There's no denying it, these bloggers are bound to make you jealous. Whether it's their guts, their energy or their tan you admire, overseas volunteers have got plenty to share with you about their remarkable work in fascinating countries. Read on to find out what you could be missing.

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Saturday Dec 30, 2006

Best Holiday Ever - Part 2

Ok, so it's been a little more than a week.... And again, the lack of time means I'm going to have to do bulletpoint/snapshot things of what I've been up to since I last posted.

We've spent time travelling along the beautiful Garden Route on the South African coast. We camped near a town called Mossel Bay, where we saw a whole group of dolphins jumping in and out of the waves just as they broke.

We stayed in the best backpackers in the world in Plettenberg Bay, where we decided to spend Christmas because it was so cool. They had a braai every night and the people were friendly - and as a bonus for Marcel, a lot of them were Dutch so he got to speak his own language again for the first time in months!

We did the highest bungee jump in the world off Bloukrans Bridge. It was amazing. It was even hard to be scared because it's like  a party up on the bridge, they have a DJ set up there and all the crew are like hardcore adrenaline junkies who've done the jump (all 216m of it) hundreds of times. The feeling when I was just freefalling before I felt the pull of the rope was so cool, all of us were on a high for hours afterwards.

Right now we're in Cape Town which is the best place to be this close to New Year. We've met up with loads of other SA volunteers and so sleep has gone out of the window a bit, but it's more than worth it!

Today we're going up Table Mountain, then on the 3rd we're leaving for Botswana. Wish me luck!

Posted by Lucy Hayes ( 10:39 AM )
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Friday Dec 15, 2006

'Europe' stuck in my head!

I mentioned to a friend I was doing this countdown of international volunteering websites and she started singing that song by 'Europe' called ' The Final Countdown'. That was two hours ago. I can't stop singing it. And, the worst part? I only know the chorus!

Anyway. Here goes...

8) World Volunteer Web - I can spend hours browsing here. It's one of my favorites. This site supports the volunteer community by serving as a global clearinghouse for information and resources linked to volunteerism that can be used for campaigning, advocacy and networking. It is an online hub where the community can meet, share resources and coordinate activities to mobilize volunteer action in support of the Millennium Development Goals.  (BTW - Until I started poking around, I hadn't twigged that it also a UN-related site. I promise no more UN sites on the list.)

7) VolunteerMatch - This is a site aimed more for local volunteering, but you can search for opportunities that are virtual. Most of them are US-based, (certainly a good way to build up your CV if you're looking to maybe spend a semester studying at one of our finer universities) but there are a fair number of international organisations. I know i keep banging away at virtual volunteering, but, heck, we bloggers are great examples of virtual vols. (And a lovely lot we are, too). It's certainly a growing niche in the volunteer market. I can't help but find it fascinating.

Don't forget you can always check out my previous picks - A Top Ten Volunteer Site Listing

Posted by Dana ( 7:50 PM )
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Wednesday Dec 13, 2006

Best Holiday Ever - Part 1

Why is it that time always seems to go faster when you're in an internet cafe? I think it's some kind of conspiracy... There's no way I can give a detailed account of all we've done so far in the time I have left, so I'll settle for snapshots of the best parts of my week-and-a-bit of holiday so far. I'm travelling with my partners, Bozena and Marcel, and the two other Namibian volunteers, Conor and Miles.

Even leaving Luderitz was fun: our lift to Windhoek fell through at the last minute so we had a manic time attempting to get out of town. We ended up leaving a day later than planned in a crowded combi taxi as far as Keetmanshoop, then hitching with a friendly Angolan the rest of the way to Windhoek.

We've been to Daan Viljoen game park, and sat on top of a Land Rover watching giraffes cross the road right in front of us while zebras grazed 3 metres away.

We crushed into a combi taxi for the 8 hour drive to Onayena, listening to the driver's choice of music at full blast: traditional Oshiwambo songs, more modern Namibian music which is like Oshiwambo reggae, and for some reason, Westlife. That was a little surreal.

We visited the village of a friend in Onayena, where his 2 year old niece stole my hat and sunglasses and posed like a pro despite having never seen a camera before.

We were given a gift of a live chicken when we complimented the cooking; when we went back to where we were staying there were 6 of us in the back of a bakkie (open truck thing) with a 12-year old driving and the Houdini of all chickens doing it's best to escape the bag it was tied up in.

Conor, much to his delight, got to decapitate the chicken; Marcel didn't realise that headless chickens really do run around, and so let go of it once the head was off. It flapped round the yard like a mad thing squirting blood out of it's neck, all over Marcel's shoes.

I cooked the chicken! I was so proud. Then we ate it sat on the floor with a makeshift table of bricks watching the amazing Owamboland sunset over the desert.

We saw dolphins swimming just off the shore at Swakopmund, right in the shallows; it was amazing how close to us they came.

We went sandboarding on the dunes just outside Swakop. At one point we had Conor lying on the plank of wood, with Bozena on top of him and me on top of her, hurtling down the sand dune at a ridiculous speed before coming to an abrupt inelegant stop and ending up with quite a lot of sand in my mouth. It was so much fun.

We hitched from Swakop back to Windhoek in the back of a bakkie again - we were out in the open for 5 hours across the middle of the day. It was the hottest I have ever been in my life. I lay with my hat over my face to attempt to stop myself burning to a crisp, and Bozena even resorted to wrapping her head in a towel. Our coke, Bozena's Lipsyl, Conor's toothpaste and my deodorant all overheated and exploded, which was highly amusing but messy.

And that's it for now! Hopefully the rest of the holiday will be as fun as the start has been, because I'm having an absolutely amazing time. Life is great.

Are you jealous yet? You should be!

Posted by Lucy Hayes ( 1:12 PM )
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Sunday Dec 03, 2006

to keep me from screaming...

To keep me from screaming in frustration over things, I thought I'd put my energies to use for good instead of evil and pull together a Top Ten of sites which might be of interest to anybody thinking about taking a plunge into the world of international volunteering.

So... let the countdown begin (OT question - is it true, have they really taking Top of the Pops off the air?)

10. UN Online Volunteering - I know... I know, I've already mentioned this site, but I really do like the fact that you can do virtual volunteering for organisations all over the world. I've applied for two different things via this website and have found it dead easy to use.

9. UN Volunteers - This website is the United Nations Volunteers program. It has lots of interesting information about volunteering as well as information on how to become a UN volunteer in your own country or abroad. .

I've got a bookmark collection that has a listing of these sites (along with some other stuff - especially volunteer management for anybody interested in finding out how our vol supervisors think....<evil laugh>.

Til next time.... ciao

Posted by Dana ( 8:33 PM )
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Friday Dec 01, 2006

Holiday!

 

This is just a quick one to say that I leave to go travelling tomorrow, so I'm not sure how much internet access I'll have for the next 6 weeks. Don't know if they have many internet cafes in the wilds of Botswana!

School's all finished up for the summer; my Christmas play didn't go too badly, despite the Wise Men refusing to give Jesus the gifts and a sheep's costume falling apart. Oh, and there was a slight confusion with one of the costumes; the Afrikaans words kameel and kameelperd are, respectively, camel and giraffe. The cutest and smallest of my camels misunderstood his instructions and only realised his mistake at the last minute, ensuing in this conversation:

“Miss Lucy, is my camel costume ok?”

“Yeah, it looks great.”

“....It's a giraffe, isn't it?”

“Yes, Shareef. Yes, it is.”

Anyway, our holiday plans: We're first going up to the north of Namibia as we haven't seen that much of the rest of the country, and we're going to visit Marcel's old project in Onayena. It's a tiny village outside Ondangwa, so we're going to go there too and also probably to Oshakati as that's the biggest city in the north.

We're then going to head down to South Africa and meet up with more volunteers there, and after travelling along the coast we'll spend Christmas and New Year in Cape Town. We want to try and get to Mossel Bay, where there's the biggest bungee jump in the world. On 3^rd January we're going to go back up through Botswana, ending up in Maun from where we'll go back across to Windhoek then home to Lüderitz again.

Hopefully.

I've got to say, I'm looking forward to spending Christmas on a beach in Cape Town... I hope everyone back in the UK isn't suffering from the cold too badly!

Posted by Lucy Hayes ( 6:54 AM )
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