Pretending to be Moral

I left Antigua, spent a couple of days at the lake of Panajachel and have moved on to Quezaltenango. Guatemala is littered with “volunteers.” Seriously, wherever you go, there is another group of people talking about how they are helping the poor Guatemalans by teaching the kids something or another. Its all under the banner of “fighting poverty with education.”

Its just a little too convenient that these volunteers have chosen a warm paradise country where they can practice their Spanish. Additionally, the people are friendly and the work is mostly involves talking and playing with children. The Westerner gets to go home and tell everyone what a great person they are by essentially going on vacation.

I’ve been to a lot of places much worse off than Guatemala, yet there are few, if any volunteers there. Its too bad Cambodians don’t speak Spanish. If only Moldova had tropical weather. Maybe India is just too dirty and far from home. The Peace Corps tries to send people off the some of the worst places, but few stay in those locations.

Seriously, I find this illusion of “volunteering” a little ridiculous. If one really wanted to help a country, the teaching would focus on instructing the twenty-somethingers in accounting and computer programming. Rather than spending the money on a plane trip, the money could easily be used to improve the country’s public schools and public utilities. Right now, all Guatemala has are private religious institutions. We know that leads to- creationists at best and terrorists at worst.