Being away from site for almost 2 weeks can be overwhelming. It was refreshing and reminded me of how great I have it in Kpetoe. However, it also exposes just how daunting of a task that PC and the likes have taken up. I’m very partial but I truly believe PC goes about development the right way. It’s definitely not the easy or short way.
We don’t come offering money, we offer trainers/facilitators. Often we don’t get to see our results and yet we spend the longest time here. While we’re forming groups and trying to transfer knowledge NGO’s are constructing buildings and donating vehicles. It can be extremely frustrating when people don’t want to work for something because they think that someone else should come and do it for them. Luckily I don’t deal with this too much but lots of PCVs do. The others leave infrastructure and buildings, what will we leave?
These are just the tip of what PCVs deal with. If you don’t like sports or carpentry and want to have a long conversation with me pros and cons of development is a good choice. With this much time to think sometimes stuff just gets to ya. I say all this because I just got to catch up with about half of my group and I’m hoping it’s just a phase but overall we’re just not that happy. No one has gone home yet but it looks like that will be changing relatively soon. A year away from home is a long time especially when you don’t have that many concrete accomplishments. We all miss people and know we’re not even half way done.
At the same time I look at how our group has changed and what small changes we’ve helped to bring about and I’m honestly pretty proud. We can eat just about anything, picked up new hobbies, languages, and friends and really have had some successes. The cultural exchange is there just by us living alone in our communities. Our health volunteers have done HIV/AIDs camps, programs, and even dramas. Our environment volunteers have planted millions of seeds and aided in alternative livelihood projects. We business volunteers have the most range to our work but we’ve had our share of things to write home about too. I may not have done much but when you add it to the little things the rest of the group has also done…then we’re making progress. It’s slow and frustrating but we’re going about it the right way.
You’re probably like after all that dependency talk you’re getting your family and friends to build a basketball court? Defense: It’s not something they need to survive, it’s for the kids, and HIV/AIDs awareness is something that I truly believe we need to continue to do. I want to do that in a fun way. Also, have you seen “The Air Up There”?.

“Local bands in California sing about Michigan.”
“Really?”
“Chh...no”
-Marcus after asking who sang a song about California of mine.