Marian Haley Beil – Page 5 – Peace Corps Worldwide

Talking with Jerry Redfield (Ecuador) about WHILE I WAS OUT

Aug 17 2022

Two Years That Changed America A Peace Corps Memoir Jerry, what was your educational background, and did it help you as a PCV? My undergraduate education at the University of Wisconsin, Madison aided me somewhat, as I was a political science major with an emphasis on Latin American Studies. Along with three years of Spanish it gave me at least an understanding of, and foundation for, my Peace Corps experience. However, it did not prepare me for some of the many cultural and personal conditions I was to encounter. Tell about your Peace Corps experience. I served in the Peace Corps in Ecuador on a School Construction and Community Development Program. Our group was designated Ecuador V, and served from July of 1963 to July of 1965. I served in three locations, Cangonamá, Catamayo, and Gonzanamá all in the southernmost province of the country, Loja. I spent most . . .

Review — THE COLOR OF THE ELEPHANT by Christine Herbert (Zambia)

Aug 15 2022

The Color of the Elephant: Memoir of a Muzungu Christine Herbert (Zambia 2004–06) GenZ Publishing January 2022 $15.99 (paperback), $5.99 (Kindle) Reviewed by Rebecca M. Zornow (eSwatini 2011–13) • I visited the landlocked country of Zambia from the landlocked country of eSwatini, practically neighbors. As a Peace Corps Volunteer on leave, I wished for more than the cursory understanding of Zambian culture, even more than the quick mist of the thunderous Victoria Falls. But as a Volunteer from another country with much to see, I wouldn’t get that chance until reading Christine Herbert’s memoir, The Color of the Elephant. Christine arrives in Zambia in 2004 and quickly learns to eat nshima (cornmeal porridge) and wear citenge (sarong) but wonders throughout training if she’ll be enough to live up to the experience of two years making a difference in the remote countryside. On a trainee outing with an established Volunteer, Christine wonders, . . .

THE DELCO YEARS by Bill Owens (Jamaica)

Aug 12 2022

Bill Owens has written an irreverent, funny dystopian novel about a pandemic mitigated by drinking unpasteurized beer. Rich with illustrations by Italian Illustrator Francesca Cosanti, this book is a unique interactive experience. THE DELCO YEARS is the story of how a community of craft beer drinkers flourish and survive after a dystopian event. Hunting and gathering would be at Costco, Target, Home Depot, and CVS. Eventually, they would barter wine for salt, sugar, flour, and hay to feed the horses and cows. From the unhappy Bobby releasing the pandemic to the world in revenge for the televangelists’ sins to the various members of the Craft Beer community who thrive in Livermore Valley and beyond, THE DELCO YEARS is a darkly whimsical romp. See more at THE DELCO YEARS website here: delcoyears.com. The Delco Years: A Dystopian Novel Bill Owens (Jamaica 1964–66), Francesca Cosanti (Illustrator) Delco Years Publishing April 2022 $32.85 (paperback), $42.58 (hardcover) Bill Owens Biography Bill Owens was born on September 25, . . .

DEAR MICHELLE, LETTERS FROM AN OLD FRIEND IN A NEW LIFE by Samuel Gerard (Ukraine)

Aug 07 2022

by Samuel Gerard (Ukraine 2018–20) (pen name of Samuel Gerard Luebbers) Having had the chance to reflect on my Peace Corps experiences, and knowing how fickle memory can be, I felt the necessity to write them down. What became of this project was a meandering epistolary, one which I both mentally dedicated and fictionally addressed to an old friend, Michelle. We met a lifetime ago on the roof of my college freshmen dorm. We shared a long conversation then, and several others afterwards. We always imagined, to ourselves, that we would be together. I promised her that when I was ready to commit to someone, it would be her. Life has a way of getting in the way, though. I learned this alongside college’s so many other lessons. In ultimate testament to life’s effect on well-laid plans, soon after Michelle and I began dating, I received my invitation to . . .

The Volunteer Who Used His Corporate Positions in Service to Others — Bob Haas (Ivory Coast)

Aug 05 2022

by Jeremiah Norris (Colombia 1963-65) Robert (Bob) Haas, Peace Corps Volunteer, Ivory Coast, 1964-66, subsequently served as the Chairman of Levi Strauss & Co. He is the son of Walter A. Strauss, and the great-great-grandnephew of the company’s founder, Levi Strauss. Bob received a BA degree from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1964, and a MA from Harvard Graduate School of Business in 1968. H was a White House Fellow from 1968 to 1969. He joined Levi Strauss in 1973 and went on to serve others in a variety of corporate roles. Bob was elected to the Board of Directors in 1979, then as President and CEO in 1984, serving until he stepped down in 1999. He became Chairman of the Board in 1989 and retired from the Board in 2014. Under his leadership, Levi Strauss & Company carried out the company’s engagement in corporate social responsibility; . . .

Review — MY SADDEST PLEASURES by Mark Walker (Guatemala)

Aug 05 2022

My Saddest Pleasures: 50 Years on the Road: Part of the Yin and Yang of Travel Series by Mark D. Walker (Guatemala 1971–73) Cyberwit.net May 2022 63 pages $15.00 (paperback) Review by: D.W. Jefferson (El Salvador 1974–76; Costa Rica 1976–77) • This book is part of the author’s “Yin and Yang of Travel” series of ten essays, which was inspired by Paul Theroux’s (Malawi 1963–65) The Tao of Travel: Enlightenments from Lives on the Road Mr. Walker has spent over 50 years traveling in many countries around the world, first as a Peace Corps volunteer, and later as a professional fund raiser for various nonprofit organizations or NGOs. The book is an easy read. Walker writes in a conversational style, and it is only 63 pages. It is primarily a journal of his travels alone, with his family, and leading trips for donors to NGOs he worked for. His travel has . . .

Review — ASK NOT WHAT YOUR COUNTRY CAN DO FOR YOU by Carl Stephani (Colombia)

Jul 30 2022

Ask Not What Your Country Can Do For You …: Peace Corps Remembered – Bogota 1962–64 by Carl Stephani (Colombia 1962–64) Independently published June 2022 237 pages $6.95 (paperback) Reviewed by John Chromy (India 1963–65) • Our 1960s Peace Corps colleague Carl Stephani has assembled a very interesting and readable screed that for first decade PCVs will bring back many memories, and for post-1970 PCVs. Ask Not . . . provides an interesting view of Peace Corps in the “Olden Days” The days when Peace Corps training included 2-3 months at a US University, a month of outward bound hiking/mountain climbing/river swimming and a week or two in the cross-cultural setting of a poverty ridden neighborhood, be it urban slum or rural Appalachia, migrant stream camp or Native American reservation. The arrival in country and three days later delivered to the village or neighborhood of your assignment. The days . . .

Review — IT SEEMED LIKE A GOOD IDEA AT THE TIME by Tom Corbett (India)

Jul 28 2022

It Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time Tom Corbett (India 1966–68) Hancock Press 644 pages $14.99 (paperback), $24.99 (hardcover), $4.99 (Kindle) Reviewed by John Chromy (India 1963–65) Tom Corbett’s book, It Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time, is well worth reading, mostly for the very thoughtful reflections of the India 44 RPCVs that arose at three reunions that started in 2009, forty years after their PC service in Rajasthan and Maharashtra. Drawn from Tom Corbett’s notes from the reunions, the narrative focuses not on all the problems or peculiarities of the host country, as many Peace Corps stories do, but rather these India RPCVs thoughtfully and often humorously reflect on: Some of the positive achievements, however small, each of them made during her/his PCV assignments, How much the PC/India experience changed their lives and forced them to become better people, The many achievements and progress . . .

The Volunteer Who Had Encounters with Emperor Haile Selassie of Ethiopia — William Seraile (Ethiopia)

Jul 28 2022

by Jeremiah Norris (Colombia 1963-65) (The following Profile is drawn largely from an article by William Seraile, Ethiopia 1963-65, published in Peace Corps WorldWide.) • William (Bill) Seraile was among about 140 Volunteers, mainly in their early twenties and graduates of Ivy League Colleges, some small schools, a few large public universities, and a small number of historic black colleges and universities, that arrived in Ethiopia as the second group of Volunteer teachers in the fall of 1963. Most of them had to examine their atlases to find Ethiopia on the map. Only one had ever been to Africa having spent a summer in Kenya with Operation Crossroads Africa. The trainees had two months of Peace Corps training at UCLA, studying Ethiopian culture, history and Amharic. Their language instructors were all young Ethiopian graduate students studying in American universities. Following that, Bill’s group departed for Ethiopia from New York . . .

Review — THE REAL PRESENCE: A NOVEL by Ron Singer (Nigeria)

Jul 15 2022

The Real Presence: A Novel Ron Singer (Nigeria 1964–67) Adelaide Books, May 2021 236 pages $19.60 (paperback) Reviewed by Lucinda Wingard (Nigeria 1966-68) • Many of us RPCVs will agree that our lives were significantly altered by living and working in a foreign country. For author Ron Singer (Nigeria 1964-67) the years since Peace Corps have included serious attempts to understand and write about the evolution of his country-of-service. The Real Presence opens with two Igbo characters each taking a chapter to describe for an indeterminate audience their lives before and up to independence in 1960. Addressing the reader in distinctly regional cadence, Lydia Ogochukwu and her much younger brother Jerry (Jeremiah) tell of village life, tribal customs, and their education from the 1930s to the 1950s. They attempt to correct the reader’s misconceptions about their birthplace and the region’s history. The third character is Peace Corps Volunteer Bob Shepard . . .

The Volunteer Who Found Albert Schweitzer in Gabon — Eric Madeen (Gabon)

Jul 07 2022

The materials for this Profile were drawn largely from an article in Peace Corps Worldwide by Eric Madeen in which he recalled tracking down Dr. Albert Schweitzer at his hospital in Gabon. by Jeremiah Norris (Colombia 1963-65) In 1981, Eric Madeen joined some 60 other would-be Peace Corps Volunteers in Gabon for training in TEFL, fisheries, agriculture and construction projects. During a stretch of French language training, he made several trips to the nearby Schweitzer Hospital to gather information about its founder for an article to be published in his home town newspaper. He gave the subsequent article to a friend who was leaving the country, but alas, it didn’t make it home and he has since regretted not posting it properly himself. Eric’s PC training took place at a high school in Gabon’s capital of Lambarene that was located atop a hill. After French classes on Saturdays, . . .

16 New books by Peace Corps writers — May and June, 2022

Jul 01 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 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 Goal . . .

BUILDING COMMUNITY by Harlan Russell Green (Turkey)

Jun 25 2022

Answering Kennedy’s Call Building Community Answering Kennedy’s Call, Harlan Green’s memoir of his years working to build successful communities at home and abroad, shows what is possible when communities come together to improve their lives. He describes his work as a Peace Corps Volunteer in a rural community development program in a Turkish village, teaching vocational skills and convincing the villagers to develop new agricultural methods. Green also worked as a photographer and filmmaker for the USEPA in its earliest days lobbying communities to implement the Clean Air and Water Acts that were enacted to mitigate the growing air and water pollution. He joined Cesar Chavez and the United Farmworkers of America during its mid-1970s struggle organizing seasonal farm workers to better their living conditions; documenting the grape and lettuce boycotts, and Cesar’s charismatic leadership using non-violent methods to fight violent opposition by growers and the Teamsters Union. He . . .

THE GECKO IN THE BATHTUB by Janina Marie Fuller (Philippines)

Jun 25 2022

Encounters with Marvelous Creatures In encounters with an array of creatures, from both domesticated and wild animals inhabiting my Louisiana backyard to denizens of the Amazon I present these stories to illuminate our inseparability from the life around us by capturing peak moments in the natural world. These experiences are chronicled in the context of my day-to-day life and relationships, from childhood to retirement, highlighting a few unique glimpses of animal lives as they have intersected with mine. I have been investigating my natural surroundings as long as I can remember, wherever my life and travels have taken me. From earthworms to egrets and from Indianapolis neighborhoods to the Amazon rainforest, I have paid careful attention to the creatures crossing my path, doing my best to respect each life and place as I do my own. Imagine a bee sting that results in a 4-day flu; wondering how to . . .

The Volunteer Who Was Named One of Most Powerful Women on Wall Street — Patricia Cloherty (Brazil)

Jun 10 2022

by Jeremiah Norris (Colombia 1963-65) (A cautionary note to readers: a significant portion of Patricia Cloherty’s professional career involved her firm’s investments in Russia at a time when it was a viable member of the Community Nations. That status has been tabled since its February, 2022 unprovoked invasion of Ukraine). • Patricia Cloherty earned a Bachelor’s Degree from the University of San Francisco, followed by two MAs from Columbia University. After hergraduation, she became a Peace Corps Volunteer in Brazil from 1963 to 1965. She began her career in venture capital at Patricof & Co. in New York, which she joined in 1969. She was named a partner and later would become resident and co-chair of the firm, along with founder Alan Patricof. After she left the firm, Patricof & Co. (now known as Apax Partners), became one of the largest private equity firms globally. In an interview with . . .

Author - Marian Haley Beil