In order to remain diligent with this blog and not lose my mind waiting for word from Placement, I'm going to try and post once a week until I hear from them.
I just got back from a lovely trip to Chicago to see friends and family and now I'm back to work in Santa Fe. This morning I've been reading other applicant's blogs on peacecorpsjournals.com, searching for some sort of clue as to when I might hear from placement. It's bizarre that I don't seem to remember anything about this process from the last time I applied. This time I'm keeping a good record so I can share it with other potential applicants to help ease the tension of waiting. It would seem, from my previous application and from these blogs, that typically you do not received your invitation packet until two months before your departure date. In the case of my invite to Cambodia I didn't hear until a June 1 and I left for Cambodia July 20. So I'm not quite sure what to think. I was nominated for fall of 2010 so, doing some quick math, I would hear in June at the earliest....yikes. So I'm crossing my fingers that I hear back A LOT sooner than that. I am applying to graduate school as a backup, but I would love to hear yes or no from Peace Corps before I go spending hundreds of dollars on applications!
In other news, I'm moving out of my current house into a much nicer, cheaper house a few blocks away tonight. Maybe there will be a invitation packet waiting for me when i get there.
Wednesday, December 30, 2009
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
3:08 pm, Santa Fe, New Mexico
So after about a year and six months of silence I'm back. No I didn't get swallowed up in some tropical storm or buried in a mud slide... no this is a tale of hardship, bad decisions, better decisions, some more bad ones, monotony, and then some more good decisions. As you may have guessed I was a Peace Corps volunteer in Cambodia with the K2 group for about 10 days in 2008. Now that 2010 approaches and my *current* Peace Corps application is pending I felt like it was a good time to write.
After my last post I was sort of preoccupied with visiting my friends and family in Chicago, gathering necessary resources, and saying last goodbyes to great friends. After a somewhat epic summer of adventuring and living in rural AZ, I was off to the wild unknown…San Francisco. Just kidding Cambodia. The first day of staging was incredibly exciting. It was great to finally meet the people that I was about to spend two years of my life with. One thing I can say for Peace Corps is that they definitely know how to pick 'em. Our group bonded pretty quickly and went on several small excursions into San Francisco. I got to spend some much needed quality time with my dad and my brother and I managed stay out late and get me back to Japantown.
After two days of staging in a basement conference room of the Kobuki Hotel, our group was off to the airport in a large party bus. We were all somewhat flustered trying to make sure we had all of our bags, passports, money, etc. I don't know about the other volunteers but I was under the impression that we would be accompanied by a PC staff member. We weren't. But, the airport staff was very helpful and we all got through ok. I have to say the flight to Tokyo was GREAT. I sat next to a good, new friend and we watched probably six or seven movies and drank a bit. We finally arrived in Tokyo with enough time to eat some sushi, drink a bit of Sake, and try the shrimp burger from McDonald's. And then...back on the plane. This time to Bangkok and 9ish hour flight. We reluctantly got back onto the plane where I said to my friend "there's no way that I can handle another long flight", she replied "I have some prescription sleeping pills..". And that's about the last thing I remember until we landed in Bangkok. I woke up thinking I had only slept about an hour and my buddy tells me "no way man, you were out for about 8 1/2 hours we're about to land in Bangkok". etc, etc, etc, we arrive in Cambodia at about two in the afternoon after about 30 hours of travel time and 2 hours of sleep. (excluding my drug induced coma). We were greeted by some of the K1 volunteers and PC staff and were whisked off in a tiny, tiny bus to a hotel and then to PC headquarters. The first thing I noticed was the sheer amount of scooters (aka motos), the lack of street signs, street lights, stop signs, adherence to traffic laws (if they exist), and that you can easily fit 4-5 people on the back of a scooter. We arrived at the hotel, finally unpacked our things and set off to a luncheon at a local restaurant. Our first taste of Khmer food! I was somewhat surprised at how much I enjoyed it. After all the talk of adjusting to local diets and all.
The next few hours are a bit fuzzy, but that evening we got invited to a sort of meet and greet with the PC Cambodia staff on a smallish boat on the Mekong River. That’s right the Mekong! It was somewhat bizarre that the view of the riverfront was largely obstructed from view, walled out from the city. We walked down a narrow gangway onto the small boat and greeted our Cambodian counterparts with the very, very limited Kmae we had learned throughout the day. Sitting at the edge of the boat I could see a monsoon storm brewing in the distance. I got a chance to finally have some wind in my face and do a bit of socializing after the very long journey. We had a sort of banquet set up in the middle of the boat, followed by traditional Cambodian dancing and music.
We stayed out pretty late on our little Mekong party boat and when we started back to the hotel it had gotten dark. We had a fleet of Tuk Tuks (a scooter attached to a carriage, aka the most excellent mode of transportation ever devised) waiting for us on the street. We all hopped in and were reminded to keep our valuables in close to our bodies to prevent “snatching”.
The next two days were filled with various administrative tasks at PC headquarters and very little time to explore Phnom Penh. Our arrival coincided with a somewhat historic event, the national elections. The Prime Minister, Hun Sen, had been in power for quite some time and there was talk of a potential upset at the polls. PC thought it best if we avoided the capital city for a few weeks until things settled down.
We left the city early in the morning by bus and headed toward the outskirts of Phnom Penh. We passed through mile after mile of heavily populated suburbs and finally into endless rice paddy/river delta. Kampong Chanang Province would be our home for the next few weeks until we moved to our training villages and host families.
We began a fairly intensive series of language, cultural, and medical seminars aimed at giving us a crash course in all things Cambodia. Since the sun goes down so early, we would typically end our days at four or five and then go to dinner at one of two spots up the road.
*Brief note on animals*
Cows, chickens, feral dogs/cats, all wander the streets as if they own the place. I literally saw a cow look both ways before crossing the busy road…I’m not joking it was amazing. The dogs can be a bit ferocious, but are generally pretty kind if you have some food to give them. I saw one very small “lap dog”-type dog mating with three or four females inside of a restaurant.
Anyways, our nights were mostly occupied by soccer games, basketball or ultimate Frisbee at the local high school’s fields. And Ultimate friends, if you ever hear of a Cambodian ultimate team you have me to thank!
Around about day five I started having a horrible feeling in the pit of my stomach. No, this wasn’t a parasite. It was a seed of doubt that would end up growing into an unavoidable mass that made me terminate service after a very brief stint.
I can honestly say that I loved, with all of my heart, the people I was with, the country I was placed, the food/culture/music, everything about the entire experience. But I felt like I rushed into my first stint in the Peace Corps. For whatever reason I decided to apply before I was really emotionally ready. And after a few days of deliberation, I made the extremely difficult decision to terminate.
After 10 days in the Peace Corps I was once again back in Arizona. I was confused, upset, nervous, and sort of angry with myself for leaving but I have to say, for the time being, I was relieved. I knew from the day I decided to terminate that I planned to reapply a year or so later.
After a year of working in Arizona I decided in August, 2009 that I was not only ready, but anxious to reapply to Peace Corps. As it is not very common for those who terminate to reapply, PC headquarters was somewhat confused with the protocol. The first conversation with the Dallas office I was told that I would now need three months of ESL teaching experience to qualify, along with eight recommendation letters (including one from a person I volunteered with, a Peace Corps, Cambodia staff member, current and former employers, etc). I was not particularly surprised with these new requirements and had actually already begun to volunteer as an ESL instructor after moving to Santa Fe, New Mexico. The letters were not hard to get. I had kept in touch with the majority of my volunteer friends in Cambodia as well as my former medical officer who had finished service and now lived in Pecos, New Mexico (about 30 miles from Santa Fe). Linda (the medical officer) was extremely encouraging and helpful and without her I would probably have never gotten as far with this process as I have.
I submitted my application in August and was contacted frequently by my recruiter in Dallas for additional information. Including two additional essays, more letters of recommendation, amended resume, etc. In October I was asked to fly to Dallas to interview with my recruiter.
This trip deserves a few words. I left on a Wednesday evening after work, on the commuter train to Albuquerque. Stayed in a cheap hotel. Set five alarms on my phone to wake up…I was a bit paranoid. Woke up at 5 am and figured I’d grab some food and walk to the airport. I don’t know if you’ve ever tried to walk to an airport but it’s not possible. There aren’t pedestrian crossings or sidewalks anywhere. I began to think I was going to miss my flight and called a cab. Made it on the plane with about 15 minutes to spare. Landed in Dallas, cab to the Peace Corps office downtown. I was about two hours early. I walked around downtown Dallas for a bit, saw an old courthouse, had a 72 oz coke, good times. I decided to just show up a bit early for my interview, I was already sweating a bit and wanted to relax for a minute before having what I knew was going to be an extremely difficult interview.
My recruiter called me into her office, decorated with the usual Peace Corps décor and asked me to have a seat. Now, let me just mention how great my original Peace Corps interview had been. So relaxed, so friendly, just really a very positive experience…this, however, was the exact opposite. I expected the interview to delve into my reasons for leaving, but what I did not expect was the extremely probing and what I felt to be irreverent lines of questioning. I was told repeatedly that “you got the hardest recruiter” by the recruiter herself. That being said, I answered her questions as best I could, trying to prove to her that in this past year and a half I had grown emotionally, supplemented my resume with great professional experience, and done a great deal of volunteer work, but she wouldn’t let me get a word in. After an hour and a half of very emotional questioning it seemed like there was absolutely no way in hell this woman was going to nominate me. She said “well, we’ll see what happens I’ll let you know in a few weeks, do you have anything else to add”. I basically reiterated my point that I have been extremely committed to this application from the beginning, additional experience, etc. And left her office feeling utterly defeated. After months of hard and diligent work on my application I was going to be turned down. I took a cab back to the airport, wandered around feeling somewhat lost emotionally and grabbed some coffee and some pulp novel from the airport bookstore. I ignored several calls from well wishers and then I got a call from a Texas area code. I pick up and it’s my recruiter. “Quinn, I just wanted to call and tell you I went ahead and nominated you for an ESL position in the South Pacific”. WOAH, seriously? After all that. So it was, on October 18, 2009 I was once again nominated for the Peace Corps. I quickly phoned the people who called me and told them the good news and hopped on the plane back to New Mexico.
After about a week I got my medical kit in the mail. I, however, do not have insurance. I was trying to figure out the finances in my head; how much did all of this cost last time, when could I come up with the money, etc. After a few days of contemplation, I wrote to my friend Linda in Pecos and mentioned the situation, she offered to give me a physical and blood work at her clinic for $150! I got the medical kit finished in a week and half, mailed it next day shipping to D.C. and began my least favorite part of this process, the waiting game. Through some sort of miracle OMS was able to process my medical kit and approve me by December 4 and now I’m waiting to hear from Placement on whether or not they’ll give me another shot at service. As of December 22 I have yet to hear from them, but, judging by the process last time, it will be quite awhile before I hear anything.
As this post is already a lot longer than you want to read, I’m only going to say a few more things re: Peace Corps and hopefully they’ll help out some random applicant or potential applicant in the future.
Please, Please, Please make sure you’re ready for service. It is an extremely challenging and rewarding experience that you need to take the time to prepare for. The application process is vigorous and slow for good reason, they want you to make sure that you have absolutely thought things through and that you’re committed. In my case, I guess I fooled myself into thinking I was. But after a year and a half of consideration I can honestly say that I’ve never been as well prepared for anything in my life. I know what to expect, I know how it feels to be in-country, to terminate, to come back to the states, to talk with friends that are still in-country and I’m glad for that experience…but I don’t wish it on anyone else. So if you have any questions or concerns feel free to email me any time.
Hopefully, I will be posting with much greater frequency in the near future. I’m sure I will have another post concerning my invitation or decline letter. For now I’m going to have to immerse myself in some sort of hobby or cryogenically freeze myself until the letter comes.
After my last post I was sort of preoccupied with visiting my friends and family in Chicago, gathering necessary resources, and saying last goodbyes to great friends. After a somewhat epic summer of adventuring and living in rural AZ, I was off to the wild unknown…San Francisco. Just kidding Cambodia. The first day of staging was incredibly exciting. It was great to finally meet the people that I was about to spend two years of my life with. One thing I can say for Peace Corps is that they definitely know how to pick 'em. Our group bonded pretty quickly and went on several small excursions into San Francisco. I got to spend some much needed quality time with my dad and my brother and I managed stay out late and get me back to Japantown.
After two days of staging in a basement conference room of the Kobuki Hotel, our group was off to the airport in a large party bus. We were all somewhat flustered trying to make sure we had all of our bags, passports, money, etc. I don't know about the other volunteers but I was under the impression that we would be accompanied by a PC staff member. We weren't. But, the airport staff was very helpful and we all got through ok. I have to say the flight to Tokyo was GREAT. I sat next to a good, new friend and we watched probably six or seven movies and drank a bit. We finally arrived in Tokyo with enough time to eat some sushi, drink a bit of Sake, and try the shrimp burger from McDonald's. And then...back on the plane. This time to Bangkok and 9ish hour flight. We reluctantly got back onto the plane where I said to my friend "there's no way that I can handle another long flight", she replied "I have some prescription sleeping pills..". And that's about the last thing I remember until we landed in Bangkok. I woke up thinking I had only slept about an hour and my buddy tells me "no way man, you were out for about 8 1/2 hours we're about to land in Bangkok". etc, etc, etc, we arrive in Cambodia at about two in the afternoon after about 30 hours of travel time and 2 hours of sleep. (excluding my drug induced coma). We were greeted by some of the K1 volunteers and PC staff and were whisked off in a tiny, tiny bus to a hotel and then to PC headquarters. The first thing I noticed was the sheer amount of scooters (aka motos), the lack of street signs, street lights, stop signs, adherence to traffic laws (if they exist), and that you can easily fit 4-5 people on the back of a scooter. We arrived at the hotel, finally unpacked our things and set off to a luncheon at a local restaurant. Our first taste of Khmer food! I was somewhat surprised at how much I enjoyed it. After all the talk of adjusting to local diets and all.
The next few hours are a bit fuzzy, but that evening we got invited to a sort of meet and greet with the PC Cambodia staff on a smallish boat on the Mekong River. That’s right the Mekong! It was somewhat bizarre that the view of the riverfront was largely obstructed from view, walled out from the city. We walked down a narrow gangway onto the small boat and greeted our Cambodian counterparts with the very, very limited Kmae we had learned throughout the day. Sitting at the edge of the boat I could see a monsoon storm brewing in the distance. I got a chance to finally have some wind in my face and do a bit of socializing after the very long journey. We had a sort of banquet set up in the middle of the boat, followed by traditional Cambodian dancing and music.
We stayed out pretty late on our little Mekong party boat and when we started back to the hotel it had gotten dark. We had a fleet of Tuk Tuks (a scooter attached to a carriage, aka the most excellent mode of transportation ever devised) waiting for us on the street. We all hopped in and were reminded to keep our valuables in close to our bodies to prevent “snatching”.
The next two days were filled with various administrative tasks at PC headquarters and very little time to explore Phnom Penh. Our arrival coincided with a somewhat historic event, the national elections. The Prime Minister, Hun Sen, had been in power for quite some time and there was talk of a potential upset at the polls. PC thought it best if we avoided the capital city for a few weeks until things settled down.
We left the city early in the morning by bus and headed toward the outskirts of Phnom Penh. We passed through mile after mile of heavily populated suburbs and finally into endless rice paddy/river delta. Kampong Chanang Province would be our home for the next few weeks until we moved to our training villages and host families.
We began a fairly intensive series of language, cultural, and medical seminars aimed at giving us a crash course in all things Cambodia. Since the sun goes down so early, we would typically end our days at four or five and then go to dinner at one of two spots up the road.
*Brief note on animals*
Cows, chickens, feral dogs/cats, all wander the streets as if they own the place. I literally saw a cow look both ways before crossing the busy road…I’m not joking it was amazing. The dogs can be a bit ferocious, but are generally pretty kind if you have some food to give them. I saw one very small “lap dog”-type dog mating with three or four females inside of a restaurant.
Anyways, our nights were mostly occupied by soccer games, basketball or ultimate Frisbee at the local high school’s fields. And Ultimate friends, if you ever hear of a Cambodian ultimate team you have me to thank!
Around about day five I started having a horrible feeling in the pit of my stomach. No, this wasn’t a parasite. It was a seed of doubt that would end up growing into an unavoidable mass that made me terminate service after a very brief stint.
I can honestly say that I loved, with all of my heart, the people I was with, the country I was placed, the food/culture/music, everything about the entire experience. But I felt like I rushed into my first stint in the Peace Corps. For whatever reason I decided to apply before I was really emotionally ready. And after a few days of deliberation, I made the extremely difficult decision to terminate.
After 10 days in the Peace Corps I was once again back in Arizona. I was confused, upset, nervous, and sort of angry with myself for leaving but I have to say, for the time being, I was relieved. I knew from the day I decided to terminate that I planned to reapply a year or so later.
After a year of working in Arizona I decided in August, 2009 that I was not only ready, but anxious to reapply to Peace Corps. As it is not very common for those who terminate to reapply, PC headquarters was somewhat confused with the protocol. The first conversation with the Dallas office I was told that I would now need three months of ESL teaching experience to qualify, along with eight recommendation letters (including one from a person I volunteered with, a Peace Corps, Cambodia staff member, current and former employers, etc). I was not particularly surprised with these new requirements and had actually already begun to volunteer as an ESL instructor after moving to Santa Fe, New Mexico. The letters were not hard to get. I had kept in touch with the majority of my volunteer friends in Cambodia as well as my former medical officer who had finished service and now lived in Pecos, New Mexico (about 30 miles from Santa Fe). Linda (the medical officer) was extremely encouraging and helpful and without her I would probably have never gotten as far with this process as I have.
I submitted my application in August and was contacted frequently by my recruiter in Dallas for additional information. Including two additional essays, more letters of recommendation, amended resume, etc. In October I was asked to fly to Dallas to interview with my recruiter.
This trip deserves a few words. I left on a Wednesday evening after work, on the commuter train to Albuquerque. Stayed in a cheap hotel. Set five alarms on my phone to wake up…I was a bit paranoid. Woke up at 5 am and figured I’d grab some food and walk to the airport. I don’t know if you’ve ever tried to walk to an airport but it’s not possible. There aren’t pedestrian crossings or sidewalks anywhere. I began to think I was going to miss my flight and called a cab. Made it on the plane with about 15 minutes to spare. Landed in Dallas, cab to the Peace Corps office downtown. I was about two hours early. I walked around downtown Dallas for a bit, saw an old courthouse, had a 72 oz coke, good times. I decided to just show up a bit early for my interview, I was already sweating a bit and wanted to relax for a minute before having what I knew was going to be an extremely difficult interview.
My recruiter called me into her office, decorated with the usual Peace Corps décor and asked me to have a seat. Now, let me just mention how great my original Peace Corps interview had been. So relaxed, so friendly, just really a very positive experience…this, however, was the exact opposite. I expected the interview to delve into my reasons for leaving, but what I did not expect was the extremely probing and what I felt to be irreverent lines of questioning. I was told repeatedly that “you got the hardest recruiter” by the recruiter herself. That being said, I answered her questions as best I could, trying to prove to her that in this past year and a half I had grown emotionally, supplemented my resume with great professional experience, and done a great deal of volunteer work, but she wouldn’t let me get a word in. After an hour and a half of very emotional questioning it seemed like there was absolutely no way in hell this woman was going to nominate me. She said “well, we’ll see what happens I’ll let you know in a few weeks, do you have anything else to add”. I basically reiterated my point that I have been extremely committed to this application from the beginning, additional experience, etc. And left her office feeling utterly defeated. After months of hard and diligent work on my application I was going to be turned down. I took a cab back to the airport, wandered around feeling somewhat lost emotionally and grabbed some coffee and some pulp novel from the airport bookstore. I ignored several calls from well wishers and then I got a call from a Texas area code. I pick up and it’s my recruiter. “Quinn, I just wanted to call and tell you I went ahead and nominated you for an ESL position in the South Pacific”. WOAH, seriously? After all that. So it was, on October 18, 2009 I was once again nominated for the Peace Corps. I quickly phoned the people who called me and told them the good news and hopped on the plane back to New Mexico.
After about a week I got my medical kit in the mail. I, however, do not have insurance. I was trying to figure out the finances in my head; how much did all of this cost last time, when could I come up with the money, etc. After a few days of contemplation, I wrote to my friend Linda in Pecos and mentioned the situation, she offered to give me a physical and blood work at her clinic for $150! I got the medical kit finished in a week and half, mailed it next day shipping to D.C. and began my least favorite part of this process, the waiting game. Through some sort of miracle OMS was able to process my medical kit and approve me by December 4 and now I’m waiting to hear from Placement on whether or not they’ll give me another shot at service. As of December 22 I have yet to hear from them, but, judging by the process last time, it will be quite awhile before I hear anything.
As this post is already a lot longer than you want to read, I’m only going to say a few more things re: Peace Corps and hopefully they’ll help out some random applicant or potential applicant in the future.
Please, Please, Please make sure you’re ready for service. It is an extremely challenging and rewarding experience that you need to take the time to prepare for. The application process is vigorous and slow for good reason, they want you to make sure that you have absolutely thought things through and that you’re committed. In my case, I guess I fooled myself into thinking I was. But after a year and a half of consideration I can honestly say that I’ve never been as well prepared for anything in my life. I know what to expect, I know how it feels to be in-country, to terminate, to come back to the states, to talk with friends that are still in-country and I’m glad for that experience…but I don’t wish it on anyone else. So if you have any questions or concerns feel free to email me any time.
Hopefully, I will be posting with much greater frequency in the near future. I’m sure I will have another post concerning my invitation or decline letter. For now I’m going to have to immerse myself in some sort of hobby or cryogenically freeze myself until the letter comes.
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