The PC's Like Going From VCR to DVD

What was the Peace Corps like?

Well, it was like…..it was sort of like……pretty much it was like going on vacation. Except for a really long time and you don’t have any money and it’s not nearly as much fun and you’re kind of just waiting around for it to be over but you feel like The Shit while you’re there and even when you get back, if you want to impress someone, all you have to do is slyly mention that you were a Peace Corps volunteer doing development work in a faraway country and automatically you’re cooler than anyone else at the table. Unless you’re at a table with an astronaut who’s been to the moon. Astronauts always win. I try not to associate with them.

It’s kind of like that.

How to sum up 2 years, 11 weeks of your life in a few sentences (or paragraphs if the person asking is really asking and not just trying to be polite)?

It was frustrating and boring and really hard. I found the language challenging, the culture emotionally intense, and I didn’t end up doing many of the things I imagined myself doing. I cheated a lot and, instead of integrating into my community, spent the weekend in other towns with other Americans.

I loved the people and hated them. I could feel both simultaneously cuz I got to know them - really got to know them –talked about the culture and the ideals and the social norms constantly, dissecting with fellow PCVs the dynamics of a place that we couldn’t accept (always aware of our own arrogance while at the same time convinced we were right). I loved the people because the ones I met, the ones that touched my life and I’ll never forget, were wonderful. I couldn’t help but think that in many other places they would do so much better for themselves and yet I was so glad they were there because their country really needed them. DevelopingCountry was a better place with them in it as they provided a sense of hope – hope being that tortuous thing that every place and person needs but doesn’t trust completely.

Yet for some inexplicable reason I now feel restless. I know, many of us know, that if we had the opportunity, we would leave the life we have now, jump on a plane with nothing more than a few pairs of clothes in a backpack and travel to some new developing place and not feel an ounce of trepidation. On the contrary, it would feel right. We would know we were just where we were supposed to be and the lack of stability would be comforting – it being an adventure that makes all of the questions marks in our life seem insignificant, like semi-colons that no one ever uses or trusts.

But instead, I’m being a grown-up with this story from my past that’s too long to actually be a good story that people would listen to.

The Peace Corps was like pushing the pause button on  your American life, living a completely different one, and then coming back to push play – except that all the images on the screen look different now and you want to push pause again.

Or maybe it was like something else. What do I know?

-Age