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Our placements are designed to immerse you in a different culture, living and working with local people. There’s plenty to gain personally from this challenge – a sense of achievement, broader horizons and some wonderful memories. But we make sure that local people benefit too.
Meeting local needs - The whole placement is geared towards helping the local community. We have been sending volunteers to the area for 10 years and have long-standing relationships with local people. This means we have a good idea of where help is needed, and can ensure volunteers make a real contribution. We place volunteers in schools where they can change children’s lives by teaching English, helping them out of poverty. As well as teaching, our volunteers have helped build classrooms, educate local street children and contributed to other local projects.
Our volunteers contribute to the local economy, bringing income to their host families and shopping in the town. We employ local staff. In addition, we donate money regularly to the local projects in response to their needs.
Cultural sensitivity - We emphasise the importance of showing respect for local people and their customs. Our pre-departure course includes a session entitled ‘Responsible tourism’ where we discuss cultural differences and sensitivities, as well as advising volunteers on appropriate conduct. Volunteers are given a Nepali language course and briefed on what is considered polite in terms of eating, greeting and dressing.
Environment - Our company is an environmentally responsible one that operates recycling and reusing of waste products. We also offset carbon emissions in our office (gas, electricity, business mileage) and encourage all participants to offset their flight emissions via a carbon offset scheme run in conjunction with Tree Aid. Our volunteers are given a pre departure briefing where they are encouraged to minimise waste and to live in a way that will not have a detrimental effect on the country or communities. Our Himalayan trek is on foot or horseback, so there is minimal negative environmental impact.
We invite every traveler who books a vacation via us to send in a review. Because we don't run the vacations they're completely independent and unedited... remember to read between the lines though, as two people on the same vacation can have different views!
