Purdy says he does not feel like his standard of living is that much different than it was in the States. He has wireless Internet access, a washing machine and an air conditioner. “The hardships are more annoyances than anything else. You can’t flush your toilet paper, electricity can be erratic at times and there’s a night club next to my apartment building that blares chalga music until the wee hours of the morning on Saturday nights,” he says, adding that chalga is a mix of Bulgarian folk melodies with synthesized pop music, sung by flashy Bulgarian divas. Purdy says me misses having a variety of food menus, libraries, cheap electronics, and good central heating and air-conditioning everywhere. “But, basically, other than a few creature comforts, what I really miss are loved ones – my family and friends,” he says. Purdy sums up his impression of Bulgaria with this dichotomy, “You can often see a BMW speeding past a mule-drawn cart, loaded down with vegetables. It’s a country caught between two worlds; it’s at a crossroads, both geographically and in its identity as a country.”
Peace Corps volunteer Matt Purdy says he loves his job as one of four English teachers in a small Bulgarian town of 4,000 people, on the southern edge of the Balkan Mountains
Day in the life of a Peace Corps volunteer
By BRENDA HAWKINS (Contact)
2:03 p.m., Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Caption: Peace Corps volunteer Matt Purdy wears native Bulgarian dress and plays the ukulele (not a native instrument) to accompany Bulgarian singers during a presentation to other volunteers on Bulgarian culture.
Matt Purdy has eaten some strange foods, including sheep brains straight from the skull, sheep tongue straight from the mouth and scrambled pig brains, but the Peace Corps volunteer says he loves his job as one of four English teachers in a small Bulgarian town of 4,000 people, on the southern edge of the Balkan Mountains.
The former Naples student decided to join the Peace Corps several years ago, while working in a post-college office temp job.
“I felt I was stagnating. I needed a change,” he says in an e-mail to the Collier Citizen. “I had taken the obligatory European trip abroad shortly after college, but as a tourist, I didn’t feel like I fully experienced the places I was visiting. So, I finished one final temp job and then took an 80-day bicycle trip from New York City to Seattle during the summer of 2007, as a way to see America before leaving for the Peace Corps.”
Purdy’s decision reflects a growing trend in Florida. The number of Floridians joining the Peace Corps rose by 35 percent in 2008 over 2007, while national figures rose by only 16 percent, according to the organization’s headquarters in Atlanta.
Southeast region public affairs specialist David Leavitt attributes the figures to the number of retirees in Florida, whom the daily golf course grind just doesn’t excite. He says the number of inquiries from colleges is also rising, as more schools implement domestic agriculture study programs.
Purdy says it felt right to volunteer his services for a couple of years, to try to make, “a small, but significant difference in the world,” as well as broaden his global perspective.
“As a young, single male without many assets, I don’t feel like it was a particularly large sacrifice,” he says of the decision, “especially given the current economic crisis. In retrospect, it was pretty good timing.”
Purdy arrived in Bulgaria in April 2008 and lived with a host family for several months before moving to a permanent site in June. He teaches three or four 45-minute classes a day. He also helps with the school’s afterschool program three days a week, reading in English to his students and helping them with the school’s Web site.
Purdy has also brought his work “home.”
Last summer, he wrote to the teachers to Vineyards Elementary School, where his mom, Marilyn Purdy, serves as P.E. teacher, asking them to donate books to start a small English-language library at his school in Bulgaria. The effort was a success, with 650 books donated from teachers and students. Michael Hotchkiss, owner of Naples Packaging and Shipping, then shipped the books, free of charge.
In addition to his school activities, Purdy works on various secondary projects at a cultural center. In December, he showed the movie, “It’s A Wonderful Life,” with Bulgarian subtitles. As a part of the film event, the school’s Red Cross raised money to buy Christmas presents for kids in a nearby orphanage and his class delivered the presents, with one of them dressed as Santa Claus.
“Just being a presence in the community is 50 percent of the job,” he says. “I’m sort of an object of pride for the town – ‘the American.’ I am told on a weekly basis that I need to find a nice Bulgarian girl to settle down with. The generosity and welcome that I have received has been amazing. I have been given untold amounts of fresh fruits and vegetables, mason jars filled with soup, dried herbs, fresh honey and yogurt.”
He has also taken to the local folk remedies and ‘comfort foods.’
“When I was sick with a cough for a while, I was given a box of fresh herbs to make tea, a honey and brandy concoction called rakiya, which is mostly homemade brandy and is used with everything here, thick woolen socks, a mason jar of lard to soothe the throat, a chicken cabbage soup and jars of fresh honey,” he says.
Purdy admits the job has its ups and downs. The winter hasn’t been particularly cold, but there have been long stretches of days with bleak, overcast skies.
“Having grown up in the Florida sunshine, the weather threw me for a bit of a loop,” he says. “I try not to spend too much time in the apartment. I go over for dinner with other teachers several times a week. Monday night is ‘Curb Your Enthusiasm’ night. We drink Coke, eat popcorn and watch ‘Curb Your Enthusiasm’ (with Bulgarian subtitles). I have made wonderful friends here whom I will be in contact with long after I return to the States.”
Purdy says he does not feel like his standard of living is that much different than it was in the States. He has wireless Internet access, a washing machine and an air conditioner.
“The hardships are more annoyances than anything else. You can’t flush your toilet paper, electricity can be erratic at times and there’s a night club next to my apartment building that blares chalga music until the wee hours of the morning on Saturday nights,” he says, adding that chalga is a mix of Bulgarian folk melodies with synthesized pop music, sung by flashy Bulgarian divas.
Purdy says me misses having a variety of food menus, libraries, cheap electronics, and good central heating and air-conditioning everywhere.
“But, basically, other than a few creature comforts, what I really miss are loved ones – my family and friends,” he says.
Purdy sums up his impression of Bulgaria with this dichotomy, “You can often see a BMW speeding past a mule-drawn cart, loaded down with vegetables. It’s a country caught between two worlds; it’s at a crossroads, both geographically and in its identity as a country.”
