April is coming to a close, and I need to do another update
on my life. A whooooole lot changed this month, but the biggest changes were my
location, my job, and my health.
Last month in March, a bunch of emotional things happened.
Two of my closest friends left Liberia, dry season heat was at its peak and
making me miserable, and the lack of work at my site was reaching a tipping
point. I thought long and hard about my options.
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| My favorite little 9 month old is almost walking |
I felt torn. I didn’t really want to leave Liberia, but I
also wasn’t sure how much more of my situation I could emotionally handle. I
felt like I’d lost control over every aspect of my life; my well-being,
privacy, daily routine, and happiness all felt dependent on my environment and
the people around me. I tried not to stress about this realization, but I also
felt like I’d reached an inescapable and unhealthy place.
Thankfully, things sort of fell into place all at once. As I
was mentally preparing myself to make the call to return to America and give
up, a communications job at our PC office opened up. Our staff was kind enough
to allow me to move to Monrovia and fill the open role for the remaining 4-5
months of my service instead of having to terminate my contract early.
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| Watching Aladdin with Harris |
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| See you later to my Bassa ma & pa! |
I moved in mid-April. It was a pretty stressful change as I
didn’t have much time to tell people in my community that I was leaving. It
kind of took all of us by surprise. It was fairly easy to pack up my house as I
didn’t really acquire much during my time there. However, it was really hard to
say goodbyes to a few individuals in my community with whom I’d become close.
The day arrived, and I was on my way to the city, carrying only what I could fit
on a motorbike. (A Peace Corps car passing by my community a few days later
carried the remainder of my things).
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| Day 1 in my new place: so happy with some falafel from my favorite restaurant and watching Gossip Girl |
Peace Corps found me an apartment located about a ten-minute
walk from the office. It’s a small studio flat with one big room and a small
bathroom attached. It’s pretty basic, but the fact that it has running water, a
hot shower, a refrigerator, and air
conditioning makes it absolutely perfect in my eyes. It’s in a fenced
compound with guards 24/7, so I feel extremely safe. And now I can cook big
pots of food on the weekends and bring it with me to work each day,
significantly cutting out hours of food prep time. This is NEW to me since, in
the bush, I couldn’t save food for more than about 12 hours without it
spoiling. There’s also a grocery store and a farmer’s market across the road
from the compound where I can buy a variety of fruits/vegetables along with
other “specialty” items like coconut milk, cheese, yogurt, cans of black beans,
honey, and booze. The farmers market has tons of cheap produce and general
supplies, and sometimes I meet other “Bassa” women with whom I can exchange a
limited number of Bassa phrases which brings me a small amount of nostalgia for
the bush life I left behind.
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| Looking left: View right outside the gate of my compound |
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| And looking right |
Work was an interesting transition. It felt like I was
brushing dust off of a hibernating brain—going from barely having enough to do
to now juggling mounds of new tasks including reports, operating procedures,
and content collection plans. I have been managing the PC Liberia Instagram
since November but learning the ropes of everything else has been a process.
I’ve been working for about two and a half weeks thus far and am just starting
to feel like I’m not floundering in the deep end.
The great news is that in this new position I’m learning
loads about communications including marketing strategies and branding
guidelines for Peace Corps, and I’m also managing different social media
platforms. Now that I don’t have to be constantly worrying about keeping my
electronics charged, I am able to experiment with video creation, to organize
digital content and media, and to really put time into collecting content and writing
success stories from our volunteers in the field.
Working in an office is new for me too. I’m a novice at
workplace culture, having only really worked in the field in most of my
previous jobs. I have my own little cubicle in a room with our Liberian staff
who manage training and provide support for different program areas within
Peace Corps Liberia. It’s fun to get to know them during breaks in our little
kitchen where they cook fragrant Liberian rice and soup (which I have chosen to
avoid, having eaten my fill of it over the past 7 months).
Overall, I feel much more stable and happy than I have in a
long time. I have tangible deliverables, daily tasks to complete, and, most of
all, a purpose. I feel lucky to have this unexpected experience and to be able
to try out communications work before making any bigger decisions in terms of
my future career field.