Travel with Purpose: A Field Guide to Voluntourism

by Jeff Blumenfeld

Overview

Imagine yourself in a schoolroom in one of the most remote regions of one of the most hard-to-reach countries on earth. Nepal. The Lower Mustang region to be exact. To reach it takes a 14-hour flight from New York to Doha, Qatar. Then four hours by air to Kathmandu. Transfer at one of the world’s most dangerous airports to a 90-minute flight to Pokhara, followed by a jarring, eight-hour Jeep ride over a vertiginous dirt road – one side is a mountain wall, the other side a two-hundred foot cliff.

Finally you arrive, but it’s not just any schoolroom. It has been converted into an operating room so that doctors from New York Eye & Ear Infirmary can provide the gift of sight to 24 Nepalis who were blind due to advanced cataracts.

Jeff Blumenfeld witnessed this first hand. He was there as a traveler, but also as a volunteer.

A voluntourist.

People often wonder how they can explore the world and help the less fortunate even if they don’t possess specialized skills. These are people who make lousy vacationers. They’re bored sitting on a beach or touring umpteen churches on a cruise ship excursion. They want a meaningful role when they travel.

That’s where voluntourism comes in – a mix of both travel and volunteering. Is it hard work building wells and schoolhouses or excavating dinosaur bones? Yes, it is. But voluntourism doesn’t take a particular outdoor skill, just plenty of sweat and the desire to see the world and leave it a better place.

Travel With Purpose deals not with celebrities, nor the rich and famous. Instead, it relays examples from Blumenfeld’s travels and many others from Las Vegas to Nepal. From health care facilities to impoverished schools. These are stories of inspiration from everyday people, all of whom have definite opinions about the best way to approach that first volunteer vacation.

You don’t need to be wealthy to travel to foreign lands to volunteer; you may not even have to go to foreign lands, as opportunities may exist within your own state. Blumenfeld shows readers how to identify the right location and volunteer situation, how to go about planning trips and preparing for activities, how to reach out, how to help. Through vivid examples and first hand stories from both recipients of volunteer work and the volunteers themselves, Travel with Purpose may make you rethink your next vacation.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781538115329
Publisher:	Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
Publication date:	04/05/2019
Pages:	208
Sales rank:	1,106,753
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.40(d)

About the Author

Jeff Blumenfeld is founder and president of Blumenfeld and Associates PR, LLC, a public relations and adventure marketing agency based in Boulder, Colorado, that has represented some of the largest outdoor recreation companies in the U.S. Clients have included Coleman, Duofold, Du Pont, Eddie Bauer, Lands’ End, LEKI, Lewmar, Mares, Michelin, Orvis, Timberland, Timex, and W.L. Gore & Associates.

Blumenfeld is also editor and publisher of Expedition News, a newsletter, blog and website he founded in 1994 to cover news about the adventure marketing field. A Fellow of The Explorers Club based in New York, he is the organization’s former director of communications and is currently chairman of its Rocky Mountain chapter and member of its Flags & Honors Committee. He is the author of You Want to Go Where?: How to Get Someone to Pay for the Trip of Your Dreams (2009) and Get Sponsored: A Funding Guide for Explorers, Adventurers and Would-be World Travelers (2014). Blumenfeld also belongs to the American Alpine Club, based in Golden, Colorado, and is a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society in London. In May 2013 he served as communications director for Dooley Intermed International’s “Gift of Sight” Expedition to Nepal – an effort to deliver badly needed quality eye care to 700 impoverished villagers.

Table of Contents

Introduction A World of Voluntourism Opportunities Chapter 1 Why We Travel Chapter 2 The Growth of Voluntourism Chapter 3 Selecting the Right Project Chapter 4 Become a Better Voluntourist Chapter 5 Stay Safe Out There Chapter 6 Stories of Purposeful Travel Chapter 7 The Dark Side of Voluntourism Chapter 8 Funding Your Volunteer Project Appendix A Voluntourism Resources Appendix B Best Travel Apps Appendix C Favorite Travel Books Appendix D Voluntourism Videos

Editorial Reviews

Jeff Blumenfeld covers everything you need to know about voluntourism, from its upsides and downsides to how to find the right project—and he’s included memorable stories that span from Kathmandu to Vegas. This is an excellent resource for anyone who wants to volunteer abroad.

Ken Budd

Whether for an hour or two, a day or a week, Jeff Blumenfeld’s Travel With Purpose explains how any traveler can give back to the local communities they visit, anywhere in the world. The experience turns you from an everyday tourist into a small part of the solution to some of the globe’s most pressing challenges.

Richard Wiese

Practical, motivating and loaded from cover to cover like an overstuffed suitcase, Travel With Purpose is a big-hearted book full of guidance and inspiration that just may finally get you out the door. Crack it open, then pack your bags.

John Marshall

Every traveler can benefit immensely by lending a hand to local organizations wherever they travel for business or pleasure. Travel With Purpose explains how to do this most effectively and with passion. Don’t miss this book!

Barbara Corcoran

Starred Review: Well-traveled expert Blumenfeld (You Want to Go Where?, 2009) shares many ways to combine the spirit of volunteerism with a vacation. As he tells stories of his own good deeds abroad—being part of a medical mission in Nepal, chaperoning a high-school expedition to Antarctica—he also expounds on this booming sub-industry, its growth, how to select the right project, and the good and not-so-great sides of volunteering outside of the U.S. He writes well, with a good eye for memorable details, and provides a wealth of do’s and don'ts for starting to help readers learn new skills, lower expectations about what the work will be, avoid some of the darker issues (such as lack of sustainability and, unfortunately, human trafficking), and fund the project. Among his stories and advice are tales of a just-married couple who raised funds to enjoy a volun-honeymoon, and a young woman who fundraised through a unique combination of creative food-related events. Blumenfeld leaves almost nothing to the imagination, with appendixes on volunteerism resources, best travel applications, favorite travel books, and volunteerism videos, along with notes and a bibliography. Who wouldn’t agree with Albert Schweitzer? "Wherever you turn, you can find someone who needs you."

Starred Review Booklist

Blumenfeld throws all those preconceived notions about voluntourism out the window and instead focuses on the good it can do. Right from the start, Blumenfeld dispels one of the most prevalent misconceptions about voluntourism: the cost. He shrugs off the suggestion that it might cost thousands for would-be do-gooders to make the trek to an impoverished country, citing $850 as the cost for a weeklong stay in Honduras (including round trip travel). Another misconception he addresses is that voluntourists do more harm than good due to their lack of skill; Blumenfeld asserts that there is a leadership hierarchy that naturally forms. Although critics of voluntourism can be a tad cynical, claiming that there’s something selfish about briefly passing through a third world country and making a small, sometimes negligible impact, the way that each individual person helps demonstrates that this might not be the case. If each volunteer understands that they are part of something larger, and instead of overstepping their role works as a team player, there’s nothing inherently selfish about wanting to be there, on the ground working as opposed to simply writing a check.

Booktrib

There’s no better education for a child than travel that provides a glimpse at how other people live their lives. Travel that also involves volunteer work is perhaps the best of both worlds. As Travel With Purpose shows, voluntourism can expand horizons, and build an important bond between parents and their sons or daughters.

Rainer Jenss

Starred Review: Well-traveled expert Blumenfeld (You Want to Go Where?, 2009) shares many ways to combine the spirit of volunteerism with a vacation. As he tells stories of his own good deeds abroad—being part of a medical mission in Nepal, chaperoning a high-school expedition to Antarctica—he also expounds on this booming sub-industry, its growth, how to select the right project, and the good and not-so-great sides of volunteering outside of the U.S. He writes well, with a good eye for memorable details, and provides a wealth of do’s and don'ts for starting to help readers learn new skills, lower expectations about what the work will be, avoid some of the darker issues (such as lack of sustainability and, unfortunately, human trafficking), and fund the project. Among his stories and advice are tales of a just-married couple who raised funds to enjoy a volun-honeymoon, and a young woman who fundraised through a unique combination of creative food-related events. Blumenfeld leaves almost nothing to the imagination, with appendixes on volunteerism resources, best travel applications, favorite travel books, and volunteerism videos, along with notes and a bibliography. Who wouldn’t agree with Albert Schweitzer? "Wherever you turn, you can find someone who needs you."

Booklist