New York Times Reporter Jonathan Weisman (Guinea Bissau/Philippines 1988-90)

You may have read the A1 story above the fold, left side, in the New York Times this morning. It was written by journalist and RPCV Jonathan Weisman (Guinea Bissau/Philippines 1988-90.) Jonathan is one of two RPCV reporters at the NYTIMES. The other is Maya Lau (Senegal 2009-11). Maya is in New York; Jonathan works out of the Washington office. We have had other RPCVs working for the TIMES, (our blogger Karen DeWitt (Ethiopia 1964-66) was one.)

Jonathan says he had a strange Peace Corps career. “My wife and I went to Guinea Bissau in July 88 to train for Peace Corps 1 in Cape Verde. But the Cape Verdean government shrunk the program and we were left in the cold. We were then transferred to the Philippines where we served until July 1990, when the program was evacuated. With two years in and lots of evacuations due to the invasion of Kuwait, we were told we couldn’t re-up.”

Jonathan studied African history and journalism at Northwestern University before joining the Peace Corps, then starting a journalism career that has included time at Education Week, CQ, USA Today and The Washington Post. He recently completed work on his first novel, a romance set in Portugal’s colonial wars in Africa.