Thai Elephant Preserve

Bangkok, Thailand

Volunteer with elephants by helping bring them back into their natural habitat.

Make a difference in the conservation efforts to save elephants living under terrible conditions.

Walking about the forests and observe elephants’ natural behaviors in their home environment.

Experience the fascinating Thai-culture in your free time.

Wildlife Reserve Supporter

Sidbury, South Africa

Volunteer with the Big Five in a South African wildlife reserve.

Experience the unique chance to work alongside this fascinating wild animals.

Enjoy the rewarding feeling of saving South African’s wildlife by helping injured or orphaned animals to get back on track.

Animal Rescue Center Supporter

Alajuela, Costa Rica

Volunteer with Costa Rica’s wildlife animals surrounded by beautiful and unique nature.

Experience the rewarding feeling of saving wildlife by helping injured animals to get back on track.

Meet like-minded volunteers from all over the world and build life-long friendships.

Enjoy your weekends by visiting stunning beaches and improving your surfing skills.

Learn this beautiful language by attending Spanish lessons.

Amazon Rainforest Conservation

Manu National Park, Peru

Join conservation researchers and community development staff in their daily efforts to make a difference to the Amazon’s phenomenal wildlife!

Experience the Amazon-the largest and most species-rich rainforest in the world.

Contribute to gathering data and improving techniques, which are extremely important to the future of not just Manu National Park but also the entire Amazon Rainforest ecosystem.

Explore the local village with fellow volunteers!

Remember making friends in the lunchroom? For many of today’s teens, friendships can start online. A just-released report from the Pew Research Center finds 57 percent of teens have met a new friend online, and nearly 29 percent say they’ve made more than five friends in digital spaces. Only one in five teens have actually met an online friend in person.

Where in the digital world do teens meet new friends? Among boys who have made a friend online, video games are a hot spot—57 percent made a friend while gaming over online networks. As for girls,78 percent who made a friend online met on a social media site.

The report also finds that the majority of teens on social media use it as a way to stay connected with the friends they already have. Seventy percent say it makes them feel more connected to their friends’ feelings.

But there are challenges. Most(88 percent)of teen social media users believe people share too much information about themselves. Teens also report feeling pressure to post content that makes them look good to others, and having had someone post things about them that they can’t change or control.

Still, not all interactions are virtual. “Teens still spend substantial amounts of time with friends in-person, especially at school,” said Amanda Lenhart, Associate Director for Research at the Pew Research Center and the lead author on the report. In a press release Lenhart noted, “But mobile phones, social media, and for boys, online video gaming, have become deeply enmeshed(陷入)in creating and maintaining teen friendships. In many instances, these technologies makes teens feel closer and more connected to their friends.”

As for the top way, teens stay in touch? That’s no surprise—the report finds 88 percent of teens text their friends, with 55 percent of those texting daily.

VR is like something simply wear a headset and open your eyes in a completely different world, without having to leave the one you’re in. It’s great for gamers and fun for thrill-seekers, but honestly I think VR’s real potential lies in travel.

From holiday inspiration to making a booking, the future of travel ties firmly online. But I’ve spotted a trend: We don’t simply base our bookings on great deals any more. While at Expedia—an online traveling company, I’ve noticed that more and more holidaymakers want to guarantee they’ll be getting an authentic (真实的) experience: local produce, authentic dig sand adventures they’ll never forget.

Picture the scene: I can wear a headset and stand on top of Iceland’s Gulfoss waterfall, or, perhaps, Peru’s Machu Picchu. I could even find myself wandering the busy streets of an Asian city, where the tourist industry may or may not have taken away some of the local charm. VR has the potential to attract potential travelers with style and substance, offering true-to-life expectations and matching wearers to their ideal experience.

If you’ re sick of spending hours searching the Internet for your dream hotel, then don’t worry. Booking bot, an app, does all the hard work. I begin a message to Expedia with a friendly ”Hi“, input where I’d like to go, when and for how long, and in seconds, I’ll be shown the best deals. There’s little annoyance and I could be making a cup of tea in the time it takes to chat.

With the unavoidable airport check-in experience complicated, making it easy will be key in the future. Some experts are even going so far as to predict the fall of human interaction-front desk staff replaced by holograms (全息图), waiting staff exchanged for robots and smartphone apps.

I haven’t only seen VR making waves: AR is coming to the front as a holiday must-have, too. Travel is changing, and the future may not be as far away as we’d first thought.