India Staff Praised by Recent Volunteers

Volunteers in India help care for orphaned and abandoned children, teach in the classroom, and paint, repair and construct facilities for impoverished children. Four Indian staff facilitate the volunteers’ work.

The following quote from Asha Phillips is representative of what volunteers say about our India Country Manager, Stephen Raja Chinnappan: “ I cannot say enough about Stephan’s professional and caring manner. He assisted us whenever necessary. He and his staff made this an even more enjoyable experience than I could have imagined.”

Fellow volunteer Jon O’Shea added, “Stephen is the perfect fit for his job! He has incredible patience, great organization skills and a depth of knowledge. Stephen made this trip incredible.”

You too can help children in India. You too can leave your mark on the world.

Fundraise Your Fee and Serve This Year!

Don't allow a meager bank account to deprive you of a volunteer vacation this summer! Take the lead from our creative volunteer fundraisers, and engage your social network in your service with Global Volunteers. Many volunteers -- students as well as mature adults -- have raised their full service program fees and all travel costs by reaching out to friends, family and civic supporters. Below is just one volunteer story:

Last year, through the Global Volunteers website, I raised enough money for my trips to both Peru and Ecuador. The only thing I paid for was my flight to both countries. How'd I do it?

I put a letter in my church bulletin and received an overwhelming amount of supplies that I was able to split between both trips for donations. I ended up bringing at least one extra suitcase on both trips filled with supplies for the children. When I signed up for the trips, I wrote a letter explaining what I was doing and why, asking for any sort of donation. I sent the letter to all my family close and extended as well as family friends, neighbors, teachers, distant relatives etc. I received an overwhelming response and received donations up until the week before I was to leave to Peru on my first trip.

I took the semester off from school last fall, and when I found Global Volunteers, it was a perfect fit. I found out about the program through a girl at my school who had done a trip to Brazil with her mother a few years ago. The fact that Global Volunteers provided me with the means to create a fundraising page was very helpful. It was perfect for me to fundraise through. Global Volunteers is the only volunteer program I found that allowed you to fully fundraise all of your costs and helped you in doing so. All other programs were much more expensive and more of a volunteer 'vacation' rather than a strictly volunteer trip.

This has been a wonderful, fulfilling memory for me. I encourage you to do it.
-Meagan Minott

Call or email us to learn how you can establish your own fundraising page on our website and for examples from other successful fundraisers.

Great "Editor's Notes" from Peru Team Journal :)

These "Editor's Notes" were just TOO GOOD not to share with our entire Global Volunteers family!! This 2011 volunteer team served in Lima, Peru with host partners PPA (children's home) and La Molina (university). We hope you enjoy these final day comments as much as we did!!

FROM THE EDITOR – SOME FINAL THOUGHTS

When I retired in 2008, my brother-in-law gave me one of those “retirement” plaques and I put it on an upstairs bedroom shelf. On Saturday, as I put my things away, it caught my eye.

It read: “On Your Retirement: There are new roads to travel, with adventures yet unseen, new friendships to make and realizing your dreams.”

The Lima, Peru group accomplished all that and more! At our respective assignments at La Molina and PPA, we worked together with a common purpose. We shared ideas and materials. And yes, sometimes we shared frustrations. But we also shared tremendous satisfaction, triumphs and victories, brought to us by the smiles and enthusiasm on both ends of the spectrum -- doctoral students and 3 year olds.

At the end of the day when our work was done, we played together, laughed together and had many happy times together. And on this new road, during this little piece of our lives, we had quite a lasting adventure.

**********************

And so I leave you with a Final Thought for the Day…..

“Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and proclaiming, WOW, WHAT A RIDE!” ~ Author Unknown

Paz y Felicidad, Amigos! Adios!

~ Volunteer Bea

Planning for a Summer in Poland

Zakopane Summer English Language Camp in the Tatra Mountains

To all our volunteers and blog readers: I hope that 2011 has been a happy and healthy year for you and your family so far. Here in Poland we are eagerly awaiting for the upcoming Global Volunteers spring and summer service programs to begin. We hope that - with your help - we’ll be able to continue to provide service to the Polish students throughout 2011 and many years to come!

The months of June and July will bring the beginning of the summer camp sessions in Poland. The volunteers who will help us in the summer will work with the elementary school students at the Reymontowka Camp, as well as middle and high school students in Zakopane area and they will play a very crucial role in educating the future leaders of Poland.

In Zakopane summer camps, we will work with the bright high and middle school students who need their English to make their future professional lives successful in a very competitive job market in Poland. For a lot of them studying the English language, as well as the American history, geography and culture is a real passion. The volunteers give them such an excellent opportunity to learn so many interesting facts about the country and language of their interest.

So, please join either our June 25th or July 2nd Zakopane teams today so we can continue to serve our Polish students in 2011.

Because it is a camp, the students and volunteers can participate in a lot of fun activities in the afternoons (while practicing English together at the same time) so this program is ideal if you would like to bring your child or grandchild to serve with you. These activities include hiking in the mountains, visiting museums, playing sports, going swimming, shopping and exploring the town of Zakopane. In the evenings, the students often put on skits and musical plays. During the free weekend you can visit Krakow, Auschwitz- Birkenau Concentration Camp and the Wieliczka Salt mine (started in the early Middle Ages and listed on the UNESCO List of World Heritage Sites).

Thank you so much for your considering the idea of assisting us this summer! It would be wonderful to work with you again in my home country! Also, please tell others about our service opportunity.

Dorota Wierzbicka, Poland Country Manager

World Book Encyclopedia Donation Arrives on Rarotonga!!

A big thank you to Volunteer Nancy, Global Volunteers' staff & host partners and World Book Encyclopedia for allowing this great donation effort to happen!

Please take a peek at a few photos below of the encyclopedias arriving at a local school and the students diving right into learning!




Here a student takes his first crack at sign language!!