I like to consider myself a fairly accomplished traveler and working at Projects Abroad has certainly helped that! But Kelsy tipped me off to this cool program which will map all the countries you have been too. After putting in all the countries I have visited into the program it turns out I have only visited 8% of the Earth. It is pretty humbling and it makes you realize how big this world is.

create your own visited countries map

By Dr. Peter Slowe, Founder and Director of Projects Abroad

I just got back from South Africa where we are starting a lot of new projects.

The first place I visited was in the far north where we have leased a stretch of land on the Botswana border. I travelled up with the guy who’s going to be running the programme, Gerrit Prinsloo – Gerrit (pronounced “Kherrit”) is an interesting character, originally Afrikaner but now English-speaking but with such a strong accent that I spent a lot of time saying “pardon?” or “what?” – he’s a fully-qualified ranger and knows every plant, insect, bird and animal, so he’s a good companion and exceedingly enthusiastic.

The reserve itself, called Legodimo (pronounced “Lekho-deemo”) has plenty of wildlife, particularly when you get near to the Limpopo river – Rudyard Kipling’s “Great, grey, greasy Limpopo”. There are zebras and elephants which apparently you mustn’t get too near or they get very nervous – I startled Gerrit by jumping out of his jeep and going towards one to photograph it. In fact, one thing that struck me about wildlife in the bush (technically this is “bush-veld”) was that most of the animals are nervous wrecks because there’s always something around who wants to make a meal of them. The particular elephant I approached had a baby, which was bigger than me anyway, so it lifted up its trunk and waggled its oversize ears – these are apparently preliminary to a ten-ton charge at 40 mph, so I got back in the jeep. One of the most spectacular sights was a pair of fish eagles sitting on a dead tree in perfect sunlight – enormous and very impressive. An eagle owl ate a guinea fowl and a crocodile was just surfacing in the water. There were also masses of Marabou Storks, rare kingfishers and hornbills and a magnificent Goliath Heron.

More photos and information about accomodation and barbecues after the jump

The accommodation is a bit rough at the moment but we’re going to paint it, put in new beds and add a few cheerful decorations to make it homely. Once they’ve been tarted up, the facilities will be really good – and include a swimming pool which is occasionally shared with elephants and ostriches (which are really dumb).

Gerrit is a specialist in camp-fires. He is a great believer in the South African barbecue or “brai”. Personally, I’m not all that keen on strange South African sausages and tough raw Biltong, a kind of salty meat snack, but apparently they’re popular with many people. He assures me he can cope with vegetarians, although I guess the vegetables are all barbecued too.

Later on, I went down to Cape Town – fantastic new projects of which more will come.

By Catherine Stidston, Assistant Country Manager, Sri Lanka

After a 10 hour flight, I couldn’t wait to leave the airport and catch a glimpse of the country that was going to be ‘home’ for the next 6 months. I wasn’t disappointed.

As soon as I walked out onto the street with huge backpack attached, I was hit by a wall of humidity and greeted by an array of taxi drivers and tuk tuk men who seemed unbelieving of my “I’m meeting someone here, thank you”. With the beeping of horns and the buzz of people milling around me, I knew I’d arrived!

On the drive to my hotel I couldn’t help but stare at everything. The first thing that struck me was how tropical it seemed despite being in a city. Lush palm trees, market stalls of fish, fruits and vegetables of all colours, shapes and sizes lined the streets along with scratchcard sellers, street food vendors and a stray dog here and there. This was combined with buses, cars, bikes, lorries and tuk tuks chaotically dodging and weaving and breaking and beeping around one another.

Since arriving in Sri Lanka I have passed rice paddies, rubber plantations, salt mines, banana plantations, grazing water buffalos and a comical elephant cruising down the highway in the back of an old truck. I’ve spotted monkeys swinging on telephone cables and caught glimpses of huge lizards, little geckos, beautiful birds, cheeky squirrels and even shared the bathroom with a frog!

I’ve sampled the amazing delight that is Sri Lankan cuisine. They really do know how to make a good spicy curry with delicious accompaniments of dhal, roti, sambol, hoppers and much more! I’ve seen the beautiful stretch of palm tree lined coastline that extends over the West side of the island and I’ve been touched by the kindness, friendliness and happy smiles displayed by the people of Sri Lanka.

All of this I have seen in just two weeks. There is so much more to see, do, learn and experience and I really can’t wait to explore and discover more of what this beautiful island has to offer!

Reading Will’s blog piece about lost parcels brought to mind lost luggage. Did you know that 5.6 million bags went missing last year? British Airways came top of the tree losing 2.3% of bags. It was interesting to see that Virgin Atlantic, BMI, Ryanair and Easyjet decided not to release any figures!!

One story I remember is of a lady who was queuing up at check in behind a particularly obnoxious character on his way to Melbourne from London. He was being more and more unreasonable with the check in staff over nothing. Eventually he was checked in. The lady in the queue behind walked up and said how impressed she was with how the check in attendant had kept her cool with this idiot. She said the customer service training must be good. The check in attendant said that what kept her calm in these situations was the knowledge that she was sending his bags to Taipei “by accident”. Apparently Taipei is a hole where many bags disappear into. She assured the lady that hers would be taking the direct route to Melbourne. Take care when you are at the check in desk!!

Another occasion was returning to Southampton from Dublin from a careers fair. The display stands I had checked in didn’t arrive so I was filling in the paperwork so they would be delivered on the next day. Two guys from Dublin had come over to a motorbike festival for the weekend and their rucksacks hadn’t turned up. The girl behind the desk was very apologetic and said not to worry they would be on the next flight tomorrow. The guys were asked where they were staying so she could deliver the bags. They replied we are staying in the tent which is in their rucksack!!! With typical Irish good humour they found the whole event rather amusing and we headed off to have a few consoling beers before they looked for a bed and breakfast to stay in.

Any interesting experiences anyone else has had?

I have been meaning to put up a post about my recent trip to the Head Office in the UK but up until now I couldn’t retrieve my photos from my camera. Drum roll please for a Projects Abroad blog first as we are do a photo essay on an Open Day that Projects Abroad put on in Bristol on April, 14th 2007.

Since my trip to the Head Office coincided with the Open Day in Bristol I jumped at the change to help out! Open Days are great opportunities for prospective volunteers to put faces to our staff members on the other end of the phone or email and to speak with alumni who have been on a lot of the projects, plus it gives me the chance to reconnect with my colleagues across the pond!

Join us on a look back at the Open Day in Bristol …..

The Wills Memorial Building of the University of Bristol (the undergraduate alma mater of our own Dr. Peter Slowe) on Park Street, Bristol

The weather was actually quite amazing and unseasonably warm the day of the Open Day. Coming from New York where it was cold and overcast, I was not complaining! I also believe I picked up several British mannerisms as in true British form I started this blog post by talking about the weather!

The event was held at the John Mackay Theatre at the Bristol Grammar School where our very own Senior Programme Executive Ian Birbeck honed his cricket skills as a school boy.

The John Mackay Theatre with a Teaching and Projects Abroad sign

The Teaching and Projects Abroad banner as you entered the car park. Doesn’t it look good? It took Rob and me a good 10 minutes to put this up although to our credit it didn’t fall down the whole day!

The Open Day kicked off with an introduction by Dr. Peter Slowe and a presentation by Ian. We then had a great presentation by Frederick Campbell-Jones who had some amazing photos of his time as a Medical volunteer in Mexico. After a lovely tea, we all split up into smaller rooms where a member of staff and alumni would speak about different countries and then projects. Here was my room where I spoke about Romania and Moldova.

But what makes the day so great is being able to speak to our staff members face to face, many of whom have had experience in the countries or projects people are interested in. Here is Rob, a Programme Advisor from the Head Office, and Jery Lee, our Desk Officer in Mexico. What a team!

If you are interested in attending one of our upcoming Open Days the next one will be held in London on June 16th from 2 to 4:30 pm. You can get more details and RSVP here, http://www.teaching-abroad.co.uk/more_info/open.php. Our staff would love to see you there!

There are some of us out there who are just plain airplane dorks (no pun intended!). While some people hate to fly, I love planes, going to new airports and flying different airlines. So I was excited when I found out about flightmemory.com. I entered all of my flights from the last two years and voila! (Click on the link to see my profile)

Flight Memory lets you input information about every flight you have taken and plots it on a map. Plus it gives you some quirky stats about your flying. I apparently have flown enough to circumvent the earth three times and the total hours I have flown would add up to one week of continual flying!

What is the longest flight I have ever been on? New York to Bangkok last May

My most popular airport? LaGuardia Airport here in New York City. Which is no surprise since it has only been a 15 minute ride from my two apartments here!

My only regret is that I lost all the flight information I had pre-2005 when I lost all the emails on my old university account. My advice to graduating college and university students, back up your emails! It seems the only statistic that is missing is how many trees I should plant to offset all the CO2 I have left in the atmosphere. I’m sorry Mother Earth! I’m sorry Rob, our collective conscious!

Although it is a bit belated we would like to announce to opening of our newest Recruiting office in Toronto, Canada which is in the capable hands of our new Director there, Rob Levine! Rob, just like me, got his start with Projects Abroad as a volunteer in Romania and ended up starting and running our pioneering Drama program there as well. So if you live within the 10 provinces and 3 territories of Canada, feel free to give Rob a call toll free at 1-877-921-9666 or visit him at

62A Charles Street East Suite 300
Toronto, Ontario M4Y 1T1

He loves visitors!

Rob in a cafe in Brasov, Romania

I recently came across a race sponsored by “The Supply Chain & Logistics Institute”(who knew that existed?) at George Institute of Technology to discover which courier service could deliver packages the fastest (if at all) to five far flung destinations like Apia, Samoa and Harare, Zimbabwe. The three contestants were FedEx, UPS and DHL with DHL coming out as the winner by being the first to three destinations and second to the remaining two. You can read more about the race here,http://www2.isye.gatech.edu/~jjb/wh/package-race/2007/2007.html.

But reading this got me thinking about all the distant lands this office and our volunteer’s friends and family ships to! From our office here in New York, we recently shipped a box of brochures to Cusco, Peru and a box of folders to our office in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. Hopefully they will both get there soon! I feel like at Projects Abroad we could have our own little race!

There are also all the stories I hear from parents trying to send care packages to their kids and hoping it will 1.) get there and 2.) get there before they leave! Do any of our former alumni have any good stories about trying to get packages out to their volunteer destination?

When I was a volunteer in Romania, my mom had sent a care package filled with newspaper clippings from home, letters from my family and American candy bars! My mom, bless her heart, sent it a good month before I was to leave and guess what? I was only able to pick it up from the post office the day I was scheduled to leave. But those Kit Kat bars were the best I have ever had!

By Suzi Lamb, International Development Manager

Returning to Senegal two years after my first visit in May 2005, it was fascinating to see how much had changed. Projects Abroad in Senegal has come a long way, doubling the number of full time, permanent staff to four and adding new projects like Medicine and Sports.

The Teaching and Care projects have also expanded to include new schools and kindergartens and we now provide four meals a week at the talibé street children centres. I was pleased to see that many of the host families I met two years ago continue to welcome volunteers and I was bombarded with lunch and dinner invitations. Many of them are in touch regularly with previous volunteers and proudly show me the photos of the family with the volunteer. Special thanks to one of our hosts, Mme Beye for a great lunch on the Sunday (Ed. I just have to note that when I visited Senegal I also had lunch with Mme Beye and she cooks a mean mamfe)!

Mme Beye and Suzi, St. Louis, Senegal

The island of St Louis itself, where our office is now based, still retains its crumbling colonial charm with goats wandering the pale sandy streets and the sound of the wailing mosques calling people to prayer mixing with strains of traditional Senegalese music, and at this time of the year – Jazz. The famous St Louis Jazz festival starts later this month and I’m told gets the whole town partying.

Moctar, our Senegal Country Director has just returned from a visit to the UK, where he got to meet all the UK team, attend a careers fair in Norwich and a school talk in London. I’m sure he’s returned full of stories of his first visit to England.

As for me, I’m back in the UK office, but I hope I get to return to Senegal again soon.

Moctar, Suzi and Issa. What a team!

By Scott McQuarrie, Programme Advisor

Scott with a huge hat, Brasov, Romania

Keys…check! Tickets…check! Passport….passport? After going back to my flat to retrieve my passport I was finally on my way. Destinations Romania and Moldova. I had always wanted to visit Eastern Europe, although I do have to admit I need to reacquaint myself with where Moldova was on the map. First stop was Bucharest in Romania. I was picked up by Mircea (Country Director) and Leo (volunteer co-ordinator). The drive north to Brasov takes around 3 hours. It is an enjoyable and scenic journey passing through rural, urban and mountainous regions. Apart from Mircea and Leo’s singing, the highlight of the journey was winding through the serpentine roads as you enter Transylvania.

The main focus of my visit was to experience our Archaeology project which is based in Alba Iulia at this time of year. George (our archaeology co-ordinator) advised we would be assisting on an excavation in the grounds of a Roman Catholic Church. Over the next few days we uncovered bones, teeth, a human skull, washed pottery, cleaned profiles and visited the university restoration room (where items are reconstructed to resemble their original form). The whole experience gave a great insight into the archaeological process. The fact I really didn’t want to leave at the end of my time speaks volumes for this project. A truly fascinating subject!

Archaeology Dig, Romania

My bag was a little heavier when I re-packed to travel to Moldova due to the Polinca (a traditional Romanian drink distilled from prunes or pears) George had bestowed upon me. No Romanian experience is complete without sampling a drop – it’s strength just edging out its distinct taste. It has to be tried to be believed! With the taste of Polinca just about leaving my mouth, a day later I arrived in Moldova.

MORE…

Igor (Moldova’s Country Director) collected Mircea and I from the station and took us to our lodgings. There is more to Moldova than meets the eye in many regards. A good example of this was our accommodation – an old style Soviet block which looked fairly battered from the outside, the lift had it’s own particular smell but the apartment itself was lovely. Looking at Chisinau on the map reminded me of New York’s grid system (although that is where the comparison ends!). It makes navigation around town very intuitive. There are many methods of transport – trolley buses, auto buses and maxi-taxis. Each has their own charm but my preferred vehicle was the maxi-taxi. They are extremely cheap and sue to their petite size can slip in and out of traffic to great effect. When actually walking around the centre of town, with its array of commercial outlets and well dressed residents, it seemed in contrast to some of the statistics that I’d read before coming (80% of Moldova’s population was living under the official poverty line). However it is widely recognised as Europe’s poorest country.

Igor and teaching volunteers, Moldova

The projects I visited at an independent living centre for people with disabilities, a secondary school in need of English teachers and our Russian language teacher highlighted the great placements volunteers can get involved in. It was pleasing to know that volunteers can contribute in an extremely worthwhile way. With their help hopefully people will start to remember Europe’s forgotten country!