A month ago, I swore in as a Peace Corps Volunteer and moved to my site. Now that I have been here for a month, I have started reflecting on what I have experienced so far in my Peace Corps service, and thinking about what the Peace Corps experience is like for other Volunteers. Which leads me to the question:
What is it like to be a Peace Corps Volunteer?
It's a very good question, without a single answer. Because each country where Peace Corps Volunteers serve is different, and each community in each country is different, and each Peace Corps program within each country is different.
During our Peace Corps training here in Moldova we talked about the danger of the "Single Story." The linked TED talk is great, and made me think about not only how I view the country I live in, but also how people view Peace Corps Volunteers. When I first told a close friend that I was considering joining the Peace Corps, her response was, "But you like to shower..." That's true! I definitely do like to shower. And it's also true that there are Peace Corps posts where it might be might challenging to bathe, but it's also true that there are posts where it's possible to shower every day. This is even true from site to site within one country.
My blog captures my experience in my town, but every other Volunteer will have a different experience. If you'd like to learn about what life is like for other Volunteers, you can check out the blogroll on the sidebar. Last week, I started watching videos on YouTube about different PCVs' experiences of living in their host countries. There is so much variety! Here are a few that I have enjoyed watching:
Mongolia
Azarbaijan
Jamaica
(this one made my day because she has Sounders stuff up on her wall! at this very moment I am wearing the Sounders MLS Cup Champions shirt my dad mailed to me :) ).
Armenia
This week, two of my Peace Corps colleagues who live in the same region of the country visited my town. One of them came with his librarian partner to attend a Novateca event that my library hosted. The other, who lives in a very small village, came to purchase some items from the supermarket in our town that he isn't able to buy in his village. Talking with both of them made it clear that our experiences in our sites have been very different.
For example, one lives in a town that is a bit smaller, but almost exclusively Russian-speaking. The other lives in a village of about 5,000. I live in a town of around 30,000 people. People speak Romanian, but also Russian. There are restaurants and supermarkets here. There is a also university, and I have heard English spoken around town a few times. There are two other PCVs posted here, which is not common; most PCVs are the only American in their village. However, my site mates' experiences are different, too. Both are educators, but they teach different subjects at different schools. One lives in an apartment. They each have a retired host mom, but I live with a family where the parents work and the son who lives at home attends university. So even in one town, our experiences are quite different.
All this to say, I hope that my blog give you some insight about Moldova, and some insight about being a Peace Corps Volunteer, but it's only one little glimpse! And I've only been in-country for 4 months, and at site for 1 month. So there is a lot more that I will discover while I am here!
Sunday, September 17, 2017
Monday, August 28, 2017
Ziua Independenței: Moldovan Independence Day
I knew very little about Moldova when I found out I would be moving here. I tried to do some research before I arrived, but with all the other things I had to do before I left the U.S., there wasn't much time. So, every day that I'm here I learn more about this interesting place that is now my home.
Yesterday was Moldova's Independence Day, and my town celebrated with festivities similar to what we do in the U.S.: honoring service members, a parade, speeches by local officials, fireworks. But they also celebrated by dancing! Maybe there are places in the U.S. where doing traditional American dances on holidays is typical, but not where I come from. However, in Moldova, traditional dances are a point of national pride, and from what I have seen in the few months I have been here so far, Moldovans are excellent dancers!
After the parade and speeches in the morning, several dance groups performed in the main square:
Yesterday was Moldova's Independence Day, and my town celebrated with festivities similar to what we do in the U.S.: honoring service members, a parade, speeches by local officials, fireworks. But they also celebrated by dancing! Maybe there are places in the U.S. where doing traditional American dances on holidays is typical, but not where I come from. However, in Moldova, traditional dances are a point of national pride, and from what I have seen in the few months I have been here so far, Moldovans are excellent dancers!
After the parade and speeches in the morning, several dance groups performed in the main square:
It was lovely to watch all the groups dancing. Later we were treated to more dancing, and beautiful fireworks!
Friday, August 25, 2017
Show Up
There's a saying I have heard more times than I can count: "Showing up is half the battle." I felt that this week for sure. It was my first week in my town, and it's the end of summer. Next week there are two Moldovan national holidays where people get the day off (and the library will be closed), and then school starts on Friday. My partner has also been on vacation this week. Needless to say, it has been pretty slow around the library. Most days this week I found it difficult to muster the energy to go in. But I did it anyway, because you never know what might happen when you just show up.
I spent some time reading through the mountain of papers that I acquired during training. I studied Romanian language. I made Pinterest boards and researched ideas for English Clubs and American holiday celebrations for the American Resource Center (ARC). I tried to speak in my limited Romanian with the staff who were at library. I wrote out a list of questions to discuss with my partner when she returns. I researched Novateca, Diamond Challenge, and Technovation; programs that my library is involved with or might want to be. I found things to do that were useful, but most of them didn't require me to physically be in the library. I was feeling a bit guilty that I wasn't doing anything exceptionally useful yet.
But I reminded myself that it was important for people to see me there and get used to me being there. When people know you are available, they are more likely to feel like they can approach you and involve you in things. A few days ago, a man walked in while I was sitting in the ARC and asked when the English classes would be starting! Yesterday and today, I saw a large group of young people (mostly women) in the library. I was sitting in the ARC today, and two of them walked in and introduced themselves. One was an 11th grade student who had just returned from studying in North Carolina, and the other was a 3rd year law student at the university. They told me the event was a project for them to create a website to provide information about events in town. Very neat! In the programs I will help with, young people will be a primary target demographic, so it was exciting to see that they are already participating in this type of activity. Awhile later, a woman walked in and introduced herself as one of the trainers. We had a great conversation, and another woman came in and they explained to me that the organization that was hosting the event is a local NGO that works with young people. The second woman is a volunteer with the NGO and suggested that we could collaborate in the future. Fantastic!
I'm excited to see that there is interest in participating in clubs and activities at the library and the ARC. I'm excited to talk to my partner next week and get started on deciding what kinds of programs and projects the library will focus on this year. And I'm glad for the reminder that it's important to show up, even if it is challenging and you are not sure whether you will be able to speak to or understand the people you may encounter.
I spent some time reading through the mountain of papers that I acquired during training. I studied Romanian language. I made Pinterest boards and researched ideas for English Clubs and American holiday celebrations for the American Resource Center (ARC). I tried to speak in my limited Romanian with the staff who were at library. I wrote out a list of questions to discuss with my partner when she returns. I researched Novateca, Diamond Challenge, and Technovation; programs that my library is involved with or might want to be. I found things to do that were useful, but most of them didn't require me to physically be in the library. I was feeling a bit guilty that I wasn't doing anything exceptionally useful yet.
But I reminded myself that it was important for people to see me there and get used to me being there. When people know you are available, they are more likely to feel like they can approach you and involve you in things. A few days ago, a man walked in while I was sitting in the ARC and asked when the English classes would be starting! Yesterday and today, I saw a large group of young people (mostly women) in the library. I was sitting in the ARC today, and two of them walked in and introduced themselves. One was an 11th grade student who had just returned from studying in North Carolina, and the other was a 3rd year law student at the university. They told me the event was a project for them to create a website to provide information about events in town. Very neat! In the programs I will help with, young people will be a primary target demographic, so it was exciting to see that they are already participating in this type of activity. Awhile later, a woman walked in and introduced herself as one of the trainers. We had a great conversation, and another woman came in and they explained to me that the organization that was hosting the event is a local NGO that works with young people. The second woman is a volunteer with the NGO and suggested that we could collaborate in the future. Fantastic!
I'm excited to see that there is interest in participating in clubs and activities at the library and the ARC. I'm excited to talk to my partner next week and get started on deciding what kinds of programs and projects the library will focus on this year. And I'm glad for the reminder that it's important to show up, even if it is challenging and you are not sure whether you will be able to speak to or understand the people you may encounter.
The American Resource Center at my library was a project
of a previous Peace Corps Volunteer and opened in May.
Wednesday, August 23, 2017
Swearing In!
I have lived in my town for a whole week now! Time seems to have both compressed and expanded. It's hard to describe, but somehow days seem both short and long. On one hand, it seems like forever ago that I swore in as a Peace Corps Volunteer and moved to my town, but on the other hand I feel like I haven't done anything here yet and still don't know anyone. Partly that is because I haven't done much yet because my partner has been on vacation. So I have been in limbo a little bit, resting (hurray! I needed it after PST!) and reading all the papers I collected from Peace Corps during training, and just sort of "being" in the library and around town. It has been good; I have a better idea of where things are in my town, and have been able to talk to a few people in shops and things. And I know things will speed up as soon as my partner comes back, the school years starts (in about a week), and clubs and projects get rolling. In the meantime, let me back up a bit to last week when I finally became an official Peace Corps Volunteer!
We were told to have our bags ready to go by 7:30 am, so I did. By around 7:45 am, my mama gazda had to leave for work, but she told me she would come to the Swearing In ceremony for an hour. That was a surprise because she hadn't mentioned it before and I thought she would have to be at work! By 8:00 am I started messaging other trainees in my town to see if anyone else had been picked up yet. No one had. By 8:30, most people had been picked up, but I was still loitering in front of my family's house. Finally at 8:34 am, the rutiera arrived! I was the last to be picked up, and clearly the rutiera was running late because it was racing through Chisinau to get us to the ceremony location in time. We had to be there early to do some preparation (some trainees had to get dressed in traditional Moldovan attire for their dance performance, and some of us had to warm up and practice to sing the national anthem during the ceremony). It turned out that we were there in plenty of time.
The ceremony was really nice. A Moldovan singing group sang the Moldovan national anthem, and then we sang the Star Spangled Banner. Our Country Director spoke, and so did some Moldovan officials. Then the U.S. Ambassador to Moldova spoke and we took our oath. When he announced that we were now Peace Corps Volunteers, a cheer went up from all of us on stage! Then those who had learned the Moldovan dances performed. They did such a great job!! After the ceremony, delicious Moldovan food was provided, and I saw my mama gazda. I'm so glad I got to see her again before I moved away. I really appreciated her hospitality during training. I hope to be able to visit her in the future. She told me she would like that.
When it was all over, each of us gathered our luggage and were taken to our permanent sites. It was so strange splitting up after being with each other for 2 months! I'm thankful that there are 2 other PCVs in my town, especially because we are so far from the capital. Although each day of training felt long, and it seemed like training would never end, I was surprised how quickly it did end. One day I was in language classes, and suddenly we had our Language Proficiency Interview, and then we were sworn in, and now I am a Peace Corps Volunteer! It has been a very long process to get here; I initially applied in April 2016. I'm so thankful to have finally made it to being a PCV and I am excited for what is to come in my town in the next couple of years!
We were told to have our bags ready to go by 7:30 am, so I did. By around 7:45 am, my mama gazda had to leave for work, but she told me she would come to the Swearing In ceremony for an hour. That was a surprise because she hadn't mentioned it before and I thought she would have to be at work! By 8:00 am I started messaging other trainees in my town to see if anyone else had been picked up yet. No one had. By 8:30, most people had been picked up, but I was still loitering in front of my family's house. Finally at 8:34 am, the rutiera arrived! I was the last to be picked up, and clearly the rutiera was running late because it was racing through Chisinau to get us to the ceremony location in time. We had to be there early to do some preparation (some trainees had to get dressed in traditional Moldovan attire for their dance performance, and some of us had to warm up and practice to sing the national anthem during the ceremony). It turned out that we were there in plenty of time.
The ceremony was really nice. A Moldovan singing group sang the Moldovan national anthem, and then we sang the Star Spangled Banner. Our Country Director spoke, and so did some Moldovan officials. Then the U.S. Ambassador to Moldova spoke and we took our oath. When he announced that we were now Peace Corps Volunteers, a cheer went up from all of us on stage! Then those who had learned the Moldovan dances performed. They did such a great job!! After the ceremony, delicious Moldovan food was provided, and I saw my mama gazda. I'm so glad I got to see her again before I moved away. I really appreciated her hospitality during training. I hope to be able to visit her in the future. She told me she would like that.
When it was all over, each of us gathered our luggage and were taken to our permanent sites. It was so strange splitting up after being with each other for 2 months! I'm thankful that there are 2 other PCVs in my town, especially because we are so far from the capital. Although each day of training felt long, and it seemed like training would never end, I was surprised how quickly it did end. One day I was in language classes, and suddenly we had our Language Proficiency Interview, and then we were sworn in, and now I am a Peace Corps Volunteer! It has been a very long process to get here; I initially applied in April 2016. I'm so thankful to have finally made it to being a PCV and I am excited for what is to come in my town in the next couple of years!
I'm a Peace Corps Volunteer!!
singing the national anthem
Ellen gave a wonderful speech in Romanian on behalf of the M32 cohort
the dancers performing
the Ambassador swearing us in
our Country Director and my two language trainers (they taught us so much!)
with our Country Director
my training site team and our language trainers
the dancers! they were fabulous!
I am so lucky to have these ladies in the same town for the next 2 years!
my first PC Moldova friend, Staging roommate, and flight aisle-mate, Courtney!
(we have friends back in the U.S. who knew each other before we met, too! woah)
Olorunbunmi, don't know how I would have gotten through training without you!
Rebecca, I am so thankful we were in the same training site!
Chels, you are wonderful!
Moldovan food!
my host mom at my training site!
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