Interested in volunteer opportunities in Chubu? If you’re looking for a more meaningful way to get involved in the area and/or your community, volunteering for various organizations may be a good way to get started. Whether you’re hoping to spend time aiding the less fortunate, helping with international communication efforts, or getting involved with performing arts, there are many opportunities for you to try new things or stay connected with your current hobbies—or both!
Helping children
Santa and Friends Nagoya is an organization that helps connect Chubu’s foreign community with 100+ orphaned children at five different orphanages around Nagoya. Volunteer activities and events include walkathons and seasonal/holiday parties, as well as helping out with English, piano, and cooking lessons. The group seems to be quite active, with new activities scheduled for almost every month, so if you’re interested in working with them, just complete the volunteer form on the site (both English and Japanese forms are available).
Ronald McDonald House is a residence for the families of children with serious or life-threatening illnesses who are being treated at nearby hospitals or facilities, such as Nagoya University Hospital. It offers volunteer opportunities in the form of housekeeping (sweeping floors, vacuuming, gardening, making beds), office work (answering phone calls, performing reception duties, giving house tours), and night volunteering (night time patrol and emergency responses). This house offers set three-hour schedules, with the first shift starting at 9 am and the last shift ending at 9 pm, but there’s also an option to make your own volunteer schedule.
Annual events
The Chubu Walkathon, formerly known as the Nagoya Walkathon, is an international charity festival held in May. It supports local charities and orphanages, and though the walkathon itself only occurs once a year, weekly event-planning meetings between organizers and volunteers begin as early as January. Volunteering opportunities include setting up facilities on the day of the marathon, assisting with ticket sales, facilitating kids’ games and activities, helping with information and guidance, and organizing/coordinating stage entertainment. The group advertises an “international team of volunteers” and has an English website, so you don’t have to worry if you can’t speak Japanese very well. One caveat, however, is that all participants—including volunteers—must buy raffle tickets, which are ¥2,000 for adults and ¥1,000 for students (100% of proceeds go to charity).
Animals
At Famille Shelter in Nagoya, new volunteers are always welcome. The shelter provides a home for dogs and cats, and is connected to a “protective cat cafe,” called Cafe Hemingway. The information below comes from our very own Rebecca Alpert, who currently volunteers at the shelter. (Read about her experiences here: Shelter helper.) The initial commitment involves coming in for a training session once a week for the first month, from 9 am to 12 pm or 5 pm to 8 pm. The shifts are four hours long. After that, volunteers can come any day and any number of times they’d like. Unfortunately, volunteering at this shelter requires a moderate level of Japanese, as the trainings are conducted entirely in Japanese and the lead volunteers don’t speak any English.
Performing arts
If you’re more of a creative and/or artsy type, you can also try volunteering for the theater group, “Nagoya Players.” They’re “Nagoya’s oldest English-language theater group,” and are looking for volunteers to help in various areas, such as administrative (communications, records, accounting, translation, office work), technical (lighting, sound, set construction), and creative (set design, costumes, makeup, props, writing, photography, video). They’re also looking for people to be directly involved in productions (directors, producers, actors, singers)! If you’re interested, just fill out the form on their website and wait to hear back about open volunteer positions.
There’s also “Theater Iridescence,” an English and Japanese fusion theater company. They didn’t specify what work they need help with, but their website has a form for volunteering inquiries, so you could try your luck and shoot them a message! The submit button isn’t visible at first, but if you scroll over the area under the final text box, one will magically appear. Voila!
Food bank
There’s a Japanese food bank known as Second Harvest Japan, with headquarters in the Tokyo area. They’re very supportive of volunteers, and Japanese language skills are helpful but not a prerequisite. Shifts are approximately 2.5 hours long, from Monday through to Saturday, and you don’t have to be a regular volunteer.
There is a Tokai version of 2HJ, known as “Second Harvest Nagoya,” or “2HN.” This one is a bit more difficult to navigate as the volunteer page is in Japanese and there aren’t any specific volunteer forms to fill out, but one can apply using the site’s general inquiry form. The organization also advertises group volunteer training sessions and seasonal volunteer opportunities for holiday events.
Museum guide
The Nagoya City Science Museum’s website says they need volunteers for exhibition rooms and manufacturing. If you’re more technologically or scientifically inclined, this opportunity might be the one for you. Training sessions are conducted in Japanese, so volunteers with Japanese language proficiency are preferred.
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