Love Volunteers

I was inspired by the desire for helping disadvantaged children from other communities who need help in education and learning. 

Traveling around the world can expand one’s perspective on life. I knew that being able to meet and interact with those who are living in completely different cultures, environments, and societies would open my mind to something I’d never experienced before. I was also called to go abroad because I wanted to use my skills to give back to a community, while at the same time experiencing the culture in a new way and learning the language more proficiently. That way, I would be gaining from the people I worked with, while they gained from me!

I had traveled quite a bit but I wanted to go somewhere and truly immerse myself into a different country, see a new way of life that wasn't in a book. And I wanted it to be somewhere fairly off the grid. 

I wanted to do a volunteer program somewhere I had never been before and completely different from where I live. 

It's my nature—I like helping people and spending time with kids and travel as well. 

At the time, I wanted to go to med school, and wanted to shadow doctors and go abroad at the same time because I love to travel. I found Love Volunteers, who are relatively inexpensive, so there I went! 

I am living in South Korea as an English teacher. Living in a city like Seoul is a hard adjustment to make when you come from a small town in Oregon. I was accustomed to living in a wild, natural environment, so when I was placed in Seoul, my mountains were transformed into skyscrapers and my rivers were turned into busy streets. It is a different kind of wild. But, from my initial move abroad, I was able to recognize the profound and fundamental changes that happen to you once you travel.

There are many reasons. For starters, I wanted to become a better person. I wanted to learn more about myself. Through my journey, I saw many lovely things and was moved by many scenes. When I landed back in my country, I knew that I had become better. I also love children very much. Children are very important. Truly, I hope that every child can have a happy childhood. I want to see children smiling and laughing out loud, I don't want to see them crying, trapped, and with no hope for the future. Children need to receive love from this world, as well as the right care and a sense of safety and belonging. I know how hard it would be when someone feels totally helpless, and I would like to be a shoulder to lean on for those in need. I want to do my best to help others and to make this world a better place.

How did you get connected with Love Volunteers?

I had always loved travelling and experiencing new cultures, but like most people I always felt as though I should be “doing more” with this one and only life of mine. I wanted to help people and to give back rather than take selfishly, as modern society grooms us to do. I had worked very hard to forge a career, to “earn”, to have the best “stuff”; but by my early 30’s, I had grown to almost loath it all, and a chance meeting with Kelly, LV’s founder and “inspirational leader”, led me to challenge all the assumptions I had made about what it truly meant to live life.

I've always been interested in serving people in my daily life. I wanted to gain experience doing so out of the country, and at the same time learn about their culture. I was also interested to meet international volunteers and exchange views on our traveling experiences.

I often do volunteer work from a very young age as I like to serve the community that I'm living in. And travelling around Mexico has always been a big dream for me.

I had volunteered before and after travelling extensively in 2012, I vowed that the next travel experiences I had would include volunteering on some level.