This is a kind of common thread among volunteers and those interested in volunteering. How did you go from a thought about serving to having an impending departure date? I'm probably not as concise about having exact dates, so this is a more fuzzy outline of the progress I've took. My best advice about the Peace Corps is to apply in advance, even before you're certain you want to volunteer. There's lots of steps, and can be big delays in between each one.
Sometime in 2008: Thought about volunteering. Opened an application and didn't get past the first few pages. Decided to go to Graduate School instead.
January 2010: Looking at the current job market, the idea of earning local wages in a rural village in a developing country doesn't seem like a bad idea. Discovered student loans can get deferred during service. Resumed application.
February 2010: Got three references for the application (one friend, one former employer, and one professor). Wrote an essay about why I would pursue volunteering, as well as one on how I would deal with cultural change. Jumped through other loops of the application.
March 2010: Submitted application. Waited.
April 2010: Received a phone call from the local recruiting office, set up a date for an interview.
May 4, 2010, 1pm: Prepared for interview by watching a YouTube video where a Peace Corps recruiter offers tips. My in-person interview, coincidentally, is conducted by the same recruiter. Some of the questions are easy to answer ("When's the last time you transferred skills to someone else?") others are more difficult. I get nominated on the spot (Primary Teacher Training), and the recruiter offers to call me later in the day with details about the region.
May 4, 2010: 2pm: Recruiter called me as I drove from the interview. She offers me Asia in November, Pacific Islands in December, Africa in February. I choose Africa.
May-June 2010: Received thick medical and dental forms. I attempt to decipher these, and set up appointments before my student medical insurance expires in September.
August 2010: After getting medical forms filled and practically living at my dentist to get a variety of fillings performed, I finish medical paperwork.
October 2010: Received a call from Washington confirming a few things with my medical paperwork. Apparently, my packet is on someone's desk and is about to be cleared. The application process consists of pockets of patient waiting interrupted by swift bureaucratic movement. My invitation packet gets sent the same day.
October 4 2010: Got my invitation packet. It's huge. The most important part: my assignment. Community Education Specialist in Zambia, departing January 31, 2011. After calling everyone who wanted to know my destination, and some who didn't, I decide to wait two days before responding.
October 6 2010: I respond to the invitation. I change my Facebook status to reflect this.
October-November 2010: I send off my Visa paperwork, take passport pictures, investigate discounts on travel and living gear, and set up a packing list. A few more things to do, a few more books to read before I go.
November 23, 2010
The Ugly American?
I started this blog to document and illustrate my service as a Peace Corps volunteer in Africa from 2011-2013.
"We tried to point out the fact that we spend billions on the wrong aid projects while overlooking the almost costless and far more helpful ones." (Lederer and Burdick, epilogue to "The Ugly American")
The title of Ugly American is pertinent because it is used to describe U.S. Foreign Policy and the behavior of Americans as they travel and work abroad; however it resonates with me because it is ironically used in the novel of the same title by William Lederer and Eugene Burdick.
In it, the handsome Americans are responsible for the more incompetent and ineffective aid and diplomacy projects: they don't speak the native language, are unaware of local customs, and seclude themselves in large residences and exclusive Americans-only social clubs. The following is a quote from a Filipino Minister to a U.S. Official:
“The simple fact is, Mr. Ambassador, that average Americans, in their natural state, if you will excuse the phrase, are the best ambassadors a country can have. They are not suspicious, they are eager to share their skills, they are generous. But something happens to most Americans when they go abroad. Many of them are not average . . . they are second-raters.”
The Ugly American, Homer Atkins, is ugly in his appearance and rejection of the handsome and fashionable American ex-patriot culture. Homer is an engineer with dirty fingernails and calloused hands; his project that "works" is a bicycle-powered water pump that co-develops with a local counterpart.
Homer's example is key because it reflects the potential of the Peace Corps volunteer: Americans living in similar conditions in communities collaborating towards local solutions to pertinent problems. In the book, Homer addresses his philosophy of aid: “Whenever you give a man something for nothing, the first person he comes to dislike is you.” In fact, the book was disseminated by John F. Kennedy to his fellow representatives in the Senate. There have been questions about the book's influence in a contemporary context (a New York Times review and article in the Christian Science Monitor). And, of course, the relevance of the Peace Corps itself has also been addressed.
As many fellow nominees know, the length of the Peace Corps application process allows a lot of time for reflection. The success of the institution's own assessment and recruiting process aside, I'm more concerned about my own context and projects that I may be involved in. In whatever I do, I hope I do it as an Ugly American.
"We tried to point out the fact that we spend billions on the wrong aid projects while overlooking the almost costless and far more helpful ones." (Lederer and Burdick, epilogue to "The Ugly American")
The title of Ugly American is pertinent because it is used to describe U.S. Foreign Policy and the behavior of Americans as they travel and work abroad; however it resonates with me because it is ironically used in the novel of the same title by William Lederer and Eugene Burdick.
In it, the handsome Americans are responsible for the more incompetent and ineffective aid and diplomacy projects: they don't speak the native language, are unaware of local customs, and seclude themselves in large residences and exclusive Americans-only social clubs. The following is a quote from a Filipino Minister to a U.S. Official:
“The simple fact is, Mr. Ambassador, that average Americans, in their natural state, if you will excuse the phrase, are the best ambassadors a country can have. They are not suspicious, they are eager to share their skills, they are generous. But something happens to most Americans when they go abroad. Many of them are not average . . . they are second-raters.”
The Ugly American, Homer Atkins, is ugly in his appearance and rejection of the handsome and fashionable American ex-patriot culture. Homer is an engineer with dirty fingernails and calloused hands; his project that "works" is a bicycle-powered water pump that co-develops with a local counterpart.
Homer's example is key because it reflects the potential of the Peace Corps volunteer: Americans living in similar conditions in communities collaborating towards local solutions to pertinent problems. In the book, Homer addresses his philosophy of aid: “Whenever you give a man something for nothing, the first person he comes to dislike is you.” In fact, the book was disseminated by John F. Kennedy to his fellow representatives in the Senate. There have been questions about the book's influence in a contemporary context (a New York Times review and article in the Christian Science Monitor). And, of course, the relevance of the Peace Corps itself has also been addressed.
As many fellow nominees know, the length of the Peace Corps application process allows a lot of time for reflection. The success of the institution's own assessment and recruiting process aside, I'm more concerned about my own context and projects that I may be involved in. In whatever I do, I hope I do it as an Ugly American.
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