 I was looking to learn. I was looking to volunteer. I was looking for a beautiful place to travel to. I was looking to meet people from around the world. And that’s how it all started.
Next thing I knew, I found myself standing alongside nine other volunteers at the top of affectionately-named Death Gully, a secluded section of land on the northern most tip of the Coromandel Peninsula in New Zealand. Latisha, a woman of tiny stature but with a drill sergeant mind-set, was giving us final instructions before sending us out into “the bush” to check traps. A few hours later, I face planted it as I crossed a stream and slipped on a rock. My partner for the day didn’t even break stride when he asked if I was okay. With another 50 traps to check and reset, there was no time to linger over mishaps that don’t result in a compound fracture or loss of an eye. Besides, considering another volunteer nearly broke his neck the day before as he slid down the side of a cliff he foolishly took as solid ground, my calamity seemed like a walk in the park. 
After Death Gully, it didn’t get any easier. But it didn’t get any harder either. I had signed up to participate in the New Zealand conservation program for a month and I loved every aspect of what I was doing—loved the projects, loved the people, loved the location, loved the challenges. All the research I had done prior to this adventure paid off, though a little credit must be given to luck as well. I’m a firm believer that you make any situation what it is. The old adage that when life hands you lemons you make lemonade is true. There was lots of room for my New Zealand experience to be a disaster. But it wasn’t. If I had to do it over again, I wouldn’t change a thing.
I spent four weeks working on a variety of conservation work, from predator control and tree releasing to water stream projects and marine studies. I counted seals. I cleaned out kiwi enclosures (kiwi the bird, not the fruit or the people). I pulled invasive weeds. I built a walking path in a nature preserve. I set up tracking boxes to see what kind of critters were in the area. The variety of projects to work on is what attracted me to the program and it didn’t disappoint.
At 36, I fully expected my age to be some sort of factor. I just wasn’t sure if it was going to be good or bad. Turned out it was neither. The other volunteers ranged in ages from 18 to 40-something. I slipped between the “kids” and the “others” seamlessly, though there wasn’t really an “us” and “them” mentality. Only after our communal dinners was the age gap apparent and only could it be seen in our drinks of choice…cheap beer for the kids, more expensive wine for the others.
I could divide up the group more, if forced to. The Frenchman, the Swiss German, the Americans, the Brits. The sweet, the can’t-quite-figure-you-out, the funny, the pain. The smart, the troubled, the ones who had been there for three months, the guitar player. But none of it really means anything. None of it really mattered. We all got along.
 New Friends
Living communally and working in groups on projects was something I hadn’t done since college. Differing levels of what one considers to be “clean” can be frustrating at times (and I learned that had more to do with age and gender and age of said gender than with country of origin). Not everyone sees direction and suggestions as constructive. The weather does not always cooperate, challenging even the most level headed of us. But there was always something new to learn; the name of a bird, how to tie a slip knot, why it’s okay to kill one species in order to save another, a funny British phrase, how much in common you have with a 33-year-old German woman who was your roommate for two weeks, how much you love working in nature.
It’s been a year since my New Zealand volunteer experience and I’m itching to do the month-long volunteer thing again. Late at night, I find myself surfing the Web, Googling “volunteer” and “sanctuary” and watching the opportunities appear before me as blue links on screen. They are like dozens of closed doors lining a long hallway in the biggest mansion in the world. Who knows what you’ll find when you open them.
I crave conservation work. I feel myself being pulled toward other continents. I can’t stop thinking about all the interesting people in the world that I could be working alongside. I know there’s a stream out there, somewhere, calling me, a rock with my name on it, waiting for me to step on it so I can face plant it, once again, in new waters.
All images courtesy of the author.
Barb volunteered through Global Volunteer Network: http://www.volunteer.org.nz/
In her words:
What I liked about them, and ultimately why I choose to work through them, is that their mission is to connect local efforts (existing operations run by locals who best know what their communities need...as opposed to some US
organization coming in and telling them how to do things) with international volunteers willing to share their sweat and ideas. They have a WIDE variety of opportunities...my New Zealand program was just a small fraction of what
they do.
They've also recently started leadership programs teaching students (high school, college and grad) how to start, organize, and run nonprofits.
I paid for my expenses...my airfare over there (I cashed in my miles that I had accumulated on business trips as a member of the corporate world..it felt SOOOO good to do that), room and board (something like $1200 for the month which included a room that I shared with another woman and all my meals), and any extras (I bought a lot of Hokey Pokey ice cream and New Zealand wine!). Any travel we did as part of the program was covered (so when we traveled from Wellingtonto the Coromandel, it didn't cost us anything out of our own pocket). I also paid an "administrative fee" of $250 or $350. That's a one-time fee you pay per year and you don't have to pay it again if you sign up for any other volunteer programs with them in the year. |
