Browsing my e-mail one day, I was given a notice that there was an opportunity to study abroad in South East Asia; Corporate Social Responsibility in Thailand and Cambodia. Without thinking, I went straight to applying. I might have been a few minutes late to work that day (okay fine… 30 minutes late), but all on my mind during that day was to ensure to get in.
The reason why is, I did not want to second guess myself when applying for this trip, I wanted to go full force at it, with no hesitation or discretion, full speed ahead! The commitment of studying abroad is a long and tedious process, filling out applications, forms, and insurance papers, however, you realize at the end of this process, this is something truly worth seeing the end to.
As I stepped out of Bangkok’s airport, humidity and sweat hit my face, with the city being one of the hottest places on earth, it truly caught my breath. As well as the concrete jungles encompassing the city life, temples, businesses, and traffic. Throughout this, my mind was not only hit by the climate but the culture shock as well. How the infrastructure, culture, and environment were not at all what I was accustomed to.
With the plan to hit 5 cities in under 20 days, this trip was thoroughly planned to enlighten us about how different corporations, from charities and NGOs to the private sector, and government organizations – How can we tackle social responsibility? From building classrooms out of plastic water bottles found in the villages of Siem Reap, Cambodia, to planting mangroves in Khao Lak, Thailand; the perplexity of social responsibility began to hit.
However, the values I gained were simple to understand.
DO NO HARM
As one of our guest speakers explained to us, we are experiencing a completely new culture, values, environment, language, and infrastructure – we do not know much. However, we understand that preserving the well-being of an environment, or society is important in being a global citizen. By providing support and sustainable practices to different organizations, we cannot only preserve well-being but ours as well. To help others by causing no harm helps provide a connection universally. If hotels, like the ones in Pattaya, continue to release waste into the Gulf of Thailand, it eventually reaches globally, impacting the lives of many to come.
In addition to the waste dumping of hotels in Pattaya, we also got to hear about the Indian Ocean Tsunami of 2004, and how it impacted the city of Khao Lak, and neighboring cities, how a beautiful coastal city was devastated by what occurred. Through this, we understand the benefits of planting mangroves and how they’re important in keeping the local ecosystem in check, by providing nutrients as well as structural support for the lands around them. By planting mangroves in the tidal slew by our hotel, we were able to learn how our social responsibility of taking care of the local environment is important in being a sustainable tourist.
Throughout this entire journey, I learned how tourism impacts these two enriched countries, whether for good or for bad. With everything that happened in those 20 days, the most important thing is nothing’s at a loss when you learn something new.
