Rachel's Questions

Rachel’s Questions

1. What is Togo like?

That’s a tough question. Imagine trying to sum up what the United States is like in just a couple sentences. Granted, Togo is only about as big as Delaware, but the huge ethnic diversity – at least 35 distinct local languages! – and the regions with very different climates, the Oceanside Maritime region, lush and mountainous Plateau region, dry Central region that has the largest wild preserve, surprisingly developed Kara region, to the arid and dusty Savannah region. Togo is a developing country, which means that there’s still a lot of work to be done creating the infrastructure that can support and encourage local businesses and non-profits, especially those existing in rural areas, far from the resources of the big cities. The economy is largely based on agriculture, although the biggest export is phosphorous from the mines. Most families have their own small farm where they grow food for themselves; and perhaps enough extra to sell so that they can buy things like powdered milk, sugar or cloth (pagne) with which to make clothes. That’s another cool thing about Togo – a lot of the clothes people wear are tailor-made by local seamstresses.
Because most people work all day in the fields the diet is very starchy. They have to get a lot of energy (calories) from their food without spending a lot of money. The most common food is pâte – basically corn flour mixed with hot water until it forms a thick paste that can be shaped into balls. A sauce based on tomato, hot peppers, and sometimes edible leaves (kind of like spinach) will accompany it. It’s not particularly tasty to my palate, but it is very filling. Togolese people are very generous – especially with their food. If you ever see someone eating, the first thing they will say to you is “hello! Come and eat with me!” Even if they don’t know you, hospitality and welcome are always very warm.

2. When is the best time to join? After high school? College?

The Peace Corps generally requires that applicants have a bachelor’s degree (4-year college degree). The exception is when an applicant has a significant amount of work experience. So your best bet is to graduate from high school and head to a good college, choosing a major that you really like and that possibly has something to do with development work, like pre-med, political science, African studies, social work, communications, French, agriculture, women’s studies, engineering, etc. etc. As you can tell – the specific major you choose doesn’t matter all that much!

3. How long is the application process and what do they look for in someone who wants to volunteer in Africa?

The application process can be really long. Many of us joke that the wait itself helps to weed out applicants who aren’t committed or don’t have the patience to see it through. Patience becomes a very very important virtue once you are in a developing country and trying to work! The application requires a lot of initial information: an essay/motivation statement (why do you want to be in the Peace Corps), your work experience, college transcript, an essay on your experience of diversity or cultural exchange. Plus three recommendations. The ideal for the recommendations is to send in one from an academic supervisor (a college professor who really knows you well), one from a work supervisor (a boss who you did really good work for), and one volunteer work supervisor (someone you volunteered with who can talk about your commitment to service). They really want to see applicants who have already shown commitment to doing volunteer work – particularly in the area in which you want to work in the Peace Corps. For example, if you want to work in community health in Africa, you could get involved as a hospital volunteer or a volunteer at a retirement home. If you want to do youth development, you could volunteer as a youth group leader at your local teen center. If you know you to work in Africa, every single project in Africa has an HIV/AIDS prevention component, so it’s a great idea to already look into the causes and effects of HIV and perhaps volunteer at a relevant center. Also, Peace Corps loves if you already have language ability. For Africa, that could be French, Portuguese, Arabic, or African languages like Swahili.

4. Is it hard to be away from your family for two years? Do you get to visit them while you are still in the program?

Yes, it’s hard to be away from family. I moved away from home when I went to college in 2000 and haven’t lived in California since. So I was used to only seeing my immediate family for short once or twice a year visits. As a PCV, I chose to save up my vacation days (we get 2 vacation days per month) so that I could go to California for June 2009 – it was really important to me to be there to celebrate my brother’s graduation from high school, my sister’s graduation from college, and my sister’s promotion from 8th grade. Some volunteers’ families come over to visit them in country – or they meet at a mid-point in Europe or another “vacation spot” instead of making family come out to tiny African villages without amenities. Peace Corps doesn’t pay for volunteer’s plane tickets to visit home, so you have to save up for that yourself. The exception is for volunteers who extend their service. For example, I did the normal two years of service and then I chose to stay for a third year to take on new responsibilities as a Volunteer Leader. Because I signed up for another full 12 months of service, the Peace Corps requires that I take one month of home leave. They paid for my plane ticket to my ‘home of residence’ – California. It was great to have this break, I feel re-motivated to get back to work!

5. What do you plan to do when you are finished volunteering?

I want to keep working in international human rights, specifically looking at gender and sexuality issues. I’ve been really inspired by my work with young people during my service in the Peace Corps and before (I was a sexual health/mental health youth worker in Scotland before joining the Peace Corps). I am currently looking at going back to graduate school, perhaps for law or public policy, with the goal that I could use the knowledge from these programs to work for the United Nations or the US State Department or a non-profit international organization like Women for Women International or Human Rights Watch.

6. What kind of security do you get? Aren’t you scared of getting AIDS or another disease?

First of all, HIV, the virus that leads to AIDS, is not like a cold – I can’t get it by shaking hands with someone or because someone sneezed near me. HIV is entirely preventable, except perhaps for babies born to HIV-positive mothers, but even then the risk of can be minimized through careful pre-natal care provide by doctors who know the woman’s HIV status. In fact, Washington DC has a higher percentage of people infected with HIV than Togo. That said, HIV prevention, is a huge part of the work I do for a very good reason. Practices that have become normal in American society, like sterilizing a razor between customers at a barbers’, getting pre-natal care for pregnant women, and using a condom, are still out of the norm in Togo. So a lot of the work I do is just repetition, encouraging people to do thing I would consider common sense.
The illness that I worry about more is malaria. Untreated, malaria can be fatal – attacks your liver and kidneys and can leave you unable to process toxins out of your body. Malaria is carried by mosquitos. Peace Corps has a fantastic medical service team that is provided for free to volunteers. Part of the service is anti-malaria pills (called malaria prophylaxis). These pills are so important, in fact, that volunteers who don’t take them get kicked out of the Peace Corps and sent home.
The other illnesses I worry about are pretty common for any travel or work in developing countries: digestive troubles. You will have them; it is inevitable. But in order to help minimize them, Peace Corps Medical does several trainings during the initial three months about proper water preparation, malnutrition and cooking. And when you get sick, they provide your prescriptions, and even a bed at the medical unit if it’s serious enough. Some conditions might require specialists – for example dental surgery or a broken bone – for these Peace Corps will pay for you to get to a facility to receive appropriate care – that could be Senegal, South Africa, or even Washington D.C. They take really really good care of us. In fact, I think it’s the best and most holistic health care I will ever get and it’s free!

7. What kind of things do you do? (Are you a teacher/doctor/etc)

Peace Corps is different in every country but I would guess that most volunteers would agree with me when I say that you don’t walk into a job in the Peace Corps, you create one. Most people think Peace Corps volunteer = English teacher. In Togo, we have four programs that volunteers fit into, and none of them are English teaching. The four programs are: Natural Resources Management/Food Security, Community Health and Family Planning, Girls’ Education and Empowerment, and Small Enterprise Development. The program I’m part of is Small Enterprise Development. Specifically, I’m in a sub-program of NGO Development (NGO = non-governmental organization, or non-profit). I’ve been doing a lot of different activities, the first (and most important) being a participatory needs assessment of the village where I lived. What this means is I talked to a lot of people – I gathered groups of women, student, rice farmers, churchgoers, or teachers and asked them about their village and their work, the cycle of planting crops and the rains. We discussed what’s working and what could/should be improved. Once I had a good idea of what already existed in the village, then I was ready to start projects. I always have several things going on at the same time and over time as I gained experience and knowledge in my village and in Togo in general, my projects became more sophisticated.
· I developed a small group of women leaders to present workshops on business skills and health life skills (communication, nutrition and HIV prevention) to apprentice seamstresses. While I was working with seamstresses I got the chance to practice sewing on a foot-pedal powered machine!
· I started a group of health peer educators at the local junior high/high school. We put together skits about HIV/AIDS prevention, the importance of staying in school, facing up to sexual harassment, etc. and then performed the skits for the whole school.
· I supported a small group working to create a mushroom growing cooperative.
· I taught English to 4 classes of 50-60 junior high students. We learned songs and stories and I focused on cultural exchange – introducing American traditions and holidays – as well as adding to the correspondence exchange with junior high girls.
· I created a business club at the junior high 5 km from my house. We worked on the set of skills you have to develop to know whether a business idea could work. We also worked on some small income-generating activities (like making soap and lotion to sell).
· I organized a camp for Togolese young people from all over the country. I was on a team of Peace Corps volunteers and Togolese professionals. We recruited community leaders to be counselors at the camp, arranged transportation and food for everyone and raised 25000 dollars to run the camp in 2009 and 30000 to run the camp in 2010. I’m particularly proud of helping to coordinate the team of organizers to form a more coherent collaboration among the Togolese non-profits so that they could take on more leadership roles in running the camp.
· I administered a scholarship for girls who are chosen based on both need and merit. The system for approving scholars and sending them their scholarship money needed a lot of reworking. I’m really proud of creating and hosting a national conference for the scholarship girls so that we could better ensure the scholars are getting support both academically and emotionally, ‘cause it can be really tough for girls in school in Togo. About 12 of the scholars this year are going to be in university! Amazing.
· I worked with several other volunteers to create a (huge) document for Peace Corps volunteers who want to work with non-profit organizations or associations in Togo. The resources for this type of work are kind of out-of-date and not specific to working in Africa, much less Togo.
· Seeing the need for better management training for local non-profits, my friend and I put together a workshop for small non-profits. This meant not only teaching the lessons, but also putting together a 100-page document in French! about typical management issues. It was a lot of work but so worthwhile that I am planning to replicate the workshop in another city this year.

8. What is your apartment/room/house like? Do you have access to electricity?

When we first arrived, I lived in a single small room in a house with a family. But once I moved to my village, I was in a house by myself. I lucked out and had a pretty cute house – with a living, bedroom, kitchen and an indoor toilet! The house is made out of cement blocks and has a tin roof. The floor is simply concrete as well. I have lots of windows, which helps with air flow. There’s no glass in the windows – just mosquito screen, iron “burglar” bars, and wooden shutters I can close and lock. The house can get really hot and I didn’t have electricity or running water, so no fans or cooling showers. And even though I had a toilet, I still had to “flush” by pouring in a bucket of water. I get my water from a rain-collecting cistern that’s right next to my house. I kept a large (huge) plastic bucket inside my living room so I only had to go out and fetch water from the cistern once or twice a week. There are a couple shops that have generators so I can charge my phone for a few hundred francs CFA. Most of the time, my electricity access is when I got into a larger city nearby where I can find places to charge my batteries and use the internet.
I have recently moved as part of my new role – I’m in a regional capital now and I have a city house – including electricity and running water! It is amazing how quickly I got used to these new amenities.

9. What about the violence/crime?

Safety and security is a primary concern for the Peace Corps. If they judge that a country is too unstable to be safe; the Peace Corps will pull out volunteers (or not send them). Togo is a relatively safe country and there is a designated Safety and Security Officer who does his best to keep us up-to-date with threats to security. It can be difficult because communications are not as fast as they are in the United States with Twitter, Facebook, even news media, but they develop systems early on in training to ensure that volunteers know where to turn if a safety problem happens. My primary concern about crime in Togo is theft. So I take precautions – like locking my house whenever I leave – even though I trust my neighbors because I feel there is no need to give them the temptation to explore what American goods I might have. There were recently some protests that involved some violence because of elections and gas prices, but no volunteers were caught up in them.

10. When did you know that you wanted to join the Peace Corps?

I’ve thought about the Peace Corps since I was in high school, like you. And I met some amazing returned Peace Corps volunteers who were doing Masters’ in Peace Studies at Notre Dame. So I looked into the possibility several times, but I put it off after college because I received a Rotary International Ambassadorial Scholarship to go abroad to do a Masters’ degree. I went to the University of Edinburgh in Scotland. I loved Scotland and decided to stay for a few years, taking advantage of a work visa program for overseas students who graduate from a Scottish university. Once my two years were nearing the end, though, I started looking at the Peace Corps again. At the same time, I was looking at jobs with international non-profits and almost all of them require a minimum of two years experience working in a developing country. Peace Corps seemed to be a perfect fit: not only would I be pursuing the dream that I’d hoped for since high school, but I’d also be getting career experience that would enable me to work internationally for the rest of my life!

Another birthday

Tuesday felt like much more of a celebratory day than Monday (my birthday) which was spent getting lost among crowds of fresh-faced 18-year-olds in itsy-bitsy shorts and walking in circles searching for a restroom because I just couldn't get the street grid figured out in Foggy Bottom and was suffering from tummy troubles. I blame the clam bake. It was fun, but not very gentle on the belly. Probably the wine and beer and more wine didn't help too much either.

I went to a law school fair at GW on Monday. It is kind of silly how ill-equipped I am, at least clothing-wise, for the United States. I wore what are probably my nicest top and skirt and felt very very scruffy. It doesn't help that my feet are now shaped to only fit into chacos. I tried to wear my favorite pair of comfy 2-inch heels. They sliced up my achilles AND my in-step! yikes. I will need an entire wardrobe rehaul before trying to reintegrate here. Somehow I'm getting the feeling that the 'readjustment allowance' just isn't going to cut it. Especially since I've already received (and spent) one-third of it.

I was really surprised by how old I felt on Monday. Every law school recruiter I talked to asked me when I had graduated from Notre Dame (as opposed to when WILL i graduate). There's an upside to the 'older' as well: I felt like I actually knew what I was doing walking around the fair. I had good questions and was able to build rapport with the recruiters much better than the sophomores walking around asking everyone "What can I do NOW so I can guarantee getting into your school?"

I wonder if I'll qualify for the Older and Wiser Law Students group (OWLS) when I finally get back to school.

Chance encounters

Updating from a Megabus. I am in the top level front seat on my way from DC to NY.

I am currently adventuring on the East Coast of the United States. I've been visiting family and friends and law schools. My most exciting stop so far has been to a Trader Joe's in the middle of Washington D.C. I had no idea TJ's was in town until I saw a girl carrying two of their distinctive brown paper bags on the metro. I watched enviously as she flouted the rule against eating on the trains and enjoyed some stuffed grape leaves. The first thing I did after arriving at my aunt and uncle's home (after a metro ride to the end of the line and a 40 minutes driving with two missed signed and subsequent u-turns) was look up the location of Trader Joe's in DC.

So exciting to discover my favorite California shp on the other side of the country. I wandered around the shop for ages before finally selecting some chips and salsa. I headed up to the checkout line, which was surprisingly quick considering how long it was! When I reached the cashier, a thirty-something black man called Gregory, he asked me, "Where did you get your shirt?"

I replied, "Togo." We had a short moment of surprised silence and then began chatting.
He's from Kpalime and I explained where I live and a little of what I do.

As I headed out to meet some former PCVs for dinner, I couldn't help but smile at the joys of chance encounters.

I'm in California!

This means I've been able to upload my COS Musical...
Part One Part Two

And here are some photos from Camp UNITE

Wishlist

I’m going to be back in the States in September, just in time for my birthday.
I thought it would be a good idea to put up a little wish list so that I don’t receive well-intentioned but contextually useless things like bath bubbles, sweaters, and socks.
I’ll try to put up a link to example items through amazon or something similar.

·
Tech stuff
o Ipod, headphones
o External hard drive
o Digital camera
o External cd/dvd reader (for my little cd-incapable netbook)
·
Food stuff
o Tea! Any kind, but flavored green and black teas are my favorite
o Eggnog Tea – amazing
o Seeds for sprouting
o Seeds for an herb garden
·
Bathroom stuff
o Conditioner
o A hair cut and color
o Deodorant
·
Other
o Book for career search
o Maybe some pre-reading books from law school lists (I’ll look these up later)

Introductions

1 July 2010
How would I introduce myself?
This differs entirely based on context, so I will imagine how I would introduce myself to a classroom to whom I’m presenting my Peace Corps service.
Hi! My name is Rose. I am a Peace Corps volunteer in Togo West Africa. I graduated form this school back in 2000 and all three of my sisters also went here – in fact, one of them is currently in 10th grade! I grew up here in California but I went away to college in Indiana at the University of Notre Dame. While I was there I studied abroad in France for a year and liked Europe so much that I went to Scotland to do my graduate studies in International Politics. I’ve been working in Togo as a pCV for 2 years already, some of the projects that inspire me the most are…
If I were presenting myself to a Rotary Club…
Hello, my name is Rose. I was a Rotary Ambassadorial Scholar to the University of Edinburgh from 2004-2005. I loved the culture so much that I stayed there to work for two years after achieving my Masters in International and European Politics. When finally my time was up in Scotland, I decided I wanted to continue learning and living internationally, promoting development and understanding so I joined the Peace Corps and that’s what I’m here to talk to you about…

As a new member of a book club…
Hi! I’m Rose, I grew up the oldest of five kids in southern California but I’ve lived in the Midwest, Europe, and most recently in Africa. My favorite types of books to read are books on spirituality, and my favorite fiction is adventure fantasy. My favorite authors are Paulo Coelho, Starhawk, Robert Jordan, and Ursula K LeGuin.

So I wrote these up as a part of an exercise on cultural exchange . The second half of the exercise is to note how a local person introduces herself. In my experience, they don’t. That’s not entirely true. People introduce themselves as the brother of…, the wife of…, or the cousin of the brother of the wife of…. Or by their profession, their role in society. I still giggle sometimes as I look over my phone book. Last year when I had some shelves painted, I thought the painter did a good job and wanted to take his number so I could contact him again if needed. He willingly gave it, but then I asked for his name so I could enter it in the phone and he said “painter.” I looked at him, to check if he was joking –but no. So I have an entry for painter, moto driver 1 and 2, and catechist in my phone – people who I contact or at least come across frequently but whose names are a complete unknown to me.

A tough moment

30 June 2010
A tough moment.
Yesterday I loaned another 5 mille to a high school kid who already (still) owes me 56.000 for the digital camera I had timefortea bring over. I really didn’t want to do it (loan the 5 mille). I felt so yucky about it that I was grumpy to the point of tears for several hours. Of course my aching leg contributed to that malaise as well.
My relationship with money has gotten even more precarious living here where people simply assume that I am rich because of my skin color. This strikes me as wholly unfair while at the same time devastatingly truthful. For most of my life I have been significantly less ‘well-off’ than most of my schoolmates. I’ve worked since I was a pre-teen and I take a lot of pride in being able to support myself with jobs that are bigger in social value than salary. But when it comes down to it, I know I’m making sacrifices. I could be earning a lot of money but I chose to be poor – if earning less than $3000 a year isn’t poor, I don’t know what is – and work in a difficult environment.
So when the little kid who lives at the top of the hill yells out my name as I’m puffing past him on my bike, I turn and say hello cheerfully. But when he follows up my greeting with a “donne-moi cent francs [give me 100 francs]”, I explode. Literally. I guess it’d been a tough day in Tsevie surrounded my mostly strangers and I was looking forward to my village, my own little “Cheers” where everybody knows my name. My anger was over the top. I slammed on the brakes, tires skidding on the sandy road, and demanded, “What did you just say?!”
I yelled out “I will never greet you again if you ask me for money”
“Donne-moi cent francs yovo”

I reigned in my boiling temper and instead of jumping off the bike to practice some of the corporal punishment that my teacher colleagues are always recommending, I remounted and rode off, muttering to myself.

The sheer force of my anger surprised me. I think it was partly based on shock- this is my village, people jknow me, I’ve greeted this kid many times before – where did he get the message that I’m a vending machine? I didn’t see it coming.
I know that a Togolese person would have reacted totally differently. Perhaps she would have handed over the money; if not, she would have made a little joke – “Oh, maybe tomorrow” the red cloud of anger would never have occurred to her.

We looked at average salaries in Togo the other day when I was with the new group of trainees, to help describe the economic state of the country. As a PCV I earn just a little more than a high school professor and just a little less than a state-paid doctor. Both of these professionals support families – not just their own but their whole extended family. With success comes responsibility, a successful family member is expected to take in the children of poor relatives, pay for their schooling, he is expected to take on the lion’s share of paying for family expenses like funerals, weddings, and hospital bills. A typical high school prof’s salary is 100.000, is not sufficient for all these responsibilities, so most teachers in villages have farms, own small shops, and/or offer tutoring to supplement their income. The majority of the population of course, are not professors. Based on GNP, the average amount of money an adult in Togo earns is 20.000F CFA per month. If 100.000 is not sufficient – have can 20.000 even be survivable?
So yes, I’m rich. I have disposable income. But the real reason why I’m rich is because I have an education, training, American citizenship. I can go somewhere else and succeed. A wealth of opportunity.

Dear Family

9 June 2010
Letter to my family
Dear family,
I’m sitting in my little house, enjoying the cleanliness so much I don’t want to move and disturb it (I had two kids come over yesterday to help me clean). The Country Director and my Program Director came by my house yesterday to interview me for the volunteer leader position. I received confirmation this morning that I’ve got the “job” and I’ll be moving to Atakpamé – a beautiful hilly city in the Plateau region. I don’t know exactly where I’ll be living but there is a house a previous volunteer lived in that is situated on a hill overlooking the city, has floors covered in colorful tile and a succulent lime tree just outside the kitchen window. I’ve got my sights set on that lovely place.

But in the meantime, I’m at home for about another month and a half, in Mission Tové. Fare from the easy-going leavetaking I’d anticipated, I will be running around finishing up a few projects and taking care of a new one – I was just granted the money for a water and sanitation project for which we’ll be building a rainwater-collecting cistern at the junior high where I teach English and have my business club. It’s going to be stressful, but I’m happy to be leaving a physical mark on the community, especially in a way that addresses such a pressing need.

We’re combining the cistern-building with a series of presentations on the importance of washing your hands (with soap) before meals and after using the WC. I’m going to train my business club members to be peer educators so that they will have some investment in the hand-washing element of the project and will hopefully take on some follow-up, making sure the system is used and maintained properly. As part of the workshop, each class will make about 20 liters of liquid soap which should get them through a significant amount of the school year. I’m hoping the combination of better access to clean water and developing hand-washing habits will make a huge improvement on the health of students and thereby their academic (and life) achievements. No small goals here.

Transportation in Togo

9 June 2010
It loomed in front of us, the gasoline truck, sprawled across the highway like a great beast, life pouring from its torn belly. The smallest spark would have cause a fire to blow the asphalt off the road. Horror filled me as I watched tiny children soaked in gasoline running home with jugs of the stuff on their heads; rushing back to fill another container. Men, women, taxi drivers, moto drivers, clothes soaked in gasoline, reached out to take their fill of the precious liquid seeping from the downed truck. The cab of the truck had fully separated from the cylinder; the driver looked unharmed but shaky as he paced on the side of the road, speaking into his cell phone. His apprentice driver was seated on the ground, head cradled in his hands, rocking slightly, still devastated by the shock of such an accident.

My stomach writhed and my heart thundered as we slowly passed between the gushing cylinder and the truck cab. One rock kicked off by our wheels, one piece of glass magnifying the equatorial sun, and we would all die… very painfully. My palpable fear was a strange counterpart to the sheer joy in the faces of the women rushing toward the truck with the big bowls usually used for collecting water. Shiny, happy people. Shiny with the slick shimmer of gasoline. The bright smiles on the kids’ faces made me shiver with visions of horror. But to this tiny, lucky village, this accident may prove to be their main source of income for the next six months. One liter of gasoline sells for 500-600FCFA. Each jug I saw carried away contains about 20 liters. One jug is enough money to travel from the ocean in Lome to the northern border with Burkina Faso. Is this the silver lining?

Automobile accidents are common here – we like to joke that when cars die in Europe, they’re sent to Ghana to rot; when they are finished in Ghana, they arrive in Togo. And the roads are bad, especially during and right after rainy season. An aspect that I’d never really picked up on until recently is the state of the tires. At Camp UNITE this year, we started a new “challenge” – a team-building physical/strategy game – that involves three tires per team. So we sent out one of the organizers to buy some used tires. He came back with 6 tires that were completely bare. Every single one was as smooth as a baby’s bottom. Who had these things on their car long enough to end up in such a state?! I’ve started looking at tires more often now. I noticed that on trucks, if a tire is really worn down, they won’t stop using it – just put it somewhere in the middle, so I guess at least it’s not responsible for steering? Yikes.

a close of service musical

I've tried and tried to get the video of this musical uploaded but it's a little too big for blogspot (127 meg) and I can't get a good enough connection to upload to youtube :(

Narrator: In the summer of 2007, Rose Lindgren applied for the Peace Corps. Let’s listen in on her interview, shall we?

Nikhil: I can show you the world
Shining, shimmering, splendid
Tell me truly now when did
You last let your heart decide

I can open your eyes
Take you country by country
It’s the toughest job that you’ll ever love I promise you

A whole new world
Escape from parents, books and jobs
No one to tell you no
Or where to go
Or say you’re only dreaming

Rose: A whole new world
A dazzling place I’ve never known
When I’m a volunteer
It’s crystal clear
That I will save the whole wide world with you

Narrator: Rose received her assignment a mere 12 months later… she was heading for a tiny little country called Togo.

Rose: From the day I arrived in this country
And blinking stepped into the sun

Taylor: There’s more to see than can ever be seen

Heather: More to do than can ever be done

Rose: There’s far too much to take in here

We’re following the yovo, the yovo, the yovo
We’re following the yovo, wherever she may go

Narrator: The first step is stage…

Whitney: Let’s get down to business to defeat poverty
Dig your hands right in there and get dirty
You’re the prissiest bunch I’ve ever seen

Stagaires, I’ll make volunteers out of you

Narrator: Rose was posted in a small village…

Rose: Little town, it’s a Peace Corps village
Every day like the one before
Little town full of Ewe people waking up to say

All: Bonjour, bonsoir, bonjour yovo bonsoir

Good morning yovo
Good morning Madame
Where are you off to?
The market
Don’t forget to bring me some bread!

Look there she goes that girl is so peculiar
I wonder if she’s feeling well (diarrhea?)
With a dreamy far-off look
And her nose stuck in a book (and it’s not the Bible!)
What a puzzle to the rest of us this yovo

There must be more than this villageoise life!

Now it’s no wonder that her name means “whitey”
Her looks have got no parallel
But behind that fair façade
I’m afraid she’s rather odd
Very different from the rest of us this yovo!

Just watch I’m going to make her my wife

Narrator: Daily marriage proposals started to get Rose down, luckily she had some good friends who taught her an important phrase:

Heather: Du courage what a wonderful phrase
Du courage ain’t no passing craze
It means no worries for the rest of your days
It’s our problem-free philosophy – du courage!

Taylor: Here! Have some pate with fish sauce – and drink this, it’ll help with the digestion.

Les poisons, les poisons, hee hee hee ha ha ha
With the coupe-coupe I hack them in two
I pull out what’s inside and I serve it up fried
Jesu, I love little fishies, don’t you!

Narrator: Rose woke up the next morning with a hangover, giardia and covered in heat rash. She started to wish she could go home and have air-conditioning, pizza and cold beer.

Rose: I really miss America
Nikhil: How can you say that? Everything you need it right here!

Rose: Maybe he's right, maybe there is something the matter with me. I just don't see how a world that makes such wonderful things could be bad.

I wanna be where the Americans are
I wanna see, wanna see 'em dancing... not like that!

Walking around on those what do you call em? Streets

Riding a bike you don’t get too far
Cars are required for shopping, road trips
Cruising along down a
What’s that word again… street!

Up where they drive
Up where they date
Up where they worry about being late
Wanderin’ free wish I could be
Part of that world

What would I give if I could live out of this mudhut
What would I pay to spend a day down at the mall

Betcha out there they wouldn’t stare
Bet they won’t care that I’m not married

Bright young women
Sick of swimming
In my own sweat

And ready to know what the Internet knows
Google my questions and get some answers
What’s a real job and what will I…
What’s the word?

Earn!

When’s it my turn
Wouldn’t I dare, dare to explore that world over there

Out of Togo
When can I go
Be part of that world