All Volunteer Conference Part 2

After lunch, we broke up by region. It turns out the Cibao, the region where my community is located, has so many volunteers that it is broken into three sub-regions. In my sub-region I was delighted to find that there are several volunteers located near me who would be interested to have my scouts come help their communities and who can provide guidance in approaching my secondary projects.

Volunteers take in Boriana's health and safety session

For the last session, we had a chance to float around between different areas of interest including the Marine Interest group, a volunteer publication called the Gringo Grita, and medical missions to name a few. With this time, I concentrated on getting plugged in with the PCDR website and the committee in charge of an upcoming conference for RPCVs (Returned Peace Corps Volunteers) to mark the Peace Corps 50th year. After a closing session on health and safety we were allowed to go our merry way.

All Volunteer Conference Part 1

The day after swearing-in was the all volunteer conference, and event held annually which every volunteer is required to attend. Being the newest arrivals and having never met most of the volunteers already in the country when we arrived, we were each asked to take the stage and tell our names, where we're from, and where our assigned community is located. When I said I was from Portland, I heard several cheers from the crowd.

Team-building dinámica: group rock-paper-scissors

What followed was a number of break-away sessions. The first divided us into those who were newer and those who had already been in the country a year or more. The newer volunteers took part in several dinámicas, activities designed to give youths a chance to get up and move around in the context of learning situations. It was a blast. Next, we broke up by sector and I had a chance to meet all the ICT volunteers that I hadn't already met. They shared some pieces of advice, of which, “don't compare yourself to others”, stood out in particular.

Swearing-In

On Wednesday, May 11, 2011 I took the oath of service and became one of Peace Corps Dominican Republic's 51 newest volunteers. The highlight of the swearing-in ceremony was a speech by Jamie David Fernández Mirabal, secretary of the environment, imploring us to plant a tree wherever we were placed. Mr. Mirabal went on to say that while he loved us all, he had a little extra love of Colleen Ferris who will be spending the next two years on an island, Isla Saona, near the southeastern-most point of the country.

Post-graduation (left to right): Will Dale, Pedro Medrano, Ryan Browning,
Ekow Edzie, Mike Bustamante, Christina Bradley, Mike Bourgeois, Kayla Reynolds

Potential

While I've learned through experience that it is best to under-promise and over-deliver, it is easy to let the imagination run wild here. My community is enormous compared to the five or six hundred people a volunteer's project sometimes addresses. So is my pool of potential collaborators; Scout Group 8 boasts 160 active members. They live all over town and can likely provide me with useful information and contacts. Scouts is a well-known and respected institution. I feel incredibly fortunate in my present situation.

Though I've only been here about 48 hours, already I've begun to dream big. My first obligation is to my primary project, the clubhouse and the lab. I intend to fulfill this obligation with superlative aplomb. It may very well be that all my time and energy is devoted to this alone given my commitment to making it a self-sustaining project and the amount of time and effort required in order to make this so. All the same, I can't help but imagine working on potential secondary projects.

For example, there is another group of Scouts in town that meets in a local school, it sounds as if they are less established and politically connected, but it would be interesting to see what I could apply with this group that I learn in working with Group 8. Also, I'm excited to see what emerges from my community diagnostic. I wonder if there is something that they may want me to provide outside the obvious computer-related service. Group 8 has a zip line they would like to develop to run through the canopy in the empty green space behind the clubhouse. Also, it seems as though the surrounding area is sufficiently prosperous to yeild a pool of used computers for reuse/recycling. I would be positively thrilled to develop some community-sourced computer education and donation in the spirit of Free Geek. Only time will tell.

Finally, a Project

After seven months of waiting to see if I would be nominated for service, eight more months in the application process, waiting to see what country I would get, and finally seven months of waiting for my departure and subsequently receiving Peace Corps training, I have finally gotten my project. For the next two years I am assigned to Scout Group 8 in a neighborhood near the edge of Moca in the northern Province of Espaillat, Dominican Republic.

My project partner, Pablo Ovalles, is a leader in the scout community. He solicited a Peace Corps volunteer to work in the Group's clubhouse which was constructed last year by Indotel on a parcel of public land near the edge of town that was granted to the them for that purpose. My role as a volunteer will be to help the Scouts fulfill their obligation to Indotel to keep the lab open for regular hours as a resource to the community.

Radio Show Part 2

About twenty minutes into our timeslot, with youths still arriving and filling the small on-air room to brimming, Carlos finally finished the final edits and we began in earnest. The show was to contain several segments, each of which was to be presented by a different youth or youths under the guidance of a specific volunteer. There were interviews with the winning team of a local soccer tournament, a couple local rappers, and with us, the Peace Corps trainees interspersed with hit music selected by the youths. In addition, they had invited a candidate for the local beauty pageant, Miss Patronales to do a live interview.

With the aid of the show outline written in two-inch-high print with blanks for each participant who would introduce a song or segment, we made it through what proved to be just over an hour of programming. Everyone conducted him or herself with remarkable aplomb and in the end a cheer of approval went up, accompanied by many high-fives and group photos. Afterwards, the volunteers retired to my place to celebrate. It was hard to believe the practicum was over.

Radio Show Part 1

On monday came the culmination of five weeks of training and practice in education and youth development. At two in the afternoon, I met with the five other trainees in my practicum group. We gathered at the CTC (Community Technology Center) to iron out the last details and go over the radio show outline our youths had developed at their last meeting. As our youths trickled in, we briefed them on the outline and assigned roles. A few minutes before our show was scheduled to begin, Carlos, our faithful group member and DJ took my USB drive containing the pre-recorded portions of the show and began preparing to play them on the air.

By ten minutes after our scheduled start time, Carlos still wasn't ready. "What's the problem?" I asked. "One of the rappers we interviewed used some words we can't play on the radio." I watched in horror as the minutes of our precious air time ticked away and Carlos frantically made edits in Adobe Audition. I began losing my patience until suddenly I remembered that this is the DR where any time less than half an hour behind schedule is considered early.