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“Phoenix Projects Guatamala teaching intern-ship (GVI)”

Written on: 30/07/2012

After paying over 3,500 pounds and dedicating six months of my life to this project, The least I was expecting was a warm welcome.however the pick up staff did not speak a word of English and the project leader was too busy shopping to come greet us on time.

Over the first two weeks communication did not improve, I felt uncomfortable in such a dangerous country and phone lines where never answered.

Another shocker for me was that once in the country they told me I would be volunteering in another country for the last 3 months, which was not agreed upon!

The project leaders wanted little too do with the volunteers, which was most upsetting. And the project its self was poorly run with staff members not even knowing their own job role within the company.

As a person who has volunteered and worked with children for the past 4 years, I was hoping to step up in my job role as an intern (which I
paid more for) However I did not receive any training which was promised and had a lesser role of a volunteer.

When I approached staff with my complaints, they handled it in an unprofessional manner and where extremely rude. I took a break from the project and waited to hear if they would refund me. During my time off they accused me for bad mouthing the organisation which was totally untrue and there for kicked me off completely and would not refund my money.

Furthermore, during my time there I stayed with a host family. They did not pay my host family or the other host families for over two months.. as a result of this my host family struggled. Which any person would do , especially if they lived in a third world country.

I befriended the people they where suppose to be helping and they felt that this once great project, was more of a disappointment now.

I am very angered by the whole experience, on the lighter side Antigua was a lovely place to stay and if you do wish to volunteer there, there are plenty of organisations which don't charge you to volunteer, I volunteered at vet pro plus caring for the strays and my help was greatly appricated!