The pair flew out of Australia on Saturday, January 6 and arrived in Samoa at 5.20 am (Samoan Time). They were greeted at the airport by a volunteer Project Supervisor and driven to their host family’s home, which was about an hour from the airport.

“We met our host Dad Mika and he was just lovely.” Maddie said. “In fact, I would say that the best thing about our trip was our hosts, they made us feel like part of their family.”

“Things on the trip were very different than we thought they would be.” Sharni said. “We were told that we would be working with children, but we weren’t told until we arrived that we would actually be working with the ‘Little Sisters of the Poor’, clearing and replanting sustainable keyhole gardens. That was a bit disappointing, but in the end we realised that we were making a difference to the community.”

“We paid $5 000 each for the volunteering experience and thought that a lot of that money would go to help out the Samoan community. We were very disappointed  to learn that only about 7% of the money we paid goes toward starting new projects for the Samoan people. Over half of the money was eaten up by ‘admin, company profit and marketing costs’.”

“Our host families were only paid $17 per person, per night to have us stay there.” Maddie said. 

“The Samoans are called ‘The Happy People’, because even though they are not rich, they are happy with what they have. It really made Sharni and I stop and think about how lucky we are to live in Australia. We have both stopped sweating the small stuff and are more grateful for our families and what we have.”

Both girls have said that they would go back to Samoa to volunteer again, but not with the same company.

“This was such an amazing experience, I would recommend it to everyone.” Sharni said. “ My only advice would be to really research the company you volunteer with and make sure the money you are paying is going to help the poor, not just the company owners.”