Peace Corps Turns 50!

The Peace Corps was founded on March 1, 1961. Fifty years later, I am proud to be serving as a volunteer. The world has seen many changes since those first volunteers were deployed, but the mission of world peace and friendship is still the same. The three goals - providing trained men and women to countries that request them, sharing American culture with people of other lands, and sharing the cultures of other lands with Americans - remain. From "The Toughest Job You'll Ever Love" to "How Far Will You Go?" to one of the new PSAs, "There Isn't An App for This," Peace Corps has been a life-changing experience, not only for people in developing countries but also - and especially - for the volunteers. This is Peace Corps week - events are happening in major cities across the U.S. and all over the world! Find one near you - and or read more about the 50 years of Peace Corps - at peacecorps.gov.

When we arrived here, we were told that there would be a reception at the Ambassador's house (the Ambassador is a Princeton classmate!) on March 1 and that the Peace Corps Response volunteers would be invited. Well, when we hadn't received the details by last Friday I asked about it, and it turns out we were taken off the list.... Too many Americans relative to Armenians. So to celebrate the anniversary, I am doing a little Third Goal by writing this! I was hoping for a Princeton picture; instead I took some of a different kind on Sunday. I had read in Lonely Planet that "the lower part of (Abovyan Street) has some sturdy 19th-century buildings in volcanic hues of orange and black." Sure enough, it does! I still hope to meet the Ambassador before her term here ends this summer!

On Friday night I was told that, "Europe is out of Macbook displays." Meaning that my computer can't be repaired anytime soon. So on Saturday morning I made a dent in my email at the Peace Corps office. The early bird gets the solitude there - by mid-afternoon on Fridays and Saturdays it is a gathering place for PCVs coming in for the day or overnight, and the chatter makes it impossible to get any computer work done. So I left and I priced out Plan B options (buying an external hard drive and borrowing Brian's extra computer - he brought two! - seems the most workable for now) and then went to the Vernissage. That night I went out with a bunch of PCVs who were in town to celebrate a couple of birthdays. There isn't a McDonald's in Armenia (a la the one in Fes), so where did we go? KFC. Is that Goal #2? 3? Neither? And have I already been here too long if I say that the food looked pretty good? I had eaten an early dinner before the KFC plan was confirmed, so I didn't have any chicken, but I did have some ice cream, and dare I admit that it was mighty tasty?

March 1 is also the anniversary of violent post-election protests that took place here in 2008. We were told to stay vigilant today and to stay away from the Matenadaran, where people were killed. Our counterpart says that Armenia has not been the same since that day.

On Sunday I went to the State Museum of Armenian History. Humans have inhabited this part of the world for millennia, and they left ample evidence here in Armenia. Some of the items in the museum were from as early as 6000 B.C., including the world's oldest shoe. Stones (I hope to see those in situ!), bronze, tools, weapons, jewelry, figurines. There was an exhibit on the Urartu civilization, with cuneiform and ceramics. And there were more recent cross-stones, coins, carpets, lace, costumes. There wasn't a continuous narrative, but what was there was impressively preserved, restored, and displayed. There was also an interesting exhibit of ancient maps - the Armenians have been on the map for centuries too, despite not having their own country for most of that time!

And speaking of map, I still have my trip to the south to talk about! Which I shall do....