What are your plans when you come back?
Since my boyfriend got a scholarship to study at a university in the States, I am going to move to the town he will be living in and try to get a job there. My intent is to basically just BE THERE for him and try to help him get adjusted and settled in…it is going to be a huge change for him living in the States, let alone going to school again.
How has Africa changed your view of the world?
It’s hard to quantify this. I’ve thought about it a lot, especially in the past few weeks. I have seen people with very little material resources but who are rich in social grace. The way that people here will share with others, be it inviting a complete passerby to come and eat with them or paying the bus fare for someone sitting next to them, is really a whole different ethos than what I have experienced in the Western world. For example only this morning my taxi driver offered to share his breakfast with me and I had to convince him that I really wasn't hungry.
How do you see this experience influencing your future?
Well, hopefully the linguistic fluency I have gained in French will be an asset that I can use in the future. Also, I am interested in getting into development work as a career, so you could say that I am hoping this experience will serve as a sort of launching point.
Are you still going to do the peace corps?
Um, not quite sure what the question means. Peace Corps is a two year contractual thing. In a week and a half I will have finished that contract and will be considered a “returned peace corps volunteer” or RPCV. I’m sure I’ll still be involved with Peace Corps through the very large RPCV community (
SherryDarling!) and I wouldn’t be opposed to working for the Peace Corps in an administrative role in the future.
What are you looking forward to when you get back?
Cheesecake! Bagels and cream cheese, free local phone calls, ATM machines, overpriced coffee, and cold weather.
Are you prepared for reverse culture shock?
Yes and no. Can one ever be prepared for that? Thankfully, I have previous experience to guide me. I spent the majority of my formative years in Indonesia and had to re-adjust to American culture at the tender age of 16. Looking back I can see that I mucked that up, so at least this time around I know what to expect. Still, in all the time I have travelled since and lived overseas for periods of time, it is always hard to accept the flagrant consumerism and overall “too much”ness of America. To go from a life where I see extreme poverty everywhere to one where people are rich to the point of excess will be hard. What I hate the most about the re-entry experience every time I’ve done it is watching myself slide slowly into the mindset, buying into the lies, getting wrapped up in “things”. I don’t like the person I become when I live in America. It is hard to have clarity of vision, hard to live simply and really hard to see what should be one’s real priorities. I’m really hoping to do better at it this time around.
When can we have coffee?
Anytime you’re ready and willing to get yourself to the DC/North Virginia area.
i might be headed over to rwanda for a 2 to 3 year stint to help set up a micro lending operation. i'll be taking my wife and kids. am i crazy?
No, not at all. I say go for it. I’ve talked to people who have lived in Rwanda and they’ve only had good to say about it. Also, there is a lot of potential in micro-lending so you’d be doing a good thing. Also as a “third culture kid” myself, I think travel and new cultures is a great experience for kids. Best of luck to you in the future!
What will you miss the most when you leave?
Complete strangers being able to greet each other and strike up conversations without being self-conscious.
what are some things you're most proud of accomplishing during your time there, and what frustrated you most that you weren't able to do?
I am proud of the fact that I was able to help my organization open a technology resource center for artisans. I wrote the grant and managed the project, and it is something concrete that I will leave behind that can (and I hope will) continue to help people help themselves. I'm also very proud of
the website that I helped make a reality which promotes Malian handcrafts to a larger audience. I'm happy that we were able to organize a craft fair that about 80 artisans participated in. And the thing I am most proud of is seeing the young woman I trained in MS Excel teaching it to another secretary in local language.
A lot of things frustrated me. Looking back I can see a lot of stuff I could have done if I had had the motivation. But at the end of the day, you have to pick your battles and your priorities. You can’t do everything. As much as I’d like to be supervolunteer, I’m not. If I could do it over again, I would probably try to get more involved in the personal lives of my coworkers. As it was I had a boyfriend so that sort of changed the whole dynamic meaning that I had less of a need for social relationships outside of work because I was spending time with him.
and how is your boyfriend?
Hot.
Seriously, he’s doing good. It’ll be hard for him to say goodbye to his sister and brothers for four years, but he’ll be alright.
Did you manage to travel outside of Mali to other parts of Africa as well?
One of my biggest regrets is that I really haven’t been able to do much travelling outside of Mali. I was lucky in that I did get to see quite a bit of Mali itself, all the way from Kayes in the west to Timbuktu in the north and the magnificent Dogon Country out east. I did spend a little time in Mauritania by accident (got bumped on a flight and stuck for 3 days!). In a few weeks my boyfriend and I will be travelling by road to Burkina Faso and Ghana, so I am really looking forward to that. From what I’ve heard, Ghana especially is much more advanced and better off than Mali. It’s also Anglophone and I’ve only ever been in Francophone Africa. Should be interesting!
Peace Corps has an actually very impressive career counseling program, for what it's worth. 
