Conversations: An Ode to Peace Corps (well, an ode of sorts)

I’ve got a lot of good friends in my life. They trickle in from different sources – childhood, high school, college, study abroad, camp, Peace Corps – and they’re all really difficult for me to explain. You see, I love all of these people equally, but I love them in different ways. These differences aren’t important in a life or death kind of way and I’m not sure why I feel that they need explaining the way I think they do. Humans are very complex creatures, I suppose, and I am no exception…perhaps this is just one of those things. Maybe I want people to understand the explanations – the background of how we came to know one another – because my overzealous love for these people could be rationalized once the history has been discovered. I want those one-word descriptions to evoke a slew of images and moments so that my logic could be shared posthaste. I’ve talked about my camp family on this blog. Now, fresh from a visit to a Peace Corps friend, I’m going to talk about another.

Making dinner for Kate's mom in Semypolky, just after we arrived in Ukraine.

Kate and I met in Philadelphia, but I’m not sure I realized how vital she was going to be in my survival in Ukraine until I found out we would be clustermates for almost three months in my training village, Semypolky. We’re very different in many ways: Kate was more open with her opinions, even if they weren’t the nicest. She had a really quick wit, and she wasn’t afraid to speak to Ukrainians in Ukrainian with our crude language skills, knowing full well she wouldn’t always make sense. She was less sheltered, more bold. So, obviously, I wanted to be more like her. We spent a lot of time together in Semypolky. We had sleepovers, cooked food together for her host mother. She validated my initial fear of my host grandmother. We fed her cats our breakfast and clung to each other in an odd mixture of merriment and horror as we watched one of her neighbors emptying the outhouse early one weekend morning. We became fascinated with the sidecar phenomenon and huge Rolex clocks. Training was a really difficult process, but it was difficult in a good way. I never had a day when I felt like quitting. And I think a lot of that has to do with the fact that I had Kate, and so many others, going through their versions of the exact same thing.

At my school's English Camp

Once we got our site assignments, I don’t know that I consciously thought about whom I would lose touch with within Peace Corps and whom I wouldn’t. I’ve never been a good phone talker – I should be honest and say I’ve never liked talking on the phone, so I worried about these newfound loves of mine – but I stayed in touch with Kate and others (in 30 minute increments, thanks to Life and Kyivstar) despite the fact that we were nowhere near one another. She came to my site and helped with summer camp – twice – and I visited hers to assist with her observations of the science guy and obtain spring water. We went to Hydropark probably more than any other volunteers and longed to join the tan family. We traveled outside of Ukraine and inside of Ukraine. Hitchhiked in Soviet-era trucks and created taco feasts and gnocci feasts and visited all sorts of markets. Washed our clothes by hand, got lost, dreamed of acquiring our very own pair of golden teeth. Often we were inside the bubble, doing our job in conjunction with these things, but sometimes, we left the fishbowl we were living in and were able to live thoughtlessly. That, my friends, is the glory of Peace Corps friendships. If we worried about the impressions we made inside the fishbowl, we stopped. If we weren’t the sorts to worry, we were able to be freely in a place that didn’t irritate us with its judgments. We told our “Conversations” stories and reveled. When we needed to, we forgot we were volunteers far from our homes and comforts, and we reveled.

Sandwich making at its finest.

One of my favorite Peace Corps memories is of my time traveling with another volunteer named Brandon. We went on a Balkan adventure with three Romanian volunteers during our second summer there. As the five of us were sitting at a table in Athens, Greece, eating lunch, our conversation turned to bowel movements. We weren’t exactly speaking in hushed tones, but I wouldn’t say we spoke loudly. We weren’t trying to be disgusting, we were just used to the fact that more often than not, when we spoke English, the people around us didn’t understand. And then I noticed the table next to us, occupied by an American couple and their children, had gone conspicuously silent. I had moments before heard one of the girls say she wanted to try something different, so she ordered a Corona. (The last time I had tried something different, it was homemade booze, tinged an indescribably muddy color, from a village. If you can’t tell by my snide comment, I am irritated by these sorts of travelers. I am also aware of how uppity this is.) My cohorts noticed, too. Our conversation continued.

At a regional gathering near Dolyna

I suppose that is when I knew I had something to be cherished. We’re a welcoming group, but we’re somewhat insular. We know how to mingle and we aren’t an exclusive bunch, but when we gather, no matter how large the group, we lose ourselves in the freedoms we offer one another. We’re inexplicably connected (no matter how I might try to explain it) and, though it is done unintentionally, I’m sure others feel like they’re missing something. And I think it might be that sense of protection – no matter what the situation may be, we’ll be okay – we’re not alone and have no need to fear. The world was once good and it will be again. We know this because it’s happened before. We’ve lived through the proof.

A long ride in a packed marshrutka and happy about it.

I will probably never stop feeling like I’m in a sort of protective cocoon when I’m around my Peace Corps people, just like I do when I’m with my other people. Only with them, it’s slightly different.

Tags: conversations, experiences, friends, peace corps, uppity travelers