Developing countries close borders to spring break service trips

On Friday, April 29, twelve developing nations mandated states of national emergencies requiring the immediate closure of their borders after thousands of affluent, prep-school teenagers inundated the lands through various community service outreach programs. The twelve nations -- including Ghana, Haiti, Yemen, Puerto Rico and Tanzania -- show no signs of opening up their borders again until the madness subsides. The main culprits of the rogue situation are Rustic Pathways and Building Without Borders, community service programs that provide (for a mere $4,000 plus airfare) international trips for students who want to help people in less fortunate places. Students usually go to get “real world” experience so that they can see how “the poor” live in other countries. Many participants return with something “super emotional and juicy” to write about on college applications. Usually, these groups build schools, terraces, soccer fields and roads in small, rural towns all with the comfort of living in the only building in that town with clean sheets, walls and running water.  After the students complete their mission and return to their NoMo and Bel Air mansions, the organization takes down their week’s work for a new group of students to come and build the same structures. Affluent parents are clamoring to pay for these trips.The desire to set oneself apart from the rest of the college application pool has, ironically, resulted in a record number of 90,000 students signing up for community service programs abroad. In mid March, with spring break beginning, students swarmed the streets of developing nations while innocent citizens watched in horror as teenagers with ernest faces carried pitchforks, hoes and floorboards, hoping to “help.”  One local reportedly said to BBC News, “What is ‘Rustic Pathways’ anyway? That sounds so goddamn stupid. You know what, our ‘pathways’ are ‘rustic’ for a reason. Because so many stupid white teenagers keep trampling over and destroying our new roads! Hell, they’re making our pathways MORE rustic, not less!” The video of the man later went viral.    After much consternation, leaders of these twelve nations met in a top-secret, late-night session and decided that their only option was to ban all foreigners. One loyal Rustic Pathways customer who has been going ever since she set her sights on Princeton University in eighth grade, Aubrey Rothschild (’20), had just finished packing her Louis Vuitton x Supreme rolling suitcase to go to Haiti when she heard the news. She is heartbroken not only for library shelves she had planned to design, but mostly for herself. “When I heard I wasn’t going to get to go to Haiti, I was devastated. I don’t possibly understand why countries wouldn’t welcome as many philanthropic young people as possible, especially those as kind hearted and understanding as me. Also, I really needed that fourth year of solid community service on my Princeton app and this was my last chance. Thank god Mommy and Daddy went to Cornell, or I would be majorly screwed. I can always resort to that as my last option,” Rothschild said. While most nations chose not to make a statement, the president of Ghana agreed to speak. “While we know the young Americans are well-meaning, the people of Ghana and elsewhere cannot manage chaos that arrives every spring and summer. We are no longer able to contain the mass of people that shows up at our doorstep, disrupts our homeland and expects us to be grateful. We do not know when we can open our borders again, but it is for the best,” the president said.