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Three years ago, Frédéric Belanger was unemployed and socially isolated. At 24 years old he had burned himself out working as an instrument technician in Montreal—the monotony of which contributed to high stress levels which he chose to deal with by "self-medicating" with marijuana.
Eventually, he quit his job and shut down his emotions—a result, he says, of being afraid to feel. Then he came across GIT en Amérique.
Established in February 2004, GIT en Amérique is a joint project of Canada World Youth and Groupe Information Travail, a Montreal-based employment agency for street kids, addicts and other youth-at-risk. Designed as a street-smart version of the esteemed Canada World Youth (CWY), GIT en Amérique offers young Montrealers the kind of unique hands-on learning that can only be gained by living and working in another culture. For Belanger, it also provided something else; a chance at redemption.
“It was a gift,” he explains. “A very big gift.”
As several generations of Canadians know, CWY was created nearly 40 years ago by Senator Jacques Hébert as a cultural exchange program for those aged 18 to 30. Participants live and work for up to six months in a developing country (as well as in Canada) alongside other international counterparts. Generally, the young people who take part in the program are high achievers, who apply for the opportunity and spend the volunteer time between high school and university, or during a gap in university education.
GIT en Amérique serves another demographic. The brainchild of Stephanie Grenier (a former employee of both Groupe Information Travail and CWY), the program was born of a desire to see the benefits of Canada World Youth extended to a new audience, mainly youth lacking the same kind of skills and educational opportunities—not to mention privileged backgrounds.
Under GIT en Amérique, up to 10 young people spend 11 weeks learning Spanish, staying for a week on an Aboriginal reserve in Quebec and then travelling to a village in South America. There they spend a month with local families and volunteer on a service project.
In 2004 Belanger’s group helped to construct a tourist centre in San Felipe de Otlaltepec, Mexico. He stayed with a family of seven in a modest home with no indoor plumbing or running water.
After their time in the village, the participants return to Montreal. Each person completes a project about the experience and presents it. Then they receive follow-up training to help them get a job or return to school.
“Sixty-nine percent of them go on either to work or to school,” says Francine de Guise, director of GIT en Amérique. “It’s really like a transformation every time they come back.”
The program also accepts participants with mental health issues says de Guise, but only after consulting with their psychiatrists or doctors. Sometimes, addicts that are accepted into the program do drop out, as do those who find that they just can’t work with others.
But the majority of participants complete the program, and earn tangible skills in the area of construction, teamwork, conflict resolution and group dynamics. They also come back speaking conversational Spanish, and increased self-confidence.
“What the project does is give them a break from their reality, and they beget to see the reality of another culture,” de Guise says. “Then they see their reality another way. They see that people can live with less—and live well.”
De Guise believes this kind of hands-on learning experience is 10 times more valuable than what participants could learn in a traditional classroom. For many of the young people, who were depressed or even suicidal before they began the program, it offers a window into a new world and door to a possible future.
“It’s a good program that gives access to youth that wouldn’t have any chance to participate in a regular international exchange program,” says Nadia Karina Ponce Morales, program manager for Canada World Youth. “They come back to Canada with this sense of accomplishment.”
Before GIT en Amérique Belanger had wanted to travel, but he had been afraid to venture outside of the familiar. His experience in Mexico changed all that.
“I learned that I can adapt very easily to almost every situation,” he says. “That I don’t need a lot to live and to be comfortable.” When he returned to Montreal, Belanger got a job at a video-game store. Today, he not only manages the store, he is responsible for training new employees at several other stores. According to him, he would not be able to do the work without the skills he gained from working abroad such as how to work with others and manage group dynamics.
For example, a few weeks after he started his managerial position Belanger says he needed help from some employees, who wouldn’t cooperate. “There were three girls in front of me trying to argue,” he says. “Before, I would have just continued arguing.”
Instead, he realized he was getting nervous and felt pressured. So he delayed the conversation until he was calmer.
“That’s an example of what I learned. Basically, I got some maturity out of the experience. I’m generally more calm even when unexpected things happen, because now I know most of the time I have what it takes to face whatever is thrown at me.”
One of the most valuable and moving experiences Belanger remembers occured during his group’s stay on a reserve in Quebec. The group demolished and cleaned up the site of an old house, and they also participated in Aboriginal healing ceremonies. But his most intense experience came during a meditation where he had to ponder his younger self. When he visualized the scared young boy that he had been “I started crying,” he remembers. “Something got unlocked.”
Finally, he was able to see himself as a young child and to recognize his vulnerability and unhappiness that had ruled his life.
Part of what Belanger learned from GIT en Amérique was that he lived “too much in my head,” having closed off his emotions because of his childhood vulnerability. Today, he knows that he needs to interact with people, to talk to others, and to stop isolating himself.
“I’m a lot less afraid of my feelings and more conscious of my feelings,” Belanger says. “My fear has always been a big weight for me. I wasn’t realizing I was doing things out of fear—the fear of being out of control.” In the past, that fear had prevented him from working well with other people, because he would shut down if conflicts arose. Living and working with the group on the reserve, and in Mexico, helped him to understood relationships better, he says.
Two years after Belanger’s involvement, Valerie Pichette had her own life-changing experience with GIT en Amérique. In 2006, she helped to build greenhouses at schools in Comcebpeom Cuautla, Mexico.
“It’s impossible to come back the same,” she says of the program. Pichette, 29, came to GIT en Amérique by answering an ad for youth who were having difficulty finding work. Although she finished high school, she had no post-secondary education. She had to give up owning and operating a roadside chip truck road in Lamoraie, outside of Montreal, when she was diagnosed with kidney cancer.
With no health benefits, she moved back in with her mother. Although she won her battle with cancer, Pichette lost the self-confidence she needed to apply for and find a good job. GIT en Amérique gave it back to her.
Pichette loved learning Spanish and living with her hosts in Mexico, who became a second family to her.
“The expression ‘Mi casa, su casa’—it’s not just an expression,” Pichette says. “It’s life in Mexico. You live there two days, you are family.” The greenhouse that Pichette’s group built was a small but essential project, she says, that will provide children in the primary and high schools with vegetables for themselves and their families.
While living in the village, Pichette noticed the mountains of trash that mar the landscape. That sparked an idea—and a new career. When she returned to Montreal, she applied for a job with Recycle Notre Dame, a small, family-owned waste and recycling company.
Today, Pichette continues to work for the company. She’s registered for a university course in January that will enable her to become a drinking water technician, and when she’s finished, she will move to Costa Rica to work with her firm’s sister company. Being able to speak Spanish clinched the opportunity for her.
“It’s the proof that I’m adaptable and I can learn new things,” Pichette says proudly. She is earning three times as much as she ever made selling French fries and hot dogs—and she has also learned how to live a simpler life.
Pichette also gained valuable people skills, since GIT en Amérique forced the group to live and work closely with people they didn’t choose. "Your mind changes, your vision of the world changes,” she says of her experience. “You learn about yourself.”
Pichette plans to return to visit her host family this December, to check on the greenhouse project and to introduce them to her partner. In the meantime, she urges everyone she knows to donate to GIT en Amérique.
“It’s important that young people in Quebec know other things in the world, especially for young people that have difficulty,” she says. “It’s important for us to know that everything is possible—for everyone.”