My name is Bernadette Hoste , I am British/Belgian . I was in Buenos Aires in 2006, travelling with my husband when a poster for Voluntario Global caught my eye:

“Do you want to discover another side of Buenos Aires”? Do you like teaching?”

I thought that it would be interesting to meet local people, local children and exchange ideas. I also love teaching and I thought that I could help by teaching them English and in exchange they would share a bit of their life with me.

I met Armin, who founded VG with Valeria and I went with him to Villa Soldati to an “ after school club” to help the children with their homework. I enjoyed it, I loved working with Nely and Armin.

Armin helped me to understand the life and the people of the villas. I loved listening to him and discovering his world. He was someone I greatly admired .

My husband and I, we both fell in love with Buenos Aires and decided to come back every year for a few weeks. This gave me the chance to work with VG on various projects.

I ended up working mainly with Lorena and Viviana in the kindergarten called Travesuras. It’s a joy for me to go back to Buenos Aires every year to be with people whom I consider to be part of my family.

It has now been 14 years since I first started with VG and I have seen them grow into the great organisation that it is today. Voluntario Global has changed my life and I feel proud to be, in a small way, part of it.