April 2009 – Peace Corps Worldwide

All Those Sad Goodbyes

Apr 30 2009

The 25th Anniversary Conference mostly took place on the Washington D.C. Mall where 5,000 + gathered under the largest tent ever raised at the foot of the Capitol Dome and adjacent to the Air and Space Museum. The Mall was the brainchild of Bill Carey (India 1968-69) the executive director of the conference. The late talented writer David Schickele (Nigeria 1961-63) wrote, “The tent was like the Peace Corps I was part of. Its muggy windless flaps said something about heat and hard work and improvisation, its massive nonchalance the perfect protection for the ideas being hatched beneath it.” Over 70% of those at the conference had served in the first 10 years of the Peace Corps. Almost 45% had served in just 10 of the 82 countries represented at the conference. Brazil, Colombia, Ethiopia, India, Liberia, Malaysia, Nigeria, Philippines, Thailand and Turkey. People had come from all 50 states and 12 other countries. Doug . . .

The Pleasure Of Small Presses

Apr 30 2009

Sometimes (many times) it pays to be published by a small press. Take Lauri Anderson (Nigeria 1965-67) His novel, Hunting Hemingway’s Trout was first published by the well known New York publisher, Athenaeum. But since that edition came and went, he has been published by the small Minnesota press, North Star. They are a legitimate small press who do not give advances but do pay royalties. They also keep all of his books in print and have gone back to print with his most popular books. Several of his books are used in literature classes at various universities and two, those set in Misery Bay, were woven into a film that was shown on prime-time TV in Finland. Many of his characters are Finnish because Michigan’s Upper Peninsula is full of Finns and the town where he grew up in northern Maine also had a lot of Finns, including his father. As Laurie writes, “My writing career has been disappointing monetarily but gratifying in that . . .

Tony Zurlo (Nigeria 1962-64) New Collection of Poems

Apr 30 2009

In his review in the San Antonio Express, Roberto Bonazzi writes of Tony Zurlo (Nigeria 1962–64) new collection of poems, The Mind Dancing: “These poems about China make it clear that he [Zurio] is neither Western-centric nor egocentric, and that he has remained open to the ancient wisdom of the East.” Tony’s first poem is “Dao: The Elusive One” who “consumes scholars / in missions of the mind, / convinced they can analyze / and split it like an atom, / attracts philosophers / like gravity, confident / they will tame it with syllogisms and logic, / lures pilgrims to mountain tops, / guided by monks who promise / paradise to all who yield / to the scripture of bliss.” Not all of the poems are brief Zen-like lyrics; there are also longer discursive poems with witty turns and several love poems for his Chinese wife, artist Vivian Lu, who provides a . . .

Talking About 'Honor Killing' With RPCV Ellen R. Sheeley

Apr 30 2009

Ellen R. Sheeley was an early business PCV in Western Samoa from 1983 to 1985. Finishing her tour, she traveled home very slowly, circling the globe. Years later as a successful businesswoman, she happened to watch a television newscast that impassioned her. Ellen was kind enough to grant an electronic interview about her book Reclaiming Honor in Jordan: A National Public Opinion Survey On “Honor” Killings. She was interviewed by Lawrence F. Lihosit (Honduras 1975-77) a city planner who publishes books (travel & poetry) as a hobby. [Larry:] What is an honor killing? [Ellen:] “Honor” killing is the murder of family for actual or perceived immoral sexual behavior. It is a misguided attempt to restore family honor. Immoral behavior could be rape (in which case the rape victim is murdered), extramarital or premarital intercourse, or even flirtation. “Honor” killing is believed to have its origins in misinterpretations of pre-Islamic Arab . . .

Reflections on the Peace Corps

Apr 29 2009

Alan Guskin, as most people know, was one of the key influences in the creation of the Peace Corps and went from the University of Michigan to Thailand with the first group of PCVs. He has had a long career in education and is currently the President Emeritus of Antioch University, where he was President and then Chancellor from 1985-97. This is a short except from his essay, A Way of Being in the World: Reflections on the Peace Corps 30 Years Later. It was published in the The Antiochian in the Fall of 1991. It is republished here with Alan’s permission. . . . The Peace Corps began in a light drizzle at 2 a.m. in the morning on Oct. 14, 1960, near the end of a tumultuous presidential campaign. John Kennedy won the election a few weeks later, the hopes of a new generation of the 1960s began . . .

The Ugly Peace Corps Volunteer

Apr 29 2009

In 1958 came The Ugly Americanby William Lederer and Eugene J. Burdick. This book went through fifty-five printings in two years and was a direct motivation in creating the Peace Corps, as Elizabeth Cobbs Hoffman points out in her history of the Peace Corps, All You Need Is Love. In a “Factual Epilogue” to the novel, Lederer and Burdick lay out the basic philosophy and modus operandi of what would later be the Peace Corps. Writing about how America should “help” developing countries, the authors declare: We do not need the horde of 1,500,000 Americans – mostly amateurs – who are now working for the United States overseas. What we need is a small force of well-trained, well-chosen, hard-working, and dedicated professionals. They must be willing to risk their comforts and – in some cases – their health. They must go equipped to apply a positive policy promulgated by . . .

Review Of The Disappearance

Apr 28 2009

The Disappearance by RPCV Efrem Sigel came out several months ago from The Permanent Press, a company that had published a number of fine Peace Corps books. It is reviewed here by Leita Kaldi Davis who worked with Roma (Gypsies) for fifteen years before she became a Peace Corps Volunteer in Senegal. The Disappearance by Efrem Sigel (Ivory Coast 1965–67) Permanent Press February 2009 264 pages $28.00 Reviewed by Leita Kaldi Davis (Senegal 1993–96) Joshua and Nathalie Sandler’s 14-year old son, Daniel, disappears one day from their summer home in a quiet New England town where Joshua is involved in the development of an upscale resort that earns him enemies among local citizens who view them as New York outsiders. Anonymous threats result in the poisoning of Joshua’s partner’s dog and Joshua, sensing the town’s secrets and mysteries, suspects that his son’s disappearance might be a similar sinister warning. What he . . .

The New Peace Corps Director???

Apr 28 2009

Insiders in D.C. are telling me that Tony Patrick Hall, the former Democrat Congressman and PCV from Ohio, is on the short list to be the next Peace Corps Director. Tony recently served as the ambassador to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations and chief of the U.S. mission to the U.N. Agencies in Rome. Hall, I’m told, has expressed ‘interest’ in the position. Also lobbying for the job is the former Regional Manager of the Peace Corps Recruitment Office in Boston. Not a PCV, it is unlikely that he will get the appointment.

RPCV Mike Meyer Talks At The New York Asia Society

Apr 28 2009

Mike Meyer (China 1995-97) will be talking about The Last Days of Old Beijing — May 7th 6:30 – 8:00 pm at the New York Asia Society and Museum: 725 Park Avenue, New York (Cost: $7 students and members, $10 nonmembers) Mike Meyer after his Peace Corps tour lived — as no other Westerner has — in a shared courtyard home in Beijing’s oldest neighborhood, Dazhalan, on one of its famed hutong (lanes). There he volunteered to teach English at the local grade school and immersed himself in the community, recording with affection the life stories of the Widow, who shares his courtyard; co-teacher Miss Zhu and student Little Liu; and the migrants Recycler Wang and Soldier Liu; among the many others who, despite great differences in age and profession, make up the fabric of this unique neighborhood. Their bond is rapidly being torn, however, by forced evictions as century-old houses and . . .

RPCV Writers In The NYTIMES Book Section

Apr 28 2009

You might have seen the Book Section of The New York Times on Sunday, April 26, 2009. There was an essay by Tom Bissell (Uzbekistan 1996-97) on the writer David Foster Wallace. The essay was about a book coming out from Little, Brown, a transcript of the 2005 Kenyon commencement address given by Wallace. What’s interesting to me is that within the last month two of these back-of-the-magazine essays have been written by RPCVs. Mike Meyer (China 1995-97), who wrote The Last Days of Old Beijing, had an essay on the rise (and fall) of book advances a couple weeks back. Meyer, I know, is scheduled to publish another essay in the Book Section of the Times in the next few weeks. Perhaps we should just plot on how we might take over this pages for our own purposes.

Before MorePeaceCorps There Was More Peace Corps!

Apr 27 2009

Now that there is talk and even some planning by the outgoing administration for a 50th reunion, I have notes from the 25th Anniversary Conference that was executed by the RPCVs of Washington, D.C. and a coalition of other groups, all chaired by Roger Landrum, (Nigeria 1961-63) and a guy name Doug Siglin (Zaire 1979-81) who was one smart organizer and might have been at one time the Director of the National Council of Returned Peace Corps Volunteers, (as the NPCA was then ungainly called) if the Board of Directors had had any sense. As Roger told the crowd of RPCVs gathered under the huge tent on the Washington Mall, “We wanted to have this national anniversary conference in Washington to bring as many alumni together as possible. We told the Peace Corps that we were going to have some fun but we were not going to burn down the . . .

The Original: The First PCVs

Apr 26 2009

Credit must be given to those Volunteers who joined the Peace Corps in the early Sixties. They were all kids who had come of age in the final years of the Fifties, schooled in novels like Sloan Wilson, The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit, published in 1955, and the non-fiction The Organization Man, written by William H. Whyte and published in 1956. These books were underscored by Ayn Rand’s philosophy as articulated in her novel Atlas Shrugged, published in 1957. Every man, philosophized Rand, was an end in himself. He must work for rational self-interest, neither sacrificing himself to others nor sacrificing others to himself. None of us knew in the winter of 1961 if joining the Peace Corps would mark us for life, like being a member of the Communist Party, or worse, a member of the Republican Party (just kidding!). The real heroes were the “Originals,” those PCVS . . .

Broken English — a song

Apr 26 2009

Since 1992 Peace Corps Writers has annually recognized the outstanding writing of Peace Corps Volunteers both returned and still in service. One of the awards is the Peace Corps Experience Award given to the writer of a short piece that best captures the experience of being a Peace Corps Volunteer. We are sharing the past Peace Corps Experience Award winners with our Peace Corps Worldwide readers. In 1993 the winner was a song by Greg Horn. Broken English — a song by Greg Horn (Papua New Guinea 1991-92) Now your friends have all gone and the parlor is empty ‘cept for me in this chair with a book full of words and your thoughts and your deeds, they all come back to claim you ’cause no one’s understood anything they just heard. So you try to explain in your broken English ’bout the rivers of pain that keep crossing your . . .

Books That Bred [and Explain] the Peace Corps

Apr 24 2009

During the 1950s, two social and political impulses swept across the United States. One impulse that characterized the decade was detailed in two best-selling books of the times, the 1955 novel by Sloan Wilson, The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit, and the non-fiction The Organization Man, written by William H. Whyte and published in 1956. These books looked at the “American way of life” and how men got ahead on the job and in society. Both are bleak looks at the mores of the corporate world. These books were underscored by Ayn Rand’s philosophy as articulated in such novels as Atlas Shrugged, published in 1957. Every man, philosophized Rand, was an end in himself. He must work for rational self-interest, neither sacrificing himself to others nor sacrificing others to himself. Then in 1958 came a second impulse first expressed in the novel The Ugly American by William Lederer and . . .

Discovering a New RPCV Writer

Apr 23 2009

The nice thing about this blog is that I get word of new RPCV writers. Here is a writer who has been under the radar of PeaceCorpsWriters: John Shannon (Malawi 1968-71). John has written nine “Jack Liffey” mysteries and four other novels, including Courage, the story of a disillusioned American Communist who goes to Africa to help foment a revolution. This novel came out of his Peace Corps experience and left him a “prohibited immigrant” in Malawi for over a decade. His 11 California mysteries are about Jack Liffey “a decent guy, as compassionate as he is brave. His city is greater LA, his turf the forgotten suburbs, run-down neighborhoods and volatile ethnic communities. “Jack Liffey understands loss. First he lost his job in the aerospace industry, then he lost his wife and daughter. All he really has left is his ability to track down missing children, and his willingness to elbow his . . .

Archive - April 2009