Ask the returned Peace Corps Volunteer

[even_sven]

@Chefguy

I noticed a quirk with former PC field workers who became “lifers”. They seemed to shun improvements to their lives, even though they were readily available and highly advisable. An example: the admin officer I mentioned above was living in a decent house in Bamako, leased by the embassy. They had the usual accessories, which included a water purifier, which, in my opinion and experience in Africa, is an essential and extremely advisable thing to have. Well, it broke. Rather than call for a new one, they just started drinking tap water, with the predictable result. I asked the wife (who had been out for weeks with a particularly virulent stomach bug) what the hell she was thinking, what with the health advisories, etc. She just shrugged and said it was a “Peace Corps thing”. To me it was irresponsible, since they had children in the house.

I guess the question is: is this a normal mindset for people in the field, even when they return to ‘civilization’?

Yes and no. I think it’d be unusual to that extreme, but I do know that returned PCVs can get a little uncomfortable with the “swimming pool, fleet of maids, and a white Landcruiser” situation that comes with things like foreign service positions. One the big philosophies of Peace Corps is that to really understand a community’s needs (and thus design good programs for them) you need to become a part of the community, which is almost impossible if you live in an air-conditioned mansion behind a big gate. I think it’s also pretty common for PCVs to feel embarrassed by their riches. I knew one PCV who slept on a mat, because she didn’t want to be the only one in her village with a bed. It just becomes really awkward when you are obviously so much richer than everyone you know.

Many Peace Corps volunteers eventually come to use the perks provided by working with larger, less grassroots organizations. But I think most of them miss their free-wheeling days in the mud hut, chatting with the village ladies and taking public transport. Sitting in an air-conditioned office with bureaucrats and other Americans is rarely what their passion is.

@Amasia

What do you think about PC becoming, in your opinion, “nearly essential” for working in development? PC does appeal to a certain type of person with a certain amount of freedom and independence, and it seems that limiting development work largely to those people could greatly reduce the ability of development agencies and orgs to be flexible and independent. Also, with the shared experience of PC, there are sure to be some biases that the group has as a whole.

If you don’t have a lot of freedom and independence, you are going to have trouble in this particular field. The guy who can pack up on Tuesday and be in Somalia on Wednesday is going to have a huge career edge over the man with three kids and a hearth condition. It’s not a particularly family-friendly field, nor is it great for introverts, people with small comfort zones, or people with a lot of stuff tying them down. Peace Corps is usually done pretty soon after college. If you’ve managed to get yourself tied down or whatever by then, that’s probably a good sign that development isn’t a great match for you.

In terms of experience, what you get out of Peace Corps simply cannot be found elsewhere. There is no greater body of knowledge in the world about Cameroon (besides the population of Cameroon itself) anywhere near as complete as a Peace Corp’s volunteer. A group of five of us probably knows more about Cameroon than the entire embassy. You know the country and the cultural intimately, from the inside out. The language acquisition, the cultural immersion, the opportunity for leadership…there is not other way to get so much so quickly. It’s the biggest one-stop career boost you can get at that age. The Peace Corps bias is not just nepotism or a buzzword- when people hear you are a Peace Corps volunteer, they know you have a depth of knowledge and skills that is usual for that skill level.

Separately, I know many, many PC volunteers- some with overall positive experiences and some with more neutral- “meh” experiences. Regardless of the outcome of their experience, many chose to enter PC because of a general lack of direction in their lives. They knew they wanted to do something, but were unsure of it. Almost every single person I have known that has done PC went to either a large public university or expensive private school, got a liberal arts degree and then realized that their employment options were minimal. So while there are many things about PC and the experience that I think are positive (of which you’ve spoken), should PC really provide aimless 23-26 year olds a long-term break from decision making?

What would you rather they do? Do you think they ought to be suffering more for their aimlessness, or something?

Looking at the people i went to Cameroon with- one is in Mauritania working on food security, one is in DRC developing a mobile justice program, one started a tech incubator that finds venture capital to fund African tech ventures, one travels around Africa doing micro-finance training, a few work in various US government agencies doing professional level work, a number of them are at various sites in Africa doing fellowships with Catholic Relief Services, a few work for Peace Corps, another does HIV/AIDS prevention, one runs a fair-trade store marketing village handicrafts in the US…almost all of the China cohort is teaching (they recruited a lot of English and Education MAs), often at inner-city public schools…one is running an ESL school, another counsels autistic youth, one does business relations in China, one does education consulting for charter schools…

In other words, if you go in aimless, you probably don’t come out aimless. Peace Corps is the number one training ground for future leaders in development, and provides a lot of skilled personel for various US government agencies. Our country and its programs would be much, much, much less effective without their expertise and leadership.

I do wish Peace Corps could attract a better spread of aimless young people, because it is skewed pretty heavily towards the upper middle class. But no, I don’t see any particular problem that Peace Corps takes bright, educated young people and puts them on a track to success and contributing to society. I wish even more people had access to this!

[even_sven]

@Amasia

Finally, I have heard stories from my RPCV friends about how a large percentage of their cohorts that left early were due to women in PC returning to the US (or other nearby country) to get abortions from consensual encounters. In your estimation, were people on birth control in PC? Did PC help women have access to birth control if they wanted it? That they would not is unimaginable to me.

Birth control is available and heavily promoted by the Peace Corps health office. Additionally, every volunteer is sent into the field with a lifetime’s worth of condoms.

That sounds unusual for me. I think in my four years I’d head of one person going home for a few weeks for an abortion. Normally you will return after an abortion (unless you want to stay home, of course, and complete your service. You only get one shot at that, though, and you have to pay for the actual procedure yourself.) One in the group right after me went home to have a baby, and I know two people who got knocked up with a long-term partner near the end of their service and kept their babies. Anyway, abortions certainly are not a routine thing.

Like any group of people, Peace Corps has X percent flakes, wierdos and idiots. The vast majority of PCVs are not these things, however, and I don’t really think the rate is any higher than you’d find in any similar group of people.

[robert_columbia]

To what extent do receiving countries get to pick and choose Peace Corps workers, or specify the desired attributes of Peace Corps workers?

E.g. can a country say “Give us the list of candidates, we will chose 10.”, “For our Rural Outreach program, we want men between the ages of 20 and 30, no Jews or Hispanics.”, or does the US Government say “You get who we send you, deal with it or you get nothing.”

[Zsofia]

My cousin is a PCV in Mexico - she isn’t in the “traditional Peace Corps” mud hut style setting, though. She’s working with a university in San Luis Potosi. We went to see her a few months ago and were impressed with a) Mexico, which wasn’t what we were expecting, and b) the amazing PCVs we met there, most of whom were gathered in one place for a Peace Corps anniversary 5K in Queretaro. They weren’t at all the stereotypical ‘I don’t know what to do with my life now’ young people, that’s for sure. Extremely driven and accomplished, and much more varied in age and background than I expected. (My cousin isn’t your fresh out of college liberal arts major either - she has her Ph.D. in environmental chemistry.) All women, oddly, although she mentioned several male volunteers in country.

Anyway, is it common for volunteers to stay abroad after their tours? Is it possible to continue working as a free agent with the same organizations? Does everybody come back to America, or is it like teaching English in Japan where a certain percentage of people become permanent expats?

My aunt refused to come with us for a whole host of made-up reasons, which shocked my mom (her sister) and I to no end. Seriously, it wasn’t even a long flight to the Third World, it was the country next door, and your sister and her daughter are going and have done all the work… and you won’t go see your daughter? So, is it usual for family to come visit? (Obviously, it’s much harder to go to Africa or China.) I know we were allowed, and we planned it for a break in the university schedule so she’d be able to travel with us and be our pet interpreter. Did your parents or friends ever come see you? What about the other volunteers you knew?

[even_sven]

@robert_columbia

To what extent do receiving countries get to pick and choose Peace Corps workers, or specify the desired attributes of Peace Corps workers?

E.g. can a country say “Give us the list of candidates, we will chose 10.”, “For our Rural Outreach program, we want men between the ages of 20 and 30, no Jews or Hispanics.”, or does the US Government say “You get who we send you, deal with it or you get nothing.”

It really depends on the program. I’m pretty sure really high-level programs, like China and Mexico, get first pick of the more skilled volunteers, since their needs are so more specialized. China, for example, gets people with MAs or extensive teaching experience.

Other programs get a little less sway. If you are sending someone to a remote village to, say, teach basic sanitation, you probably don’t need an engineer. I think for most programs, they have to accept who they are offered.

@Zsofia

Anyway, is it common for volunteers to stay abroad after their tours? Is it possible to continue working as a free agent with the same organizations? Does everybody come back to America, or is it like teaching English in Japan where a certain percentage of people become permanent expats?

My aunt refused to come with us for a whole host of made-up reasons, which shocked my mom (her sister) and I to no end. Seriously, it wasn’t even a long flight to the Third World, it was the country next door, and your sister and her daughter are going and have done all the work… and you won’t go see your daughter? So, is it usual for family to come visit? (Obviously, it’s much harder to go to Africa or China.) I know we were allowed, and we planned it for a break in the university schedule so she’d be able to travel with us and be our pet interpreter. Did your parents or friends ever come see you? What about the other volunteers you knew?

A lot of China volunteers stick around, because it’s pretty easy to get a lucrative job in China if you are already there. In places like Cameroon, there just aren’t any jobs for foreigners. Now and then someone would find a special post at the embassy or something like that, but it was tough to stick around. I’m not sure about other countries- it probably varies a lot.

I think most people have at least one family member visit. My mom came to Cameroon for a month, and to China for a month. It was so good to have her there- when you get back, it’s tough because you’ve had this huge experience that most people don’t understand and really don’t care about. When you have a family member visit, you have at least one person who can relate.

It can be tough on the parents. For most parents coming to Cameroon, it wasn’t a pleasant experience. They get uncomfortable with stuff like open-air slaughterhouses (one person’s parents refused to eat for a week!), riding motorcycles and packed-full busses, and dealing with the very hot weather. My mom was a champ, though, and she ended up having a lot of fun. She especially enjoyed seeing me teach, and seeing me speak in these crazy languages. I think it’s just something she never imagined seeing me do, and she was pretty proud.