Leaving Tanzania (1 of 10)

This is the first of ten parts to conclude my Peace Corps experience. I will try to post one new part each day so that you don’t have a novel to read.

 

I'm safely back in the states now and enjoyed a very Merry Christmas with my Mother and Aunt and Uncle. I want to thank everyone who prayed for me, sent good wishes, and sent letters and packages. I'd be happy to sit down and talk about my experience with you and show you pictures, but unless you want a two hour slide show, give me a couple months to get my pictures organized and pared down. Following is an account of my travels since leaving my home in Korogwe Tanzania.

 

On my last day in Korogwe, I woke up very early to hike to the top of a small hill overlooking the town to watch the sun rise. It's a very beautiful time of day and peaceful. I had told my students that they were welcome to join me and to meet me in front of the college at 5:30. I was disappointed that none were waiting for me. The sun waits for no man so my friend and I went to the hill to watch the sun rise. It was indeed beautiful as always. On our return we met one of the students who I had expected to join us earlier. It turns out that he was a little late and had tried to find us but had failed. However, he returned with us to my house to wait for my eventual departure. He was shortly joined by another student. These two students stayed with me and went on errands for me and with me throughout the morning and escorted me to the bus at 2:30 in the afternoon!

 

-Dar es Salaam

I left my home in Korogwe on 1 December heading for a short stay in Dar es Salaam. In Dar es Salaam I was poked and prodded by the nurse at Peace Corps to determine my health status - prognosis is good. I also had miscellaneous paper work to finish (bureaucrats - gotta look good for Washington!) and my exit interviews. In an exit interview, the fatal mistake of the interviewer was to ask, "What could we do better?" So I told her - her being the country director, aka the head honcho of Peace Corps Tanzania. Things got icy very fast. It was only mild criticism too; she got completely bent out of shape over it.  Maybe because she was new (only arrived a few weeks before).

 

My criticism with Peace Corps is this: they don't truly support the volunteers. The health care is touted as such a huge benefit, but in reality it is not very good. They are not required to have a doctor on staff so we had Nurse Practitioners. One of these argued with western trained doctors about diagnoses! They also prescribed medicine without consulting charts. I would describe the health care as adequate, but not superior. As an organization, Peace Corps treats "volunteers" like a fraternity on misbehavior suspension. While other organizations similar to Peace Corps have a hostel for their volunteers to stay in Dar es Salaam, Peace Corps does not. This is a world wide Peace Corps thing with exceptions where Peace Corps feels the other options are unsafe. But I ask why? Also, the other volunteer organizations are compensated three, four, and even five times as much as Peace Corps volunteers. Why not the "elite" organization of Peace Corps? If you adjust into today’s dollars the end of service compensation of volunteers from 1961, that would be more than 900 dollars per month of service; today volunteers receive a paltry 225 per month. One of the guiding principles of the designers of the Peace Corps program in the 60s was that volunteers, who all have a college education, should be compensated about the same as a low level enlisted serviceman not serving in a war (as according to one of Peace Corps own pieces of literature). Remember that enlisted servicemen typically only have high school education. I think it is very fair that we be compensated about the same, plus some money for college loan repayment. It is degrading that Peace Corps basically expects college graduates in their mid to late twenties to move back in with mom and dad after their Peace Corps service.

 

Tomorrow: Ethiopia