Peace Corps News

RPCV Pam (Eliason) Haglund reports from Iran: Americans welcome here

RPCV Pam (Eliason) Haglund reports from Iran:  Americans welcome here
Gracious. Welcoming. Well-educated. Outgoing. Not your typical description for what some people consider a culture of terrorists. That’s because, Pam (Eliason) Haglund insists, Iran’s populace is not a culture of terrorists. Haglund has made it her mission to get out the word about the engaging folks she met this summer, the people who live on the fuse of the political world’s dynamite keg. “I think we’re all world citizens,” Haglund said from her director’s office at Literacy Volunteers of Flathead County, “and there’s opportunities for peace if we get to know each other. I try to live my life that way.”

The people were so gracious and friendly,” Haglund said of Iranians who approached them in the public square to strike up conversations with the Americans, offered their home addresses with invitations to visit if ever the tourists were in their towns, and were anxious to have their photographs taken with the foreigners. “They always came up to ask what we thought of Iranians, what we thought of Iran,” she said. “They approached us a lot. They wanted to know who we were.” In a group made up largely of liberal-minded people with Democrat leanings, Haglund said, the tourists often disagree with President Bush’s policies toward Iran. But she said most often she and her fellow travelers responded by saying simply that they don’t always agree with their political leaders, leaving the door open for the Iranians to share their thoughts. Exchanges were respectful and lively, with 20- to 30-year-olds most likely to initiate them.

At a religious school, backpacks hang outside the door, decorated with Sponge Bob Square Pants, Mickey Mouse and other Western icons. Obituaries are posted at open-air markets, bearing photographs only of the men. Statues throughout the cities pay tribute to their revered poets. A domed ice house provides space for ice harvested in the winter in the mountains to be packed in straw for use throughout the summer. And everywhere are fountains and pools and channels of water flowing from the mountains. Haglund photographed a wind tower that catches the wind and channels it downward across a standing pool, providing a super-sized swamp cooler for the entire building and surrounding court. “They love water,” Haglund said of the desert people who appreciate the natural world’s gifts and deprivations.

She plans to keep telling her stories of Iran and its people to everyone who will listen. “It gets such bad press. Iranians are seen as the axis of evil, and that just is not my experience,” she said, convinced that personal stories can go a long way toward overcoming negative images. “I don’t think the people should suffer from the stereotype of evil, from the actions of a few bad apples. Of all the places I have traveled, these are my favorite people. “They would find out who we were, they’d act a bit surprised, then I bet 90 percent of them would say ‘Welcome to my country.’”  Read more.

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Two RPCVs help increase African Food Production

Senegal RPCV Molly Brown works at NASA monitoring farms from space to see if food crops are in trouble
Brown's maps start at NOAA, The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which creates the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI). That gives a green and brown picture of current vegetation conditions. She and her colleagues add rainfall measurements-- "If it rains today it will be green tomorrow" --and look at humidity and sea surface temperatures to create a vegetation forecast for the next one to four months. Based on those predictions and information about local markets across the region, Brown formulates a continuous map of market price forecasts. Their first maps, which will appear in the journal Land Economics, are of the dry central and northern regions of West Africa, where food prices are a matter of basic survival. "Because in this region, it rains only for four months or so," says Brown. "So, this humidity/rainfall information is then put together in a model and allows us to predict how green it's going to be two, three, four months into the future."

That prediction is important not just for food production, but also for food access -- whether people in the region can afford to buy food for their families. Brown combines these two factors to measure overall food security. When food security is critically low, it's time for international aid agencies to step in and help. When it's high, markets should be stable and people will have access to the food they need to survive. Brown says the Africa food price map will be available in 2008, with vegetation maps for other parts of the world in 2010. When are we going to see a map of prices at our local grocery store? Well, it's not that simple in a country as mobile as the U.S., Brown explains.

"So, in the U.S., it's completely different: we eat lettuce from California and we eat, you know, strawberries from Guatemala, and so because of the internationalization, the globalization of our market system, it's very hard to determine the impact of food production on local prices" she says. "In Africa, in these very small, informal markets, almost all of the grain that's bought and sold there is grown locally and is moved into the markets on foot." But U.S. farmers will still benefit from Brown's work. The maps that she and her colleagues plan to develop for the U.S. will predict vegetation and rainfall levels months in advance, helping farmers decide what crops to plant when.  Read more.

Cameroon RPCV Carol Miles has been working with African farmers to increase seed production of red kidney beans and get them into the hands of farmers where transportation systems are poor
Washington State University researcher Carol Miles has spent many months over the past five years traveling from Vancouver to Africa, planting, harvesting and cataloging beans. Her purpose is to help American farmers earn a profit and to help African farmers feed the hungry. Quietly and steadily, the internationally known vegetable horticulturist has joined with her assistant Liz Nelson and a changing crew of graduate students to test a new exotic mix of dried beans. In Western Washington and Oregon, the new varieties of beans may produce major profits for small, specialized niche farms. But the work that had been conducted at WSU's Research and Extension Unit here has shifted to a facility in Mount Vernon, north of Seattle. The move occurred amid questions about the future of the Vancouver site.

For African farmers, Miles and her students have been working to increase seed production of red kidney beans and get them into the hands of farmers where transportation systems are poor. "In Washington, we've been using colored and patterned beans," Miles said before leaving to work in Malawi. "These are beans that are not on the shelf anywhere, beautiful old beans, heirloom, in very pretty colors and patterns, that farmers have been selling from Olympia to Western Oregon, often at several dollars a pound." They've been a success, for example, on Laura Masterson's 47th Avenue Farm in Portland as well as at Ayers Creek Farm in Gaston, Ore. Masterson said she's been growing and selling Jacob's Cattle beans and cannellini beans that Miles developed, and has just started growing other varieties of dry beans from Miles' stock. "The beans are great. They are definitely profitable for us, a nice little niche option" said Masterson, who grows a wide variety of fruits and vegetables. "Carol is a tremendous resource. She saved us years of work. I can't tell you how tragic it is that she is not going to be here anymore."

Miles has developed an international reputation. She joined Washington State University in 1994 as an area extension agent specializing in vegetable production systems. She also has studied alternative high-value crops including edamame (vegetable soybeans), baby corn, pea shoots, wasabi and bamboo. Her interest in sustainable agricultural systems seems to have grown naturally out of the pattern of her life. Born in Rangoon, Burma, she attended grade school in Turkey, Nigeria and Panama. She graduated from high school in Afghanistan. She served in the Peace Corps, teaching vegetable production in Cameroon. There she also worked on a bean and cowpea project studying crop balancing and pest issues. She also worked on preventing blindness in Malawi with the Helen Keller Foundation and Save the Children. She saw a lot of subsistence agriculture in all these places and cultures, and her goal became working with farmers to create sustainable production systems that provide a source of well-being to both the family and the community. She has also worked on organic pest control, disease suppression and human pathogens. She has worked in Malawi and Tanzania on sustainable seed systems. She said she intends to carry on her work, wherever she can find space and interest. Read more.

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Mark Schneider writes: Getting answers on Pakistan

Mark Schneider writes: Getting answers on Pakistan
This fall offers an opportunity for change. Musharraf's term ends in October, and the following month the National Assembly completes its tenure. For the first time since the October 1999 coup, Musharraf's authoritarian rule appears shaky. His attempts at pre-election rigging -- including his onslaught on judicial independence and the media-- illustrate he refuses to commit to free and fair elections and to leave office if the new Parliament names someone else president. The Pakistani people have registered their desire for a democratic transition with street protests, which have been met by guns and gas. This increasingly vocal opposition, spearheaded by the bar associations, human rights groups, and the media, is channeling public resentment to military rule.

The United States needs to use leverage -- financial and political -- to insist upon free and fair parliamentary and provincial elections, monitored by independent international observers. Anything short of that -- including the call for a state of emergency, postponing elections, or permitting Musharraf to stand for reelection by the current lame-duck assemblies -- will de-legitimize the ballot box. While Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice made a useful phone call this week to dissuade Musharraf from declaring emergency rule, much more is needed.

Exiled opposition leaders also must be allowed to return to Pakistan. Pakistan's two national-level parties -- Benazir Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party and Nawaz Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League -- are pragmatic centrist forces that will contain fundamentalism -- not accommodate it. These moderates would not ignore an opportunity to capture Al Qaeda operatives hiding out on their turf, and their election could give US leaders confidence in Pakistan's partnership in the war on terror. If Bhutto and Sharif are not allowed to participate in October's election, their mainstream moderate parties will be further alienated, leaving the political field open to Islamist forces. Reports that Bhutto has been in talks with Musharraf to negotiate her return and work out a power-sharing agreement could be a good first step, but early optimism must be tempered by Musharraf's track record of unwillingness to relinquish any control.

The United States must stay engaged with Pakistan, but engaged in the right way. Supporting a deeply unpopular government -- either tacitly or directly -- is no way to help fight terrorism and neutralize religious extremism. And it puts the United States at even greater risk by feeding the growing anti-American sentiment among pro-democracy Pakistanis. The choice before the United States in Pakistan's election year, with time fast running out, is stark. It can support a return to genuine democracy and civilian rule, which offers the added bonus of containing extremism, or it can sit on the sidelines as Pakistan slides into political chaos, creating an environment in which militancy and radicalism will continue to thrive.  Read more.

Mark Schneider is senior vice president of the International Crisis Group and a former director of the Peace Corps.

Caption (top):  Former Peace Corps Director Mark Schneider served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in El Salvador.

Caption (bottom):  Caption: Pakistani lawyers chant anti-Musharraf slogans during a protest rally in Lahore. Thousands of people rallied against Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf for the first time since violent clashes in Karachi, as the military ruler headed to the still-tense city. Photo: AFP/Arif Ali 

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Colin Powell talks about the greatest threat facing us now

Colin Powell talks about the greatest threat facing us now
What is the greatest threat facing us now? People will say it’s terrorism. But are there any terrorists in the world who can change the American way of life or our political system? No. Can they knock down a building? Yes. Can they kill somebody? Yes. But can they change us? No. Only we can change ourselves. So what is the great threat we are facing?

I would approach this differently, in almost Marshall-like terms. What are the great opportunities out there—ones that we can take advantage of? It should not be just about creating alliances to deal with a guy in a cave in Pakistan. It should be about how do we create institutions that keep the world moving down a path of wealth creation, of increasing respect for human rights, creating democratic institutions, and increasing the efficiency and power of market economies? This is perhaps the most effective way to go after terrorists.

This doesn’t mean there isn’t a terrorist threat. There is a threat. And we should send in military forces when we have a target to deal with. We should also secure our airports, if that makes us safer. But let’s welcome every foreign student we can get our hands on. Let’s make sure that foreigners come to the Mayo Clinic here, and not the Mayo facility in Dubai or somewhere else. Let’s make sure people come to Disney World and not throw them up against the wall in Orlando simply because they have a Muslim name. Let’s also remember that this country was created by immigrants and thrives as a result of immigration, and we need a sound immigration policy.

Let’s show the world a face of openness and what a democratic system can do. That’s why I want to see Guantánamo closed. It’s so harmful to what we stand for. We literally bang ourselves in the head by having that place. What are we doing this to ourselves for? Because we’re worried about the 380 guys there? Bring them here! Give them lawyers and habeas corpus. We can deal with them. We are paying a price when the rest of the world sees an America that seems to be afraid and is not the America they remember.

You can drive up the road from here and come to a spot where there is a megachurch over here, a little Episcopal church over there, a Catholic church around the corner that’s almost cathedral-size, and between them is a huge Hindu temple. There are no police needed to guard any of this. There are not many places in the world where you would see that. Yes, there are a few dangerous nuts in Brooklyn and New Jersey who want to blow up Kennedy Airport and Fort Dix. These are dangerous criminals, and we must deal with them. But come on, this is not a threat to our survival! The only thing that can really destroy us is us. We shouldn’t do it to ourselves, and we shouldn’t use fear for political purposes—scaring people to death so they will vote for you, or scaring people to death so that we create a terror-industrial complex.  Read more.

An Exhibit of RPCV David Whitman's photographs of Brazil opens in Key Biscayne September 9

An Exhibit of Saint Lucia RPCV David Whitman's photographs of Brazil opens in Key Biscayne September 9
Six years ago Miami photographer David Whitman visited Ilha de Maré, an island in northeastern Brazil. His friend Jorge Antonio Espirito Santo Batista, a teacher there, had promised Whitman a glimpse of a Brazil that was disappearing—an island without cars, where you arrive by boat and wade through the surf to the shore, a place still dependent on the sea and the legendary tides that give the island its name. As they wandered along streets made of crushed shells and earth, Whitman noticed two barefooted boys playing marbles. “From where I stood, they happened to form a yin-yang shape,” Whitman recounts, “and I quietly reached for my camera, hoping I could record the moment before they shifted positions.” He did, and the young marble players—Jefinho and Darlei—famously landed on the cover of the International Calendar of Returned Peace Corps Volunteers in 2005. Jefinho and Darlei inspired the calendar’s theme that year: Harmony in Play. “The two boys playing marbles convey the age-old concept of Yin and Yang—opposites that fit together perfectly to make a whole—a reminder that harmony does not come from being the same. It comes from embracing differences and discovering how we complement and balance each other, thereby making the world a richer place.” Whitman’s photo—and the story behind it—were featured at the time on Progreso Weekly and Progreso Semanal, and also caught the attention of Alhemar Altieri, the publisher of InfoBrazil, a site that offers independent analysis and opinion on Brazilian current affairs. “With most Brazilians absorbed by the annual Carnival celebrations, we at InfoBrazil decided to break away from the usual political, business and economic content, and asked David Whitman, an accomplished photographer, to reflect on his time spent in Brazil.”

Last November, Whitman returned to Ilha de Maré during a four-week photographic journey through Brazil. As he was walking along the same road where he’d encountered Jefinho and Darlei six years earlier, he passed two boys—about the same age as the marble players had been—seated at a cement table. He gave them each a keyring from Miami, and asked if he could take their picture, the first shot of the day. That photo, “Best Friends,” is now the announcement for an upcoming exhibit of Whitman’s work, in Miami, called “Luminous Youth.” Reviewing an exhibit of Whitman’s work in Berkeley, California, Stephanie Hornbeck, now a conservator at the National Museum of African Art, wrote, “Whitman’s photographs evoke a gentle world. Beneath leafy trees in sunny, seemingly carefree settings by the sea, warm smiles and bright eyes engage the viewer directly. He focuses on the inner warmth and outer beauty of his young subjects, separating them from their often sad circumstances.” “Luminous Youth” runs from September 9 to November 2 at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas Biscayne Nature Center in Crandon Park, Key Biscayne. The opening reception is on Sunday, September 9, from 3 to 6 pm, with Brazilian music performed by Rose Max and Ramatis.  Read more.

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Congressman James Walsh says it's time to withdraw troops from Iraq

Walsh says it's time to withdraw troops
Rep. Jim Walsh, in a dramatic break with the White House, returned Monday from a trip to Iraq saying it's time to bring troops home and stop funding the war. The moderate Republican from Onondaga representing New York's 25th Congressional District has struggled for months with conflicting emotions about the war. "Before I went, I was not prepared to say it's time to start bringing our troops home," Walsh said. "I am prepared to say that now. It's time." Walsh's announcement came as Gen. David Petraeus, the U.S. commander in Iraq, told House members that the troop "surge" has made progress. But Walsh said he saw little evidence that much has changed in Iraq since he last visited four years ago. He said he hopes to meet with President Bush to convey his change of heart.  Congressman James Walsh of New York served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Nepal in the 1960's. Read more.

Congressman Jim Walsh takes a special interest in Nepal
It goes back a long time. When I was just finishing up my college, I applied for the Peace Corps, and I was accepted in an agriculture program, which surprised me because I had very little practical agriculture experience. I was sent to Nepal. I lived in Nijgarh, Bara. Our district capital was Kalaiya. We had a dera in Birgunj that we shared with four-five of my Peace Corps friends. When we went to the district krishi bikas meeting, we would stay in the dera, and would take the bus back and forth to Kalaiya. It was a very bumpy ride. I worked with farmers in Nijgargh Pachayat. I worked with people who moved down from hills and people who were indigenous in the terai-- the tharus. I grew wheat, corn, rice vegetables. I did a little bit of everything. I was able to see a lot of Nepal while I was there. I traveled to the West: Pokhara and Annapurna, and to Namche and the Everest region. I try to, as best I could, maintain my ties with friends whom I lived with. I email back and forth. I obviously follow the politics and the recent changes in Nepal.

My hope is that I could go and observe the elections. That would be ideal. I think the elections are the critical event in the near term history of Nepal. But when I first came back here in 1991, and the government changed and democracy was established, we wrote to the king, and asked the king to respect the students and people who went to streets asking for democracy. And I saw the impact that the United States had, and I think that the United States continues to play a positive role encouraging democracy. So if I could go for the election, that’s when I would go. Dherai namaskar and namaste to mero daju bhai, didi bahinii, and I miss Nepal, and I am looking forward to coming back. Read more.

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Margaret Pratley at 81 is the oldest serving Peace Corps Volunteer in the world

Margaret Pratley at 81 is the oldest serving Peace Corps Volunteer in the world
At the end of her most recent tour in March, in which she spent two years training instructors to teach English in Thailand, Pratley was 81, the oldest on-the-ground Peace Corps volunteer in the world. “Margaret is amazing,” said Nathan Hale Sargent, the public affairs specialist at the Peace Corps San Francisco Regional Office. “I really love her philosophy of volunteerism. She sees it as a collaboration between people.” Pratley and Raleigh Ellisen were presented with the President’s Volunteer Service Award earlier this month for their years of work on behalf of their own and other communities across the globe. Both winners received the President’s Call to Service, the highest level of the award, which is given to volunteers with over 4,000 hours of service. The two awards are only the 5th and 6th service awards that the current Peace Corps director, Ron Tschetter, has given out during his 11-month tenure as director, said Josie Duckett, a spokesperson for the Peace Corps.

Pratley said she has participated in three volunteer tours overseas with the Peace Corps and many years of work with local groups such as the Sierra Club. Pratley, who graduated from UC Berkeley in 1949, said she is grateful to the Peace Corps for giving her the opportunity and the skills to volunteer. When the Peace Corps was first founded in 1961, she said she wanted to volunteer but was busy with a marriage and children. It was not until she was in her sixties, divorced and with her children grown that she made her first Peace Corps tour to Lesotho.  She has also served in Sri Lanka. “I want to build bridges of understanding between cultures,” she said. “When people of different cultures meet each other, (there is) an understanding that our basic needs are universal.” Read more.

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Mike Honda's comfort woman resolution passes

Mike Honda's comfort woman resolution passes
The person who played the biggest role in the passage of the “comfort women” resolution by the U.S. House of Representatives is Mike Honda, a third-generation Japanese American. In January, Honda submitted a proposal for the resolution, which calls on the Japanese government to acknowledge and formally apologize for the forced mobilization of women to serve as sex slaves to Japanese soldiers during World War II. At that time, he was bombarded by criticism from Japanese people who accused him of trying to shame Japan on U.S. soil.

A moderator of one Japanese TV program questioned how he could have done such a thing considering his Japanese lineage. But Honda was unfazed, replying that an apology and reconciliation by Tokyo would not diminish its stature. It would actually strengthen relations with Korea and China, should they be satisfied with Japan’s efforts.

Honda spent 14 months in an internment camp for Japanese Americans during World War II. Following a Senate resolution in 1988, then U.S. President Ronald Reagan made a public apology for their internment. Honda said true reconciliation can only happen after repentance. He added that the passage of the resolution was not an end but a beginning. Honda is teaching the people of his ancestral home that the atrocities involving sex slaves cannot be resolved unless Japan accepts its responsibility. Congressman Mike Honda of California served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in El Salvador in the 1960's.  Read more.

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Frank Delano returns to Ghana

Frank Delano returns to Ghana
I was 22 when I arrived at St. Paul's Secondary School. Bobbo was a year older. He was in his last year at the boarding school for boys. In one respect, he was different from a lot of his classmates. Many of them had dreams of going on to American or European universities and becoming doctors, scientists or engineers. Bobbo's plan for his life was simpler. He wanted to be a kente (KEN-te) weaver as his family had been for generations. Kente is the beautiful, traditional cloth of Ghana. It is woven by hand in long, narrow strips on small looms built of sticks set in the ground. The weavers then cut the strips and sew them together. The cloth is Ghana's time-honored formalwear for ceremonial occasions. Women wear two pieces, a wrap-around skirt and a top. Men wear a large cloth draped over one shoulder like a regal Roman toga.

By any measure, Bobbo's career has turned out successfully. He has traveled often to America, Canada and Europe to demonstrate his craft and sell his colorful cloth. He has even been the subject of a book written by an American friend. Because of his travels, he knows the United States better than most Ghanaians. "Everybody in Ghana thinks America is a great place. They can't imagine all the hassles about living in America. You tell people in Ghana that there are homeless people in America and they think you are telling lies," he said. We figured we had last met in 1980. He was between weaving gigs in the United States and stayed a few weeks at my house in the Northern Neck. He set up a loom under a maple tree in the backyard and wove kente every day." Read more.

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RPCV Diplomats in the News

Christopher R. Hill says North Korea has agreed to disable its main nuclear fuel production plant by the end of the year
The New York Times reports that Hill met in Geneva for two days of one-on-one negotiations with Kim Kye-gwan, who heads the North Korean negotiating team, and that North Korea had agreed to disable its main nuclear fuel production plant by the end of 2007 and to account for all of its nuclear programs to international monitors. North Korea had also agreed to turn off its main nuclear reactor this summer. "One thing that we agreed on is that the D.P.R.K. will provide a full declaration of all of their nuclear programs and will disable their nuclear programs by the end of this year, 2007," Hill told reporters.

If the North Koreans meet the schedule and disable their equipment, it would be a major victory for the Bush administration, at a time when it is eager to claim progress on some diplomatic front to offset its problems in Iraq. Whether to offer the North rewards, including oil and, eventually, removal from the list of state sponsors of terrorism and diplomatic recognition, has been the subject of a six-year struggle within the Bush administration.

The hawks are still unhappy, and have suggested that Mr. Hill is giving away too much. “There is still simply no evidence that Pyongyang has made a decision to abandon its long-held strategic objective to have a credible nuclear-weapons capability,” John R. Bolton, the former American ambassador to the United Nations and, in President Bush’s first term, the top State Department official on counterproliferation, wrote in The Asian Wall Street Journal this weekend. Christopher R. Hill, assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific Affairs and former U.S. ambassador to South Korea, served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Cameroon. Read more.

Robert Blackwill handling contract to help pave Ayad Allawi's attempt to oust the current Iraqi government of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki
No sooner did Allawi hire Barbour Griffith two weeks ago than congressional staffers said they began to be bombarded with e-mails from Allawi (from an Internet domain registered by the lobbying firm) featuring news stories that depict the Maliki government as hopelessly deadlocked and riddled by sectarian militias. “All the e-mails make the Iraqi government look bad,” said one congressional staffer who asked not to be publicly identified talking about the Iraq issues. Adding further intrigue to the lobbying campaign was the disclosure that the Barbour Griffith principal overseeing the firm’s Allawi account was former ambassador Robert D. Blackwill—the former Bush White House deputy national-security adviser in charge of Iraq policy, who later served as U.S. special envoy to that country. Documents filed by Barbour Griffith with Justice show that Blackwill personally signed the firm’s contract with Allawi on Aug. 20, stating that he will “lead the team” that will assist “Dr. Allawi and his moderate Iraqi colleagues as they undertake this work.”

In light of Blackwill’s close ties to Bush White House policymakers, his role has lead to speculation that the retention of Barbour Griffith was a move at least implicitly endorsed, if not encouraged, by some elements of the administration that are fed up with Maliki. While the White House has been critical of Maliki, they maintain official support for his government and have had no comment on Allawi’s campaign.

Robert Blackwill served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Malawi,  Ambasssador to India, and as a Deputy National Security Advisor to Condoleezza Rice. Read more.

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