In summer of 2015 my husband and I took our kids on an international service trip. It had always been a lifelong dream of mine to travel to the developing world and learn about different cultures with the people I loved most. We decided to travel with a group, Family Humanitarian experience (FHe), which specializes in providing service opportunities for families. After our experience taking children to the developing world this is the advice I give to people thinking about taking their own family on a similar expedition. Here are 5 tips to have a life-changing humanitarian trip with your family.
Bring more comfort food for your kids than you think you need
The hardest part of the trip for my kids was the unfamiliar food, and my kids are adventurous eaters compared to most. I thought I had plenty of treats with beef jerky and crackers, but other families were better prepared with trail mix, cans of chips, candy, and granola bars. The food challenges did help my kids appreciate my cooking. At one point, after another evening of dinner of meat with potatoes and gravy, my ten year old said, “Mom, you know those noodles you make that I don’t like? Those sound so good right now.”
It’s best to travel with a group
I felt safer traveling in a developing country with a group and it’s easier to laugh when times are hard with people surrounding you. There were times traveling from town to town on the cattle truck that we were sore and tired, but with 25 of us crammed on tight, we laughed more than we complained. My ten-year-old daughter really looked up to the teenagers in the group and their positive attitudes and the attention they gave her made a difference in the quality of my daughter’s experience.
Think about the lessons you want your kids to learn before you go
Service in the developing world is complicated. I didn’t want the take home message for my kids to be, “Look how hard these people’s life is and how blessed you are.” I wanted the lesson learned to be, “You have been blessed with different opportunities then the people in Guatemala. What are you going to do with those opportunities?” I made sure to stress that while we were on the trip together.
Be prepared to love
I knew I’d love the experience of getting to know different people from different cultures, but I am still in shock how the experience swelled my heart. After working together for a few hours building a wall, sweet Nelson reached for my 12 year old son’s hand and walked hand in hand back to the town center. I thought my heart would burst from my chest. We still have pictures in our home of some of the kids we worked with and it is a reminder to me to continue to donate to worthy causes and speak out for these kids.
The best parts of travel are unplanned. Be up for the adventure
One day of our expedition we had a free day to get to know the country a little bit better. We took the opportunity to go spelunking, a bit out of our comfort zones, and that adventure with our two oldest is one of the best we have had our entire life. Another time we were stuck waiting over an hour for a ride back to town. A group of kids found us and we spent the hour playing plastic jug soccer. We also had plenty of opportunities to dance in the rain.
Our trip to Guatemala changed us to be more giving with our resources and gifted us friends and memories that we count as that summer’s greatest blessing.
– The Edwards Family