The Hardest Part

Most of you know that I had a family member pass away this week. While, the Peace Corps does allow emergency leave, it must be an immediate family member. The hardest part about training right now, is the adjustment away from life in America. I'm not discussing the difference in culture and lifestyles, I am talking about the idea that life moves on no matter where you are in the world.

I've read several blogs from RPCVs (returned peace corps volunteers) that stress the notion that the toughest part of readjustment is that everyone else's lives have moved on, too. Because of our access to the Internet and instant communication today, we have instant access to everyone back home. This can be both a blessing and a curse.

Running away from your problems doesn't make them go away. The things that were tough in America, will still follow you because of our instant access to communication. While it is wonderful to talk with family back home, it is hard to try and share this part of my life. Because unless you have studied abroad, are military, or are RPCV... It's tough to imagine my life. It's a lot of pretty pictures with children. Peace Corps is so much more than that and it is incredibly difficult to even begin to describe my experiences in words. Maybe one day, I'll write a song instead! It really is the hardest job you'll ever love.

Conversely, everyone back home has a life..that continues. That is the hardest part. Trying to keep up this identity of myself as an American, while applying everything I've learned here, is difficult. I am not the same person anymore, even in seven short weeks! But, neither is anyone back home because life moves on and you don't have to be abroad to do great things or struggle with life. When something happens at home, I have to find a way to cope while dealing with the difficulties here. Peace Corps Training, by it's very nature, is designed to make you uncomfortable and test yourself. Back before the Internet, you could leave America back home to an extent. Incorporating my American life can be mentally exhausting, but it is worth it.

So I ask for your patience as I try and learn this new culture. If I snap because you're the third person to ask me today how the food is different, please foregive me. I love sharing my experiences, but I never thought I would be tested like this. I can do this; I am a Phoenix rising from the ashes. I am choosing to constantly re-evaluate myself and see what I can positively change.

I feel like for the first time in my life I have truly found myself. Every step in my life was a step closer to this adventure. I thought majoring in music was amazing, then I found music therapy, and now, I learned that I can use my music therapy training as part of humanitarian aid. I love living abroad and being here, only makes me want to experience more of the world! They talk about our lives as being "America," "peace corps," "host family," and "past self." Every part of that makes me who I am, but how do you cross those barriers? Hopefully, this blog will help! Those who are currently also abroad have a special place in my heart because they can totally understand what I mean by all of this. Thanks for reading!

We have site placements next Friday! Expect a post soon about where I will be for the next two years!

Time is NOT always money

You know the psychological concept of "schemas?" It's the idea that your brain tries to incorporate new information into existing groups of information. For example, a toddler may see a cow and state, "dog" because it has 4 legs and a tail.

Well, one of the reasons culture shock is so difficult to work with is because there is no schema to incorporate this new information into. The peace corps gives us a book on being a volunteer and I have begun to re-read it at the suggestion of a fellow volunteer. It is hard to have everything you do in a day be totally different; I even use the bathroom in a new way! Not only am I learning a new language, I'm relearning how to do everything I ever knew.

It is hard as an educated citizen from the US to come to another country in more way than one. The second you step off that plane you are, for all intents and purposes, both deaf and mute in this new culture. Nobody cares that you have a masters degree when you can't even ask for the bathroom properly, and nor do they understand it. The added difficulty for me, is that they don't have any concept of music therapy. When I try to explain what I did in the states, people don't even know about the closest allied health discipline to relate it to in their head.

Why am I saying this? Because training is hard? No, it's because I keep telling myself that there is a light at the end of the tunnel and just because that is the way we do it in America, doesn't make it right. The village life of Fiji has so much to offer American citizens. I've been eating meals with my host family, basking in the simplicity of life, playing with my host brothers and sisters and having my life views challenged on a daily basis. The odd part is that the developing nation of  Fiji, isn't that much different than America. It's all a matter of perspective.

The Cultural Iceberg used in our trainings (OH-I-SEE.com)

One of the most frustrating things for me, is the lack of consistent technology. It doesn't just make me mad when my cell service cuts out in the middle of a conversation back home; it is absolutely infuriating. We have been taught that time is money and if it's broke, just get a new one from when we were toddlers; is that the fault of being in a third world country or my own faulty perspective? If you choose to ever study abroad or join the Peace Corps, expect to have your perceptions and personal philosophies challenged on a daily basis. I can choose to be infuriated, or I can choose to have patience, delayed gratifications and value the fact that my technology works at all over here.

I don't have the option to just fix it and move on. I have to be willing to sit and analyze my own thoughts and actions for fault. I am not right just because I believe to be so; in fact, that doesn't make anything right or wrong at all. I could choose to be negative and hole up in my room, but I choose personal challenge. Maybe time is NOT money after all? How can you challenge your own perceptions abroad or at home? Leave a comment below!

(Forgive the errors, typing on my phone again)

I used the book "A Few Minor Adjustments" by the Peace Corps as a resource for this post.