Montego Bay Travel Forum

My wife wants to help out some local families with small gifts of money. She wants to do this discretely, annonomously, and without making a big deal out of it. I am concerned about her safety if she goes to poor neighborhoods and starts handing out cash. My wife was born and raised in a desperatly poor country and now she always tries to help out folks that are less fortunate. We are only going to be in Montego Bay for one day as we will be on a cruise.

Does anyone have any thoughts or suggestions on how/where we could do this safely?

What I would do is get in contact with a non-profit organization, school, hospital, or church in the area(s) that you're interested in, an international development organization that has a location in Jamaica, or the University of the West Indies in Kingston. Jamaica relies heavily on international assistance. There should be lots of information available so she could make a contribution that way. Having lived and studied in Jamaica, I believe that her money could make a deeper positive contribution if it is allowed to flow through the channels that are in place to help people there. Jamaicans may not be at the level of destitute poverty that she may be envisioning, and may actually be insulted - depending on how the exchange is communicated - by a total stranger/tourist giving away money. This is a very interesting question though!