It started out as a family tradition of travel and cultural exploration for Clare Amador, who recalls growing up with the co-existence of “travel and nature,” she says. “My (father) taught me farm work; and my (mother) brought me with her whenever she traveled (though even when she traveled alone, she came back with all these stories and pasalubongs from all these places). It’s been of interest that we’re exposed to these things, and that’s what they always wanted for their (children to be) exposed, as they wanted kids who are aware.”

Amador adds: “Right from the very start, we were already groomed to care for others, to know about others. Growing up, they let you have a sense of fairness and justice. With all these exposure, with all these things, it’s more of a molding already of you being a Filipino, a member of a family and community, and you having a culture of diversity and richness.”

It was with this background that Amador sought to share her experiences and teach the youth about the value of Filipino culture and heritage, not merely through guided out-of-town tours but through “voluntourism,” with the founding of Youth Trip (YTRiP) with a group of friends in 2006.

YTRIP started as an idea of providing an avenue for travel and learning to the youth with the establishments of a “youthveered, travel-, and cause-oriented organization to address the need to know more about the richness of the Philippines, its cultures, and its people.”
“We promote travel in the Philippines for Filipinos so that they can learn to value their heritage, culture, and the environment,” Amador says. “YTRIP is about getting to know the Philippines. In that sense, you get to know who you are, you get to know yourself and through that, you get to value your own and become a more responsible and caring citizen.”

For months after its establishment, YTRIP threaded along the non-government organization (NGO) path, relying on grants, donors and membership to fund its programs. They had thought of fund-raising projects, but, initially, being self-sustainable was not their end-goal.

“The priority was finding people who can fund us, when in fact, at that time, there was no one,” Amador said. “You’re new and people won’t really do anything for you.”

An advice from a college professor made the organization’s founders re-think their business structure.

“From the tours you create, you can earn from them and funnel it back to fund operations,” Leland dela Cruz advised Amador. “In the Philippines we don’t have an organization that promotes Philippine culture in a different way. Within itself, YTRIP is a social innovation already.”

Becoming a bona fide nonprofit organization, the prospects of achieving their goals turned much brighter. “Seeing that it is an NGO, the avenue is much bigger,”

Amador said. “There is more leeway for you to move and when people believe in your vision, you can get more volunteers to go with you; you get more advocates to go with you.” The group has, therefore, become social entrepreneurs.

“We used to not charge for our learning sessions, but recently, we realized that to survive we have to at least ask people to give out token funds and people won’t mind,” Amador says. “They won’t mind paying for something that they know has value.”

But even with the transformation that the organization has undergone, YTRiP continues to live up to its social obligation  to provide a platform of inspiration to those who come to know and experience the mission and vision of this social institution. One time, when asked to talked to over 400 enthused students of the Polytechnic University of the Philippines, Amador, who was with the other YTRiP founders, noted how the lively singing of the Philippine national anthem may be proof of how Filipinos, especially the young, still love their country. “And when we asked them how much they loved the Philippines, one of them said, ‘Ate, I’ve always wanted to do something like what you’re doing; and YTRIP has showed me that, yes, something can be done’,” Amador says.

And so YTRIP continues to achieve its goals.