The Third Goal: Bringing It All Back Home by Karl Drobnic (Ethiopia)
“There’s no success like failure and failure’s no success at all.” Bob Dylan • I ignored the summons the draft board sent to my remote Ethiopian village midway through my second year of Peace Corps service, and dropped its greetings down the shintabet (the long-drop) hole, sending it to fester with the rest of the used toilet tissue. And I did not inform the Peace Corps staff in Addis Ababa that I had been drafted. The police curfew that kept Goba locked down while Haile Selassie’s troops fought pitched battles with rebel shifta in the nearby mountains had finally lifted, the unending rainy season that hijacked two consecutive dry seasons had finally abated, and after eighteen months of mud and fear, I could finally hike and ride in the gorgeous Bale Province countryside. But end of service was near. In 1968, the Viet Cong’s Tet Offensive had driven America . . .
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Ali, I remember you, and your group, very well. Libya has been through so much since that time, and I've…