“My dad grew up in Peru,” Emma Ortega said with a laugh. “So when I was little, whenever we would travel, he’d be like, ‘Don’t put your money in your back-pocket because they’re gonna come around and [steal from you] like that.” This was the advice Ortega’s father gave her to avoid getting robbed in a different country. Throughout her 19 years, Ortega has been to every continent and lived in places like Botswana, Thailand, Mexico, and France. So far, she has avoided being pick-pocketed, but not without her dad’s repeated help. “He said it so many times that I’m convinced my dad was a pickpocket-er as a child.”
Ortega has never lived in one place for too long, due to her father’s work as an epidemiologist with the CDC. The most time she has inhabited an area was six years in Thailand. Right now, she is finishing up her third year at The City College of New York and calls Manhattan her temporary home. But this nomadic lifestyle doesn’t seem to bother Ortega. In fact, it does the opposite. “The first time I ever traveled I was still in my mom’s belly,” she said, sitting cross-legged in her New York City apartment. “Grade six was the first time my parents sat me and my brother down and told us we had an opportunity to move again. And I said yes right away.” Her father’s constantly relocating job only fueled the fire. At the tender age of 19, Ortega has visited all the continents through her father’s work and own personal travels. “I love travelling,” she said. “And I hate staying somewhere for too long.”
After bouncing around from country to country, Ortega has witnessed and experienced different cultures and lifestyles. It has also exposed her to areas of great poverty. “In Botswana, if you go outside the city, a lot of people live in houses the size of a trailer,” she said. “My brother once visited a small village where they sell honey to make money. The daycare was literally just a clay hut with no roof or floor. It was just kids sitting there.” While living in Thailand, her father worked with immigration at refugee camps, aiding refugees from all around Southeast Asia. Most of Thailand’s poverty was in the surrounding rural areas. According to UNDP.org, 88% of the 5.4 million living in poverty are in rural parts of the country. Despite the hardship, Ortega is against any kind of help provided through mission trips. “They’re so whack,” she said, wrinkling her nose. “I hate them. Mission trips do way more damage than help.”
It is reported by the Missiology Journal that an estimated 1.5 million Americans take part in short term mission trips annually. They spend an estimated $2 billion a year on the effort. Ortega doesn’t see the point in mission trips. She believes they’re wasteful. “So you’re going to a town for a week or so, you’re paying a lot of money to fly there, stay there, to get good food and water, and you play with these kids and bring them gifts,” she fired off. “And then you just leave.” Ortega believes that impoverished people do not need more people. They need money and funding. “It would be a lot more beneficial to raise money and just send it to them, rather than plane trips and hotels,” Ortega claimed. “You’re not paying for their education; you’re not paying for their food or giving them life skills. You come and play with them and then you leave. How is that helping them?”
Mission trips receive fierce criticism because of their fleeting nature, but many also suggest there is a masked sense of privilege behind them. “In Thailand, they have a lot less, but they make do with what they have,” Ortega explained. “They recycle everything. They’re happy with not having as much. Americans come and say, ‘Wow! They have nothing.’ because they don’t see the big house with the big AC and the toys. But Thai culture is so different and their religion is so different that they don’t feel like they’re missing anything.”
Ortega understands that people want to help, but they should offer something productive. Mission trips serve more as a form of self-gratification. Instead of providing meaningful help, these trips have become something to put on a college application or an opportunity for praise from others. “People come to feel like they’re helping, but they’re not actually doing anything,” Ortega revealed. “It’s helping yourself instead of helping other people. I want people to realize that they could be putting their time and money into something much more fulfilling.”
Instead, donate what you can to those living in poverty and give them something to help better themselves. “Care about your cause,” said Ortega emphatically. “If you care about your cause, you won’t go overseas to help just to write it down and say that you did. Give them education or healthcare or shelter or food. That’s how you can truly help.”
