And then there were 3

Trip Start Apr 14, 2006
1
15
102
Trip End Jul 2008


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Thursday, May 4, 2006

This morning one of the other volunteers who was training in kocherinovo decided to terminate early and go back to the States. I was the only one of our group (including our language trainer) who wasn't surprised by it. I knew he had been frustrated by the language barrier and by being under so many rules - it's true that the peace corps is pretty controlling. Like we have to be back in our training villages every night at 8 pm, so if we want to travel on the weekends we have to be with our families. Fortunately I am really close with my family so I don't mind. Like lots of volunteers go into the closest town or city with eachother, to go shopping or whatever, but I do that kind of stuff with my family. So I was thinking that these rules were mainly designed to have us integrate into the community, which makes total sense to me as I learned from my study abroad mistakes the first time around in Spain. I travelled almost every weekend and when it came time for my flight home I barely had any spanish friends. So anyway the peace corps gossip has it that the more controlling rules are new and a result of some unacceptable behavior of a couple people in the class ahead of us. Whatever, the rules still don't bother me. I think it was just harder on this other volunteer cause he's older (32) and used to being his own person for much longer. And while his family is really cool, apparently they got more frustrated when they couldn't communicate with him. I think it's a shame to come this far and then go home, but I respect that he knows his own mind and that he made a decision to move onto other things instead of staying and being unhappy. Hopefully this will be best for everyone. And that's another thing, I think it's great that Peace Corps respects his decision. He's actually the second person from the whole group to go home, and in both cases Peace Corps accepts it and puts you on a plane back to the States. Apparently they had to do some exit interviews and stuff. But it makes total sense - unhappy volunteers don't do a good job, and might even fuck around and ruin the reputation of the peace corps in the long run. So anyway that's a good policy.
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