Peace Corps Goals

From April 7, 2013 (more than 6months late... I know...)

 

For the last week I’ve been involved in several meetings about organizing, monitoring and reporting the work of Peace Corps Volunteers in collaboration with host country partners. Peace Corps is apparently trying to move towards being a more official development organization with more organized volunteers and efficient reporting. While I see the value of such a change, of reporting the impact that volunteers have and transmitting our work to donors and future volunteers, I fear that such a systematic approach may neglect the most valuable impact of volunteers: the change we can bring simply by being ourselves and being present. The everyday interactions are what makes Peace Corps, not the number of people who attend some training on nutrition or benefit from building latrines.

The English teacher at my village’s high school told me about the Volunteer who helped run an English club in his hometown when he was in middle school. His greatest memories weren’t the lessons he planned but the attitude he brought. The Volunteer would speak of places in the world that the students had never seen, see their own culture through a perspective they had never had, play music on his guitar that they had never heard and lived life with such vibrant enthusiasm and willingness to explore and share his findings. The teacher told me how it was his interactions with the young volunteer that motivated him to continue school, to study American Literature at university and to embody what he called “American values” such as curiosity, open-mindedness and respect for others.

It is beautiful to me that this is the impression we leave in the hearts and minds of the Togolese. I only wish that all Americans actually embodied these values instead of the bickering hatred that I find every time I read American news. Perhaps this is why I’ve nearly abandoned following the news; I prefer to keep the Togolese image of America. Not that they always have a perfect image of us. The Togolese know very well about our history of slavery and racism, about our military presence around the world and about our hesitation to accept immigrants. But they also understand that not all Americans are responsible for nor accept these unfortunate truths.

But Peace Corps isn’t solely about cultural exchange. Afterall, providing technical assistance to host countries is our first goal. But in my experience, this too is most valuable when it comes from personal interactions verses formal trainings. A couple weeks ago I was roasting and cracking cashew nuts with some kids in my village and we started talking environment. One of the kids was asking me if in the US we have a dry season like here or a time when the wells and rivers dry up. I explained that in my hometown in California there is a time when we can expect more rains and a time when we can expect less, but our problem of dried up wells (or at least reduced production) is often caused by a different culprit, overdrawing water so that the aquifer cannot replenish the well quickly. I used the example to explain water cycles and how if the processes that remove water from a system exceed the processes that replenish it, problems will arise. For instance salt water can be drawn into the groundwater and the water from wells can become briny. I used an example from the coastal city of Cotonou, Benin where this is a developing problem. One of the kids recalled when he visited family there and the water out of their well was salty. He asked his family if they had added salt but they responded that the water from the pump near their house has been like that for years. The kid, and likely his family, didn’t think of the likely connection between Cotonou’s growing population, development and thus water use and the increasing salinity of their well water. This led to our conclusion that while we should encourage development in Togo and throughout the world, its important to reflect on the actions we take, recognize the potential consequences and proceed cautiously.

Of course, this is easier said than done. How do we balance economic development with environmental security? I’d like to say that I’m hopeful Togo can find a way to develop harmoniously, but that hope is nearly wiped away when I see the congested Lome streets, the Kara riverbanks overflowing with garbage and the huge consumption of single-use plastics even in the village setting. But all these changes are so recent in the history of Togo that maybe there is still hope.