cos 7 days would be ideal, so we have time to explore on our own a day or two after the project.
Political / Cultural - like Tibet, its interesting, but do we want to risk going there? or any african state that might already have internal conflict, so we have to weigh our options k?
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