Participants Blog

My community has got advocacy down, I’m just here to help-out.

Jennifer humbly reflects on her impact on her local Ecuadorean community.

In my community I volunteer at a daycare as well as at random community events with my host mom. I also try to do my best to help out at home. So I do help-out with those around me, but I don’t believe I impact them in a long term way. When I was talking to a fellow Intercordian about working in the daycare she said something that illustrates my thoughts on the subject, ¨They don’t need us, they did fine before we got here and will do fine after we leave.¨ After I leave my coworkers and family will remember me and the games I showed them, but I didn’t change their lives. It is the difference between service and advocacy, well I am here I provide a service by helping out, but it is temporary. The other form of help is advocacy, which provides change; change is long-term and alters people’s way of thinking and doing thing. The main reason why I don’t provide change is because it is not needed in Peguche, where I am living. Everyone here takes care of each other, just last week I volunteered at all-day fair that taught good-food techniques to people in the community, in Kichwa (the aboriginal language spoken by most of the people in the community). At these sections the people were given food and explanations on how to prepare it, also information on necessary vitamins and what not to eat, at the end everyone was given a bag of supplies including tuna, salt, rice, oatmeal, beans, noodles, sardines, and vegetable oil. My community has got advocacy down, I’m just here to help-out.