This post is a little less about me and my time in Brazil and more about a problem I knew existed but has become more apparent to me over the last few days.
I’m sure you’re all aware that I have been working voluntarily as an Assistant Field Coordinator and English teacher for an NGO called The Two Brothers Foundation. They’re a non-profit organization based in Rocinha and are essentially coordinated from the USA by some of the guys that founded the organization a number of years ago.
Anyway, to work as a volunteer here you don’t have to pay. For me, to pay to be a volunteer kind of defeats the objective of being a volunteer and this was one of the main reasons why I opted to work for 2Bros. By all means do some fundraising to support your project but please and I stress PLEASE do not pay an external organization ANY money to put you into a volunteer project unless you have spoken to people who have used that company or have at least read around Internet reviews.
In this post I am going to explain some stories I’ve heard since arriving, as well as tell you the names of some of the organizations that are profiting from people’s good will and hard work.
When you scour the Internet looking for some assistance on a topic you know very little about, it can be quite easy to succumb to the ease and necessity of the average gap year volunteer project. You pay them an amount of money (usually a ridiculous amount) and because you pay this ‘established company’ a considerable sum of money, you feel safe in the knowledge that:
- You will be attending a thoroughly organized project with structure
- You will feel like you are making a difference to the lives of others
- You will be able to channel the skills you laid out in your applications into a project that is well designed for you to help
- Every moment of your experience will be like the amazing pictures and quotes you see plastered all over the website of the so-called volunteer organization you are about to engage with.
WRONG!
I can’t speak for every organization when I make these criticisms, but the cynic in me thinks that this disappointment on behalf of volunteers, wasted money, and wasted productivity is a reoccurring theme across this whole industry. What tends to happen is, this ‘organization’ with the brilliant website that gives off the impression that it is extremely well-connected and has inside knowledge across all different types of volunteer projects, is actually merely a sales company. They employ an agent or agents who run(s) around silly in places like Rio de Janeiro, Buenos Aires, Salvador, La Paz, you name it, I guarantee there will be a few there, to find suitable projects for the waves of volunteers that pay hundreds and sometimes thousands of dollars for these projects. The process by which these agents assign you to a project is at times completely unrepresentative of the way the website leads you to believe you will be treated in the host country. Let me tell you about a couple of people I have met and chatted with since I have been in Brazil…
Ok, so a girl from England who I got to know last week told me about her experience in Rio which she had paid $800 for! She signed up to a project called Creative Arts Teaching in Rio. Sounds official, right? The company was called Real Gap, also known as ‘I to I’ and here is a link if you want to check out their website and the rhetoric they use to describe the particular project my friend paid $800 for.
http://www.realgap.com/brazil-creative-education-in-rio
Here is another one to be careful of:
Here are some of the comments some she sent me:
“We arrived at a hostel in a favela when the itinerary had stated we’d be living in Copacabana.”
“The itinerary is completely misleading and there was little organization regarding daily schedules, when the website had listed a thorough plan.”
“According to the website, Portuguese language skills are not necessary and nowhere to does it explain English is not widely spoken in Brazil” – This is just absolutely laughable to be honest!
“One guy who’d signed up to teach football to kids was reassigned to looking after babies in a preschool.”
“Most other people I’ve met that have come through the same companies have had similar experiences.”
“Other than the money for the hostel. I am not entirely sure where my $800 has gone.”
Another person I met paid $1000 a month through a third-party agent. She arrived, found out she was living in the same house as me, which we were paying just over $100 a month for and doing similar types of volunteer work, yet I am paying no money to do so. Confused yet? I certainly was. Anyway, just to make things even more ridiculous, short after arrival, the girl found out that the school was closed for 4 weeks for the post-Christmas / Carnaval holiday season. In summary, the poor girl had paid this company $1000 for a month in a shared room halfway up a favela. Day light Robbery! This particular story highlights the lack of communication between all parties involved and shows just how irrelevant your experience is to the company once the money has been transferred into their account.
The list could go on if I went and spoke to more people who had paid for the volunteer experience with these kinds of companies. The reality is, these organizations are selling a life changing experience, using carefully taken pictures and probably made up quotes for an extortionate amount of money. The reality is that when you arrive here, you are put in a difficult situation, surrounded by a foreign language, living an experience you weren’t expecting, purely because these companies bend the truth to convince you that their project is the right one for you.
There is nothing wrong with struggling with a language and thinking things are a little unorganized. I have experienced this my whole time here and I imagine is often a reflection of what third sector work can be like! What is wrong is being sold complete lies about it before you arrive and being charged an obscene amount of money. Unless people speak up about their negative experiences and don’t feel embarrassed that it’s happened to them, these companies will carry on profit maximizing out of people’s good will and ambitions to spend some time doing what they think could be useful and beneficial to other people’s lives.
I thought to myself, if every penny that has ever been transferred into the hands of these firms had been used for an effective and genuine development related project how much more could have been done over the past few years.
Like I see written on Facebook every day, rant over!
Please share and tweet and spread the word. And PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE don’t pay to volunteer unless you know from a good, reliable source that organization is trustworthy. Scour the web for blogs for decent inside information, make an effort to learn a language, do your research, and don’t affiliate yourself with firms making big money out of volunteering.
Jennifer Kim 