“Voluntourism” is a highly popular term used for volunteer tourism. For those who are not aware of it, volunteer travel is a form of traveling abroad where you take up volunteering work while traveling and exploring a new destination. This is a great way to unwind yourself from a routine lifestyle and experience something new and different; while, of course, help improve several disadvantaged lives.
Volunteering abroad is commonly practiced, and highly popular, amongst college and high school students. However, over the years, its popularity has extended to young adults and working people. One of the key reasons of this extension is the monotony that a 9-5 job life brings in. In order to break that, working professionals take sabbaticals to travel abroad.
And, while there are a number of activities you can choose to take up, below are some of the most promising reasons to consider voluntourism as an effective career break option.
It Provides The Freshness In Life You’ve Been Looking For
Waking up in the morning, getting ready for work, spending 8 hours in a cubicle, seeing the same faces and listening to same punchlines from your co-workers; all this can really take a huge toll on anyone. Taking a volunteer vacation can really help getting that much needed space and change. Meeting new people, exploring new places, immersing in a new culture, learning a new language, trying new dishes; all this can bring a kind of freshness you’ve been looking for.
It Gives You The Platform To Use Your Expertise In Making A Difference
All those years that you’ve been working on projects and assignments, getting praises and raises, are definitely an achievement. But, the real achievement comes with the gesture of sharing and caring. When you find yourself with a bunch of enthusiastic and passionate kids, who are eager to learn as much as they can from you, that’s when you’ll get the actual sense of achievement. When you help build houses for the community development volunteering project, the smile on the faces of the people will bring you the sense of actual achievement. Volunteer travel can be seen as on-site project you are on, minus the hassles, monotony and, boundation of an office.
It’s A 2-in-1 Experience Option You Can’t Afford To Miss
If it’s a travel expedition, it has to be an interesting one; voluntourism is no different. Volunteering abroad during a gap year can take you to some of the most adventurous trips in the world. A volunteer trip provides two different kinds of experiences on one single tour. While it let’s you live a native life, interacting with the locals and help bringing about a positive change in the society, it provides extensive adventure experiences through weekend excursions, thrilling activities, and city tour to some of the best tourist hotspots.
It Goes Easy On Your Pocket
Taking a career break means cutting out the income source and flow of money for the time-period you’re on the sabbatical. The savings that you have should survive till you get back into business. But what’s all the money worth if it’s not utilised to get the happiness and satisfaction you’ve been earning it for. One of the key benefits of taking volunteer trips is that they are quite affordable and fit to the budget. The living expenses; such as, accommodation, food, local support, etc. are all covered in the program fee paid during the registration.
It Involves Traveling The World; Period!
Yes! Isn’t the prime objective of taking a career break is to give yourself some time off, to explore what else is there in our world? Traveling takes you to a different soil, but, voluntouring, stepping a notch above, takes you to a different dimension of traveling and exploring the world altogether. Most of the volunteer projects are offered in developing or underdeveloped countries, where one would not think of visiting otherwise. And, it is this that thwarts the chances of witnessing some of world’s most hidden gems. Volunteering abroad lets you, not only travel the world, but also, explore places that are filled with nature’s gifts and deserves appreciation.
Are you planning to take a career break soon? Why not plan a volunteer trip this time and see the difference.
This is a guest post by Dronacharya Dave. Dronacharya is a full-time travel writer/blogger. His passion for traveling got him into the habit of writing, which soon turned into a profession. He writes and shares his personal experiences and facts in his articles with only one objective in mind: motivating others as well to travel as much as they can. You can find more of his work on Huffington, SocialEarth, VolunteersMagazine, Cultural Trip, etc.