27 June 2016 | Binfield, UK [Victor Hulbert] Meet Lara Žestić. She has a passion for volunteering. As a recent midwifery graduate you might have expected her to settle down, establish her career and reap the rewards of her hard work. Instead, she headed to Thailand, volunteering at ‘bamboo school’, an orphanage and clinic for 61 children near the Myanmar border.
“It’s kind of why I did midwifery in the first place,” she confesses in a tedNEWS video interview She says she wanted a useful skill that she could use in the developing world and that she has a fascination for Asia.
Maybe that is why after six months in Thailand she is about to volunteer again. After a short time holidaying with family and a chance to lead worship at Newbold church, she is headed to Oinofyta refugee camp in Greece, just an hour’s drive north of Athens. With two babies born there in the past 10 days she believes her skills can be put to good use.
Lara has left part of her heart in Thailand, but she is just one of many thousands of Adventist volunteers who donate time – sometimes a few weeks, sometimes a year or two, to make a difference in another part of the world. Karen Plaatjes knows this well. She is co-ordinator of the Adventist Volunteer service for the Trans-European Division. She also met her husband, a South African, while she was volunteering as an English teacher in South Korea.
“I have never met a single person who regretted volunteering,” she told tedNEWS – and over the years she has interacted with many hundreds of them. In her role she sees Europe benefit with volunteers from Adventist universities and churches in the USA, South America and Australia, while for their part, European youth often like to travel and serve in the Far East or Africa – or simply in other parts of Europe. “It’s not always easy, but it is always rewarding,” Plaatjes says.
Volunteerism is not just an international activity. For Lara it is something that started in her local church and was strongly encouraged by her parents and other mentors. Kirsten Øster-Lundqvist, a personal friend and former Associate pastor at Lara’s home church, Newbold college in Binfield, England, noted that “Lara would always find time to help others, helping out at youth events, using her camera skills to good effect, and being one of those reliable youth who actually gets the task done! As her musical skills and confidence grew, you could also frequently find her leading worship during Newbold’s contemporary service.”
Lara puts her spirit of volunteerism very much down to her Christian faith and commitment. She also recommends it as a life changing experience. When friends express an interest in volunteering, but say they need to sort out their life first, she has one response! “Don’t! You always think there is something more that you can do that you need to organise, need to fix, need to stabilise your life back home. Just forget about it. Just go for it! There is no better time than right now!
To find out more about volunteering visit the Adventist Volunteer Facebook page or website. [tedNEWS]
tedNEWS Staff: Victor Hulbert, director; Esti Pujic, editor
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