10/13/09
Heard today from Peace Corps in Washington, DC that the Bulgarians changed their requirements for an experienced volunteer from one to help Sofia University's Business Alumni Center raise money and network with businesses to that of an experienced Career Counselor.
Mary and I were set to go. Now we have to see when or if another opportunity for a person with my background arises. In the meantime...
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Monday, October 12, 2009
Window with a View
10/12/09
The view from my condo window is not what many people would call spectacular, yet from it are scenes as amazing and unexplainable to Samoans as the Samoan scape is to those passing below. My American friends remark how they are able to live or sample what my life is like in the South Pacific as if my Samoan host family can understand my descriptions of what life is like outside my window. Ah, but the mind does construct concrete worlds made from imaginary stones.
Saturday, October 10, 2009
Crossing Over
10/10/09
Whether you want to or not, you find your surroundings before Peace Corps begin to swallow you up, to redefine who you now are. The activities you remembered while in Samoa are now the activities you do do. What you left, now are what you find routine; you never left them at all. Your tan fades. Your shorts and t-shirts replaced by jeans and jackets. Instead of watching sunrises and hearing the oinking of pigs, you sit before TV's endless stream of car/beer/fastfood commercials interrupted by ballgames as the sounds of the city provide the white noise. There is a mental disconnect between what you are and what you just were. It is finding new meaning in familiar places that makes this readjustment process so difficult.
Whether you want to or not, you find your surroundings before Peace Corps begin to swallow you up, to redefine who you now are. The activities you remembered while in Samoa are now the activities you do do. What you left, now are what you find routine; you never left them at all. Your tan fades. Your shorts and t-shirts replaced by jeans and jackets. Instead of watching sunrises and hearing the oinking of pigs, you sit before TV's endless stream of car/beer/fastfood commercials interrupted by ballgames as the sounds of the city provide the white noise. There is a mental disconnect between what you are and what you just were. It is finding new meaning in familiar places that makes this readjustment process so difficult.
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
Update: Bulgaria, Samoa
10/6/09
Bulgaria
Our wait about going to Bulgaria is a little bit longer. Peace Corps says the Bulgarians are revising the qualifications for the assignment. Once the new qualifications are determined, the Peace Corps will see if they still mesh with my background. I believe this delay affects Mary as much or more than me. She is ready to go.
Samoa
Catholic Deacon Tovi'o Mano said in the Samoan newspaper, "The disaster (tsunami) is God preaching to us. This is a message from God for us to look deeply into." Other Samoan clerics have made similar statements. To understand these statements is to get an insight into Samoa and the Samoan mind. While our news explains the cause of the tsunami as a sudden shifting of tectonic plates deep under the sea, Samoans look to their Christian clerics for the answer.
A little discussed fact of the Samoan tsunami was that the hardest hit areas were also the major resort spots. Just when Samoa was enjoying one of its best tourist years ever, the waves washed away the islands most important source of income.
Bulgaria
Our wait about going to Bulgaria is a little bit longer. Peace Corps says the Bulgarians are revising the qualifications for the assignment. Once the new qualifications are determined, the Peace Corps will see if they still mesh with my background. I believe this delay affects Mary as much or more than me. She is ready to go.
Samoa
Catholic Deacon Tovi'o Mano said in the Samoan newspaper, "The disaster (tsunami) is God preaching to us. This is a message from God for us to look deeply into." Other Samoan clerics have made similar statements. To understand these statements is to get an insight into Samoa and the Samoan mind. While our news explains the cause of the tsunami as a sudden shifting of tectonic plates deep under the sea, Samoans look to their Christian clerics for the answer.
A little discussed fact of the Samoan tsunami was that the hardest hit areas were also the major resort spots. Just when Samoa was enjoying one of its best tourist years ever, the waves washed away the islands most important source of income.
Sunday, October 4, 2009
Limbo
10/4/09
I am in a state between here and there, this and that, just floating aimlessly, knowing where here and there are or this and that is, but not moving towards anything. The pressure to do something is counteracted by being surrounded by lights stuck on red. I can't remember ever being in limbo while in Samoa where even doing nothing was a part of doing something. Now, as I await word from the Peace Corps as to whether I shall be selected for a post in Bulgaria, I am doing nothing while awaiting something.
I am in a state between here and there, this and that, just floating aimlessly, knowing where here and there are or this and that is, but not moving towards anything. The pressure to do something is counteracted by being surrounded by lights stuck on red. I can't remember ever being in limbo while in Samoa where even doing nothing was a part of doing something. Now, as I await word from the Peace Corps as to whether I shall be selected for a post in Bulgaria, I am doing nothing while awaiting something.
Annuity
10/3/09
Don't ever buy an annuity. I didn't buy one, but ended up getting one years ago when Hartford Insurance bailed out a real estate trust. Now I have to decide how to take the payout. How to get the most out of this meager investment before I die?
The choices are endless. Do I take larger monthly payments until I die, or be guaranteed a certain amount for 10 years with additional payments for life, or a guaranteed fixed amount for a specific time period? The actuarial combinations boggle the mind as you try to outsmart your own demise.
P.S. Since my father and grandfather lived to be 81, I am betting on living till 83 which makes taking the maximum monthly amount, ceasing upon death, worth the extra $10-20/month.
Don't ever buy an annuity. I didn't buy one, but ended up getting one years ago when Hartford Insurance bailed out a real estate trust. Now I have to decide how to take the payout. How to get the most out of this meager investment before I die?
The choices are endless. Do I take larger monthly payments until I die, or be guaranteed a certain amount for 10 years with additional payments for life, or a guaranteed fixed amount for a specific time period? The actuarial combinations boggle the mind as you try to outsmart your own demise.
P.S. Since my father and grandfather lived to be 81, I am betting on living till 83 which makes taking the maximum monthly amount, ceasing upon death, worth the extra $10-20/month.
Thursday, October 1, 2009
Tsunami News
10/01/09
Here are clippings about the recent tsunami/earthquake from various Peace Corps Volunteers and Staff currently in Samoa:
Here are clippings about the recent tsunami/earthquake from various Peace Corps Volunteers and Staff currently in Samoa:
- "Some absolutely wonderful news is that Filia’s (Peace Corps Staff) two nephews and nieces who were reported as either dead or missing are OK. They were found earlier today in the forest up the mountain where a wave deposited them after being torn out of the grasp of adults. They are OK after a night on their own. Her sister-in-law also was reported as having died, but she is OK, too."
- "We’ve heard from the Samoa Red Cross that they need volunteers for various tasks, as well as donations of food and clothing. If you want to volunteer your time, go directly to the Red Cross office. If you do volunteer and they send you to the field rather than doing office work, be careful and prepared with shoes (rather than flip flops), water, sunscreen, a little food, a hat, etc. You also can take up any donations of food or clothing, or bring it to the Peace Corps office and we will deliver the donated materials in batches."
- "Teuila (Peace Corps Medical Officer)has been donating her medical skills, and we also have sent to the Red Cross some food we have been storing at the office for an emergency."
- "We’re also trying to work the leaders of the villages of Poutasi and Saleapaga (where Peace Corps has contacts), where they have lost family members, to see if they could use our help on Friday or Saturday for relief and clean-up efforts. We thought it best to try to focus our efforts on villages with which our staff members have a strong connection. If so, we’ll send out staff members and PCVs in some of our vehicles. As these plans firm up, I’ll let you know."
- NZ Red Cross is taking donations for Samoa:
- "It's very hard to get news. The phones don't work. But I have heard via email that my village of Poutasi was one of the hardest hit. Initial reports are that it was devastated, flattened. One Peace Corps volunteer in country says that there are possibly 50 dead in Poutasi (in a village of 325 people). I heard by email from the Peace Corps country director that one of my family members was killed. Her body was found washed up in a tree after she tried to help some children get to safety. I don't know yet if the others are safe."
- "The quake, with a magnitude between 8.0 and 8.3, struck at 6.48 am Samoan time on Tuesday and locals said it lasted up to three minutes. According to news reports, eyewitnesses said that over the next 20 minutes there were four giant walls of water, between three and nine meters high."
- "About 8 minutes ago, we just had a big earthquake. Big. No information yet on the exact magnitude, but it was quite long and certainly big enough to knock over stuff around my house. I'm guessing it was at least a 6.0 on account of the stuff flying about. About 40 seconds in, I grabbed my laptop because I was afraid the cinder block shelf was going to fall on top of it. The quake went on and on and on to the point it felt like it was continuously shaking into the aftershock phase. And we've had a couple aftershocks already."
Check these Peace Corps Volunteers blogs for excellent eyewitness accounts and experiences:
From BBC.com:
- Returning New Zealand holidaymakers told of "truckloads" of bodies in the worst hit area on the southern side of Upolo, in Samoa.
- "We've seen pick-up trucks carrying the dead... back to town," Fotu Becerra told radio Newstalk ZB, the AFP news agency reported.
- Joey Cummings, a radio broadcaster in Pago Pago told the BBC that he watched from a balcony as a five-metre (15ft) wave struck and "the air was filled with screams".
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