I have been serving in the Peace Corps for just about a year now. Ask any volunteer, and they’ll
tell you that in the Corps, no two days are the same, no two volunteer experiences are the same, and that the quality of your service
can depend on the work you do, where you are placed at, the culture you’re integrated into, and the people you meet.
A lot of people join the Peace Corps for a
million different reasons – an altruistic nature, a desire to travel, to
see new places, to experience something different somewhere else -
somewhere new and foreign and exotic. Some volunteers want to break down
barriers, some want to learn new skills, some want to learn about a new
culture. Through being in the Peace Corps, wherever you are placed, you
will learn new languages, you will become a better communicator, you
will become more patient, you will become a fuller and more balanced
you.
In the Peace Corps, like anywhere else, you
will have your good days - maybe the best days of your life - and you’ll
have your bad days - those days where you have never felt more challenged by
your circumstances. Some projects are failures and others – well, maybe
they’re successes even if they aren’t exactly what you thought they might be
– but if they are successes – then they are more relevant and needed than
what you first imagined the project to be.
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With all of this said, let me tell you a
little more about my personal experience. I’m Alaska Native and proud. I’m
Lower Tanana Athabascan and my mother is from a small village in Alaska’s
Interior. Minto, Alaska has about 250 people, three churches, a store, a
post office, a clinic, a K-12 school and a lodge that houses the tribal
offices. Most people from Minto are proud of our songs and dances and
culture. This is where I come from; Alaska is, and has been, and always will
be my home.
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But in the last year I have found a new home
in the most unlikely of places. And the home has come with a new culture, a
new language and new family members. In Vanuatu, they would say I have
become “One Woman Shepards.”
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Erata Village is one of five small villages
located on Tongariki Island. Tongariki is about 2 kilometers by 4
kilometers. The population of the island is about 350 people. There are 3
“stores,” in which you can purchase kerosene, batteries, peanut butter,
cigarettes, rice and sugar – and when the ship is running steadily you might
be able to buy some cookies or other sweet snacks. There are 3 churches, a
K-8th grade school, and a local clinic, but there is no post office or bank,
and the only truck they ever had broke down in 1987. My father, visiting
from Alaska, was the very first tourist in Tongariki – and so why would
there be a lodge?
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Both villages face similar challenges in terms
of “development.” Both suffer from brain drain and urban migration, and both
suffer from unique geographical challenges and remoteness, and as such,
suffer from high prices of fuel costs. Amongst all the differences in
cultures, personalities, songs, dances, languages, and lifestyles, we, all
of us in the world, can always find some common ground; find ways to better
understand each other.
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Tongariki is a small, small island in the
South Pacific. It is part of an archipelago known as the Republic of
Vanuatu, if you are in Alaska; just head south to Hawaii, and keep heading
south. Indeed, many Vanuatu maps might not even include Tongariki on the
map. You might just see a spattering of land masses known as the Shepards
Islands groups. But from the top of Tongariki, you have a 360 degree view of
Tongoa, Falea, Ewose, Epi, Emai, Pele, Nguna, Efate, Makira, Mataso, Amour,
and Buninga Islands. These are the islands that make up Shefa Province. It’s
an amazing view, the deep rolling ocean blues, the shale grey of rock
jutting out of the ocean, white sand beaches, the lush green foliage that
provides bananas, mangoes, papayas, manioc, taro, yam, coconut and other
local organic fruits and vegetables. The sea, too, yields its share of
shellfish, fish, octopus and crab.
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The people on Tongariki are generous, with a
great capacity for laughter. They work hard to maintain their gardens, and
are anxious for development. They absorb every magazine, newspaper, photos
and articles sent from home. In many ways, the people from Tongariki are
situated on a cusp of change. Maybe in the way Minto was situated 50 or 100
years ago.
Then, in Alaska, we had not yet come across statehood, the Alaska Native
Land Claims Act, the discovery of oil, or the pipeline. Then, in Alaska, we
weren’t even really a part of the great nation that is America.
Now in Vanuatu, we see the march of development: cell phone towers rising
from the ground, the promise of running water and electricity, laptops and
computers in schools.
But with development and globalization moving forward, Ni-Vanuatu people and
communities are struggling mightily to strike a balance between new kinds of
infrastructure and the changes to the homogeneous culture that has kept them
strong for thousands of years.
But that is an internal struggle. In the mean time, they toil away in their
gardens, or fishing, or in their work with the church or school or woman’s
club. They love to socialize and they love to hear about Alaska. Is it cold?
The surprise washes across their face when I tell them it’s colder than the
inside of a refrigerator during certain months. Is it dark? Again, amazement
at the fact that sometimes the sun refuses to set, and sometimes it refuses
to rise.
If I take the effort to explain to them that my heritage is such that my
mother’s family was settled in long before the American government or the
missionaries arrived – they find a certain kinship in my heritage. And if I
tell them my father arrived in Alaska himself as a volunteer – they can
understand the connection between that and my own ambiguous reasons for
making the decision I did to serve in the Peace Corps.
In my work as a Community Health Facilitator I spend time helping to develop
the health committee and the management of the local clinic. I also teach
health classes in the school and make health education workshops throughout
the island. Currently I’m working with other health volunteers to develop a
survey for the Province that will give us some baseline data; data that will
tell us where to expend our efforts and to help us measure our progress.
I have fundraisers with donated articles sent from home, pens and pencils,
bubble gum, bras and kilots (underwear), t-shirts, skirts, markers and
teaching supplies, earrings, necklaces, and nail polish. Locals tear through
the sale goods like Christmas morning spending precious vatu for a chance at
something new. The vatu (local currency) goes towards the repair of the
dispensary and puts money into the hands of the health committee.
These projects are fulfilling, slow-going, challenging – its progress at the
grassroots level. Sometimes, I don’t know what I’m doing; and what I know
then is that I’m working with the islanders to work our way through the
challenges together in order to “mekem rod blong yumi everiwan stret (to
make the path ahead straight for everyone)".
A typical Peace Corps experience includes 3 months of pre-service training,
in which you are introduced to place, culture, language and an outline of
the work that is expected of you. As a volunteer, you alone are required to
fill in the details of your work – incorporating Peace Corps goals,
community needs, and your own aspirations. After pre-service training you
swear-in as an official volunteer and you begin the next two years of your
life.
I am midway through my two-year service now. And after a year, I find myself
still grappling with the concept of “sustainable development,” even though
it’s been a concept rural Alaska has been grappling with for ages now. And
after a year, I find myself still coming to new understandings about the
culture here in Vanuatu, in all of its nuances.
A year has passed by so quickly and yet there were days that passed by so
slowly, even time had seemed to disappear into the deep abyss of the ocean.
But even so, rural village Alaska, if not Peace Corps Vanuatu, has taught me
that all things will come to pass in their own time. And, even if I am only
a small speck on the wave of history, I will never undermine my own
capability to make a positive impact on the lives of others. Even if it’s
only found in the smile of my host mama, in the fact that my host brother
washed his hands, or in the fact that you, the reader, has taken the time to
appreciate the wondrous resources around you and the diversity of culture
that’s found in this world.
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