We just had our COS (Close of Service) conference, in which we were given an exorbitant amount of paperwork we have to take care of before we go. But besides all the red tape, going to the COS conference made us all reflect and it all started to sink in. We’re almost done… we’re going back. This thought causes an array of emotions, from relief, to terror, to excitement, to sorrow, to happiness, to nostalgia… the works. Although I am looking forward to going home, I am really nervous too. At COS some RPCVs (Returned PC Volunteers) came to talk to us about the transition back, and how in many ways it is harder than the transition in coming here. From the stories I’ve heard, what commonly is the hardest in returning is trying to relate the experience here to people back home. The RPCVs said that when they mentioned that they were in the Peace Corps, most people were intrigued for a 1 to 2 sentence description of what it’s like and not much more… they don’t really care. I mean, I guess I’m realizing how hard it’s going to be to really reconnect with old friends and family. I’m sure there’s going to be so much that I’ll want to share and won’t be able to, so much that I’ll have to keep internal. And that’s okay... this whole experience is so personal anyway. But I figured… I have this blog… which is my point of view and entirely self-indulgent, so why not use it to vent now and hopefully relieve some of the frustration I’m bound to feel eventually? At least, I’ll use it as an attempt to explain what I feel now, and what I imagine I’ll be feeling in about three months.
So much of this experience has been tremendously humbling. Which is something I’ve really needed… keeping my ego in check is a matter I should always keep in mind. Witnessing abject poverty, starvation, death… genuine human suffering… easily puts things into perspective and makes you evaluate what is truly important and what is not. I do think I’ll come home appreciating many things I took advantage of before: good food, paved roads, trash collection, hot water, flushing toilets, sarcasm and wit, profound conversions, diversity... the whole nine yards. I’m sure I will delight in many things when I get back; and I hope I always keep in mind how life is here so that I can really be grateful for my life back home. But in this same vein, I have a feeling that I’ll be fairly stringent in my sympathy for others. It’ll probably drive me nuts to see how much people take for granted when I come home, and masking this bitterness might be difficult. I definitely noticed a bit of this when I visited last summer; the levels of impatience, complaint, frustration, and anger seemed so completely disproportionate to the “problems” they were related to.
Time and time again, I see people here dealing with devastating conditions that would warrant years of therapy and an amalgam of antidepressants by our standards. But here, they deal with their problems so pragmatically and objectively; it has left quite an impression. The general belief here is that: problems are par for the course… everyone expects that inevitably within a family there will be drama, bad blood, serious ailments, neglect, abuse etcetera. So they aren’t resentful when it comes to handling their predicaments. They are much more reconciled in the idea that life is not fair, and that so much in it is a craps shoot. So when I talk to children who have been abandoned by their fathers, or women who have been beaten by their husbands, or parents who have lost children to illnesses, and see how resolved they all are and how they are not at all bitter… it makes me realize how active a character we play in creating and solving our own problems. It’s a harsh claim… but I declare that many of our neuroses are self-created, unnecessary, and not really real.
Not that I think all therapy is bullshit and that people can’t really have huge breakthroughs for legitamate problems with psychiatric treatment and medication. In fact, there are a number of people here I think could benefit from some therapy. Mari for one… as incredibly sweet and nurturing as she is, she can also be cripplingly insecure. She’s fine around her family, but she folds in front of crowds, with strangers, or with someone she considers her superior. I think she has major trust issues with men… and I can easily see why. She doesn’t know her birth father, she was abused by her step father, and her husband lives a separate life from her and cheats on her. The love she shares with her daughters is meaningful and profound, but her inner-confidence and self-worth as an individual are very low. But for everyone here, professional therapy is a luxury… it doesn’t really exist. And people cope regardless. I don’t want to pull a Tom Cruise here… but the lack of professional psychiatric help here makes me discern how “first world” many of our afflictions are. Obesity is not a problem here… even with the food as unhealthy as it is, gluttony is rare. Hoarding is not a problem here… they can’t afford to collect much of anything in the first place. ADD is not a problem here… sure there are some kids who have short attention spans… but here, they call them CHILDREN. So, when I go back to the States and see a bunch of fat, lazy, chronically unsatisfied, Ritalin-addicted hypochondriacs, I have a feeling I won’t credit much sympathy to their issues.
In just reading back that last line it sounds harsh. I don’t want to come back and be completely unsympathetic and act superior and be too judgmental… I’m fairly judgmental already. But truth be told, it will probably be hard not to judge more severely after living here… my whole frame of reference has changed. However, understanding the relativity of everything and keeping it to myself, that will be the trial of it all. I hate arrogance; it’s the trait that turns me off the most. So, making sure I don’t indulge in this vice will be a goal of mine when I get home. I want this whole experience to enrich the relationships I have with people back home, not to alienate them.
Then again… while I might be scrutinizing the cons of our culture more austerely when I get back, I’ll probably also be enjoying the pros of it like never before. But relishing these comforts may take a bit of an adjustment. I was talking with another volunteer about going back, and she mentioned one thing she’s nervous about is socializing with American men again. How, after everything she’s witnessed and experienced with men here, there will probably be some residual nerves and angst that may affect how she acts around men when she returns home. This made me wonder… and worry.
Dealing with men here has been one of the hardest, most infuriating parts of this whole thing. After all of it, my general esteem for men has dropped quite a few notches… and it’s no big secret that it was never very high to begin with. Being stared at and getting constant piropos wherever I go has not gotten easier to handle over two years, it’s gotten harder. I don’t know how you get used to being disrespected without either becoming completely irate or losing all sense of worth. Characteristic of me, I’ve committed the former, not the latter, and probably will have contracted arthritis and TMJ by the time I return with all of the fist and jaw clenching I’ve done here. Two years of this garbage has really scraped away at my patience and tolerance. In recent weeks, I’ve lost both in instances and have yelled or confronted people… something I didn’t do when I first came here. By the way, getting angry doesn’t work; it just encourages the pigs even more. Jesus, just writing about this is getting me bothered.
And hence, I am a little apprehensive in how much of this irritation will overlap into my life when I get back. There are men here whom I respect and who respect me, men who are open and modest and confident. But these cases are so rare, that they almost seem like they are freak exceptions to the true nature of men. Honestly, seeing what seems to perennially motivate men here makes me question the innateness of it all. As if all communication men have with women is nothing more than a social conditioning that masks what it is they really want. This is fairly Freudian of me, and the sociologist inside doesn’t exactly want to believe it when I come home.
In all honesty, as I was when I visited last July, I’ll probably be refreshed and delighted with how much more respectful and courteous and un-creepy men are in The States. This is kind of funny in a sad way, isn’t it: that I might enjoy American men more when I get back just because they are so awful somewhere else? Ba pues… I guess I’ll take it. But of course, as charmed as I may be up front by men, I have a feeling that a nagging concern of whether to trust what’s underneath will be hard to shake off. This is all fairly presupposed and premature indeed… how am I to know how I will react to it all? But I guess I’m saying that two years of experience with men here is probably going to have deep and lasting effects on how I feel when go home.
I don’t know if all of this worrying is senseless or if it’s practical. Don’t get me wrong… I am very, very excited to return to my life back home. And really, after being here, I sure don’t worry as much as I used to. But I can’t expect the transition to be breezy and seamless, I know it won’t be. A sense of belonging, and consequentially, a sense of identity are things that probably won’t come easily. In my experience here, there are times when I feel so completely at home, times when I think: I am where I should be. But through it all there’s the intrinsic feeling that I am an outsider, and as much as I try, I don’t really belong here. Well, I’ll probably be feeling the same thing in America after I return.
What is that romantic Gertrude Stein quote, something like: “America is my country, but Paris is my home-town.” Well, though she words this delicately, there seems to be some kind of painful compromise in it. As if, the people in one place won’t ever fully understand the effect people in the other have on one person. As if, while there is a feeling of belonging in both, there is no true unity between them, and they both affect the person’s whole. As it is in my life here, there’s a big part of me I left back home that people here are unacquainted with. When I leave here, I know some part of me will stay behind and never leave, part of me that my friends and family at home will never know.
Here we all are... we lost 3 along the way.... but 27 made it the whole way through.
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