senior year and Peace Corps

Well it's official! I am departing for the Peace Corps in Cambodia on July 21. Lots has happened since I left Copenhagen, so I will try to offer a brief summary of my senior year, and then get into the details of my upcoming Peace Corps service. After Copenhagen, I took a class at Penn and did some campaign work for the DNC. Then, I got a great internship with a small business development organization, Chester Microenterprise Partnership.

My senior year was not quite as exciting as my junior year since I didn't spend the entire year studying abroad. I did get some traveling in though: I went to Honduras, Guatamala and Nicaragua with my sister over fall break; I went to San Diego and Florida over winter break; and, I received a grant from Haverford to go to Mexico City over spring break to learn about microfinance firsthand. I also spent a weekend in Austin at the Clinton Global Initiative University Meeting, and frequented New York City, Philadelphia and some other college towns for various conferences.

The main reason I attended many of these meetings and received the grant to go to Mexico City ( aside from academic curiosity of course), was because I started the Microfinance Club at Haverford (soon to be renamed Microfinance Consulting Network). It started with me and a fellow student attending the Penn Club's meeting and realizing there was a void at Haverford; so many students are interested in economics and social justice and student life does not account for that. We spent much of the year finding our identity. By the end of the year, we solidified ourselves in consulting.

During our first semester, we won a "consulting competition." We had to research whether it was feasible to start a microfinance institution (MFI) in Abia, Nigeria. We presented our findings via video conference and our recommendations and presentation were considered the best. We built off our victory to attract more students. We got great publicity in the college newspaper and on the college website: http://www.haverford.edu/news/stories/16181/30

While in Mexico City, we met with various MFIs and we realized we could do more research and offer our services for free to MFIs. Two members of the club are in Mexico City now on summer internships and working on this, and that is the direction the club is heading in now that I have graduated. I am pleased that the club will continue after I graduated. We struggled getting people to attend our meetings at the beginning, but by the end of the year we had at least a dozen people at every meeting and a 70 person list-serv.

As you can see, my commitment to economic development attracted me to the Peace Corps. I will be going to Cambodia at the end of July to teach English and work with a health NGO or clinic. I will answer the two most common questions people have been asking me here: How did I get involved with the Peace Corps and what will I be doing?

Basically, I leave July 21. I spend two days in San Francisco, meeting my group, getting shots, signing forms, and getting some very basic cultural training. Then, we depart for Cambodia. We will live with host families for 9-10 weeks. We will meet at a conference center sometimes, but for the most part, we will be in small groups learning Khmer (the local language), Cambodian culture, our work responsibilities and ways to take care of ourselves in a new country, ranging from maintaining a bike to avoiding dengue fever.

Then, I will spend two years on my own, living with another host family. I will spend part of my time teaching English to high school students with a Cambodian counterpart. The other part will be the health component. I am also expected to work on other projects, including extracurricular activities with students and the community. They said you can work with other NGOs, so I requested being where I can work with a microfinance institution.

So, how did I get here? I knew I wanted to do something related to economic development where I could live abroad or travel after I graduated. I talked to as many professionals as I could throughout the summer and fall to try to figure out the best move. By January, Peace Corps was one of my top choices. Let me say here, that I am extremely lucky that I began applying in January and I'm leaving in July. They say the process typically takes 13 months, and I was invited in less than five.

The application process began with some online forms, which included questions about my medical history, my background and a few essays. I also had to get three letters of recommendation: one from an employer, one from a friend you've known for a long time and one from a community service supervisor. I am very appreciative of everyone who wrote me a recommendation. After I submitted these forms, they sent me more forms to fill out, which included getting myself fingerprinted. Apparently, I got through everything pretty fast and my interview was in early March.

The interview lasted about an hour and the recruiter said she would let me know within a week. At that point, I was hoping to do business development work for the Peace Corps. The recruiter told me at the meeting that I probably wouldn't be able to leave until early 2010 because so many programs were full. (At this point I was waiting for a nomination. Once one is nominated, they have to get legally and medically cleared, then they get an invitation for placement in a particular country)

I received my notification the following week via email. I had not been nominated. What I was unaware of after the interview was that if she couldn't find placement for me right away, I would have to wait until May to find out if I was nominated. In other words, I knew I probably wouldn't leave until 2010, but the 2010 nominations didn't open until May.

Then, the following week, I got an email from my recruiter saying there may be a health extension opening in Asia. It was a long shot, but if I got it, I would leave in September. I had to decide by the next day. I made a few calls to former volunteers I knew because I wanted to ask them if it would be really different doing something besides business development. I realized that for the most part, although you learn valuable skills as a volunteer, it generally does not make a huge difference what you are sent there to do (with some exceptions).

As I was about to email my recruiter the next day, she calls me. Apparently, I would be leaving in mid-July and there was a very good chance of my being nominated. The government sure moves fast. Later that day, she called me and said I had been nominated. The nomination process involves regional recruiters using the internet to place their nominees. Apparently, there were five slots available and I got the fourth one.

After the nomination, I had to get a bunch of check-ups and shots and wait for all my paper work to go through. At that point, at the end of March, I knew I would be going to Mongolia, China, Thailand, Cambodia or the Philippines. At the beginning of May, I found out I was going to Cambodia on July 20.

Now, I have been trying to prepare for my trip. I don't need to bring that much, since I can buy almost everything I need there and I will have to wash my clothes by hand, so I don't want to bring too many outfits. I still do need to buy some stuff, like a digital watch and a new backpack. I am also using the time before I leave to spend time with all my family and friends and maybe make a little extra money for traveling. I'm also working to organize all my stuff and give away everything I don't need, since whatever I don't take will be sitting in my room for two years.

For the most part, I am quite excited about my trip. It's definitely right up my alley. Some days I'm less excited than others because it will be a big change. It's also weird when I'm speaking with people about it and they think it's so crazy/dangerous/impossible to do.

I hope to update my blog at least twice a month while I am in Cambodia. They say I will probably have internet at least once a week. I do not get placed at a site until I get there, so I may have daily access to internet or I may have internet once a month.

As much as what I have written here sounds definitive, my understanding is that I cannot fully comprehend what two years will be like in one of the poorest countries in the world (one of the 50 poorest in the world according to the UN: http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0908763.html) Wish me luck!