1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:05,000 Voluntourism is a multi-billion dollar industry. 2 00:00:05,000 --> 00:00:17,000 It sells wealthier people access to impoverished and struggling communities in exchange for a life-affirming experience. 3 00:00:17,000 --> 00:00:32,000 Kids would see bands of volunteers pulling towards them, and they'd quickly rub dirt on their faces so that they'd be more appealing, ironically, to the volunteers and look like they needed more help. 4 00:00:32,000 --> 00:00:40,000 Each of us paid thousands of dollars to go on this trip. Of that trip fee, almost none of it went to the orphanage. 5 00:00:40,000 --> 00:00:56,000 The primary goal, we were told, was to build a library. Our work was so bad that the local builders who were working alongside us would come back while we were sleeping and undo our work and redo it. 6 00:00:57,000 --> 00:01:04,000 They abused children in orphanages while under the guise of being a volunteer. 7 00:01:04,000 --> 00:01:12,000 What you're being sold is the idea that you'll help a community. What you're really buying is an opportunity to help yourself. 8 00:01:19,000 --> 00:01:22,000 I've been involved in voluntourism for over a decade. 9 00:01:22,000 --> 00:01:31,000 The language used by voluntourism tends to be along the lines of, you can change the world and find yourself all at the same time. 10 00:01:31,000 --> 00:01:37,000 I wanted to physically go out to be that change, make a difference, be a global citizen. 11 00:01:37,000 --> 00:01:43,000 I definitely was thinking about how it would look when I applied to college and how it would look on my resume. 12 00:01:43,000 --> 00:01:50,000 I convinced my parents to pay a couple thousand dollars for me to be able to go on this trip to Tanzania. 13 00:01:50,000 --> 00:02:02,000 It was about three weeks long. For three thousand dollars, we would get to volunteer at an orphanage, teach some English lessons, play with some kids, go on a safari. 14 00:02:02,000 --> 00:02:07,000 I was entirely unqualified and unprepared and should not have been allowed to do this. 15 00:02:07,000 --> 00:02:12,000 You are going to be working with young children who are extremely vulnerable. 16 00:02:12,000 --> 00:02:23,000 I came from an all-girls school where I had a walk-in closet and I was pulling up to this all-girls orphanage where they shared bunk rooms without running water. 17 00:02:23,000 --> 00:02:28,000 The primary goal of our time at the orphanage was to build a library. 18 00:02:28,000 --> 00:02:36,000 We believed that we would be able to build the whole thing while we were there until you realized that none of us had ever done any construction work. 19 00:02:36,000 --> 00:02:44,000 There was a general feeling that the local workmen were lazy at times because they were showing up late. 20 00:02:44,000 --> 00:02:56,000 One morning I woke up and decided to go outside. I started walking up where we were building the library and I saw that there were men working at the construction site. 21 00:02:56,000 --> 00:03:05,000 I realized that they were taking apart what we'd done and redoing it and then they'd let it set. 22 00:03:05,000 --> 00:03:11,000 And by the time that we would show up to work in a few more hours, we'd be none the wiser. 23 00:03:11,000 --> 00:03:21,000 I told one of the chaperones from my school on the trip about what I'd seen and was advised to keep it to myself. 24 00:03:21,000 --> 00:03:37,000 You have stories of people donating bags full of toys that the orphanage director then goes and gives to his own kids or sells or locks in a closet so that the next group of volunteers will donate bags of toys. 25 00:03:37,000 --> 00:03:41,000 Because if they see kids playing with tons of toys, they won't bring toys. 26 00:03:41,000 --> 00:03:47,000 If they see kids sleeping on a good bed with a good mattress, they won't donate money for better beds and better mattresses. 27 00:03:47,000 --> 00:03:55,000 We did not eat our meals with the children in the orphanage. We ate separately, which was a rule at that orphanage. 28 00:03:55,000 --> 00:03:57,000 It was so we wouldn't know what they were eating. 29 00:03:57,000 --> 00:04:07,000 My typical breakfast at the orphanage would include fresh fruit juice, hard boiled eggs, toast, jams, butter. 30 00:04:07,000 --> 00:04:13,000 The children were most often having beans and rice that they cooked themselves. 31 00:04:13,000 --> 00:04:16,000 We also would help them sort the pebbles out of the beans. 32 00:04:16,000 --> 00:04:21,000 A number of times, the girls were expected to sing for us. 33 00:04:21,000 --> 00:04:25,000 The exchange for them having a really good meal was to sing and dance. 34 00:04:25,000 --> 00:04:28,000 We were a predominantly white group. 35 00:04:28,000 --> 00:04:38,000 When I was in Tanzania, a young woman was questioning her sexuality and was being encouraged by this volunteer to live openly. 36 00:04:38,000 --> 00:04:48,000 The reality of this young woman's life was that she lived in a community where doing so would put her at very great physical danger. 37 00:04:48,000 --> 00:05:04,000 And so this volunteer was so focused on her own moral compass and moral values that she couldn't quite see how the advice she was giving this young woman could potentially kill her. 38 00:05:04,000 --> 00:05:11,000 The directors of the orphanage did not see the children's health as a priority. 39 00:05:11,000 --> 00:05:27,000 We were advised by other long-term volunteers at the orphanage that when residents did get malaria, despite there being money to pay for them to get medical care, they were not provided with medical care. 40 00:05:27,000 --> 00:05:32,000 The leadership of the orphanage were unwilling to spend the money. 41 00:05:32,000 --> 00:05:42,000 Eighty percent of children who live at orphanages have not lost one or both parents. 42 00:05:42,000 --> 00:05:44,000 They are not orphans. 43 00:05:44,000 --> 00:05:45,000 They don't have birth certificates. 44 00:05:45,000 --> 00:05:46,000 They don't have IDs. 45 00:05:46,000 --> 00:05:48,000 No one knows who they are or where they are. 46 00:05:48,000 --> 00:05:50,000 These children are anonymous. 47 00:05:50,000 --> 00:05:59,000 The thing that really haunts me is the connection between orphanages and child sex trafficking. 48 00:05:59,000 --> 00:06:05,000 There are Brits, there are Americans, there are Australians who've been arrested. 49 00:06:05,000 --> 00:06:17,000 And that's just the tip of the iceberg for exploiting children and abusing them sexually and physically while making money from people like me who wanted to do good. 50 00:06:17,000 --> 00:06:24,000 They abused children in orphanages while under the guise of being a volunteer. 51 00:06:24,000 --> 00:06:29,000 Voluntourism is continuing to grow as an industry. 52 00:06:29,000 --> 00:06:40,000 During the pandemic, the trip providers who are the most successful were actively marketing trips to Tanzania as an opportunity to escape COVID and pretend like it didn't exist. 53 00:06:40,000 --> 00:06:45,000 You can say that you are giving 100% of fees back to a community without doing that. 54 00:06:45,000 --> 00:06:48,000 You can say those things because no one's checking up on you. 55 00:06:48,000 --> 00:06:50,000 No one's verifying that this is happening. 56 00:06:50,000 --> 00:07:08,000 The reason why it continues to increase is that many of the experiences that are similar to what I had as a volunteer of having children running towards me and wanting to sit on my lap and wanting me to carry them are still so emotionally compelling. 57 00:07:08,000 --> 00:07:18,000 They're still so alluring, it feels so good that it's really easy for someone to apply exceptionalism. 58 00:07:18,000 --> 00:07:20,000 To be continued... 59 00:07:20,000 --> 00:07:22,000 ... 60 00:07:22,000 --> 00:07:24,000 ... 61 00:07:24,000 --> 00:07:28,000 ... 62 00:07:28,000 --> 00:07:29,000 ... 63 00:07:29,000 --> 00:07:30,000 ... 64 00:07:30,000 --> 00:07:31,000 ... 65 00:07:31,000 --> 00:07:32,000 ... 66 00:07:32,000 --> 00:07:33,000 ... 67 00:07:33,000 --> 00:07:35,000 ... 68 00:07:35,000 --> 00:07:36,000 ...