Search Results for “Eres Tu” – Page 23

Review — A FIVE FINGER FEAST by Tim Suchsland (Kazakhstan)

Aug 28 2022

A Five Finger Feast: Two Years in Kazakhstan, Lessons from the Peace Corps by Tim Suchsland (Kazakhstan 2007–09), author and illustrator Peace Corps Writers, May 2022 395 pages $19.99 (paperback) Reviewed by John Chromey (India 1963–65); (PC CD/Eastern Caribbean (1977–79); (Assoc Dir-PC/Washington 1979–1981) • Tim Suchsland, a teacher and artist, takes the reader on a very interesting journey into a vast corner of the world that none of us has ever seen, of which we know virtually nothing, which borders on Russia’s infamous Siberia and yet is populated with very interesting people — Kazaks from many tribes, Armenians, Volga Germans and Russians — each with a story of how their people came to be in the village of Valenka, twenty miles from the Russian border and 840 miles (22 hours by road) from the Kazakh capitol, Almaty. Any of us who served in the Peace Corps in the 1960s, ’70s . . .

On the Road Again by Bonnie Black (Gabon)

Aug 25 2022

On the Road Again The WOW Factor: Words of Wisdom from Wise Older Woman By Bonnie Black (Gabon 1996-98) Whenever I want to travel without leaving home, I turn to Paul Theroux. Right now I’m accompanying him on his nostalgic trip throughout Asia in his 2008 book Ghost Train to the Eastern Star, in which he retraces the epic journey he took in 1973 when he was in his early thirties, which became his first bestseller, The Great Railway Bazaar. I’ll admit it: I love traveling with this man this way. I love his sensibilities, his observations, his breadth, the sound of his voice on the page. I love the way he chooses to travel – down to earth, close to the real people – the way I, too, prefer to be. In an effort to remain a companionable traveling companion, I tend to agree with him and go along with everything he . . .

Sign Up to Record Your Peace Corps Oral History

Aug 23 2022

Each person’s Peace Corps story is unique and valuable to help us understand who we are as individuals and how our individual experiences are integral parts of the 60-year Peace Corps legacy. The Returned Peace Corps Volunteer Oral History Archives Project (OHAP), an NPCA affiliate, preserves the Peace Corps experience by conducting in-depth oral history interviews of Returned Peace Corps Volunteers (RPCVs), Evacuated Peace Corps Volunteers (EPCVs), Peace Corps staff and host country counterparts. RPCV interviews follow each person’s path, including their motivation to join the Peace Corps, what on-boarding and training was like, what they did during their Peace Corps service, what their cultural-cultural experiences were, and their reflections on the impact Peace Corps service had on them, the communities in which they served, and increasing Americans’ understanding of the world. Visit the OHAP website for more information and sign up here if you’d like to be interviewed . . .

2022 Winner of the Marian Haley Beil Award for the Best Book Review(s)

Aug 21 2022

Dean W. Jefferson El Salvador 1974-76 and Costa Rica 1976-77 After Peace Corps Dean became interested in the computer software field and made it his profession. He worked first as a software engineer, and later taught programming and database management at a technical collage. Along the way he acquired a masters degree in adult education, and has worked as a Spanish language translator and interpreter. Dean is a long-time member of RPCVs of Wisconsin/Madison — the people who publish the “Peace Corps International Calendar.” Dean Jefferson has been a stalwart book reviewer for Peace Corps Worldwide for a number of years, and we welcome him to our masthead. In addition, he has volunteered to help authors who will be publishing their books with the Peace Corps Writers imprint, and who are unable to find capable and independent proof readers and/or editors, to fine tune their final manuscripts . . .

“Downsizing Books” by John Coyne (Ethopia)

Aug 21 2022

When I was growing up on a farm in Illinois all six of us kids (I was the youngest) waited for the Saturday Evening Post to arrive in Wednesday’s mail so we’d have stories to read over the weekend. After dinner, whichever of my three sisters was washing the dishes that night would prop a book up against the kitchen window so she could read as she scrubbed. Since my job was to dry, I couldn’t pull off that trick. But I loved books too, and before I learned to read, my oldest sister would read to me whatever Jane Austen or Brontē novel she had gotten from the village library. We read so many books, in fact, that soon my older siblings had gone through everything deemed “age appropriate” by the librarian, Mrs. Butterfield. So one day she refused to let my sister Eileen check out the book she’d chosen. My mother, . . .

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 . . .

Doing the Blitz Peace Corps Recruitment in the ’60s

Aug 04 2022

To Preserve and to Learn by Hal Fleming (Staff: PC/W 1966–68; CD Cote d’Ivoire 1968–72) first published in 2008 at PeaceCorpsWriters.org IN 1966, I CAME DOWN TO WASHINGTON from New York. It was a time in our country when the Civil Rights movement and the Vietnam War divided the nation. I had been tapped to work as a staff member in the Public Affairs and Recruiting office for the Peace Corps. On my very first work day in Peace Corps/Washington, I was told to join Warren Wiggins, the Deputy Director of the Agency, in his government car for a one-hour ride to a conference for new campus recruiters at Tidewater Inn in Easton, Maryland. Wiggins, preoccupied with his opening speech to the conclave, said very little to me except to read out a phrase or two of buzz-word laden prose, mostly unintelligible to me as the new guy, and . . .

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 . . .

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 . . .

Friends of Liberia celebrate NEVER THE SAME AGAIN

Jul 26 2022

Life, Service, and Friendship in Liberia By Steve Kaffen (Russia 1994-96) July 26, 2022 • In honor of the 60th anniversary of Peace Corps in Liberia, Friends of Liberia (FOL), a non-profit started in 1985 by returned Liberia Volunteers, sponsored readings from the just-published book, Never the Same Again: Life, Service, and Friendship in Liberia. The book is an anthology of 63 stories and poems written by FOL members. Proceeds from its sale are to benefit humanitarian programs in Liberia. On Sunday afternoon July 24th, FOL members, former Peace Corps Volunteers and staff, and others disregarded the record-setting temperatures outside and packed to capacity the meeting room of midtown D.C.’s Busboys and Poets restaurant for a series of readings by some of the book’s contributing authors. Susan Greisen (co-editor along with Susan Corbett and Karen E. Lange) described the two-year process from conceptualization to publication. A published author [In . . .

Tim Carroll (Nigeria) goes home and remembers his childhood

Jul 25 2022

“I just had to live a long time,” Beloved Old Mission memories turned into children’s coloring book by Tim Carroll. By Jessie Williams June 19, 2022 MAPLETON — As a fifth-generation Old Mission Peninsula resident, Tim Carroll has an abundance of stories about his home. “I’ve always been interested in the history of this place, and I love my roots,” Carroll said. Carroll, 83, is sharing his perspective on the Peninsula’s history in a new coloring book, Once Upon A Peninsula, which features stories from his boyhood on the Peninsula. The book, which includes coloring and other activities, features stories and pictures from the Old Mission Peninsula during Carroll’s youth. Once Upon A Peninsula was illustrated by local artist Yvette Haberlein, who previously illustrated “The Traverse City Coloring Book” project. Carroll is a regular presenter at Peninsula Community Library, hosting the monthly history-focused “Talk with Tim” program. . . .

Journals of Peace by Tim Carroll (Nigeria)

Jul 23 2022

by Tim Carroll (Nigeria 1963–66) In 1988, as the first d Director of the National Council of Returned Peace Corps Volunteers (NCRPCV), now the National Peace Corps Association, I felt a considerable part of my mandate was to bring our disparate numbers together, to gather us up to celebrate those feelings we had in common. A number of special events given under my tenure accomplished this in varying degrees of success, but none held the hearts of Peace Corps family as did the Journals of Peace. As the 25th anniversary of the death of President John Kennedy — the founder and much loved hero of early Volunteers — approached, I made a call to St. Matthew’s Cathedral, the church that had been the site of JFK’s funeral service, and asked if we might have a memorial Mass that would include not only the traditional Showing of the Colors, but a procession . . .

RPCV Writer, Publisher & Southerner Jason P. Reed (Mongolia)

Jul 22 2022

Jason P. Reed came of age in Eunice, Louisiana, in the 1980s. He studied English at what was then the University of Southwestern Louisiana in the mid 90s and worked as a technical writer in Houston after graduation, when it became apparent his masterpiece comic novel, which remains unfinished on a floppy disc somewhere, would not write itself. A short while later, he joined the Peace Corps and spent the turn of the century in Mongolia, (1999-01) having a really good time. Returning to the U.S., Jason sidestepped a historically rigorous screening process and was commissioned into the Air Force. Two decades later, he remains in the public sector, though he has long since traded in the uniform for a sport coat. Eager to accelerate into the next stage in his life, Jason started New Bayou Books in 2020 and wrote his first two novels, both set in South-Louisiana, . . .

Peaceworkers in Action — RPCVs from UMBC (Tonga)

Jul 21 2022

Peaceworkers in Action Published: Jul 13, 2022 By: Catalina Sofia Dansberger Duque Michael Hassett and Chiara Collette first met each other in 2014 at the Los Angeles International Airport before boarding a 17-hour flight to the Kingdom of Tonga in the middle of the southwestern Pacific Ocean. Hassett applied to the Peace Corps hoping to be placed in Eastern Europe focusing on rural development. As a certified teacher, Collette didn’t have a specific country in mind. She was more interested in being able to teach. Both were placed in Tonga in teaching positions. Little did they know that this shared placement would permanently intertwine their personal and professional lives. In 2018, the couple got married and co-founded an internationally recognized nonprofit, Friends of Tonga—which earned a 2021 Literacy Award from the Library of Congress. Since then, Hassett and Collette have used their literacy educational tools and public policy skills gained at UMBC, and connections . . .

Foreign Affairs Senate Committee approves Peace Corps Reauthrization Act of 2022

Jul 20 2022

JULY 19, 2022 MENENDEZ, RISCH, COLLEAGUES CELEBRATE SFRC APPROVAL OF PEACE CORPS REAUTHORIZATION ACT OF 2022 WASHINGTON – U.S. Senators Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) and Jim Risch (R-Idaho), Chairman and Ranking Member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, today were joined by Senators Ben Cardin (D-Md.), Todd Young (R-Ind.), Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), and Rob Portman (R-Ohio) in releasing the below statements following the Committee’s passage of their legislation to reauthorize the Peace Corps for the first time in over 20 years. Authorizing the appropriation of more than $410,000,000 per year, the bipartisan Peace Corps Reauthorization Act of 2022 will extend Peace Corps Volunteers’ health care coverage, statutorily raise Volunteers’ readjustment allowance, expedite return-to-service opportunities for those impacted by COVID-19 and future comparable emergencies, and expand the agency’s Sexual Assault Advisory Council. “Today’s Committee approval of our bipartisan Peace Corps Reauthorization Act of 2022 is a momentous victory for those of us who appreciate the crucial role that the Peace Corps plays in . . .

Search Results For -Eres Tu