By the end of the month we'll have lost, to one cause or another, 10 of the 42 volunteers that came here last April. None have been killed or had something gruesome happen to them, they've all left because they think the world outside of Bulgaria offers something the world inside Bulgaria doesn't. Good for them, I say. No reason to stay where you don't feel comfortable. What's odd is the way most of them leave. A few tell the right people that this just isn't right for them at this time in their lives, and let Peace Corps's gossip pony express do the rest. There's a certain nobility to that method.
For others, it's a little more under the table. The word "slinking" comes to mind, also "disappearing without a trace." You can be inviting them to a birthday party, be pleasantly turned down, then realize at the party that the reason you were turned down was that they were using that day to get out of Bulgaria. It's just that simple. Meh. Their life, they can do what they want with it, but it's always nice to go without leaving a nasty aftertaste in people's mouths. Just common decency, I suppose.
And common decency, then, is what brings me to the fundamental problem anybody really has with leaving the Peace Corps: that whole "promise" thing. No matter how much you rationalize around it, the Peace Corps, from the very beginning, makes it clear that they don't train people for three months, locate sites, provide medical, program, psychological, and administrative help for people who want to come for a year or less, find themselves, and then decide whether or not this whole "volunteer" thing is right for them. Two years is mentioned quite a bit in the information we get before coming. "Commitment" is thrown around a bit too.
It's that commitment that keeps a lot of volunteers here. I'm not trying to pat myself on the back here, although it's obviously coming out that way. I love being here. I have an incredible city to live in, a great apartment to relax in, and a Bulgarian cat. Life is keeping me here, not the Peace Corps.
I'd like to think that if I lived in a village where there was only one communal shower in the center of town, and the kids I was teaching were all on some international list for troubled teens needing aid, and I woke up covered in bedbug bites and went to sleep coughing up the black ash I'd been breathing all day, I'd like to think that if I were in that village, I'd stick it out for two years. This is the Peace Corps after all. I get the idea folks in Africa have it a damn bit worse than I ever would in Bulgaria. But one never knows, does one? I'd like to think that if I were on a bus that crashed into a freezing river, I'd make sure I got as many passengers needing help off that bus before I got off. But I've never been in that situation, few people have, so it's difficult to say how any given person would act.
Silly hypotheticals aside, about a quarter of the people that came a year ago aren't working with the Peace Corps in Bulgaria. I think that's a number that could be improved. We'll just have to see how this year's group does.
Posted by Rob at August 6, 2004 04:47 PMNo, it isn't 'Anybody but Bush' anymore it is 'Kerry/Edwards all the way to the White House'.
Bush is decimating the forests, parks, air and any other environmental venue he can think of.
Which is not too much considering his lack of understanding of the English language.
His latest misspeak is priceless and affirms he knows not what he says but reads prepared speeches without understanding.
The debates will prove him the idiot he is unless Cheany answers all his questions for him.
Aunt Carol
JIMMY!, buddy,
Since this was the first comment of yours that had some validity, I'm not only not deleting it, but responding to it.
If you want to comment on something I say on the site, you're more than welcome to do so as long as it doesn't refer to any of my body parts or personally attack another commenter. If you want to follow your lifestyle (which, incidentally, clashes pretty heavily with Bush's political platform) and invite me down to Plovdiv to do things I would never do, do it by e-mail.
And no, I'm not a "yellow-bellied liberal." I've gotten pretty sick of Michael Moore in his post-TV Nation days. I don't buy into the whole "Anybody but Bush" campaign the democrats are pulling this year. And the reasons I'm voting against Bush this year are 1.)His insistence on religion being a part of everything governmental. 2.)His continuing failure to change course in Iraq in the face of a changing situation. And 3.)His iffy ideas for fixing an economy.
If you'd like to give us your thoughts on why Bush should be re-elected, it'd make me happy. Basically, relax, untroll yourself, or you'll keep getting deleted.
Later,
The Management
hey ROB!!!
why do you keep erasing my comments off your damned website? can't a man have a bit of fun? are you afraid my comments might have some validity? are you just another damn yellow-bellied liberal?
Go Bush!!!
Posted by: jimmy at August 9, 2004 06:12 PMThe world of humans all of a sudden becomes a pretty nasty place once you stop and look around, doesn't it? Commitment... honesty... decency - such simple words, yet qualities so hard to come by nowadays. And qualities of a universal significance. I am near your age, but (obviously) with a completely different lifestyle, surrounding, perception, character and thousands of other "parameters". Yet the things above make me uncomfortable to say the least... Actually I don't even quite understand your path of choice with the PC, nevertheless I take my hat off to your faith and persistence in such a choice.
Anyway... just wanted to drop my 2c I guess :) It's their life, they can do what they want with it as you said.
Thanks for the blog.
R.
Posted by: |RABBIT| at August 7, 2004 04:54 AM