A Memorable Part of A Grand South American Tour

Our Country Coordinator in Chile, Paul, wrote up this blog post on behalf of Mike and Shirley, a couple who participated in an English Teaching Quest for two weeks during an extended trip through South America. Mike is a returning United Planet volunteer having previously volunteered in Ecuador and  Shirley is a former English teacher; you can imagine how excited she was to be working with children again! Here is what Paul had to say about their overall experience.

Before arriving to Chile as United Planet volunteers, Mike and Shirley spent several days as tourists in Bogota, Colombia, and Cuzco, Peru. And the same morning they finished their two-week Chile Quest by speaking to a class of Chilean English-teacher graduate students about their home state of Hawaii, they hurriedly boarded a bus going to the Port of Valparaiso to catch a cruise ship heading south around the Strait of Magellan with Rio de Janeiro, Brazil as its final destination.

As volunteers, Shirley and Mike enjoyed helping three Chilean English teachers at an elementary school while at the same time becoming part of a very comfortable and friendly homestay environment. Riding Santiago’s subway to school and receiving new classroom assignments produced new adventures every day. Shirley, a former English teacher, remembered her biggest challenge was keeping control of a class of 45 kindergarten students. Mike especially enjoyed speaking with the 7^th and 8^th graders who were able to converse with him in English.

One afternoon they visited a women’s shelter. While Shirley jumped right in helping three-year old Sabrina select crayons for her drawings, Mike was showing eight-year old Max how to play tic-tac-toe, and they ended up playing for more than an hour. Along with his two- year old brother Francisco, and their mother, Max had just arrived to the shelter that same day.

Shirley commented that unlike being a tourist, she liked the fact that as a volunteer she could really get to know people and learn about cultural idiosyncrasies. Mike had done a United Planet Quest in Quito a year earlier and fondly recalled UP Ecuador coordinator Pablo Proano and a fascinating tour he had taken into the Amazon jungle.  Mike also recalled that Jinexa, their Program Coordinator, had provided them with a lot of pre-departure help from United Planet’s Boston office. After reflecting some more on his many overseas volunteer experiences, Mike concluded by saying that he was impressed by how United Planet managed so effectively to take care of its volunteers throughout the whole volunteer process.

Thank you Paul for sharing those details and some of the thoughts Mike and Shirley had by the end of their Quest! It’s always wonderful to hear how even a short stay can make a big impact. Have you ever considered traveling or volunteering abroad? There is no age limit to volunteer work! Consider joining us abroad to work on a project of your choice in one of 35+countries!