Volunteering in Europe - A Guide to Volunteer Success

Part 1: What you can do with your time in Europe and what it's like to work on a volunteer project.

A volunteer vacation is a great way to share your skills, live in a foreign city with people of like interests, and interact with and help people from other cultures. If you're considering a volunteer vacation, this article is designed to help you decide. We'll tell you: What you can do What to expect of living conditions on a volunteer vacation. What experience is valuable to project leaders How to avoid pitfalls so you can get the most out of your volunteer vacation. Photo on right: A volunteer in Isthmia, Greece, points out the newly renovated mosaic on the floor of the Roman Bath. Photo © 2001 by James Martin.

More of this Feature • Part 2: Living Conditions and Cost • Part 3: How to Avoid Pitfalls • Part 4: Volunteer Picture Gallery

Related Resources • Europe Volunteer Links

From Other Guides • Volunteer Your Vacation in Greece • Honeymoons with Heart • Family Vacations as Global Volunteers

Elsewhere on the Web • Isthmia Fieldwork • Lifting the Mosaic at Isthmia

What can I do?

There are lots of opportunities to turn your European wanderings into meaningful excursions. You can work on humanitarian or environmental aid projects, rebuilding or renovation projects, or participate, like I've done, on archaeological digs. We've collected some of the best and most reputable projects in our Europe Volunteer Links, but you might need more information to help you decide if volunteering is right for you.

We'll take you through the process of living and working in Europe, tell you what the fees you'll pay are going for, and then tell you the steps you can take to avoid a bad experience.

A volunteer vacation sounds great--but what if I don't have any experience?

Lack of experience isn't as big a deal as you might think. Much of volunteer labor is just that--volunteer muscle (and in many cases money) that's needed to complete a project that can't be funded any other way.

For example, you may think that taking up an ancient mosaic from a Roman bath in Isthmia (Greece), restoring the subsurface pocked by falling columns, and then replacing the cleaned-up mosaic might be a job exclusively for restoration experts. After all, it certainly takes an expert to lay out the strategy for restoration and convince the local Superintendent of Archaeology that the plans will suffice to enable the project to create an enduring historic legacy. But once the project is in full swing, labor, much of it only semi-skilled, is paramount to success.

In this case, experts told us volunteers how they had recorded the location of each mosaic motif and had devised a way to "lift" the mosaic in 1 meter square segments to be replaced later. Once the mosaics had been removed, the floor was leveled and the depression from the falling column filled. Then we reattached the mosaic squares in the right place. But of course there were sections around the squares that got trashed by the removal process. For this we worked as ancient stone masons, finding or making pieces of tesserae the right size to bridge the gaps between squares. When the floor was finished we grouted the whole thing. All this under the watchful eye of a few experts, of course.

And that wasn't all. We excavated some castle buildings on a hill, we created a database of archaeological materials found in the excavation house, and mapped ancient worked stones that had been reused to make a wall.

And we lived in a hotel in Corinth, ate Greek food, participated in Greek festivals (including the big fat Greek wedding of our director), learned about the importance of the Isthmian games (and about the cheating that took place in them) and had an experience that you couldn't get just passing through looking at the ancient ruins. You can see our pictures on the last page for a glimpse of the experience.

What life skills or experience might be valuable for volunteering in Europe? You may be surprised!

The list below is certainly not complete, but it gives you an idea of the wide range of skills that are valuable to a field director of a volunteer project:

• Cooking. Honestly, if you know how to cook and are comfortable with shopping in a foreign environment, this is a peripheral skill that is often held in high regard among project directors. I've used my cooking skills in Sardinia for an archaeological project, and my bread making knowledge on a project on the Greek Island of Youra.
• Computer and Database Skills. An increasing number of projects, especially involving Archaeology, use these skills. At Isthmia we also used a scanner and PhotoShop to enhance old artifact photos and transfer the field notes into an electronic back-up just in case something happened to the dig house.
• Plays well with People. Yes, many projects feature housing that's a bit cramped. And you'll be working in close quarters with people you didn't really chose as friends. Tolerance of others is a useful quality that will earn you benefits if you mention it on your application and live it in real life.
• Likes and understands animals. Some environmental projects work on animal habitats. Your life experience with that parakeet of yours may be more valuable than you think.
• Medical knowledge. Have first aid training or better? Many directors might like to have you on their staffs if they can't afford to hire someone.

Next page > Living conditions and cost -- why is volunteering so expensive? > Page 1, 2, 3, 4