Archive - 2021

  The Life of an African Peace Corps Child by Chia Tasah (Kom, Cameroon) Pageturner Press and Media 252 pages March 2021  $12.99 Paperback; $2.99  Kindle   My autobiography recounts my life from 1980 as an African Peace Corps child until I became a US citizen in 2012. I lived a full life as a needy child from a poverty-stricken nuclear family of nine and believe I have something fascinating to share with the world. Despite my pennilessness, I made great strides in my endeavors and thrived. I call myself a Peace Corps child of Africa because American Peace Corps Volunteers, with benevolent and philanthropic gestures, encouraged my growth into an authentic adult. Mr. Alan Lakomski (Cameroon 1985-86) whisked me away from my job as bartender and manager of a confidential decadent brothel at Club 185 Njinikom at the age of fourteen, and sent me to secondary school. He returned to . . .

In 1966 a UN advisor was named to Ethiopia to help establish game reserves and, in general, take on environmental issues for the Emperor. In early 1967, as I was planning my final days in Ethiopia, this UN gentleman asked me if I would like to go on a trip to Lake Rudolf and from Lake Rudolf up the Omo River to one of the new game reserves. It sounded like a great adventure and I signed on. The story was that there was a fishing boat in a western small port of the lake which had been owned by the Duke of Gloucester (I think) who was giving it to the emperor for use in one of his game reserves. We flew to Nairobi and then took a small chartered flight to the western shores of Lake Rudolf. When we arrived we joined the other gentleman slated for the . . .

Thanks for the heads up from Steven Saum (Ukraine 1994-96)  at the NPCA —  All eleven living former Peace Corps agency directors have signed on to a letter to President Biden with a ringing message: “Now is the right time for the Peace Corps to build back better than it ever was before.” Read the entire letter to POTUS from the former directors below. • April 26, 2021 President Joseph R. Biden The White House 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW Washington, DC 20500 Dear President Biden, We write to you today as a bipartisan, unified group of former directors of the Peace Corps to express our full support for a revitalized Peace Corps, one that advances our nation’s critical foreign policy goal of world peace through international cooperation and service. We believe that now is the right time for the Peace Corps to build back better than it ever was before. We therefore . . .

by Steve Kaffen (Russia 1994–96) The United States has, to-date, missed a unique opportunity to provide critically urgent medical assistance to the world’s most populous democracy, and solidify our relationship with an important regional ally · India. Imagine a “Berlin airlift” by the U.S. and E.U. of vaccines, oxygen, beds, makeshift shelters and treatment centers (such as DOD provided to Ebola-stricken West Africa). This mobilization should have been initiated a week ago, and it is still possible. The outreach ideally should be regional and include its neighbors Pakistan and Bangladesh, which are in similar dire circumstances. India was an important Peace Corps “pioneer” country from 1961 to 1975, and its present demographics of a young population (median age under 30) and largely rural subsistence make it ideal for Peace Corps’ future return with programs geared to health, agriculture, the environment, and specialized education. The agency might be able to obtain . . .

Thanks for the ‘heads up’ from Joanne Roll (Colombia 1963-65)   This video is brief but comprehensive.   The “professional” speaker is Meagan Kallman, who wrote the book on the Death of Idealism: Development and Anti-Politics in the Peace Corps. She wants to change Peace Corps into a cultural exchange program. She “offered the services of her university” to “help” Peace Corps transition.  She is now  Rhode Island State Senator.

    Those of us who were around when the agency was created know why and how it was. Peace Corps was a hope and a vision for the developing world. We could help poorer nations of the world. And we did. The Peace Corps changed the lives of many host country nationals and it also changed our lives. Today, 60 years after the first PCVs went overseas, we have another world with new needs. One of those needs is the climate all of us are living with. It is a problem we have wherever we live in the world. President Biden has recently spoken about what must be done here at home. What he hasn’t done is link today’s Peace Corps Volunteers with the needs for  Climate Change in the developing world. This is the role, many of us think, that should be a new role for Volunteers in . . .

An in-depth work of investigative journalism has shone light on a horrific problem. There are steps we can take now.” A statement from the Chair of the Board of Directors of National Peace Corps Association. By Maricarmen Smith-Martinez Today USA Today published an in-depth investigative piece chronicling the experiences of multiple women who have been victims of sexual assault while serving as Peace Corps Volunteers. Their stories are devastating. And the statistics cited in the article about the prevalence of sexual assault are profoundly disturbing. We owe it to these women to read their stories — and to truly hear what they are saying. Those of us who have been victims of sexual assault know firsthand that it takes immense courage to come forward, especially given how the initial reports of these women were handled. And let us be unequivocal: There must be zero tolerance when it comes to sexual . . .