I have been living as
a vegetarian for 10 years now. I decided to make the switch after suffering
from severe migraines. It has become a part of who I am and I totally feared
coming to Indonesia thinking I would have to eat meat.
I
recently read a book entitled “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the
Night-Time” by Mark Haddon. At one
point, the protagonist states that “…because there is something they can’t see,
people think it has to be special…like the dark side of the moon, or the other
side of the black hole.”
My World Map Project was a little unexpected, but greatly
enjoyable. I think that it perfectly summarized my first months here at my site
in West Java in that the process of service may be hectic but the product can
be unexpected and beautiful.
I’ve
been in Indonesia for about four months now. I haven’t yet experienced
homesickness or separation anxiety from being away from my fellow Peace Corps
Volunteers.
The whim to
join the Peace Corps first came to Colleen Young when she was visiting her
daughter, Katrina, who was serving in Peace Corps Malawi, in 1999.
Bu Sari, an English teacher in Northeast Java, did not have a Peace Corps volunteer assigned to her school. Nevertheless, when Maggie, a volunteer in her local community, came to her in 2012 asking her to help organize the first local Camp IGLOW (Indonesian Girls Leading Our World), Bu Sari stepped up.
I started my day annoyed. A local Islamic boarding school had asked me to meet with their students and told me they would pick me up in a car at 7 a.m..