September 2022 – Page 3 – Peace Corps Worldwide

Founder and Executive Director of HPP — Martha Ryan (Ethiopia)

Sep 08 2022

“I wanted to make the world better. That’s what we’re supposed to do, right?” Ask Martha Ryan (Ethiopia 1973-75), who says Peace Corps Ethiopia put her on her path. Face-to-face with dire need Martha returned home to the Bay Area after her tour as a PCV in Ethiopia. She earned a nursing degree, and took a job at San Francisco General Hospital, and worked in intensive care. But then she found herself pulled back to Africa, where she’s cared for refugees fleeing civil war in camps in Sudan and Somalia, and travelled with a team of nurses to Uganda. But short-term trips weren’t enough. After a few weeks or months back in the U.S., Martha longed to return to Africa to live. It was where, she believed, she could most be of service — a value that was ingrained in her while at the University of San Francisc0 . . .

Review — A FIVE FINGER FEAST by Tim Suchsland (Kazakhstan)

Sep 07 2022

A Five Finger Feast: Two Years in Kazakhstan, Lessons from the Peace Corps by Tim Suchsland (Kazakhstan 2007–09), author and illustrator Peace Corps Writers, May 2022 395 pages $19.99 (paperback) Reviewed by Philip Montgomery (Kazakhstan 2007–09) • Travel is one of the greatest educators in life. Even more educational — worldview shaping even — is living in a country that is not your own, understanding what it means to be the outsider, the guest, the stranger. In this sense, all travel is not equal. Some journeys break up the monotony of everyday life, while others leave immense, immeasurable impacts on the sojourner, the kinds of experience that shape us more completely. Tim Suchsland’s A Five Finger Feast is an account of one such journey. In this memoir, Suchsland takes the reader along with him through his 2-year adventure of travel, growth, and discovery. Rather than presenting a superficial touristy version . . .

When Christ Stopped At Eboli

Sep 07 2022

by John Coyne (Ethiopia 1962-64) (First published in Dec 13 2009) The other weekend when visiting a small used bookstore appropriately named the BookBarn in rural Columbia County in upstate New York, several miles from where we have a weekend home, I spotted on a shelf in this low ceiling cluttered store a copy of Carlo Levi’s Christ Stopped At Eboli. It is a book that I haven’t seen in some forty plus years, in fact since I was a Peace Corps Volunteer in Ethiopia. This book was one of appropriately 75 paperbacks that Sarge Shriver and the first administration of the Peace Corps put together in a portable ‘booklocker’ for Volunteers. The books were to be read and left in country, to become seeds for new libraries in the developing world where we were serving. The used copy I found in the Bookbarn was a later edition, a TIME Reading Program Special Edition, first published in . . .

Marian Haley Beil Interviewed on E&ERPCV September Virtual Event

Sep 05 2022

Peace Corps Ethiopia & Eritrea Through The Years Marian Haley Beil Debre Berhan 1962-1964 The Ethiopia & Eritrea Returned Peace Corps Volunteer Board are pleased to announce our September Virtual Event featuring Marian Haley Beil, who was among the first volunteers in Ethiopia. Save the date: Wednesday, September 14, 2022 8:00 PM ET / 5:00 PM PT Marian Haley Beil was born and raised in Western Pennsylvania, where she received a BA in math from a small Catholic girls college. She went to the University of Maryland for one year to study math, and it was there, in early 1962, that she had the great idea… to volunteer for the Peace Corps. By midsummer, she was in a training program with 324 others at Georgetown University to be a math teacher in Ethiopia. Since returning to the USA, she has worked tirelessly for the returned volunteers of Ethiopia and Eritrea. She . . .

Peace Corps Celebrated The 60th Anniversary In Nepal

Sep 04 2022

Peace Corps Celebrated The 60th anniversary of the first group of volunteers arrived in Kathmandu According to the U.S. Embassy FaceBook Page, this month, the Peace Corps is celebrating the 60th anniversary of the first group of Volunteers’ arrival in Kathmandu in September 1962. Since then, thousands of Americans and Nepalis have worked together to create lasting change and achieve the Peace Corps mission – to promote world peace and friendship. Congratulations Peace Corps on this historic anniversary! “Happy Anniversary Peace Corps! 60 yrs ago, Nepali families & communities welcomed the first Peace Corps Volunteers (PCVs) where they formed lasting bonds. Wherever I go I hear stories of PCVs & the good they brought to their communities. Do you have a story to share?,” tweets U.S. Ambassador to Nepal Randy Berry.

11 New books by Peace Corps writers | July–August 2022

Sep 02 2022

To purchase any of these books from Amazon.com — CLICK on the book cover, the bold book title, or the publishing format you would like — and Peace Corps Worldwide, an Amazon Associate, will receive a small remittance from your purchase that will help support the site and the annual Peace Corps Writers awards. We include a brief description for each of the books listed here in hopes of encouraging readers to order a book and/or to VOLUNTEER TO REVIEW IT. See a book you’d like to review for Peace Corps Worldwide? Send a note to Marian at marian@haleybeil.com, and she will send you a free copy along with a few instructions. In addition to the books listed below, I have on my shelf a number of other books whose authors would love for you to review. Go to Books Available for Review to see what is on that shelf. Please, please join in our Third . . .

Much Cause for Worry

Sep 02 2022

A Clear-Eyed Look at Africa by Mark G. Wentling Honduras 1967-69, Togo 1970-73 Foreign Service Journal September 2022 • It is time to put sentiment aside and look clearly at Africa through an objective lens, this Senior Foreign Service officer asserts. After working and living in every corner of the continent and visiting its 54 countries over the last 50 years, I cannot help but worry about Africa’s future, and I want to spell out why. I apologize in advance to all my African friends. Though this article may come across as being too negative, I believe we need a dose of realism. It is time to put sentiments aside and look clearly at Africa through an objective lens, without exaggerating its future promise. There is no question that peace, stability and good leadership are essential to the advancement of any country. Today the opposite exists in most African countries, . . .

Archive - September 2022