Peace Corps Worldwide – Page 15 – promoting Peace Corps writers since 1989

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

A podcast — 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 . . .

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 . . .

Tom Bayer (Mali) at Creative Associates Intl.

May 30 2024

About Creative Associates International Creative Associates International is a social-impact company that works collaboratively to deliver locally led, sustainable solutions to take advantage of development opportunities and to address today’s most pressing challenges. Drawing on nearly five decades of experience in more than 90 countries, Creative has developed a reputation for technical excellence, innovation and flexibility. Creative has worked extensively in non-permissive environments, giving it the tools and expertise to keep our partners and beneficiaries safe while achieving maximum impact for our clients. Practice Area Director, Conflict Prevention & Stabilization Tom Bayer (Mali 1984-88) leads Creative’s programming focusing on fragility, conflict prevention and transitioning communities to peace. As part of Creative’s Communities in Transition division, the practice area’s team supports the integration of conflict awareness and sensitivity across Creative’s programs worldwide. The Conflict Prevention & Stabilization practice area currently manages programming in West Africa, the Middle East and Latin America, as well as two indefinite quantity contracts— Programming for Prevention and Peacebuilding (P4P2) and . . .

IF MY HAIR HAD A VOICE by Dana Marie Miroballi (Uzbekistan)

May 30 2024

If My HAIR had a VOICE (Children’s Book) by Dana Marie Miroballi (Uzbekistan); Patricia Grannum. illustrator May 2024 40 pages $15.58 (Kindle); $16.40 (Hardcover) “If your hair had a voice, it would sing of diversity and identity. It would tell you stories of our history.” In her debut children’s book, Chicago writer Dana Marie Miroballi tells the story of a young Black girl who learns to love her natural hair — and the rich culture and history that come with it. The book follows a young girl as she embarks on a journey to learn more about her afro-textured hair and its various styles, from braids that are decorated with beads like the Fulani from Western Africa to Bantu knots like the Zulu from Southern Africa. The girl soon discovers that while her hair doesn’t have a voice, she does — and she uses it to share . . .

QUESTS by Paul Spencer Sochaczewski (Malaysia)

May 29 2024

Quests: Searching for Heroes, Scoundrels, Star-Gazers, and a Mermaid Paul Spencer Sochaczewski (Malaysia 1969-71) Explorer’s Eyes Press May 2024 276 pages $17.95 (Paperback) • • • QUESTS ENRICH OUR LIVES Quests are the backbone of all the great fables. And they are key elements in leading a satisfying and enriching life. This volume of 24 quests — at times audacious, touching, and ridiculous — are some highlights of Paul Spencer Sochaczewski’s purposeful investigative travel. He… seeks out, and meets, a female vampire ghost in Borneo who wants to follow him home is invited on a date by the Mermaid Queen of Java interviews the last elephant hunter of Vietnam travels to meet the humble villager in Laos who captured a precious white elephant that was then hijacked by the country’s First Lady visits the purported “lost Jews” of an isolated Indonesian island meets a homeless Hawaiian-wannabe Chinese emperor conducts the first . . .

Tony Waters (Thailand) — Editor of Ethnography

May 28 2024

Tony Waters is the chief editor of Ethnography.com. He was at the Sociology department at California State University at Chico where he had been a professor since 1996. In 2016 he found a new gig at Payap University in northern Thailand where he is on the faculty of the Peace Studies Department. He has also been a guest professor in Germany, and Tanzania. In the past, his main interests have been international development and refugees in Thailand, Tanzania, and California. This reflects a former career in the Peace Corps (Thailand 1980-82), and refugee camps in Thailand and Tanzania. His books include: Crime and Immigrant Youth (1999), Bureaucratizing the Good Samaritan (2001), The Persistence of Subsistence Agriculture: Life Beneath of the Marketplace (2007), When Killing is a Crime (2007), and Schooling, Bureaucracy, and Childhood: Bureaucratizing the Child (2012). His hobby is trying to learn new languages.

THE GUATEMALA READER by Mark D. Walker (Guatemala)

May 27 2024

The Guatemala Reader: Extraordinary Lives, Amazing Stories by Mark D. Walker (Guatemala 1971-73 Million Mile Walker 194 pages Ages 16-18 May 2024 $9.99 (Paperback) Mark Walker has studied and written about Guatemala for fifty years, and in this book, he focused on some of the extraordinary people of Guatemala and their amazing stories. Guatemala draws up to 1.8 million tourists per year, whose visits start in the largest city in Central America with brief visits to ancient Mayan ruins and contemporary Maya villages, which provide a partial folkloric understanding of Guatemalan society. Over the years, Mark traveled to places most Guatemalans have never seen. He has used encounters with ordinary Guatemalans, and stories from local Mayan leaders, advocates, writers, and poets to bring a new appreciation and understanding of this country. Maps, graphs, fact sheets, and photos support 19 stories to provide insights into the inner workings of Guatemalan . . .

“Famous People I Have Touched” by Mark Brazaitis (Guatemala)

May 26 2024

by Mark Brazaitis (Guatemala 1991–93) First published in Under the Sun • • • I was ten years old and my sister was eight when our parents took us to the White House Fourth of July picnic in 1977. Jimmy Carter was scheduled to appear on the White House lawn to shake hands with his 300 or so guests — mostly reporters, like my father, and their families. Walter Mondale, the vice president, would also be present. My father, who worked in the Washington bureau of The Plain Dealer, Ohio’s largest newspaper, prepped us on what to expect. Guests would line up to shake the president’s hand and a photo would be snapped. The process would be orderly and easy. If orderly and easy were synonyms for chaotic, he was right. In the early evening, the president appeared on the lawn, surrounded by four secret service agents. Some guests rushed toward . . .