RESPONSIBLE TOURISM DOMINICAN REPUBLIC DESTINATIONS
ABOVE: The Tui Academy reserves 70% of places for girls
LEFT: Students learn kitchen skills from chef Candido
that my family problems stay at home. I can have fun with my colleagues and not mix the two.”
w LIFE LESSONS Training also includes life skills provided by Plan International, which has a grassroots presence in the communities and, as a result, is integral to the programme. We see this in action in a church hall in Higuey, the capital of La Altagracia province, outside the tourist enclave
BELOW: Tui Academy trainees
of Punta Cana. Students role-play common situations, such as family resistance to them going to work or husband-and-wife issues. But the focus is on solutions and solidarity. In a mobile cooking kitchen, we see chef Candido teaching the students in a Kitchen Aid class. He has 40 years of experience in the restaurant and retail trade, and is now passing on his skills to these enthusiastic teenagers. They whip up a vat of tipile, similar
to the Lebanese tabbouleh, with onions, celery, tomatoes, olive oil and bulgar wheat. It’s delicious. Other lessons cover sexual and
reproductive health, employee rights, work safety and financial literacy. The students also pick out
newspaper cuttings that show the stereotyping of women, reminding both boys and girls that they’re not tethered by their gender to any one role in life. It’s heartening stuff. For those who question such
initiatives – and some courses are no doubt less effective than others – seeing them in action goes some way to show the difference these projects can make. One girl tells us that as her mother
wouldn’t look after her children, she wasn’t going to apply for Tui Academy – until she found out the programme offered daycare. “It’s been hard with a three-year-old and a two-year-old, but I’m not going to leave it,” she says. The Tui Academy also supports other projects. In Namibia, it provides 20 female football players with hotel management training scholarships, so they can support their sporting commitments; this in a nation where female unemployment is 50%. The Tui Care Foundation sponsors other schemes too, ranging from bike tour guides in Morocco to traditional winemakers in Lanzarote. In April this year, the scheme came
full circle as the first 46 graduates from the Dominican Republic programme completed the course and started putting their new skills into practice with 24 already employed in Tui Blue Diamond hotels. What all this means for the future,
it is far too early to say. But these grassroots programmes look promising – and certainly feel much-needed in a nation where the rich-poor divide remains stark.
9 August 2018
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