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ChuckLudlam (196.207.203.67)
Posted on Saturday, December 24, 2005 - 9:15 am:   

RPCVs Serving Second Tour After Nearly Forty Year Gap

My wife, Paula, and I are currently serving as Peace Corps Volunteers in Senegal. It’s our second round of service; we each served as Volunteers 37 years ago (Nepal and Kenya) and are now serving again, this time together.

We’re interested in making contact with other RPCVs who are serving a second tour after a long gap. We know there are many volunteers who serve consecutive tours in different countries, but we’re most interested in RPCVs who have come back to serve a second tour decades later.

We’re interested in how they find the PC has changed, the special issues that arise for older Volunteers who are RPCVs, and other similar issues. We figure that over time many RPCVs may seek to serve again and we believe that the Peace Corps is not remotely prepared for them.

So far, we’re enjoying our service in Senegal tremendously. We're the first volunteers in our rural town and the Senegalese couldn't be friendlier. We found the application process to be very stressful, especially the medical clearance part, but we enjoyed the in country training and admire and respect the younger Volunteers with whom we are serving. We’re the oldest Volunteers in our group but we feel well accepted as members of the group. We don’t seek to play any special role as RPCVs, but I think the first timers find it encouraging that we are happy to serve again. That alone makes a powerful statement about our first time experience.

Let us know if you’d like to talk about these issues – via email. We’re just starting our two years in Senegal, so there’s plenty of time to talk and compile our thoughts. In the end, we’d like to make recommendations to the Peace Corps on how to handle what we believe will be a deluge of RPCV applications.

Chuck Ludlam
Chuck.ludlam@gmail.com

Cire Dieng, Phamarcie Rasul-Lilih
Cher Sow, Voluntaire, Corps de la Paix Americain
B.P. 31, Guinguinéo, Senegal, West Africa

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