When Lee toured the United States in April, he extended the invitation to all Americans who served in the Peace Corps from 1966 to 1981. Approximately 40 return volunteers will make the trip with the McGoverns. Once in Seoul, they will meet with U.S. Ambassador Kathleen Stephens, who also was a Peace Corps volunteer in Korea.
On Oct. 5, the McGoverns, along with 40 other Returned Peace Corps volunteers and staff, will return to Seoul, as guests of the the Republic of Korea President Lee Myung-bak
Peace Corps also benefits volunteers
Dr. James McGovern and his wife, Jeanne, are about to embark on a wonderful journey both back into the past and into the future.
The McGoverns are former Peace Corps volunteers who served in South Korea's northern provinces in the 1970s as middle school English teachers.
On Oct. 5, the McGoverns, along with other former Peace Corps volunteers and staff, will return to Seoul, as guests of the the Republic of Korea President Lee Myung-bak.
When Lee toured the United States in April, he extended the invitation to all Americans who served in the Peace Corps from 1966 to 1981.
Approximately 40 return volunteers will make the trip with the McGoverns.
Once in Seoul, they will meet with U.S. Ambassador Kathleen Stephens, who also was a Peace Corps volunteer in Korea.
James McGovern specialized in neuropsychology as a member of Pinnacle Medical Group. Jeanne works at PACE Center for Girls in Bradenton.
I have to say I envy the McGoverns. What a great opportunity to return nearly three decades later to see how their adopted homeland has changed.
I, too, am a former Peace Corps volunteer. I served in Medellin, Colombia, from 1967 to 1969. I often dream about my Colombian home and the Medellin family that made me one of their own.
Serving in the Peace Corps was such a grand adventure, an eye-opening experience that taught me to understand the world beyond the stereotypes of my own culture.
I sometimes think I was the real benefactor, rather than the students I worked with in Medellin schools.
You see, they taught me more than I, a recent college graduate, could have ever taught them.
The Colombians I met and worked with became my teachers, their language became my language, their food my food, their culture my adopted culture.
One morning, after I had been in the country for about three months, I was riding a bus into town. I was going over in my head the places I had to go, the people I was supposed to see that day.
Then all of a sudden it hit me.
I was thinking not in English, but in Spanish.
That was the day I really began to feel at home.
It was also the day I began to think outside of the American box of my youth.
Unfortunately, I have lost much of my fluency in Spanish. I understand far more than I can speak. But one gift I haven't lost is the awareness that there is a whole big world out there and it pays to keep a very open mind.
Donna Wright, health and social services reporter, can be reached at 745-7049.
