Don't Know When I'll Be Back Again

I am coming up on the last days of my Peace Corps journey and I can’t seem to get the lyrics of “I’m Leaving on a Jet Plane” out of my head. Nor, it seems, the reoccurring dreams of being able to eat New England clam chowder soup, mushroom and swiss cheeseburgers, or green beans with roasted almonds whenever I want. I feel ready to leave. Twenty-seven months is a long time to be out of one’s own culture. However, I already have mixed emotions about going home.

I had my exit interview with my country director last week and she asked “What will you be most proud of from your service?” That is an easy answer for me; the cultural aspect of my service has provided me with the most amazing experiences I didn’t even know I could have had. I lived with the same family for two years which entailed one house, nine people, and a newborn baby. I made best friends with my counterpart and developed amazing relationships with a group of really motivated young women in my community. But that also comes with a lot of responsibility when it comes to leaving. It means I need to go over for tea and dinner at least two to three times before I leave to each house. It’s going to be heartbreaking saying good bye for the last time to some of these girls. Thankfully, most have Skype and Facebook accounts now (Facebook is in Azerbaijan in a BIG way). But, if these last two years have taught me anything, talking over internet just isn’t the same, and it gets harder as time goes on.

Along with my Azerbaijani contacts, I have made some truly lifelong friendships with Americans here. There are people I am absolutely only saying “see you later” to, for I have no doubt that we will be together again in the States. And now, I know all these great contacts if I ever plan to road trip across the country. I’m hoping to be able to run into the capital a few times in November to watch the election with them, spend Thanksgiving, and give lots of hugs before they go.

On the logistical side of the leaving path, I need to write documents regarding the sustainability of my individual, primary, and secondary projects, close my bank account, be checked out by doctors and dentists, hand in technical training manuals and books, prepare documents for my counterparts, and take a final test to see where my Azerbaijani language ended up.

As I said before, I feel ready to leave Azerbaijan. It feels like it is time. But with the looming countdown of a month to go, all of the events, activities, good-byes, and documents I need to attend to, and the nervousness I am experiencing about returning back to America, some days I feel completely unprepared. Fortunately, the dreams of knoephla soup, ice cream in the winter, and hockey games are enough to keep me going.

Proudest Moment

One of my proudest moments from my service in Azerbaijan came this past August. My sitemate, Matt, and I had organized the students in the city to participate in the Writing Olympics competition. For copywriting purposes, I think the name was officially changed to Write On! Writing competition or something, but I prefer its original title. It was originally put together by Peace Corps Volunteers in the surrounding countries of Azerbaijan, but has now expanded to over twelve participating countries. Students from grades sixth to eleventh, university students, and a professional’s category are proposed a question that they must write a response to in the given sixty minutes. The responses are then judged on the creativity of the answers and are only docked for grammatical errors if the essay itself is unable to be understood.

Our students from the city were a byproduct of the two volunteers in our city the year before we came to Goychay. They had established a small group of young adults for a regular conversation club in intermediate to advanced English and we had the luck to be able to inherit them. These kids are really great. One thing really wonderful is that there are about four young women who come to club who, without the previous young women volunteers establishing a relationship with them, wouldn’t have been able to come to my male sitemate’s conversation club. These clubs are the only reason they leave their houses’ without their families twice a week and to be able to continue that for four years has been really beneficial for them.

Leading up to the day of the competition, Matt had worked a lot with them on creatively thinking, writing, and defending different sides of an argument. When the hour came to write the essays, a few kids complained saying, “But we’ve already talked about this twice before!” Of the seven who submitted essays, we had four of our students place for Azerbaijan. Goychay took first place 11th form, third place 11th form, first place University (freshman) category, and first place professional’s category. Even more exciting, all the first place winners are then entered automatically for the international competition, and among twelve countries, our University student, Husniyye, won first place internationally!

Miss Husniyye is a beautiful, smart young woman. She is a success story on her own, but always says she wouldn’t be the person she is today if she hadn’t met Peace Corps volunteers when she was younger. Seeing her and our other students accept their certificates at an awards ceremony in Baku was one of the proudest moments I have had here. I will admit I shed a tear or two. It is not always the case that you see the profound affects you have on lives while serving. I’m fortunate to be able to see the differences the Peace Corps volunteers before me have made and take comfort knowing I will hopefully have done the same by the time I leave.