PCN 41 - My Group

My group of trainees is Namibia 41 – the 41^st team to benefit from service in this beautiful country.  The first team traveled here in 1990, the same year Namibia elected its first president, and became officially independent.

In Philadelphia in April, deployment day.  Three of this
group came to my house for Thanksgiving.

We are 13 volunteers in the Community Economic Development program and 18 in the Community Health program.  We are all college graduates (typically a Peace Corps requirement, which I believe stems more from host country preference than PC prejudice.).  Several of us have lived in Washington, DC; three are from South Carolina.  New Jersey and California are heavily represented.  Enough of us have moved around that we qualify for two or three answers to the question, “Where are you from?”  The Californians like to argue the LA vs. San Francisco question.

The youngest is 21 – there might be two or three of these – the oldest is mid-sixties.  Average age is mid-thirties, although I think there is only one person in his 30s and two in their (late) 40s.  We have five or six in their 50s, and two in their 60s, so 20 or 21 are in their 20s.  Everyone seems smart and committed, and professional experiences vary widely.  There’s a former president of an east African college, a former entry-level investment banker, a coffee-shop manager and a wide range of others.  Religious backgrounds are equally mixed; most of us are not regular churchgoers; a few are devout.

At Heroes' Acres outside Windhoek in May.

Financial backgrounds range pretty wide, also.  There are plenty of us who are accustomed to scrimping, and others who clearly have more substantial financial resources.  The group includes twenty-five whites, four blacks and two Asians.  The blacks and Asians get frequent warnings that locals may not believe they are Americans, since the American media Namibians see is heavily focused on white culture.  The whites get warned that we may get preferential treatment given our skin color, which may make us uncomfortable, or very occasionally encounter anti-white prejudice.  I know I don’t have to check my shopping bags with security when I go into the supermarket, and my black Namibian business partner does.  Ick, right?

It is not uncommon for a trainee or two to decide that Peace Corps isn’t for him or her during the Pre-Service Training, which the staff also admits can be a Pretty Stressful Time.  So far (written in June 2015; posted in December - whoops), we’re all holding steady, even the people learning the quite challenging Khoi Khoi language, with its four precise clicking and popping noises.  Two people have been sick enough to require treatment in the capital, Windhoek, and one person has dropped a water bottle on another resulting in two broken toes.  Everyone seems to have found at least one or two colleagues to look to for support and friendship.  I am still charmed and delighted by my two roommates from the first week, and finding all kinds of other gems in the mix.

Roomies!  In Swakopmund in October.

I wrote the preceding paragraphs in June.  Now it is December, and four of us are back in the US for good – three from the 40-plus demo, which I believe is unusual.  I’ve gotten to know a few of my class better, and two or three from previous classes, and had four PCV friends visit for Thanksgiving weekend, which was wonderful.  (More on Thanksgiving later; probably, like, next May?)  This is probably the most admirable, most likeable large group of not-quite-randomly-selected people of which I have ever been a member.