Carpe Diem Education | Southeast Asia Semester: Human Rights & Cultural Exchange

This trip was beyond unbelievable and a dream come true. I knew I wanted to do this program a year before I could even apply. I learned so much and came of out my trip as a more confident and responsible person. I learned about the culture from living with home-stays and was able to volunteer in each country. I got my scuba certification while in Vietnam and I have used it frequently since. My educators were so helpful with everything and they thought my group so much about each place we went to. I also met amazing people through the whole journey and came out of it with amazing life long friends all over the country.

The best 3 months of my 21 years of life has to be the most to the point way to describe my time in Thailand, Cambodia, and Vietnam with Carpe Diem Education. I am 21 and finishing up my college sociology degree this year. For fall term of my senior year, I wanted to do something different, and experience true hands on learning outside of the traditional classroom lecture setting. This trip to South East Asia truly went above and beyond what I could have ever expected to get out of my time abroad.
From week one in Thailand when we each got placed in our own homestay with the most amazing and sweet host moms, to the last week of the trip directing our own student travel through vietnam, each experience I look back on with so much gratiude, knowlege, insight, and a smile.
Carpe Diem truly does give you the ability to have such unique and amazing experience, and there is also such a good balance of volunteer work, weeks in homestays, and life off the beaten path, to city days for self care and relaxation.
One of my fondest memories from the whole trip that I think about daily was out treck in Thailand. We went on a 3 day treck in Thailand led by 3 amazing locals who know the area and land so well. They led us through dense bamboo forests, that would open to the most amazing views on the hillside of a rice patty field. We stayed the night in village leaders home in a small Lahu village. The full day we were there was my favorite day of the trip.
We got up and walked 30 mins through the village and into a rice patty field where to the left of the path was vegetables growing, ahead was a bamboo forest, and down the hill was a stream. We brought 2 chickens, a sack of rice and some eggs. We collected water form the stream, picked vegetables from the field, made a fire with bamboo and cooked the rice, chicken, and eggs in the bamboo logs over the fire. We also learned to carve spoons, chop sticks, bowls, and cups. We ate the meal we made on the beautiful hillside in Thailand. Something about that day was so special, peaceful, and such an amazing learning experience.
Carpe Diem allows you to get to experience and connect with others so different from you. Each homestay family I stayed with showed me such kindness, love, and were so welcoming despite language barriers. I have shared so many laughs, hugs, and amazing homecooked meals with my host famalies. Most homestays are with at least two others in the group which is nice and comfortable.
A quick trip recap of everything amazing Thailand: A week learning Thai, and homestays with sweet host moms. 10 days volunteering and staying off the beaten path in an amazing Akka village. 4 days of trecking through beautiful Thailand rice/ pineapple field hillside. Some amazing hostels and city days to explore beautiful tempels. A week on an organic permaculture farm learning about sustainability. 5 days of silent meditation with monks learning about buddhism, and mindfullness.
A quick trip recap of everything amazing Cambodia: Days in Phnom Phen learning about the genocide, killing fields, and the Cambodian Center for Human Rights. Angkor Watt of course. A week on a village off the Mekong river working on a clean water project homestay living. A quick trip recap of everything amazing Vietnam: Days to explore the amazing city of Ho Chi Minh. A week with very funny Tan Tao University students staying in homestays, english teaching at primary schools, and a school for the deaf and disabled, picking pineapples, cooking, and singing a lot of karaoke. 5 days on the beautiful beach in Nha Trang getting suba certified, and tanning on the beach. Days in the city to go to museams and learn about the Vietnam War. And lastly student directed travel. Student directed travel is where we got to plan how to get from Nha Tang to Hanoi which was 800 miles in 1 week. We got to plan where we wanted to go, stay, forms of transportaiton, activites, and had to stay within a budget. It was so amazing.
So there you have it, the best 3 months of my life by far! The guides for Carpe Diem are also amazing, and really made the trip flow well. They handled the tough situations with ease and are such wonderful, and positive people. Having 10 students and 2 guides total was also great! All Carpe Diem trips have 15 people or less.
I would highly reccomend going abroad with Carpe Diem whether you have just graduated high school or are about to graduate college. I feel refreshed, and have a new motivation, and goals for my life becuase of my time abroad with Carpe Diem Education!!

Carpe Mundi gave me an opportunity to look deeper inside myself. I would have never thought I would be possible for me to travel, but Carpe Mundi made it possible. They don’t just give you a chance to travel they also teach you the skills you need to travel. Meeting the people in Southeast Asia made me want to start calling it my second home because they made me feel at home. Southeast Asia was filled with wonderful things to do like visiting temples. One reason I chose Southeast Asia was to learn more about the Buddhist culture of Asia. Live amongst the people of Southeast Asia I brought back home a deeper understanding of Buddhism. For those considering this program be prepared to learn something about yourself and the world. Carpe Mundi is your starting line.

The Southeast Asia semester was one of a kind experience. Unlike the traditional classroom, students are able to go out and learn by engaging. Throughout the semesters, students get valuable skills, such as, how to be leaders or new forms of communications. It also teaches students how to get around unfamiliar places. Most importantly, it teaches students how to have a positive impact on other communities.

I made lifetime memories, try new things and challenge myself. Being able to interact and live with locals allowed me to see things from a new perspective. It taught me that people do not have to speak the same language to connect. During, and after the trip, I reevaluate what is important and valuable. It is a door to new hobbies and passions, and I would highly recommend it to everyone.

This trip was my first time ever leaving the country. I never knew what the world had to offer outside of my hometown. I had dreams of traveling as a young child but I never thought that one day my dream would come true. I never thought that I would have ever gotten the travel to travel abroad. With the help of Carpe Diem Education and Carpe Mundi I was able to live the dreams that I had for myself that I thought were impossible. I not only made the most amazing memories but I gained friendships and life skills that have helped me know Moreno about myself. I got to stay with families that I had no way of communicating with but we found ways to communicate and we’re so happy. I got to experience life away from home and gained independence to be able to eat alone, be in strange places, and got to experience foods that I have never had before. I enjoyed that throughout the travel, each student was assigned a specific “role” each week. This included transportation and accommodation, which was how we will get from point A to point B and where we will be staying. We gained skills and knowledge on how to budget, book hostels, and how to get bus/plane tickets. Along side exploring, it was a little intimidating but with the help of my Carpe Diem Educators I was able to get around town comfortably and safety and I knew how to contact them if there was ever an emergency. I learned that traveling is possible.

My three months traveling as a student with Carpe Diem education were the happiest, most challenging, and most rewarding in my life. I discovered a profound love for international travel and gained the skills to travel the world alone or with friends. Carpe Diem's practice of education through independence promotes self-reliant young travelers and open-minded adults. They combine cultural immersion, service projects, and foreign sightseeing into a comprehensive immersive experience. I highly recommend this program for young adventurers looking to break out of the mainstream college experience.

Carpe Diem's Southeast Asia semester was an incredible, life changing experience. We did so many things that I never imagined I'd get to experience, like living on an organic farm for a week and learning how to build bricks out of clay, to living in a Buddhist monastery, to scuba diving on an island in Vietnam, and so much more. This semester completely changed my perception of the world and helped me grow and learn so much. It created a love for travel that will never go away, and I now feel very confident as a savvy traveler. The group was amazing and I made some of my best friends. If you're considering a gap year, this is an opportunity that you don't want to pass up. It will truly change your life and you will make so many incredible memories.

This trip was exactly what I was looking for in a gap year program. It gave me an incredible intro into how to travel in a foreign third world country and how plan and execute travel plans. After this trip I feel so much more confident in my ability to travel without a group, something which I am about to go off and do. I took the Carpe Diem trip to South East Asia. I had an incredible experience, and while the places we visited were absolutely incredible, the people and connections I made are what I value the most. Carpe has amazing connections and the homestay I did for ten days was the most memorable part of the trip for me. The group I had and the two leaders were also a big part of what made this trip so amazing. My group was nothing like I expected and everyone was for the most part very different, but we all got along and I have made incredible strong friendships that I will keep forever. Having the support of this group made traveling that much more fun and was a great learning experience on its own. Our group leaders were the most incredible human beings I have ver met. They both have amazing experience, great stories, so much love for what they do and for the group. They were so awesome at getting us to be excited and to smoothing things over when they became rocky. I owe so much of my growth and learning to their facilitation and support.