From axe-wielding conservation to cooking and handicrafts, there are many options for students prepared to rough it
Tough but a great challenge is how Karen Yeung Kar-man describes the weeks she spent on a UK summer conservation programme, where she helped regenerate wasteland in Norfolk, clear a canal near Leeds and rebuild park paths close to Sheffield.
Ms Yeung is one of an adventurous band of young people willing to take time out of the Hong Kong lifestyle to try an alternative.
Four years on, her initial encounter with the UK through an AFS Intercultural Exchange trip is still clear in her mind. 'It was very hard in the first camp in Norfolk as I had never used an axe before,' she said. 'In Hong Kong, you never have to do anything like this. I didn't know how to take care of plants as we don't have a garden.'
The next camp proved even tougher, working in water and very long hours. But Ms Yeung, then a 20-year-old City University student studying for a higher diploma in English for Professional Communication, found the independence gained rewarding. 'You needed to cook, wash dishes, which I never normally have to do,' she said.
By the time Ms Yeung went to Britain, she had already undertaken a year-long exchange to the US and a summer environmental programme in Switzerland through AFS. 'I've always wanted to see what it was like to live in other places. My parents like to travel so I'd been to the US and Canada before and I enjoy meeting people,' she said.