John's Next Step

I use the term “you’re invited” frequently. It might need to be explained in this season, and well, just generally explained. Sharing pito with a friend I picked the phrase up during my service in Ghana, West Africa. Wonderful people and culture. My part of Ghana, the upper west portion of the Upper West was a savanna region with one short rainy season. Generally speaking people live happy lives in a marginal region for subsistence farming – hand cultivation and all. The already capricious rainfall is changing with the climate and making life even more uncertain. Obviously, not their fault and they wouldn’t complain about it anyway - “We are managing” is another common saying. Harvesting yams and other food in the dry season. Every little bit helps.  Food will run low before the rains come again. Preparing corn for storage So these people are literally, in the true sense of the word, living on the edge. They have limited resources and any small chan

I strongly believe in the mission, the importance, the value - of the Peace Corps: To promote world peace and friendship. I have and will continue to devote years of my life to support it in a small way – although the pain and separation from family and friends in the states is not such as small thing. People of different cultures are deep down the same, but on the surface there are wonderful differences that can be embraced, enjoyed, and perhaps blended to create a better world for everyone. That is the mission and that is accomplished by integrating into the community. People who know Myers-Briggs personality types can spot me as an INTJ. The I stands for introvert. For me that means that I recharge my batteries by being alone and it takes energy to go out to meet people, to be around a lot of people. I’m a pretty extreme introvert. In a large party I need to get away at times. And so the first couple of weeks at site is difficult for me as I push to meet and greet as

Theresa in 1980 Volunteering is talked about as a good thing in America. There are different nuanced perspectives in different countries and cultures, even differences in multi-cultural America. Still, around the world volunteering – doing until others, is considered a virtue. A virtue many people don’t practice much. Some might casually help out now and then.  Many never look for the time. Others, in our upside down world, believe that volunteering is a waste of time – nothing personally gained and enabling lazy undeserving people or some other nonsense. I feel sorry for those people, not the lazy undeserving people. I’ve seen a few – but they are not always, not usually, poor. No, I feel sorry for the people who think volunteering is a waste of time, nothing personally gained. Those I’ve known don’t seem to be very happy. After years of volunteering I can assure you it is AMAZING for you as well as helpful to others and the planet. I’m happy doing it. I didn’t al

I arrived in Grenada this week and went straight to my house – no homestay. As usual, Peace Corps has placed me about as far away from the beach as possible. I like the beach! I love rivers and waterfalls and understand that one is close, so I’ll try to find it this week. The community is friendly and small. I’ve got a bit of a walk to school so I can greet people along the way. My house My house with the Atlantic in the background I’m in a single family house. Very nice two bedrooms and one bath with a shower. I can get somewhat hot water – warm.  Most of the time, I'll just do the cold shower, the water is not that bad, Visitors, all invited, can turn the heater on... Living room Kitchen Bathroom Guest bedroom My bed, mosquito net on bed is now put up. I also have a washing machine – or what would pass for a washing machine in many Peace Corps sites. A plunger with holes cut in it and a real laundry sink. Basically you let the c

I spent the last couple of months paying very close attention to Dominica and the rapid recovery they have made since Maria.  Still – a lot of work ahead, but great progress.  I had been planning to see how I could improve my resiliency and that of my local community Tete Morne for energy, communication, food, and water.  I have about 50 lbs of supplies that I was going to test and demonstrate. The bigger bag to be heading to Dominica while the red bag will be consolidated with my recovered stuff. When I fly from St. Lucia to Grenada I’ll have rather strict weight limits, My personal stuff – clothes, shoes, electronics, and kitchen stuff will likely be near the weight limit without those supplies.   Most will go on to Dominica – but I will take one of the solar panels and one of the solar lights to Grenada.   I’ll still work on disaster preparedness and resiliency. After being told my new assignment I added Grenada as a topic to my Google news feed and so I’ve been catching u

Grenada Peace Corps offered and I accepted a position on the island of Grenada.  Grenada is another great island in need of Peace Corps volunteers.  It is smaller, but more populated than Dominica.  I look forward to catching up with other volunteers and “getting back in the game". Peace Corps found me another site away from the beach.  I tend to be a site rat and stay  – working and living in the community most of the time.  Not every Peace Corps volunteer follows that option, and I tend to be rather on the far end of the scale.  Because of this I can do better in remote sites than people who need to spend more time with other volunteers or away from site.  Everyone is different.  Still, on a small island nothing it really that remote although bus travel might require more planning and patience than those sites on more heavily traveled roads. As I’ve said before all sites are difficult and although I actually would like a site near a nice beach if I had a choice.  I als

Peace Corps decided to open Dominica to a few volunteers with easy access to the capital city of Roseau.   My damaged and rather remote village was not included at this time.   That is the decision.   I said I would trust the process and I do. I was ready, willing, and able to return to Dominica and face the challenges of service to help the people in my community and on the island.  I am disappointed that I will not, at this time, be able to fulfill my pledge.  I had been paying close attention to the ongoing situation on the island so I understand the difficulties and challenges.  My background in teaching as well as disaster services and other skills could have been utilized to help the school children as well as the greater community and the island nation as a whole during this critical time.  I realized my return was a long shot - but the email received on Thursday that I would not be invited back to Dominica still took the wind out of my sails for a bit. Peace Corps T

Administrative hold The Friday email update from the amazing Eastern Caribbean country director gave me hope, but not assurance, that I will be able to return to Dominica as a Peace Corps volunteer.  There is still some final analysis to be performed and then experts in Washington D.C. will decide after a meeting next Thursday. The plan is to tell us the decision about continuing our service by next Friday.   Peace Corps might not reopen Dominica now, but I hope that the decision will be to offer the evacuated volunteers a choice to go back to Dominica or to serve on another island in the Eastern Caribbean.   We will also have the option to end our service.    Dominica has the greatest need and where I pledged my Peace Corps service so that is where I want to go back if at all possible.  Regardless, I want to continue my Peace Corps service if at all possible.    The Peace Corps will ship personal items back to home of record for anyone who decides to early terminate service.

The Prime Minister of Dominica used the Kwéyól saying for “Enough crying, let's get on with it” in a press briefing last week. He wanted to tell the people to be strong and help others. I am ready to do that. Peace Corps continues to look at the island as a whole and our sites individually - schools and homes.  They will reach a decision with Washington and inform evacuated volunteers by Nov 10 th , as mentioned in previous posts.  We will have up to three options: return to service in Dominica, serve on a different island, or end service.  I want to remain a Peace Corps volunteer so I hope to get more than just the last option.    A short video of part of my normal ride down from Tete Morne to Roseau. I've seen pictures and I've read stories about Dominica in the weeks since Maria.  Some are hopeful, some not so much.  Life is getting better, but still difficult for many on the island and it will continue to be that way for some months ahead.  There is a great

Parting with things. This week I made progress on getting rid of some things that I had been saving.  My plan is to have everything I want to keep on one set of shelves in the basement along with a large handing bag for some clothing, a small spinning wheel, and a small side table of sentimental value.  I think I’m getting close to that with the help of my children.  But, I still have more work to do. The hardest things to part with this week were books and some Red Cross things that Theresa and I had acquired.  It seems that each time I go through my books, and I started with a lot, I cut the number of books in half.  I’m now down to less than one box.  I have to take a deep breath and trust in libraries and the internet during the process. The Red Cross stuff was emotionally hard to sort.  This included cleaning up the “go box” for disasters that Theresa made, and going through our certificates, awards, and equipment.  (Theresa and I were local Red Cross Disaster volunteers f

The back of my house BEFORE the storm. Living room Bedroom with security camera .... I had been told about the damage earlier, but the good news this week is that I got pictures of my house in Dominica so I better understand and know the damage.   The bad news is that I got the pictures and saw the extent of the damage.   The good news is the house can be repaired.   The bad news is that….   Well, this could go on and on… As mentioned before I knew that living on a Caribbean island included the risk of hurricanes.  I admit I didn’t understand it completely, and like of lot other people on the island I was rather relaxed about the expected category 1 or 2 storm.  But I’ve learned my lesson well. Life is a learning experience and Peace Corps provides opportunities for more pop quizzes/lessons than I got in my old life.  Next time… So as you can see – the roof to my house was almost completely ripped off.  I lost some things.  However, I was very blessed by that m

I have so many things I want to say.  This week I focus on the news that Dominica and her people continue to recover and rebuild.  Hurricane Maria ran directly over the island with 160 mph winds as a category 5 on Sept. 18 and damaged or destroyed everything on the island, the entire island, the entire nation.  The agriculture sector, critical to the economy, was damaged as much as buildings - everything was hit with the full force of the storm. I don’t want to say Maria completely destroyed the island because it did not.  The island and her people are too strong to be taken out by just a cat 5.  Yes, terrible damage all over.  90% structures significantly damaged or destroyed .  Wind and rain torn virtually every leaf off every tree even if the tree was left standing with broken branches.  My school was destroyed, and my roof was partially damaged; but my landlady’s roof was fine with limited damage to windows and doors.  The island was damaged, not destroyed. I don't want to