Thoughts About Posh Corps

What is the image of Peace Corps? Everyone has different versions but the picture usually involves an out of place American going to a far away land, giving up many if not all the modern conveniences of 1^st world live and having a profound religious-esk personal transformation that changes their lives forever while at the same time changing the lives of the people they lived with and finally, providing a god-like perspective of the strange American foreigner who come to live here and provided them with some miraculous technology or community tool. Whew! Short version; American goes to foreign land, American lives in a hut, American changes lives and comes back with a bushy beard, the ability to wipe their ass with anything and a carbon nano-tube lower digestive unit. See picture below

While at some point in the history of Peace Corps and in some places still today many of those points may hit the hard wall of reality, but my experience here in the Philippines has been quite different.  As many know, I am in Puerto Princesa, a city of a quarter million residents with electricity, running water, Dunkin Donuts, wi-fi and a brand spanking new Robinsons which has a cinema. (Yes a cinema not a movie theater) Not to mention that I am in the frickin Philippines and just came back from a chartered dive trip to Tubbataha, some of the best diving in the world. True Posh Corps.

With my image of the Peace Corps not really jiving with reality I felt strange feelings of being cheated…but cheated of what really? Was it that I had been cheated by not being uncomfortable enough and denied as many of the luxuries that I expected? Or denied the close relationship a PCV may be able to develop with a whole village. Having to deal with cockroaches instead of strange unknown deadly insects? Don’t know, but I do know that in the beginning many PCVs including myself were very frugal and didn’t eat out, didn’t shop at the supermarkets and instead went to the local market, didn’t go to nice restaurants or Dunkin Donuts etc. etc. I cannot speak for others but I think for me some of these conveniences were self denied in order to make it feel like our experiences were more classic Peace Corps. But now that we are a couple of years in Krystal and I do treat ourselves more than we did in the beginning and I think that over the course of the two years and encountering problems we originally didn’t expect our picture of Peace Corps has changed.

Many PCVs are going to rapidly developing countries and as a result more and more PCVs are placed in or near a city. This development makes it easy for PCVs to have access to the conveniences of the developed world. For example, when my parents were in the Peace Corps their family did not hear from them at all for months and then when there was word it was a letter or a brief phone call. Today I can skype daily if I wanted to. This changes the PC experience dramatically but it is not necessarily a bad change, it’s just dramatically different than the current picture held by many of what Peace Corps is. I have still developed amazing relationships with people and I have eaten some really weird food. I am still living in a foreign culture and I still deal with many of the issues that previous PCVs encounter such as; language, work habits, religion, cultural perspectives but I am dealing with new problems that they may not have had to consider. For example, how to develop a Youth Rehabilitation Center for a city of a quarter million people and is furthermore is the only center on the entire island for that sector of youth? I guess it not necessarily the core problems that have changed but the size and scope of these problems have exploded with the growth of the countries and their cities.

I think that the universal picture of Peace Corps should be evolving and it doesn’t seem to be. The Peace Corps website shows few pictures of PCVs in city environments but a majority of the pictures are outside or are of teachers in a classroom with no windows, doors or electricity equipped with a small blackboard and a single piece of chalk. My experience has been more in an office environment with several computers and air con. Many people considering the PC want this experience and applicants should still be prepared for the possibility of a remote and rugged site but they should be equally prepared to be placed in a city. One of the best characteristics of successful PCVs is their ability to adapt and after this long rant I guess I am simply saying that I am happy and proud with my service and after working with my own unique problems and taking advantages of the opportunities of Peace Corps live in a city I do not feel like I missed the “true” Peace Corps experience because my experience is simply that…my experience.