June 2024 – Page 3 – Peace Corps Worldwide

LEAP by Brent Love (Armenia)

Jun 11 2024

A new book — Leap A Memoir by Brent Love (Armenia 2009-11) Manuscripts Press June 2024 452 pages $14.99 (paperback); 14.99 (Kindle); $37.99 (Hardcover) • • • In a small Texas town, Brent comes out to his parents, and on that night his place in the world cracks wide open. Unmoored from his family but unwilling to give up on his dream, Brent enters the Peace Corps with the incredible task of navigating an unfamiliar land, a new language, and a new identity as a gay man in post-Soviet Armenia. As he grapples with a religious past and a queer future, Brent finds himself immersed in a culture he’d never imagined. He moves in with Armenian families, celebrates his first Nor Tari, hunts mushrooms in the mountain mists, and dances in Yerevan at his first gay bar, all while hoping for and trying to find romance, even love. When his Peace . . .

STICKY RICE MAGAZINE (Thailand)

Jun 10 2024

STICKY RICE Chaa Thai is a podcast spilling the tea on Peace Corps volunteer life in Thailand! Each episode, hosts Dano Nissen and Morgan Shupsky interview a current Peace Corps volunteer in Thailand and do a deep dive on their experience at their host site. The tea is that there are as many examples of what service is like for a volunteer in Thailand as there are volunteers — join us as we get a taste! Coming off our long and lazy summer break we’ve got a chaotic episode with a chaotic volunteer – Kaleb! When he’s not in Bangkok, Kaleb is teaching English in Nakhon Si Thammarat and this is actually his second go around in Thailand, as he was also a victim of group 132’s COVID evacuation. We cover how volunteers spend all the free time and days off we have, Thai standardized testing, managing a 6-month long . . .

CorpsAfrica Expands to South Africa

Jun 08 2024

RPCVs in the news — WASHINGTON, DC, USA, June 5, 2024 CorpsAfrica is expanding its global presence by launching volunteer programs in South Africa, the organization announced this week. Founded in 2011 by former Peace Corps Volunteer Liz Fanning (Morocco 1993-95) CorpsAfrica recruits and trains educated African youth as volunteers to live and work in rural, under-resourced communities in their own countries. Operating on the core belief that African youth are the Continent’s greatest resource, the organization places volunteers in remote communities for up to one year, to facilitate small-scale, high-impact projects that are identified by the local community, many of which are related to health, economic empowerment, and climate change. Currently, CorpsAfrica has over 900 volunteers in ten African countries, with plans to eventually expand to all 54 African nations. Kelo Kubu, curator of TEDx Johannesburg, has been appointed as CorpsAfrica’s Country Director in South Africa. Kubu served as . . .

BACKYARD RACE HORSE by Janet Del Castillo (Colombia)

Jun 06 2024

Backyard Race Horse by Janet Del Castillo (Colombia 1964-66) Prediction Publication 520 pages April 2013 $40.00 (Paperback) From training horses at the farm to hauling livestock and equipment to the race track, this hands-on manual covers everything a competent horse owner needs to know to get involved in horse racing. Extensive discussions examine how to exercise horses, keep a horse sound, and prepare for the race. Specifics on monitoring horses’ legs, dispensing medication, and track personnel round out this in-depth manual. Included is a directory of thoroughbred racetracks and organizations. • • • Still practicing the Peace Corps Interviewed by Thomas R. Oldt Amidst our dreadful political morass, when we can’t even seem to agree on what it means to be an American, the whole notion of idealism is seen by many as naïve if not downright suspect. That is one of the many . . .

New Peace Corps Team Lands in Moldova

Jun 05 2024

New Peace Corps Team Lands in Moldova to Boost English Education The 36th group of Peace Corps volunteers from the United States has arrived in Moldova. Twenty-three volunteers landed today at Chișinău International Airport. Prior to commencing their service, the volunteers will undergo a ten-week training program. This program will focus on Romanian language acquisition, Moldovan culture immersion, and technical skill development. Following the training, the volunteers will be deployed to schools, town halls, and community centres throughout Moldova. The Peace Corps program was first established in Moldova by the Chișinău government in 1993. The program’s primary objective is to enhance the English language teaching capabilities of Moldovan educators within the existing educational framework.

Peace Corps Volunteers donate Korean art collection worth $250,000

Jun 04 2024

Thanks for the ‘heads up’ from Karl Drobnic (Ethiopia, 1966-68) An American couple who came to Korea in 1969 to work as Peace Corps volunteers have donated the art they collected during their six years here. The 140 items donated last year were valued at a quarter of a million dollars, they said. At first, their family tried to talk the lively 70-somethings out of giving away such a large amount of their money. “But it’s money we never really had,” Gary Mintier remarked when sharing their story. Gary and his wife Mary Ann had done most of their art shopping in what they referred to as “Mary’s Alley,” an old term for central Seoul’s Insa-dong, which has been known for housing a market selling art and antiques. Most of the art they purchased was priced very cheaply, as Korea was a poor country in those days, and centuries-old . . .

Peace Corps names UW-Madison its No. 1 volunteer-producing university for 2023

Jun 03 2024

Community health and teaching by the ocean UW-Madison graduates thrive in Peace Corps BY BEATRICE LAWRENCE JUNE 3, 2024 One recent University of Wisconsin-Madison graduate is in Kenya learning about community-based health care to help pregnant people and young children. Another is in a small Costa Rican mountain community helping students in what she described as, “The hardest job you’ll ever love.” A third is teaching sixth graders in South America near the shores of the Atlantic Ocean. All of these recent graduates joined the Peace Corps, which can be a pretty common path for students leaving UW-Madison. In April, the Peace Corps announced that UW-Madison was its No. 1 volunteer-producing university for 2023. Since President John F. Kennedy created the Peace Corps in 1961, more than 2,700 volunteers have come from UW-Madison. Three of those volunteers joined WPR’s “Wisconsin Today” from across the world to . . .

RPCV Leo Cecchini (Ethiopia) writes “Why Support Trump”

Jun 02 2024

— First Published on our site in June 2016 The Peace Corps is always accused of being overrun with ‘bleeding heart liberals” since the first days of the agency when Eisenhower declared the agency was a “juvenile experiment,” and Richard Nixon said it was another form of “draft evasion.” This was when the Daughters of the American Revolution warned of a “yearly drain” of “brains and brawn”…for the benefit of backward, underdeveloped countries.” However, the following year, Time magazine declared in a cover story that the Peace Corps was “the greatest single success the Kennedy administration had produced.” Still we had many good Americans who hated the agency. Here in this short piece, Leo Cecchini (Ethiopia 1962-64) wrote for our site back in June 2016. Leo is a good friend and a very good writer. He wrote a wonderful piece about how his father deserted the Italian army during the North African . . .

Archive - June 2024