Marta

Travel information

I am currently

Description

Hello there!
It feels like to describe ourselves we tend to just say what we do for work, what we study or where we are from, and in a way that´s what builds us as a person… our past experiences slowly modify our thoughts and believes… as for me, I remember the words “when I grow up I want to save animals, I want to be a vet” coming out from a 5 year old innocent mouth, back then it sounded all adorable and innocent, but 15 years latter the purpose of it hasn´t changed but the perspective definitely has.

It all probably started when I was 15, I moved to California for a year, hoping I was going to live “the american dream” and the whole high school musical experience, and that totally happened. For a year everything felt like I lived in a movie and it was awesome, but in a way, it felt like I was in a bubble seeing everything from a whole different perspective.
I realized how materialism and appearances can suck the energy out us in our western societies (because at the end of the day the US is just an exaggerated version of Europe) how the media tries to mix wealth and beauty with happiness and how inappropriately we use the worlds natural resources only because we had the luck to be born in the “first world” or a “developed country”. Just after that year, I traveled to Thailand, and as a cliche as it might sound, that trip wrapped all the conclusions I made from the states, I remember people that had nothing and will offer you food from their own plate or kids having so much fun and seeing so much joy in their eyes playing with the simplest stuff that any playstation could give to my little cousins, joy I hadn´t see for what seemed like a life time, life before tv and social media.
And that takes me back to Gandhi´s quote, how could I define my country which I love so much as “developed” when some of its people still enjoy bullfights, how could any occidental country put themselves over others when the animals that they eat are treated disgracefully.

One of the things that called my attention in the states was how much food they would bring you at the restaurants, you could never finish a plate; also people would get so sick from eating all that fast and unhealthy food, crazy how high the obesity rates are on kids, all that fast and cheap meat, converted into nuggets or burgers get us so disconnected from what´s behind our plate. I thought if I loved animals so much and I wanted to spend my life and make my best to save them I could not love some and eat others, so I went vegetarian.

Right now most of my time is spent in the library and the vet hospital, I love veterinary medicine, but other degrees always stay in the back of my mind such marine biology or environmental science, I´ll grab books of these interests every time I have time off.

At the end of every school year I try to travel or take an internship with wildlife. I´ve had incredible experiences during these times, from the wilderness of British Columbia, where I studied the bioacoustics of whales (orca, humpbacks and fin whales specially), camping in a remote island for three months where I would fall asleep to the sound of these majestic creatures to sailing around the mediterranean on the look for sperm whales.
I´ll be more that happy to share any of the hundreds of stories I got from that summer, but just a warning… once I start talking about orcas is pretty hard to stop me.

Interests

Languages

Languages spoken
English: Fluent
Spanish: Fluent
Italian: Beginner
Portuguese: Beginner

More details about my language interests
Im bilingual in Spanish and english, I also speak some Galician and would like to recover italian!

Find a language buddy

Skills and knowledge I'd like to share or learn

I'm interested in:  

Gardening

Charity Work

General Maintenance

Helping around the house

---

Some knowledge of:  

Babysitting and creative play

Art Projects

Helping with Computers/ Internet

---

Able to teach about:  

Creating/ Cooking family meals

Life at a Farmstay

Eco Projects

Animal Care

Hospitality/Tourism

Languages

Teaching

More details about your skills

Animal lover over all, I like to cook, gardening and photography.
Experience teaching kids, plays ukelele, piano and drums. fluent in english. Loves to travel and hikes.

Age

24

What else ...

I love whales!I guess as a kid it was more socially accepted and now I´m working in different research projects relating both whales and dolphins

Some more information

• 

  Smoker

• 

  Driver's licence

• 

  Allergies

• 

  Special dietary requirements
  Vegetarian