March 12, 2005: Headlines: COS - Costa Rica: Modesto Bee: Mary Wallace sits at her parents' kitchen table, trying to decide what to pack for her two-year stint with the Peace Corps in Costa Rica
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March 12, 2005: Headlines: COS - Costa Rica: Modesto Bee: Mary Wallace sits at her parents' kitchen table, trying to decide what to pack for her two-year stint with the Peace Corps in Costa Rica
Mary Wallace sits at her parents' kitchen table, trying to decide what to pack for her two-year stint with the Peace Corps in Costa Rica
Mary Wallace sits at her parents' kitchen table, trying to decide what to pack for her two-year stint with the Peace Corps in Costa Rica
Giving Peace A Chance Two Young Women Each At A Crossroads, Choose The Peace Corps Path
By Kerry McCray
Modesto Bee
Modesto, Calif.
March 12, 2005
Each year, thousands of people sign up for the Peace Corps, an organization founded in 1961 when President Kennedy asked students to serve their country by living and working in developing countries.
Since then, more than 170,000 Peace Corps volunteers have worked in 137 host countries. They do a little of everything, including running health clinics, helping with agricultural efforts and assisting with AIDS education.
Here are the stories of two Peace Corps volunteers from the Modesto area. One, Mary Wallace, recently left on her two-year adventure. Another, Kristine Oase, recently returned.
[Excerpt]
Mary Wallace sits at her parents' kitchen table, trying to decide what to pack for her two-year stint with the Peace Corps.
It's not easy. Although the 22-year-old knows she'll be staying in rural Costa Rica, she's not entirely sure what the living conditions will be like. Will there be running water? What about electricity? And just how rainy is the rainy season?
Wallace, a 2000 graduate of Johansen High School, decided to join the Peace Corps last year. She was a senior at the University of California at Santa Cruz, unsure whether she wanted to try to get a job or go to graduate school.
She figured the Peace Corps would help her learn more about herself so she could make a decision about her future. The organization offers health insurance, which Wallace knew would please her parents. It also offers fellowships to graduate schools, something that interested her.
Wallace filled out a Peace Corps application online. Then she told her parents. "I said, 'So, about this job thing ...,'" she says. "They kind of said, 'Oh, OK.' They never told me it was a bad idea."
Wallace made it through the application process, which includes a personal interview, three health examinations and a background check with the FBI. She still wasn't sure what country she'd be headed to, or when she would be going, until she got an e-mail from her Peace Corps recruiter.
"I have two words for you," it read. "Costa Rica."
Wallace was pleased. She'd get a chance to use the Spanish she studied in college. Then she began to feel anxious. Although she would spend the first three months of her Peace Corps experience taking classes in language and culture with other volunteers, she would be on her own in the country for the next 20 or so months.
"I expect a rough time at first," she says. "Maybe everyone won't welcome me with open arms."
Wallace says her parents, John and Susan, are a bit worried about how she will fare. Her friends, however, can't wait to visit. But they've already said they'd rather meet Wallace in a city rather than in the village in which she'll work.
While in Costa Rica, Wallace's job will be "rural community development," a fancy way of saying she will help residents improve their surroundings. She might help build a park, or assist in organizing a women's group, for example.
"I could be doing anything that gives back to the community," she says.
That should be no problem for Wallace. She studied sociology and activism and graduated with a degree in community studies.
Back to more pressing matters. What will she bring to Costa Rica? Besides her Bible and some of her favorite books, Wallace isn't sure what she'll pack in the one suitcase and one duffle bag the corps allows. Clothes, she figures. Maybe an alarm clock and a Swiss Army knife.
"It hasn't really hit me that I'm leaving yet," she says.
When this story was posted in March 2005, this was on the front page of PCOL:
| The Peace Corps Library Peace Corps Online is proud to announce that the Peace Corps Library is now available online. With over 30,000 index entries in over 500 categories, this is the largest collection of Peace Corps related reference material in the world. From Acting to Zucchini, you can use the Main Index to find hundreds of stories about RPCVs who have your same interests, who served in your Country of Service, or who serve in your state. |
| RPCVs in Congress ask colleagues to support PC RPCVs Sam Farr, Chris Shays, Thomas Petri, James Walsh, and Mike Honda have asked their colleagues in Congress to add their names to a letter they have written to the House Foreign Operations Subcommittee, asking for full funding of $345 M for the Peace Corps in 2006. As a follow-on to Peace Corps week, please read the letter and call your Representative in Congress and ask him or her to add their name to the letter. |
| Add your info now to the RPCV Directory Call Harris Publishing at 800-414-4608 right away to add your name or make changes to your listing in the newest edition of the NPCA's Directory of Peace Corps Volunteers and Former Staff. Then read our story on how you can get access to the book after it is published. The deadline for inclusion is May 16 so call now. |
| March 1: National Day of Action Tuesday, March 1, is the NPCA's National Day of Action. Please call your Senators and ask them to support the President's proposed $27 Million budget increase for the Peace Corps for FY2006 and ask them to oppose the elimination of Perkins loans that benefit Peace Corps volunteers from low-income backgrounds. Follow this link for step-by-step information on how to make your calls. Then take our poll and leave feedback on how the calls went. |
| Make a call for the Peace Corps PCOL is a strong supporter of the NPCA's National Day of Action and encourages every RPCV to spend ten minutes on Tuesday, March 1 making a call to your Representatives and ask them to support President Bush's budget proposal of $345 Million to expand the Peace Corps. Take our Poll: Click here to take our poll. We'll send out a reminder and have more details early next week. |
| Peace Corps Calendar: Tempest in a Teapot? Bulgarian writer Ognyan Georgiev has written a story which has made the front page of the newspaper "Telegraf" criticizing the photo selection for his country in the 2005 "Peace Corps Calendar" published by RPCVs of Madison, Wisconsin. RPCV Betsy Sergeant Snow, who submitted the photograph for the calendar, has published her reply. Read the stories and leave your comments. |
| WWII participants became RPCVs Read about two RPCVs who participated in World War II in very different ways long before there was a Peace Corps. Retired Rear Adm. Francis J. Thomas (RPCV Fiji), a decorated hero of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, died Friday, Jan. 21, 2005 at 100. Mary Smeltzer (RPCV Botswana), 89, followed her Japanese students into WWII internment camps. We honor both RPCVs for their service. |
| Bush's FY06 Budget for the Peace Corps The White House is proposing $345 Million for the Peace Corps for FY06 - a $27.7 Million (8.7%) increase that would allow at least two new posts and maintain the existing number of volunteers at approximately 7,700. Bush's 2002 proposal to double the Peace Corps to 14,000 volunteers appears to have been forgotten. The proposed budget still needs to be approved by Congress. |
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Story Source: Modesto Bee
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