Wishing all our readers and supporters the very best for the festive season. We’ll be back with more of the same in the New Year – here’s to a really great 2012!

The Latin Lounge has been included in the Go! Overseas list of the top volunteer blogs. The image badge (left) lets you know our outstanding content has been recognized by the Go! Overseas team. “Congratulations! We’re confident our users will enjoy reading your content as much as we have.” Andrew Dunkle (Senior Editor of Go! Overseas).

With May upon us we’re all stretching our vision forward to when summer officially begins and our schedules are lighter. No doubt you’ve given some thought to potential travel plans, and before anything is set in stone we want to urge you to add a volunteer component to your next vacation.

Volunteer travel, or ‘voluntourism,’ is a great way to enrich any trip. If you’re vacationing with friends or family, combining your efforts to do some good will bring you all closer. Additionally, volunteering in a non-familiar location will enable you to experience different and perhaps more ‘authentic’ aspects of wherever you’re visiting.

Finding opportunities for volunteer travel is simple using Volunteer Latin America. Use our voluntary work information service to find projects that match your needs or personal interests – and turn your next travel experience into something you’ll be proud of for the rest of your life.

Hello there,

I am pleased to inform you that your site has been chosen to receive a Tripbase 2011 Blog Award.

This year our panel of judges reviewed hundreds of sites from across the Internet before hand-selecting the best ten for each travel category. Your site is among these elite ranks, and can be seen here.

I would like to congratulate you on your continued hard work and achievement in winning a Tripbase Award – this year, the awards have been featured in CNBC, CBS and AOL News. We have created small and large badges for you to show off your achievement to your readers, so please feel free to grab the code and upload it onto your site.

Well done once again, and keep up the great work.

Kind Regards

Emma Stratford

Volunteer Latin America stands with Latin American presidents (Hugo Chávez, Evo Morales, Daniel Ortega, Rafael Correa, Cristina Ferdinez) in condemning the West’s imperial war on the sovereign state of Libya.

The objective of US-NATO interference is strategic: it consists in outright theft, in stealing the nation’s oil wealth under the disguise of a humanitarian intervention.

Just like Iraq the prize is significant. Libya has 3.5% of the global oil reserves, which is more than twice that of the U.S. Libya is the largest oil economy in Africa, with ten times greater proven reserves than Egypt.

The financial stakes as well as the spoils of war are extremely high. The military operation is intent upon dismantling Libya’s financial institutions as well as confiscating billions of dollars of Libyan financial assets deposited in Western banks. The US-NATO alliance will use some of this money to award their companies multi-million dollar rebuilding contracts.

There is also a greater American strategy at work regarding Libya. This military operation is intent upon establishing US hegemony in North Africa, a region historically dominated by France and to lesser extent by Italy and Spain. The Southern border of Libya is strategic for the United States in its quest to extend its sphere of influence in Francophone Africa, a vast territory extending from North Africa to Central and Western Africa.

US-NATO intervention leading to the eventual formation of a U.S. puppet regime is also intent upon excluding China from the region and edging out China’s National Petroleum Corp (CNPC). China plays a central role in the Libyan oil industry. Eleven percent (11%) of Libyan oil exports are channelled to China. The military campaign directed against Libya is intent upon excluding China from North Africa.

An invasion of Libya under a humanitarian mandate would serve the same corporate interests as the 2003 invasion and occupation of Iraq. The underlying objective is to take possession of Libya’s oil reserves, destabilize the National Oil Corporation (NOC) and eventually privatize the country’s oil industry, namely transfer the control and ownership of Libya’s oil wealth into foreign hands.

The mainstream media through massive disinformation is complicit in justifying a military agenda which would have devastating consequences not only for the Libyan people: the social and economic impacts would be felt Worldwide.

The winning organization of our ‘Spread a Little Happiness’ prize draw is Finca San Antonio – the project will receive a US$500 donation from Volunteer Latin America. Money is always an issue to small non-profit organizations so it’s really nice to inject some cash into one of our projects. Here is the response we received from their project coordinator upon hearing the good news.

“Dear Stephen

That’s wonderful news, and almost seems too good to be true!

I would like to offer a heartfelt thank you to Volunteer Latin America.

In a corner of the world where good people’s aspirations and plans are often thwarted just by the lack of relatively small amounts of money, the prize will be a tremendous boost to our small project.

As coordinator of the project, I hope to work with the Volunteer Latin America team to ensure that the money is well and properly spent.

Sincerely

Ned Cresswell”

To celebrate the Winter Solstice and have a bit of fun we will be posting some Latin-flavoured beats on Facebook on Tuesday 21 December 2010 – kicking off around 8pm GMT. The set will be a subtle blend of modern electronic beats and traditional Latin styles – full of laid back grooves, sensual rhythms and exotic charm.

Mid-way through the set we will be giving everyone the chance to win some travel accessories in association with Travelwithcare. The first person to answer our question wins anything of their choice from Travelwithcare’s online travel store up to a value of £50. We will also announce which organization has won a US$500 donation from Volunteer Latin America.

Connect with us on Facebook on the night for a luscious mix of cool and intoxicating music – perfect for chilling out to or moving your feet. The stylish soundscape will have you reaching for an ice-cold drink and dreaming of hot summer days!

The website we set up to help people find volunteer opportunities in Thailand is now gaining popularity on the web and creeping up the search engine rankings.

If you are interested in volunteering in Thailand visit the site to view a multitude of community service ideas and conservation projects.

Volunteer Work Thailand provides information on over one hundred organizations actively seeking volunteer assistance.

The site can help you find some of the best volunteer travel deals in Thailand including many free volunteer work opportunities.

The site also provides a selection of recommended travel resources to help start planning your trip overseas.

There are some countries in the world that we have a great fondness for and one of these is without doubt is India. Hopefully, we will find some time to design and build a simple yet informative website dedicated to volunteering in India. We already have some organizations we would like to include on the site (as they contacted us some time ago) but welcome any input. If you know of any organization in India that offers free and low cost volunteer work please forward details to info@volunteerlatinamerica.com

We received another piece of negative feedback this morning about Foundation Eco-Volunteer UP. A young woman who we won’t name for reasons of privacy has been left high and dry on San Cristobal, Galapagos Islands. We have sent her details of some reputable organizations to find a replacement project at short notice.

Earlier this year we heard from another young lady whose placement had fallen through with Foundation Eco-Volunteer UP. Amazingly this young woman thought she was working through us because of Foundation Eco-Volunteer UP’s web address. As stated previously on this site, this organization made a conscious decision to use an hyphenated form of our domain name (www.volunteer-latinamerica.com) to cash in on our brand. We are in no way affiliated with Foundation Eco-Volunteer UP. This organisation was previously called Urcu Puyujunda and their original web address was www.cloudforestecuador.com.

If you would like to use the services of an in-country placement agency we strongly advise you to give Foundation Eco-Volunteer UP a wide berth. They definitely get the thumbs down from us.