Alternative Spring Break: or How to Be a Jerk without Friends

Post date: Jan 29, 2015 3:38:9 PM

Alternative Spring Break (ASB) is an excellent organization that had firmly taken hold at UVA during my time there. Instead of going to Mexico and getting wasted, or wasting yourself on your couch during a Netflix marathon (note at this point Netflix wasn’t a streaming service) you could volunteer your time and travel with people who also wanted to spend their time helping.

That being said, I took two trips with ASB that spring and I have to say in both of them I gained significantly more than I gave.

I was high off of travel when I embarked on our trip to Costa Rica. We had lofty plans to visit a rarely visited part of the country where we would help building a battered women’s shelter. By rarely visited turns out it meant in the middle of the jungle and help building I really mean plant things. And I mixed cement by hand.

We spent sometime at the beach, which was amazing.

But what stands out in my mind about this trip was what a jerk I was. I was so “I’ve traveled so much, you should be just like me” that everyone in the group detested me. I don’t blame them, I was arrogant, holier than thou. Although I loved seeing the sights, it taught me a valuable lesson about how to treat your fellow travelers. Not everyone wants to see the world the same way. There are many different ways to travel. And sometimes you need to be understanding of your traveling crowd and willing to bend to what makes them comfortable. And no one likes a bragger. (“Oh well when I was in Belize…”)