This TED Talk features orphan advocate Tara Winkler, recorded live at TEDx Sydney, 2016.

These are some photos of me volunteering in a Cambodian orphanage in 2006.

When these photos were taken, I thought I was doing a really good thing,

and that I was really helping those kids.

I had a lot to learn.

It all started for me when I was 19 years old and went backpacking through Southeast Asia.

When I reached Cambodia, I felt uncomfortable being on holiday,

surrounded by so much poverty,

and wanted to do something to give back.

So I visited some orphanages and donated some clothes and books and some money

to help the kids that I met.

But one of the orphanages I visited was desperately poor.

I had never encountered poverty like that before in my life.

They didn't have funds for enough food, clean water, or medical treatment.

And the sad little faces on those kids was heartbreaking.

So I was compelled to do something more to help.

I fundraised in Australia and returned to Cambodia the following year

to volunteer at the orphanage for a few months.

I taught English and bought water filters and food

and took all of the kids to the dentist for the first time in their lives.

But over the course of the next year, I came to discover that this orphanage

that I'd been supporting was terribly corrupt. The director had been embezzling every cent donated

...