Search Results for “Eres Tu” – Page 25

The Volunteer Who Documented the Emergence of Philanthropy in America

May 15 2022

by Jeremiah Norris (Colombia 1963-65) • Michael Meyer, who served as a Volunteer in China 1995-97, has published Benjamin Franklin’s Last Bet: The Favorite Founder’s Divisive Death, Enduring Afterlife, and Blueprint for American Prosperity. In it, he documented how Franklin, at the end of his life, made a “deathbed wager” on the survival of the United States: a gift totaling two thousand pounds to Boston and Philadelphia, to be lent out to tradesmen, over the next two centuries to jump start their careers. Each loan would be repaid with interest over ten years. If all went according to Franklin’s inventive scheme, the final payout in 1991 would be a windfall. The concept that Franklin set in place can easily be seen as the institutional basis for the subsequent emergence of foundations in America, emerging from a seed grant that in its time was considered as a ‘charitable’ donation, then . . .

Mildred D. Taylor (Ethiopia) STORIES OF RACISM: Stories of Racism–Confronted by a Family with Courage and Love

May 14 2022

A tribute to decades of work by children’s author Mildred D. Taylor. This year, Peace Corps Writers recognized her with the Writer of the Year Award. By John Coyne (Ethiopia 1962-64) NPCA World View Special Books Edition 2022 • Mildred Delois Taylor is a critically acclaimed author of children’s novels. In 1977, she won the Newbery Medal, the most prestigious award in children’s literature, for her historical novel Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry. It was the second book in a series of ten novels focusing on the Logan family, and portraying the effects of racism counterbalanced with courage and love. Her latest book, All the Days Past, All the Days to Come, published last year, is the final novel in the series. Since receiving the Newbery Medal, she has won four Coretta Scott King Awards, a Boston Globe–Horn Book Award, a Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and the PEN Award for Children’s Literature. In . . .

Eric Madeen (Gabon) publishes TOKYO-ING!

May 13 2022

Tokyo-ing! is an apt title for this trio of tales that chime with anyone even slightly interested in Asia’s most dynamic metropolis and its glazing of layers – be they cultural, sexual … or taking-wing exuberant. “About Face” — An American professor is trophy hunted by a wily student who then boasts of her conquest, sparking a full-blown scandal. Brought to heel in tradition, he fights for his dignity. “Sobering Love” — A Japanese career woman is obligated to join after-work drinking sessions with her colleagues, leading to alcohol addiction and deteriorating health. There seems to be no way out, until she meets Frank, a high-octane executive … “Fire Horse” — A disillusioned expat musters the courage to break out of an unhappy marriage, then searches for love on Tokyo’s electrifying singles circuit. Can he beat the odds and find a soulmate born under the right star? Eric Madeen (Gabon . . .

19 New books by Peace Corps writers — March and April, 2022

May 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 now include a brief description for the books listed here in hopes of encouraging readers 1) to order a book and 2) 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 . . .

“Looking for Albert Schweitzer in Lambarene, Gabon” by Eric Madeen (Gabon)

Apr 29 2022

On Mission By Eric Madeen (Gabon 1981-83) What follows is a reconstruction of memories, which can be likened to partially developed film … at times hazy, at others gaining clarity like images in a developing tray … of one’s mind. My mind. It was first being readied for what lay ahead by intensive French instruction for six weeks, followed by six more during work on rural school construction in Peace Corps/Gabon. With two years of Spanish at university as basecamp, French came easily; classes were named not by level, but by towns in Gabon. It didn’t take me long, however, to learn that mine, Ndende, was at a lower proficiency level. Recent graduates from Ivy League schools to esteemed public ones, we numbered approximately 60 trainees in the programs of TEFL, Fisheries, Agriculture and Construction. We were lodged in a student dormitory whose Turkish shitters went down one by . . .

The Peace Corps Third Goal by Kathleen Coskran (Ethiopia)

Apr 24 2022

The Third Goal by Kathleen Coskran (Ethiopia 1965-67) I left for Peace Corps training the week I graduated from college, equipped with uninformed idealism and a BA in English. In other words my few skills included the ability to write a decent sentence and the habit of losing myself in the sentences and paragraphs written by others. Four years earlier I had taken the memorable words of President Kennedy’s inaugural address to heart: “Ask not what your country can do for you–ask what you can do for your country” and used that sentence as the first line of the essay on citizenship assigned by my English teacher. I don’t remember if she told the class that our essays would be entered in a county-wide contest sponsored by local Civitan Clubs. I do remember my surprise in winning first place in Hall County, getting my picture in the Gainesville Times, and . . .

BENJAMIN FRANKLIN’S LAST BET by Michael Meyer (China)

Apr 15 2022

The incredible story of Benjamin Franklin’s parting gift to the working-class people of Boston and Philadelphia — a deathbed wager that captures the Founder’s American Dream and his lessons for our current, conflicted age. Benjamin Franklin was not a gambling man. But at the end of his illustrious life, the Founder allowed himself a final wager on the survival of the United States: a gift of two thousand pounds to Boston and Philadelphia, to be lent out to tradesmen over the next two centuries to jump-start their careers. Each loan would be repaid with interest over ten years. If all went according to Franklin’s inventive scheme, the accrued final payout in 1991 would be a windfall. In Benjamin Franklin’s Last Bet, Michael Meyer traces the evolution of these twin funds as they age alongside America itself, bankrolling woodworkers and silversmiths, trade schools and space races. Over time, Franklin’s wager was . . .

Books that bred [and explain] the Peace Corps

Apr 14 2022

By John Coyne (Ethiopia 1962-64) • During the 1950s, two social and political impulses swept across the United States. One impulse that characterized the decade was detailed in two best-selling books of the times, the 1955 novel by Sloan Wilson, The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit, and the non-fiction The Organization Man, written by William H. Whyte and published in 1956. These books looked at the “American way of life” and how men got ahead on the job and in society. Both are bleak looks at the mores of the corporate world. These books were underscored by Ayn Rand’s philosophy as articulated in such novels as Atlas Shrugged, published in 1957. Every man, philosophized Rand, was an end in himself. He must work for rational self-interest, neither sacrificing himself to others nor sacrificing others to himself. Then in 1958 came a second impulse first expressed in the novel . . .

“An Unexpected Love Story — The Women of Bati”

Apr 13 2022

by John Coyne (Ethiopia 1962-64) If the reader prefers, this may be regarded as fiction. But there is always the chance that such a piece of fiction may throw some light on what has been written as fact. — Ernest Hemingway, A Moveable Feast • AT AN ELEVATION OF 4,000 FEET, the town of Bati, Ethiopia, off the Dessie Road, is the last highland location before the Danakil Depression. A hard day’s drive from the Red Sea, it’s famous only for its Monday market days when the Afar women of the Danakil walk up the “Great Escarpment” to trade with the Oromos on the plateau. These women arrive late on Sunday, and with their camels and tents, they cover the grassy knob above the town. They trade early in the next morning for grain, cloth, livestock, and tinsels and trinkets imported from Addis Ababa, 277 kilometers to the south. Numbering as . . .

Peace Corps Fund sponsors second RPCV Writers’ Workshop

Apr 08 2022

Thursday, September 15 to Sunday the 18th on Broad Creek in Maryland Want to spend three days in September on the Eastern Shore of Maryland discussing your Peace Corps memoir, fiction, or non-fiction with other RPCV writers and published authors? Peace Corps Writers, with support from the Peace Corps Fund, is arranging its second workshop for ten to fifteen RPCVs and former Peace Corps staff working on their own Peace Corps or related creative works. Founded in 2003, the Peace Corps Fund is a 501-c-3 nonprofit organization founded by Returned Peace Corps Volunteers to support the Third Goal of the Peace Corps — to increase the understanding of the people served on the part of Americans. The workshop will be held at Shore Retreats on Broad Creek, on the Eastern Shore of the Chesapeake Bay, Maryland. Costs range from $100 for those on tight budgets, $250 for those of modest means, . . .

The Volunteer who photographed the Summer of Love & then went on to slake a great thirst — Bill Owens (Jamaica)

Apr 06 2022

A Profile in Citizenship by Jeremiah Norris (Colombia 1963–65) • (This Profile of Bill Owens, Jamaica 1964-65, was largely drawn from in interview conducted by Tony D’Souza, Ivory Coast 2000-02 and Madagascar 2002-2003.) Early on in his career, Bill took iconic photos of the Hells Angels beating concertgoers with pool cue sticks at the Rolling Stones’ performance during the Altamont Speedway Festival in California four months after Woodstock on December 8, 1969. Altamont is considered by historians as the end of the Summer of Love and the overall 1960s youth ethos. Bill was so fearful of retribution by the Hells Angels that he published the photos from the festival under a pseudonym fearing they would “come and murder’ him. Some of the negatives were later stolen, he believed by the Hells Angels. In 1964, Bill joined the Peace Corps and was assigned to teach high school in . . .

Review — LETTERS FROM PEACE CORPS/HONDURAS by R. Scott Berg

Mar 18 2022

Letters from Peace Corps, Honduras by R. Scott Berg (Honduras 1976-79) Independently published 198 pages January 2022 $40.00 (Paperback) Reviewed by Mark D. Walker (Guatemala 1971-73) • I was pleased to review this memoir of a fellow Returned Peace Corps Volunteer in Honduras. It offered an opportunity to reflect on my own experience as an RPCV and learn more about Scott Berg and Honduras, which is why the author decided to share his legacy. The book is based on a series of weekly letters he wrote to Laurie, his love interest during the two-year long-distance relationship. At the end of his experience, they returned their respective letters in a shoebox. After that, he lost contact with Laurie, and he doesn’t know where she is today. The one hole in the narrative was the two weeks they spent together in Guatemala and parts of Honduras, which was a challenging time. . . .

Ethiopia RPCV, journalist and author Dick Lipez dies

Mar 17 2022

By Tony Dobrowolski, The Berkshire Eagle Mar 16, 2022 Becket, MA — Author, journalist and book reviewer Richard “Dick” Lipez, who wrote editorials for The Berkshire Eagle for many years and was a member of the newspaper’s advisory board, died of cancer at his home in Becket on Wednesday. He was 83. Lipez had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in April, according to sculptor Joe Wheaton, his husband. They had been together for 32 years. In the early 1960s, Lipez, a native of Lock Haven, Pa., served in the Peace Corps, where he taught school in Ethiopia, and later worked as a Peace Corps program evaluator based in Washington. He originally came to the Berkshires to work for an anti-poverty agency because he was tired of living in the city, Wheaton said. “He was totally unqualified for the job, but he talked his way into it,” said Wheaton, who . . .

Review — THE BOY WITH FOUR NAMES by Doris Rubenstein (Ecuador)

Mar 17 2022

The Boy with Four Names (for adults and young adults) Doris Rubenstein (Ecuador 1971-73) IUniverse June 2021 180 pages $13.99 (paperback), $3.99 (Kindle) Reviewed by John Chromy (India 1963–65); (PC CD/Eastern Caribbean (1977–79); (Assoc Dir-PC/Washington 1979–1981) • In Italy their baby son was named Enrico, and through the support of a network of Jewish people, the Cohen family were able to obtain a visa to enter Ecuador, one of the few western countries willing to take in Jewish immigrants despite the rapidly growing nightmare unfolding in Europe. Arriving on an hacienda in the Altiplano, young Enrico acquired his second name, Enrique, when his family was employed on the ranch and he began school. The story follows his family’s move three years later to Quito where his father opened a small shop and Enrique entered public school, Escuela Espejo, where he thrived academically, but faced numerous social issues as a . . .

Herm Schmidt (Staff DC/Ethiopia), Author

Mar 13 2022

Thanks for the ‘heads up’ from Ted Vestal (PC Staff /Ethiopia 1964-66) Herm writes — I thought readers might be interested in who I am and something about why I write. Much of my working life was with the US Government spending time in Germany with the Army in the ’50s, when Cold War tension was at its peak. I was one of the many young college graduates unable to find a job and chose to enlist for two years. It was a fortunate choice that gave enlistees a view of the world outside America, and believe it or not, $100 a month “spending money” that was more than most of us ever had. As to Cold War tension, it was easily dispelled by 5 cent bottles of Beck’s beer at the PX, and nights out in Butzbach, where we were stationed. We had a chance to travel all . . .

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