Meet ImpacTrip Team: Clara Polaino
Clara is Spanish and she is our local coordinator in Barcelona. Originally from Alicante, she joined the team this year because she believes tourism can create a positive impact!
Today she shares with us a bit of herself.
3 Curiosities about you
– Since always I like risk sports and heights, I have practiced bungee jumping, skydiving and currently in my spare time I do rock climbing and aerial acrobatics.
– I adore chess, when I was little I used to compete at the regional level. If it catches me younger, the protagonist of the “The Queen’s Gambit” series would have been my heroine without any doubt.
– One of my usual fears when I was a kid was the darkness of the sea, and I fought it by snorkeling and now diving. When I saw what was below the unknown stopped scaring me and I began to marvel at exploring the underwater world.
Describe yourself in 3 words.
Dynamic, curious and musical Arrhythmic.
What does traveling mean to you?
Acquire new experiences, enrich myself by knowing different people and ultimately, live intensely.
Why did you choose to be part of the ImpacTrip Team?
ImpacTrip Team gives me many of the most beautiful things about traveling without moving from Barcelona, the feeling of being active, of surrounding myself with people from different cultures while at the same time I feel that through the different volunteer projects in which we get involved I do something for improve my community.
The most remarkable moment for you at ImpacTrip
During the summer, when all the volunteers carried out their programs only in the morning, a few afternoons a week I tried to join them on the beach or in the beautiful Ciutadella park where we practiced a sport that I love and few people know, the slackline. They were especially fun times that we all spent together. Months later at least 3 volunteers have written to me sending photos and videos showing me that they have actually got a slackline and continue to practice this sport in their countries with their family and friends.
I am excited to think that something so small that took place one afternoon throughout the summer has influenced and encouraged them to practice this sport, so I wonder how their experiences on their respective projects in which they participated during their stay in Barcelona could have influenced as well.
What is for you the biggest challenge in the tourism sector nowadays?
Create something new and original, that at the same time is in balance with sustainability and social justice
The most unforgettable experience abroad and why?
Traveling alone as a backpacker around Chile and Bolivia, I found dream landscapes, met many people that I still have as friends, and I learnt a lot about myself.
The 3 things you admire more in people
Sense of humor which I relate to intelligence, musical/dance ability and cooking skills.
What’s your favourite travel time and type?
The beginning of summer seems perfect to me for any type of trip, but if it is near water, whether sweet or salty, much better.
Three things you always take with you when you travel and three things you never take with you when you travel
I always try to carry a notebook to write down things, directions or even draw a bug that catches my attention, a raincoat and sunscreen.
What I never bring with me is a suitcase (I’m a big fan of my backpack), a hair dryer, an umbrella (why do I if I have my raincoat!).
Leave your motto
It is not mine but I really love this one from Richard Dawkins: “By all means let’s be open-minded, but not so open-minded that our brains drop out.”