Bulgaria is a world away from South Florida where Edith Sloan, 61, and Rel Davis, 66, lived before joining Peace Corps in June 2001
Bulgaria is a world away from South Florida where Edith Sloan, 61, and Rel Davis, 66, lived before joining Peace Corps in June 2001. The couple now lives in a small agricultural town on the Thracian Plains in southeastern Bulgaria. It is a town where donkey carts outnumber automobiles, flocks of sheep wander down the cobblestone main street on the way to pasture, and holidays are celebrated with traditional costumes, singing, and dancing. Edith, a retired school administrator and teacher, and Rel, a former minister and journalist, came to Bulgaria hoping to make a difference in the world and willing to go wherever the Peace Corps needed them.
In Bulgaria, Edith works as a education volunteer teaching English, and Rel works as a community service volunteer in economic development. Initially shocked by the high levels of unemployment and inadequate facilities of community schools, both are committed to improving the employment and educational opportunities of the community.
The couple began by soliciting donations from local merchants and worked with volunteers to construct a new playground for a local primary school. As a result of their efforts to mobilize community support for the school, a partnership, similar to a Parent Teacher Organization, between community members and the school was formed for the first time. The couple also appealed to U.S. residents to donate funds and materials for the English resource center at the secondary school. The resource center is now equipped with a computer, VCR, tape players, photocopier, scanner, and a reference library. The couple worked with the local orphanage to update two under-equipped vocational programs in culinary education and lathe work technical training. The programs are now completely outfitted with state-of-the-art equipment.
Concerned with the high unemployment rate in the community, the couple conducted two micro-enterprise projects. Edith and Rel created a weaving and sewing cooperative to address a shortage of job opportunities for women. Financial donations, a building facility provided by the municipality, hundreds of hours of volunteer labor, and training were invested into the cooperative which has the potential to employ over sixty women. The couple also worked with a local non-governmental organization dedicated to finding jobs for community members. They assisted the organization by creating an internet craft shop where Bulgarian artisans are able to sell their work to collectors worldwide. The site is www.craftcenter.org.
The couple also helped the municipal government obtain funding to establish a service center, equipped with the technology and linked to seven surrounding villages. The project supplied computers and internet access to these remote villages and provides computerized government services to the region. Now, citizens will be able to obtain necessary government services at one office instead of dozens, and people in outlying villages can obtain paperwork without making the day-long journey once required.
Edith and Rel are proud of all they have been able to accomplish, but stress the active role of the community in their projects. "In reality," Rel says, "the community has given us back far more than we have been able to give the people here. They accepted us into their community, supported us during the difficult times. . . and shared with us all the wonderful cultural activities that village Bulgaria is famous for."
