The Gambia

Volunteering in the Gambia was challenging and rewarding, however I felt completely unsupported by Mondo Challenge. For instance, upon arrival in the country, Mondo Challenge's country coordinator offered to buy me a SIM card and have it delivered to me in the rural village where I stayed. I was there for 3 months, but it was not until 2 weeks before I left and I was visiting him in his village that he told me he'd purchased the card; by this time there was no real point taking the card from him. He did at least give me back the cash I'd given him to buy it with - I think he was able to reuse the card for the next volunteer who stayed. The most disappointing thing about volunteering through Mondo Challenge was the allocation of the funds I had paid to participate in the programme - it was not made clear to me at the interview stage, nor at any point prior to or even during my stay, that the money I paid would not be going towards the programme I was participating in. Of the £1650.00 I paid Mondo Challege, roughly £150 went to my host family to cover my food expenses. About another £50 went to the country coordinator for a night's accommodation for me upon arrival. Where the remaining £1400 went, I have no way of finding out. The school where I taught could have badly used these funds for their various, potentially self-sustaining projects, but these were not considered. The staff at Mondo Challenge were unapologetic when I queried this, and indicated that I should have read the webpage more thoroughly about their uses of funds. The breakdown of expenditure on their website does not explicitly state that the money going towards projects will not necessarily be spent on the project you are personally involved in - something that really should be made clear.