In time, though, she found a niche, helping local women who were raising their grandchildren, orphaned when their parents died from AIDS. Today, from her home in Walnut Creek, Calif., Ms. Bostrom runs a nonprofit group called Grandmothers Raising Grandchildren, which allows her to continue the work she started in Kenya. Ms. Bostrom's Peace Corps work in Kenya involved 15 local women who were raising 47 grandchildren. She helped the grandmothers start a business, selling handwoven baskets, and counseled them on how to get medical care, prepare healthful foods and provide clean water for the children. In the end, Ms. Bostrom was the oldest Peace Corps volunteer in her group to complete the two-year program; of the 30 original volunteers, 15 dropped out. "I had never been to a developing country before, but the Peace Corps seemed interesting and worthwhile," Ms. Bostrom says. "I had no fear at all about living in Africa, because I didn't know what I was getting into."
In 2004, Bie Bostrom, then age 63, joined the Peace Corps and arriving in the village of Ahero in Kenya, she found the rudimentary living conditions, oppressive heat and crushing poverty almost too much to bear
Profiles in Retirement
[Excerpt]
Inspiration Found in the Peace Corps
In 2004, Bie Bostrom, then age 63, joined the Peace Corps. Arriving in the village of Ahero in Kenya, she found the rudimentary living conditions, oppressive heat and crushing poverty almost too much to bear.
"I felt so helpless," Ms. Bostrom recalls. "I just cried for days."
In time, though, she found a niche, helping local women who were raising their grandchildren, orphaned when their parents died from AIDS. Today, from her home in Walnut Creek, Calif., Ms. Bostrom runs a nonprofit group called Grandmothers Raising Grandchildren, which allows her to continue the work she started in Kenya.
"I came home to the U.S., but I couldn't stop thinking about those grandmothers who were raising so many children against all odds," says Ms. Bostrom, now 67.
Born in Belgium, Ms. Bostrom studied as a young woman in the Netherlands and worked for eight years in London as a commercial photographer. In 1977, she settled in San Francisco -- "because it seemed like a lovely city," she recalls -- and met her future husband when she applied for a job in his photography studio.
The couple moved to New York two years later and opened their own photography business in Manhattan, which they ran together until 2001. At that point, they retired to a quiet life in a house in the country.
"Financially we had planned well, and our plans were to relax, travel a bit and generally take it easy," Ms. Bostrom says. But just two months after retiring, her husband was diagnosed with cancer. He passed away a year later.
"Joining the Peace Corps was not something I had planned, but I mentioned it to my husband right before he died, and he told me he thought it was a great idea," Ms. Bostrom says. "That was enough to convince me to take the plunge." She sold their sprawling Victorian home in New York's Catskill Mountains and signed up for a two-year stay in Africa.
Ms. Bostrom's Peace Corps work in Kenya involved 15 local women who were raising 47 grandchildren. She helped the grandmothers start a business, selling handwoven baskets, and counseled them on how to get medical care, prepare healthful foods and provide clean water for the children. In the end, Ms. Bostrom was the oldest Peace Corps volunteer in her group to complete the two-year program; of the 30 original volunteers, 15 dropped out.
"I had never been to a developing country before, but the Peace Corps seemed interesting and worthwhile," Ms. Bostrom says. "I had no fear at all about living in Africa, because I didn't know what I was getting into."
Grandmothers Raising Grandchildren, which Ms. Bostrom founded earlier this year, is helping the women in Kenya expand their business. She spends 20 to 30 hours a week running the charity and recently returned from a two-week trip to Ahero to check on the program, which now counts 43 grandmothers raising 104 children. The organization sells baskets online at www.grgahero.org and in shops across the U.S., and gives the funds to the grandmothers to buy food, bedding, clothes, mosquito nets and water-treatment products, among other items.
Says Ms. Bostrom of her counterparts in Kenya: "They had become a part of me, and I realized I had to keep helping them."
