Student Volunteer Programs Overseas

Melanie Arnost - Vanuatu 2008

It looks like I have settled back into my old life. It feels surreal that only twenty one days ago, I returned home to Australia from the most exciting, educational and rewarding summer of my life. I had just spent 10 weeks in Vanuatu, with an organisation called Youth Challenge Australia.

Months before, while I was considering programs to volunteer with, I stumbled across YCA. After looking at their website, I was pleased to see the choice of countries was vastly different to other aid organisations. Because volunteering can be so expensive, I was very excited by the cheap airfares to Vanuatu, not to mention the project’s content itself. Impulsively, I applied, and before I knew it, I was in the plane, on my way to meet 30 other young people – 10 of whom I would spend the next few months of my life with.

An aspect of YCA that distinguishes it from other volunteer organisations is that the Australian volunteers get to work alongside other young people from Vanuatu. These Ni-Vanuatu youth have shown amazing leadership potential in their own communities and are specially selected to join us for the projects and afterwards continue in professional internship offered to them.

The project that I was selected for was based in Tanna island – home to Mt. Yasur the active Volcano, and Port Resolution, where Captain Cook first arrived in Vanuatu.

Bethel, our host village, owned Ikamir Guest house – a venture that’s intended to be a new form of community income to support their children’s education. We were to construct 2 toilets and 2 showers as part of community ecotourism project.

A few days after selecting our project, we arrived to Tanna’s capital: Lenakel also known as Black Man Town. After riding for an hour on the back of a ute with a whole lots of dust in my face (which, by the way, is regular transport for on Tanna) my group and I arrived at Bethel’s guesthouse where we were to stay for the project.

Rail, our local foreman, had warned me that our accommodation would be a huge challenge for us. I remember preparing myself for very basic conditions. Perhaps I prepared too well. Because as soon as I saw our bamboo bungalows, right by the beach, I screamed “Are you kidding Rail? This is heaven!” and went for a snorkel.

But it wasn’t all that easy of course. Needless to say, in my first few weeks I was incredibly burnt. The girl’s bungalow had a rat problem too – which was a bit of a shock for the Australian volunteers. I had a few incidents with rats pooing near my pillow at night, which wasn’t fun either.

Around this time the hard work also began. We levelled the land, mixed cement and made bricks from scratch. Our brick ingredients included sand, coral, cement, water and a whole lot of shovelling. Slowly our bathroom grew, and actually began to look like a building.

Community members would come and help us build too. At first, unfit me appreciated having locals offer to shovel cement for me, but slowly my fitness improved, and before I knew it I was mixing cement just as well as the Ni-Vanuatu.

On top of our main construction project, our group were also asked to complete small team projects nominated by the community. We could each choose of the following options: a Life Skills workshop for local youth, marketing the guesthouse with brochures and posters, or, my small team project: a careers talk.

I got my mum to send me the QLD Jobguide for 2005 that I had used in year 10, and from there I organised and later presented a careers talk to the young people in the Bethel Community, and later during my stay, to Tafea College, a local high school.

It was amazing at how little the youth knew about potential careers. They genuinely did not realise that there existed more jobs than a teacher, nurse or lawyer. To their astonishment, I taught them about being a Chef, a town planner, a community worker, an I.T. specialist, an agricultural engineer, and a journalist – just to name a few!

I also offered private consultations for the teenagers, and I had over twenty young people come and see me for discussions about how to achieve their dreams. They may not have much, but a healthy thirst for progress certainly exists.

In 2006, the Happy Planet Index named Vanuatu the happiest place on Earth, and I can definitely see why. Everywhere children are smiling, adults are singing. The land is beautiful and the people are incredibly warm, always ready to share a story with you.

I will never forget the amount of children I saw running around with machetes – not for violence – but simply for cutting down fruit as they walk to town. Some other experiences that stand out for me include New Years Eve, where the whole community sung gospel songs and ceremoniously threw talcum powder over each other. We also saw the Chief’s eldest son’s first shaving. He was twenty, and had only ever been allowed to use clippers until this day, when his mother’s brother shaves his face for the first time – symbolising the beginning of his manhood.

We became very close to the community, particularly because we were each assigned a host family. I learnt to cook traditional food such as laplap and in turn I helped my little host sisters with their English and reading skills.

My Ni-Van co-challengers became my life-long friends. They helped me speak and understand Bislama as I [rarely] corrected their generally perfect English. Every weekend or so, after a big week of hard labour, our group made an effort to go on day trips together. I particularly loved visiting Mt. Yasur and actually seeing the lava erupt. I also was in awe of Tanna Island’s giant Banyan Tree, which one Peace Corps member claimed was the largest single living organism in the south Pacific. So when I say giant, I mean incredibly HUGE.

Funnily enough, a big cultural shock for me was to see chickens be slaughtered for dinner. We are so used to seeing these birds already prepared that, without the head, that we forget they were animals once. At least, I did.
But when you live on rice, pasta and tinned vegies, anything goes. So needless to say - I devoured the chicken.

Speaking of food, in Australia, I had been a serious contender for the world’s least competent cook award, but now, I can actually make a delightful coconut and tomato tuna curry, which you are all more than welcome to try sometime.

I have also learned to be quite good at hand-washing clothes and am an expert in the art of having cold showers.

Of course, there is so much I can tell you, and believe me no speech has ever been more enjoyable to prepare. I spent hours the other day, staring at my diary reliving moments of my trip. If anyone has knows any young people between the ages of 18 and 30 interested in volunteering in different parts of the world, I whole-heartedly recommend this experience. I have nothing but praise for Youth Challenge, for my fellow volunteers who worked incredibly hard, and for the overwhelmingly generous Bethel Community.

In the end, we completed the project. For the final touch, a local artist called Deni Kaio sculpted 3D shapes of sea creatures on the bathroom’s outer walls and I covered the shower floors in coral patterns. If you ever get the chance to visit Vanuatu, I recommend that you check out Tanna Island; If not to see our excellent bathroom - then at least to visit the active volcano.

Merely twenty one days ago, I returned home from the most fantastic summer of my life. At the airport, I stunned my family with my exotic tan and new muscles. But that wasn’t the only thing about me that had changed. I learned about a new culture, I learned a new language, I learned cooking, social and leadership skills, I learned that rat poo is not that bad for you, I learned how to mix cement and build a bathroom and I learned the meaning of self-discovery. During those ten weeks, not only did I positively contribute to a community, but I believe I positively changed myself.

In Australia, I have always wanted to be a political journalist. However, this recent experience has lead me to believe that before I enter into any career, I’d like to go back, and volunteer again, and continue to positively contribute to the progress of the South Pacific.

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