First Edition: June 2004

Each selection by a returned Peace Corps Volunteer in this volume appears with the permission of the author. Educators, returned Peace Corps Volunteers, and others are free to

reproduce portions of this book for educational purposes. However, reproduction of the

stories for purposes of republication requires the permission of the individual authors.

Contact the Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools program at wwsinfo@peacecorps.gov

for assistance.

This publication contains materials written by returned Peace Corps Volunteers and others that represent their individual views.These views are not official opinions of the U.S.

government or of the Peace Corps.

Cover photograph: Kerry Zahn, Peace Corps Volunteer, Mauritania (1998–2000) 

worldwise Paul D. Coverdell

schools
Peace Corps 

Adventures 

Across Cultures

Uncommon Journeys

USING PEA CE CORPS LITERA TURE IN THE CLASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools
P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

Uncommon Journeys

One of the most remarkable things about Peace

Corps living is confronting the fluid nature of

knowledge.Volunteers must daily confront what

they once accepted as fact, reevaluating both

their initial impressions of their new home and

their former perceptions of American culture.

What is real and what is not? What is true and

what is a socially endorsed notion? It is a beautiful and sometimes frightening journey. There

are no outposts, no lamps in the dark. But if

you choose to venture out, the rewards are rich:

a fuller understanding of yourself, your country,

and your world.

—Jordan Earl, Peace Corps Volunteer, Uzbekistan (2002-2004)
U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 1

U NCOMMON J OURNEYS : P E A C E C ORPS A D VENTURES A CROSS C U L TURES

Prologue: “A Straw Fence the Height of a Man,” by Michael Varga . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

A Matter of Time and Fate

“The Meaning of Time,” by Kimberly Ross Camara. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

“Three Lessons,” by Craig Storti . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

Standing Out in the Crowd

“The Train Ride Home,” by Robin Solomon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

“Running,” by Peter Hessler . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44

Generations Apart

“Soccer Until Dusk,” by Mark Brazaitis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80

“Help! My Father Is Coming!” and “The Visit to Vijay’s,” by Jim Toner . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89

Giving and Receiving

“Sharing in Africa,” by Mike Tidwell . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128

“The Senegalese Miracle,” by Leita Kaldi . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150

Resilience Above All

“Music in the Fields,” by Carrie Young. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158

“Mr. John and the Day of Knowledge,” by John Deever . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168

Bibliography. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 184

Standards. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187

Acknowledgments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 190
P ROLOGUE

A S TRAW F ENCE THE HEIGHT OF A MA N

by Michael Varga

Peace Corps Volunteer, Chad (1977-1979)

Outside, the bitter December winds howl, but inside the library at

Saint Albans School for boys in northwest Washington, D.C., we are

thinking about heat, sun. About Africa. I ask the sixth graders what

comes to mind when they think of that faraway continent.

“Elephants.” “Apartheid.” “Jungles and deserts.” “Hungry people.”

As part of National Geography Awareness Week, returned Peace Corps

Volunteers are visiting local schools to share stories about their experiences. Saint Albans is a school for the affluent, for the sons of members of Congress and other capital power-brokers. The point of the

exercise is to impress on the students the importance of learning about

other places and peoples. But I want to leave these students with

something more than a quick travelogue about sub-Saharan Africa.

“In the summer of 1977, a few weeks after graduating from college, I

found myself in an ‘animal market’ outside the capital of Chad,

N’djamena.”

I ask them what they think an “animal market” is. “Are the animals

alive or dead?”

“Dead.”

“No.They’re alive.Why are they sold alive?”

One student says, because people are there to buy pets. Another volunteers it’s because there are no refrigerators in Chad, so there’s no

way to store meat without it spoiling. I tell them animals are sold alive

so that they may be killed just before they’re eaten.

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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 3

After describing how the animal market is organized,

with herds of cattle and camels and goats and sheep

all huddled together under the blazing sun, beaten

close together by the herders, I recount how a crazed

bull suddenly breaks away from a herd and charges

me. I tell them how I freeze, how the other

Volunteers tug at me, trying to drag me away from

imminent tragedy. I tell them how the bull lowers

one horn, seeming to aim for the heart of my heart.

I tell them how paralyzed I feel. And how at the last

possible moment some of the stick-bearing herdsmen run alongside the bull and beat its sides, forcing

it to veer off.

“How do you think I felt at that moment?”

“Relieved.” “Lucky.” “Safe.” “Scared.”

“What do you think I wanted to do?”

“Pray.” “Get out of Africa!” “Come back home!”

“Right.”

Some of the other Volunteers advised me not to

make more of the incident than it was. Sure, there

had been danger, but I hadn’t been killed, not even

wounded. I had come to Chad to serve, and having

come this far, how could I let a random incident

deter me?

“A few months later I found myself in my village, the

only Peace Corps Volunteer sent to this particularly

remote corner of southern Chad where there were

no other foreigners, no running water, no electricity.

I was to teach English, French, and mathematics in

the village high school. How do you think the villagers looked at me?”

“They were happy to have a teacher.” “Like an

intruder.” “Like a white man.”

“They thought of me as this symbol of America, a

place they had heard scattered stories about, a place

rich and powerful with plenty of food. And they

all—all the villagers—kept asking me for things. For

food. For money. For books. How do you think I felt

after a while? Always being asked for things?”

“Bothered.”“Hassled.”“You wanted to be left alone.”

“That’s right. So one day some of my students

offered to build a fence around my compound.They

said it would keep the goats from eating the grass in

front of my hut. Grass was something to be protected, and here I was just letting any old goat eat it

away! So I paid them to build it. A straw fence the

height of a man.

“Now in Africa, many people carry things on their

heads. So once my fence was built, when people

passed in front of my compound I often saw nothing

but whatever they were carrying on their heads.

Bottles and jars and piles of wood bouncing along

just above my fence. And the fence kept people away

from my hut. Now there were very few requests for

food and money and books. I was quite content, sitting in front of my hut, fenced off from the villagers,

watching the things they carried bounce along.

“Then one day I saw a woman trying to kick down

my straw fence. How do you think I felt?”
“Angry.” “You wanted to kick her.”

“I ran to where she was screaming at me through the

fence. I told her to leave the fence alone, but she kept

right on kicking it and pointing at the ground. She

was speaking very fast, in Ngambaye, the local

dialect. I couldn’t understand what she was saying

but I could sense that she was warning me about

something.What do you think she saw?”

“A snake?”

“That’s right. She had seen a snake crawl under my

fence. And she wanted to warn me about it.”

“Was the snake poisonous?”

“We never found out. Chadians believe that all

snakes are dangerous and should be killed. So we

found the snake and smashed its head, and I invited

her to have some tea with me. How do you think I

felt about her now?”

“You were grateful.”“You were happy.”“You wanted

to give her something.”

“Did she know me?”

“No.”

“And yet, look at this, boys: A woman who didn’t

know me, who probably had heard stories about ‘that

white man’ and how he had closed himself off from

the village and didn’t want to share anything with

anybody, takes the time to warn me about danger.

Incredible!

“Before she left, she handed me a charm made of

some animal skins. She said it carried some ‘magic

herbs’ inside. She told me it would keep the evil spirits away from me.”

I pull the charm out of my pocket and hand it to the

boys to pass around, so they can stroke the animal

fur. So they can touch something from Chad, from

that woman’s hands.

“I wondered about it keeping away any evil spirits.

But why do you think I still carry this charm?”

“To remember that woman.”

“But why do I want to remember her?”

“Because you regret not marrying her.”“Because she

saved your life.”

“Do you think I rebuilt that fence?”

“No.”

“That’s right. I didn’t rebuild that fence. And I carry

this charm as a reminder to me that it’s very easy—

especially when people are making a lot of demands

on you—to try to close yourself off, to fence them

out, to keep what you have just for yourself. But I

had gone to Chad to work, to serve, to help. This

charm reminds me that it is in keeping yourself open

to others, to those who need your help, who ask you

for perhaps more than you think you can give, that

we really find satisfaction. We always have to fight

that urge to build a fence.”

“But didn’t you give the woman anything?” “Didn’t

you give her some money?”

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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 5

“No, I didn’t.After we finished the tea and she handed me the charm, she got up to leave. She asked if she

could take the snake’s body with her. Of course I

said, ‘Yes.’ Later that afternoon she came back to my

hut and we ate the snake, savoring it. She assured me

that all the venom had been drained and there was

no danger in chewing the flesh.”

“What did it taste like?” “Why did you eat it?”

“She had made a sort of peanut stew, and there were

pieces of the snake swimming in the sauce with the

peanuts. It was very good.Why did I eat it? Because

for one thing, I was hungry.There really wasn’t much

to eat in Chad.

“But more importantly, I ate it because it sealed the

lesson for me. Our sharing the snake tied us together. We had first shared the danger, a bad thing. But

she had forced herself through the fence to help me.

Now, sharing the snake as food—a good thing—we

were sealing our link to each other. By not allowing

fences to be built to separate us, we could both benefit—escaping danger and being nourished by the

sharing. Do you see it?”

“See what?”

“Do you see her? Picture that fence tumbling down.

Taste that peanut snake stew.”

“Yuch!” “Do we have to?”

“No, of course you don’t.”

“So, did you see her again?”

“For the rest of my two years in that village, I

immersed myself in her life and the lives of as many

Chadians as I could. So that, while I didn’t give the

woman anything that day the snake came crawling

and wound up being our supper, we shared the

gamut of life’s experiences for the rest of my time

while I was in the village.”

“But why didn’t you marry her? Wasn’t she pretty?”

“She belonged to Africa, to Chad. And frankly, she

wasn’t interested in coming to America. But while

we didn’t marry in the way we think of marriage, her

spirit remains bound up within my own. I have never

been the same man from that day forward. You see

what peanut snake stew can do to you!

“But seriously, boys, her charm has remained with

me and evil has kept its distance. And if you try real

hard‚ if you picture fences, all kinds of fences, tumbling down, crumbling—I think you can feel her

spirit here with us in the library today.”

After his Peace Corps service, Michael Varga worked as a

diplomat for the U.S. Foreign Service, primarily in the

Middle East. His short story “Collapsing Into Zimbabwe”

won first prize in the 1995 annual competition sponsored

by the Toronto Star. He completed a novel in 2004.

“A Straw Fence the Height of a Man” was first published

in Notre Dame Magazine.
I NTRODUCTION

The ultimate aim of the quest ... is the wisdom and power to serve others.

— Joseph Campbell

All of us take journeys in our lives—journeys that shape who we are.

Whether we consciously choose our journeys or they are forced upon us,

journeys can take two forms: external and internal.

External journeys may take us to exotic places and faraway lands.They may

simply involve travel to a new community, a new town, a new city—or a

move from one home to another, one school to another. Internal journeys,

on the other hand, take us from one state of mind, one kind of understanding, to another. Internal journeys mark changes of a fundamental kind,

causing us to relate to the world in new ways.They may result in changing the way we view ourselves; the way we see the world; or the way we

think about people who are unlike us.The move from childhood to adolescence is an internal journey; it often significantly modifies what we

think is important.We are different at the end of an internal journey from

the way we were at the beginning.

For more than four decades,since the founding of the Peace Corps in 1961

by President John F. Kennedy, Peace Corps Volunteers have embarked on

both external and internal journeys. They have traveled to countries all

over the globe in response to the call: “How far are you willing to go to

make a difference?”This book contains stories of some of those journeys—

journeys not only to other cultures, but also to greater self-understanding

and deeper appreciation of people and cultures different from those in the

United States.

In many ways, the journeys of Peace Corps Volunteers are both uncommon and heroic—heroic in the sense about which Joseph Campbell wrote

in The Hero With a Thousand Faces:

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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 7

We have not even to risk the adventure alone; for the heroes

of all time have gone before us; the labyrinth is thoroughly

known; we have only to follow the thread of the hero-path.

And ... where we had thought to travel outward, we shall

come to the center of our own existence; where we had

thought to be alone, we shall be with all the world....

More than 170,000 Peace Corps Volunteers have made

the choice to spend two years of their lives serving others in 137 countries.They have given up the comforts

of home—and the reassurance of the known and familiar—and responded to President Kennedy’s challenge:

“Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what

you can do for your country.... Ask not what America

will do for you, but together what we can do for the

freedom of man.”

Uncommon Journeys Brings the World 

Into the Classroom

Never has it been more important for our students to

look beyond the confines of their familiar worlds, to

understand others different from themselves.With new

waves of immigration, our schools and classrooms are

more ethnically diverse than ever before.To strengthen

appreciation of diversity, educators need to help students

step into the shoes of others unlike themselves and see

the world through their eyes.

Uncommon Journeys brings the world into the classroom

through stories by Peace Corps Volunteers about their

cross-cultural experiences—engaging stories about people and places the Volunteers will remember for life.

When students read these stories, they will see the world

through new eyes—through the eyes not of a tourist but

of a Peace Corps Volunteer who has lived and worked,

hand in hand, with people in towns and villages and

cities, from rural outposts to urban centers.

A Flexible Curriculum Resource

Uncommon Journeys is a flexible resource for language

arts and social studies teachers to use in grades 6–12.

Each of the stories in the book is followed by a set of

standards-based lessons. The lesson plans focus on two

educational goals:

• To provide students with new perspectives on other

cultures

• To increase students’ skills in reading comprehension, literary interpretation, and writing

Each set of lesson plans provides information about the

author and the story setting, including a map showing

the country in the geographical context of its surrounding regions. Each lesson has a summary of the English,

social studies, and geography standards addressed. The

lessons contain pre-reading activities to help students

link their new learning with what they already know.At

the heart of the lessons are opportunities for students to

respond to the text through group dialogue, group

activities, and extended written responses to the texts.

Journal writing is emphasized to help students identify

and explore questions the stories raise, and to think

about how an author’s message relates to their own lives.

Instructional activities are differentiated to meet the

needs of younger or less able readers and older or more

advanced readers. Underlined words are defined in the

margins of the pages where they appear.Taken together,
the stories and lesson plans give teachers everything

they need to design active and engaging learning experiences for students of many ages and ability levels.

Literacy and Standards

The lessons contain research-based reading comprehension strategies that students can use with a variety of

texts. These strategies include creating detailed mental

images, and developing comparisons, metaphors, and

analogies.As students become familiar with these strategies, their comprehension will increase and they will

begin using them on their own.

Standards for English, social studies, and geography are

listed for each lesson and spelled out on pages 187–190.

Curriculum Framework: “Understanding by

Design”

The lesson plans in Uncommon Journeys employ an adaptation of the curriculum development framework

known as Understanding by Design, developed by

Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe (1998) and published

by the Association for Supervision and Curriculum

Development.This framework suggests that lesson plans

be guided by “enduring understandings”—the big ideas

that can be transferred across grade levels and subject

areas—and “essential questions”—questions that cause

students to think at higher levels and probe deeply into

the concepts of a discipline.

Identifying enduring understandings and essential questions at the outset gives instructional activities greater

focus and coherence.The enduring understandings suggested for each story represent the editorial team’s

thinking about the big ideas and important messages the

authors were trying to express.You may wish to adapt

them to meet the needs of your students and the

requirements of your local curriculum.

About the Peace Corps 

The Peace Corps is an independent agency of the U.S.

government that was established through the vision and

efforts of President John F. Kennedy, who challenged

Americans to dedicate two years of their lives to helping people in developing countries. The Peace Corps

mission is to promote peace and friendship by making

available willing and qualified U.S. citizens to interested

countries to achieve the following three goals:

• To help the people of interested countries in meeting their needs for trained men and women

• To help promote a better understanding of the

American people on the part of the peoples served

• To help promote a better understanding of other

peoples on the part of Americans

The first group of Volunteers arrived in Ghana in 1961.

Today, there are more than 7,500 Volunteers serving.

Although programs vary from country to country based 

on the host nation’s needs,Volunteers traditionally offer

skills in education, agriculture, small-business development, community development, the environment, and

health. For complete information on the Peace Corps,

visit the Peace Corps website at www.peacecorps.gov.

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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 9

About the Coverdell World Wise Schools Program

An innovative education program of the Peace Corps,

the Paul D.Coverdell World Wise Schools program seeks

to engage students in the United States in inquiry about

the world

• To broaden perspectives.

• To promote cultural awareness.

• To appreciate global connections.

• To encourage service.

Since the program’s inception in 1989 at the initiative of

late Peace Corps Director and U.S. Senator Paul D.

Coverdell, more than 2 million students in all 50 states

have communicated directly with Peace Corps

Volunteers all over the world. Initially set up as a correspondence match program between Volunteers and U.S.

classes, the Coverdell World Wise Schools program has

expanded its scope by providing a broad range of

resources for educators—including award-winning

videos, teacher guides, classroom speakers, Peace Corps

writings and accompanying lesson plans, and a website.

For more information about Coverdell World Wise

Schools, visit www.peacecorps.gov/wws. To download

Uncommon Journeys, visit www.peacecorps.gov/wws

/journeys.

Peace Corps Literature

During the past 43 years, Peace Corps Volunteers have

traveled thousands of miles to places where they lived

and worked with the people of their host communities—eating the same food, speaking the same language,

living in the same environment, and adopting some of

the cultural norms. For a great many, it was a defining

experience. After Volunteers return home, they attempt

to answer these questions:What happened? What did it

all mean? For many, only the written word—the creative

outlets of poetry, memoir, fiction—captures the nuances

and grasps the complexities of their Peace Corps experience.

This volume offers just a few samples of what Peace

Corps Volunteers have written after their return from

service overseas.
A Matter of Time and Fate

T H E M EANING OF T IME

by Kimberly Ross Camara

Peace Corps Volunteer, Guinea (1999–2002)

Upon arriving in my village, I needed to learn the greetings in the

indigenous language, Malinke. Unfortunately this wasn’t as simple as

“Hello, how are you?” and responding “I’m fine,” as we do in the

United States. Among the Malinke people, it is proper to ask at least

five questions when you greet someone. Simply yelling out “Hello!”

and waving as you pass a friend would be considered rude, even if you

did it because you were in a hurry. Instead, you must stop and shake

hands. Then you ask, “How are you? ... How is your day going? ...

How are you feeling? ... How are your family and friends? ... What’s

new?” Even if you know that the person will respond the same way

every time (i.e., “Fine!”), it’s still important to ask, because it shows

that you care and that you are willing to take time out of your day to talk.

For Guineans, it’s the act of greeting that counts more than what you

are actually saying. It took me about four months to realize this and to

get used to it. I had assumed that my neighbors would understand that

I couldn’t chat because I was running late or that I had an appointment to get to. Eventually, I understood that this was not the case. For

Guineans, social obligations are more important

than any job-related responsibility.

It has been a challenge to accept the fact that

meetings or scheduled events never start “on

time.” If a meeting is set for 8 o’clock, people

begin arriving around 9 o’clock and the

meeting actually starts at 10 o’clock.After this

happened several times, I asked a friend if all

Guineans were habitually late. Surprised, she

told me, “We Guineans aren’t late. You

Americans are just early!” I had been acting

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

Uncommon Journeys
V OCABULARY

Indigenous: Native to

Habitually: Usually; normally; routinely

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 11

like a typical American by arriving 15 minutes before a scheduled

appointment, whereas I should have been arriving an hour after the

scheduled time, the Guinean way.

In the beginning, I failed to notice the true meaning of the term

inshallah—meaning “God willing”—which people add to the end of

certain sentences. For instance, someone might say, “See you at 4

o’clock, inshallah!” I now interpret this as, “I’ll try to be there at 4

o’clock, but if something comes up, I may arrive a bit later than that.”

These words give people permission to come later than the scheduled

time, so that they’ll be able to greet people along the way and take care

of whatever other problems may arise.

And in Guinea, many other interruptions can and will arise. The first

and foremost obstacle is the weather. In the rainy season, it faithfully

pours every day, leaving knee-deep puddles of muddy water that form

small lakes in the dirt roads. Plans are often delayed until the rain lets

up a bit. In the dry season, the sun’s hot rays beat down and force people to take cover in the relatively cool shade of their homes between

noon and 3 p.m. So it is common knowledge that any meeting scheduled during midday will have few attendees.

Difficulties with transportation also cause delays. Few Guineans own

personal vehicles, so most people use public transportation, such as

taxis, vans, buses, motorcycles, and dump trucks. There are no bus

schedules or set times for departures and arrivals.Vehicles simply leave

when they are full. In the United States, we’d consider a typical car

“full” when it contained five people. But in Guinea, as many as eight

adults plus a few children will pile into a car. Then about five people

will ride on the roof of the car, holding onto the luggage rack. And

that’s not all.

During each trip, a breakdown or an accident of some sort can be

quite normal, even expected.When this happens, all of the passengers

get out. Some will push the vehicle, as others cut off tree branches or
V OCABULARY

Tolerant: Open-minded; able to see both

sides of an issue objectively

A Matter of Time and Fate

search for rubber bands and tin cans that may be used to repair the car.

(It’s amazing what Guineans can fix without any tools or special parts.)

Often, these repair jobs can take up to five hours—or even more—but

people rarely complain.They simply eat mangoes that they pick off the

trees, talk to one another, and sleep along the side of the road.

In the United States, I never thought twice about how easy it was to

leave my house 15 minutes before work and arrive on time almost

every day. I remember getting upset when I had to wait in traffic for

an extra half-hour because of a car accident, or becoming extremely

upset when I got a flat tire, even though the AAA would come to

repair it within 45 minutes. Now, I’ve learned to be very patient. I’ve

also become more tolerant. I realize that I don’t have control over certain things, and that sometimes I must accept my fate and not get upset

about unexpected events and problems.Also, instead of letting misunderstandings complicate a situation, I take the extra effort to talk about

it until all the confusion is cleared up. My Peace Corps experience has

taught me that a problem is only as big as you make it.

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

12 Uncommon Journeys

T H E M EANING OF T IME ( CONTINUED )
S TANDARDS

English Standard: 2 (see page 187)

Social Studies Standards: I, IV, IX 

(see page 188)

National Geography Standards: 6, 10

(see page 189)

Enduring Understandings

• The concept of time differs among 

cultures.

• In some cultures, social obligations and

relationships may be more important than

work-related responsibilities.

Essential Questions

• How do our cultural values affect the way

we choose to spend time?

• What can we learn from the way people in

other cultures treat time?

Materials

Photocopies of story

Assessment Tools

Class discussions, journal entries, debate

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 13

R EADING AND R ESPONDING TO

‘ T H E M EANING OF T IME ’ 

O VERVIEW

A BOUT THE A UTHOR

Kimberly Ross Camara served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Guinea,

West Africa, from 1999 to 2002, teaching English to high school 

students and educating the people in her community about 

HIV/AIDS prevention.While in Guinea, Camara participated in a program called CyberVolunteer, part of the Coverdell World Wise Schools

program at the Peace Corps. She wrote e-mail letters about her life in

Guinea to classrooms subscribing to a listserv. (To subscribe to the

CyberVolunteer program, visit www.peacecorps.gov/wws/cybervol.)

Camara’s first letter, “A Typical Day for Kimberly in Kouroussa,

Guinea,West Africa,” provides a glimpse of what her life was like on a

daily basis as a Volunteer in Guinea.You can read it on the Web in the

archives at www.peacecorps.gov/wws/cybervol. It is an appropriate

supplement for her selection in this volume.

A BOUT THE S T O R Y

In “The Meaning of Time,” Camara describes her adjustment to some

of the cultural differences she experienced in Guinea. In particular, she

provides insight into one of the fundamental ways that cultures differ

—their concepts of time. Her story is an excellent companion piece to

“Three Lessons” (see page 19) and “Soccer Until Dusk” (see page 80).

Teaching the selections together will lead your students to see similarities in the way time is viewed in many developing countries.
A Matter of Time and Fate

A BOUT THE S ETTING

Despite mineral wealth, Guinea is one of the poorest

countries in the world. The tropical country’s economy depends mostly on agriculture. Leading crops

are coffee, bananas, palm kernels, and pineapples.

There are rich deposits of iron ore, gold, and diamonds, but Guinea’s underdeveloped infrastructure

has not supported industrialization.

Guinea has four geographical regions: a coastal

region, where the capital lies on a peninsula; a highland region of hills in the northwest; dry lowlands in

the north; and hilly, forested areas in the east.

Rainfall in the capital reaches 13 feet a year, but

much of the rest of the country receives significantly less than that.

French domination from the mid-19th century to

the mid-20th century yielded to independence for

Guinea in 1958. Although French is widely spoken,

Malinke, Fula, and Susu are also commonly spoken.

Since the arrival of the initial group of Peace Corps

Volunteers in 1963,about a thousand Volunteers have

served in Guinea. The program today consists of

about a hundred Volunteers working in four kinds of

projects: secondary education, public health, natural

resource management, and small enterprise development. In addition, a small number of third-year

Volunteers work with international or local nongovernmental organizations.

L ESSON 1

P URPOSE

To identify and understand the significant cultural traits described by the author

1. Read Camara’s letter aloud to the class or have

the class read it themselves.

2. In the space of just two and a half pages, the

author spotlights at least five important cultural

traits that are true of life in Guinea. Ask students

to analyze the text to identify these traits, writing them down in their journals. Students should

identify the following traits from the text:

a. Greetings cannot be hurried; social obligations are

paramount.

b. Punctuality is unimportant.

c. What happens in everyday life is beyond the control

of an individual person. (Inshallah, meaning “God

willing” in Arabic, defers responsibility for things to

Allah.Allah is the Muslim name for God.)

d. Climate, in the form of extreme heat or heavy rain,

often affects people’s routines.

e. People have to be highly resourceful in practical,

everyday matters.

3. In class discussion, address each trait, using the

following paragraphs as discussion guides.

a. Greetings. Given the stated importance of

unhurried greetings in Guinea, ask students

whether there is anything akin to strict greetP EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

14 Uncommon Journeys

T H E M EANING OF T IME ( CONTINUED )
U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 15

ing protocol in their own culture, in the

United States. To help students realize that

there is, in fact, an obligatory greeting protocol frequently followed in the States, ask volunteers to perform several mini-skits, in pairs,

in front of the class, simulating two friends

meeting and greeting on the street. Try to

elicit from the students, in discussion after the

skits, that there are physical greetings (handshakes, hugs, high-fives, grasping fists) and

obligatory queries (“How’s it goin’?” “How

are you doin’?” “What’s up?” “How’re

things?”) that precede a conversation between

friends. Students might also simulate telephone conversations, in which participants

rarely launch into substantive conversation

until polite queries are exchanged. Also try to

elicit from students through discussion that

the questions people often ask each other

upon greeting are pro forma greetings to

which they do not expect to get either full or

necessarily truthful answers. (We don’t expect

someone to answer the question “How are

you?” with a litany of health issues; the polite

answer, regardless of how many ailments one is

experiencing, is “Fine,” or “Okay.”)

Ask students in what ways Guinean greeting

protocols are similar to those in the United

States. In what ways are they different? What

might account for these differences? What cultural function do students think formal greeting protocols serve? 

b. Punctuality is unimportant. Perhaps

Camara summarized this trait best when she

reported that being on time was actually

being early—and that everyone else, who

she thought was late, was on time.This trait

of punctuality being of no concern is so

deep-rooted that it will be addressed separately in the next lesson.

c. Inshallah. Much of the population of

Guinea is Muslim. Muslims defer to the

God of Islam, Allah, in all matters, so that

they often add the term inshallah, or “God

willing,” to statements. For a full discussion

of the use of inshallah, see the next reading

selection, “Three Lessons,” by Craig Storti,

on page 19.

d. Climate affects routine. Ask students in

what way the author found climate affecting people’s routines. [Rains caused delays

on the roads; heat kept people inside midday.] Ask students if climate affects culture

in the United States in similar ways. If it

does not, why not? [Most roads in the

United States are paved, so rain does not

affect transportation as significantly as it

does where it renders dirt roads impassable.

Air-conditioning tends to ameliorate the

effects of midday heat, so that office workers can work right through it.]

e. People have to be resourceful. The context in which the author made this observa-
V OCABULARY

Monochronic and Polychronic Time

Monochronic: In monochronic cultures,

time is a fixed commodity, and people are

clock-driven. Often, the needs of people and

relationships are secondary to the demands of

time—schedules, deadlines, punctuality. In

monochronic cultures, schedules are considered important, being late is viewed as rude or

discourteous, and interruptions are seen as

both annoying and inefficient. Individuals in

these cultures believe that time is quantifiable,

and a limited amount of it is available.They are

often more task-oriented and value getting

the job done quickly and efficiently over “taking time to smell the roses.”

Polychronic: In polychronic cultures, time

is not a fixed commodity. It is fluid and can be

adjusted to suit the needs of people. Plans frequently change, and being made to wait when

arriving for a scheduled event is viewed as

normal; it’s even expected. Individuals in these

cultures act as if more time is always available;

they are never too busy to stop what they are

doing to talk with, greet, or help people.

Individuals in these cultures value establishing

and maintaining personal and social relationships above being “on time.”

For more information on these 

concepts, see www.peacecorps.gov

/wws/culturematters.

A Matter of Time and Fate

tion was road transportation, and the need for drivers to fix

their own vehicles with materials at hand.Ask students to speculate on why this is necessary. [The infrastructure of gasoline

stations and tow trucks, along with automobile club membership that provides instant road assistance, does not exist in

Guinea. Drivers in the “bush” are used to making jury-rigged

repairs to get them to a garage for full service.]

4. Camara, in confronting these different cultural traits, concluded

that she needed two specific traits of her own to adapt to life in

Guinea. Ask students to identify these two traits from the text.

[Patience and tolerance.] Explain to the class that these two traits

are probably the two traits most widely exercised by Peace Corps

Volunteers in adjusting to life in their host cultures. Discuss with

the class whether they think patience and tolerance are useful in

other kinds of adjustments in their own lives and in their own

communities. Ask them to be specific.

L ESSON 2

P URPOSE

To answer the questions:

—How do people of different cultures view time differently?

—What can we learn from the way people in other cultures view

and spend time?

1. Remind students that one basic way that cultures can differ is in

their treatment of time. Cultural anthropologists term the two

fundamentally different ways cultures view time as monochronic

and polychronic. Create a continuum on the chalkboard similar to

the one on the next page, with “monochronic” on one end and

“polychronic” on the other.

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

16 Uncommon Journeys

T H E M EANING OF T IME ( CONTINUED )
U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 17

Explain to students:

• The word monochronic can be divided into

“mono” (one) and “chronic” (time). In monochronic cultures, punctuality is valued because

time is viewed in just one way.

• The term polychronic can be divided into

“poly” (many) and “chronic” (time). In polychronic cultures, punctuality is not important

because time is viewed in many different ways.

Provide students with the descriptions of

“monochronic” and “polychronic” cultures in

the vocabulary box opposite.

2. Ask students where they think the culture of the

United States might fall on the continuum

you’ve drawn. Where would Guinean culture

fall, in comparison? Ask whether any student is

familiar with a culture that might be more timeconscious than the United States. [Possibly

Switzerland or Germany, both well known for

dedication to punctuality.] 

Point out that while time may be viewed differently from one culture to another, views of time

may also vary within cultures, based on the personal preferences of individuals. We know that a

sense of time is cultural when a particular

approach applies to a large group of people, or

to the majority of people in a particular culture.

However, within any culture, there exists a range

of individual preferences.

3. Ask students to jot down in their journals where

they might fall on the time continuum.Then ask

them to jot down where they think their parents

might belong.

Now have students stand up and form a human

continuum that ranges from monochronic to

polychronic. Ask students to place themselves on

the point on the continuum that best represents

their personal view of time. Then have them

rearrange themselves to represent where they

think their parents might fall on the continuum.

When students return to their seats conduct a

class discussion on what the students observed

about the continuum—and what criteria they

used to place themselves on it.

4. Divide the class in half for a debate and, if possible, have the two sides sit facing each other.

Assign one group to defend the stances: “Our

lives should be run by a schedule” and “Faster is

better.” Ask the other group to defend the statement: “Life shouldn’t be regulated by the clock.

Let things happen as they will.” Allow the teams

some class time to prepare their arguments.

Remind them that reasoned arguments and persuasive evidence are much more effective in

debates than mere opinions or emotional stances.

Assign a student moderator to manage the discussion between the two sides. Have a recorder

< >

monochronic polychronic
A Matter of Time and Fate

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

18 Uncommon Journeys

T H E M EANING OF T IME ( CONTINUED )

for each team write notes on the chalkboard of the points raised

by his or her side.

When students have exhausted the arguments for and against each

position, wrap up the discussion by pointing out that neither position is “right” or “wrong,” and that each may be appropriate for

the culture in which it is operative.Try to elicit from students that

what might “work” perfectly well in one culture could be highly

dysfunctional for another. In the United States, for example, what

would happen if trains, airplanes, schools, meetings, medical

appointments, and other details of everyday life followed a concept

of time that is dominant in Guinea? Likewise, how would Guinean

culture fare if the concepts of time followed in the United States

were suddenly imposed?

5. Journal Activity. Conclude the lesson by asking students to

respond in their journals to the questions:

• Why is time viewed one way in Guinea and another in the

United States? 

• How did these difference come to be?

Follow up by having students discuss their journal responses in the

next class period.

E XTENSION A CTIVITIES

1. Ask students to work in small groups to write a script for a dramatization that focuses on Camara’s struggle to adjust to the cultural

norms of Guinea.Then have them perform their dramatizations.

2. Have students research the basis for the worldwide conventional

divisions of time: the 24-hour day; the 60-minute hour; the 60-

second minute.What is the prime meridian, and why is it located

in England?
A Matter of Time and Fate

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools

V OCABULAR Y

T HREE L ESSONS

by Craig Storti

Peace Corps Volunteer, Morocco (1970–1972)

(Reprinted from To Touch the World:The Peace Corps Experience)

September. Sunset.The town of Safi, Morocco. I was washing dishes in

my sink. From the minaret in the mosque three doors down came the

evening prayer call, a song, actually, blaring out of the loudspeakers,

stopping the faithful in their tracks, turning them toward the east,

sending them to their knees.To my ears, the cadence, the rhythm, the

tone were all wrong, about as musical as a burglar alarm. I remember

my words as I turned to my roommate: “Even they can’t think that’s

pretty.” I had been in Morocco four months.

Eight months later I was walking a friend to the bus station where she

would catch the express to Casablanca. It was quiet, just before dawn,

no horizon to speak of yet. No one else was about. From somewhere

behind us, the muezzin’s prayer call floated out over the silence, was

answered from a nearby quarter, and then came at us faintly from several miles off to the south.The beauty of the chant stayed my step; I

had to be still and listen. And then I remembered what I had said in

September.

It was then I grasped my first Peace Corps lesson: You can accommodate the strange, the

unusual, even the very unpleasant and make

some kind of peace with it. You are not

irrevocably the way you started out. With a

little luck, you can grow.

***

Backpackers, hikers, and all manner of latterday mountain men and women won’t think

much of the following story, but consider that

Minaret: [min-uh-RET] A tower that 

is part of a mosque, with a balcony used 

by a muezzin to call Muslims to prayer

Mosque: [MAHSK] Muslim house 

of worship

Prayer call: A signal to Muslims to 

pray, issued by a muezzin 

Cadence: A beat of sound; a rhythm

Muezzin: [myoo-EHZ-in] A crier who 

calls Muslims to prayer

Irrevocably: Unalterably; permanently;

unable to be changed
A Matter of Time and Fate

it happened to a guy who, before his Peace Corps staging in

Philadelphia, had always slept under a roof, in a bed, eschewed picnics,

and never owned a sleeping bag. But who bought one at the same

staging in Philadelphia (a cheap, cotton-lined number with greenhued scenes of deer in a forest, scenes that kept coming off on my

underwear in the damp Safi spring).

In the spring of 1972, four of us rented a car and drove over the Tiz’n

Tichka pass in the High Atlas Mountains down to the desert. We

pulled up one night, just as the sun set behind the Jbel des Saghro in

a place called Agdz. French tourists had filled the only hotel, but we

could sleep on the floor of the cafe if we liked. I didn’t like, but there

was no choice.

The floor was cement, unrelentingly hard. I tried to lie in such a way

that the greatest percentage of the softest parts of my body were

between me and the cement, tried to become my own cushion. I

thought I would never fall asleep, but I did.

And woke with the light. Not exactly refreshed and renewed but

exhilarated all the same. I had slept on a cement floor! That was my

second lesson, courtesy of the Corps: how to do without. In that

instance, a bed. In others, a bath or a shower, hot water, a refrigerator.

Peace Corps whittles away your list of necessities. And when you consider that these are the things you can’t live without, that you live in

fear of not having, that you would fight to keep—then you understand

that you can only be as free as that last list is short.

* * *

The scene is a cafe in Tangiers. Tomorrow is Saturday. I’ve just invited

a Moroccan friend to a picnic at the beach.Will he come? “Perhaps,”

he says in English, translating from the Arabic, inshallah, which literally

means “God willing.” And I’m feeling hurt. What does he mean,

“Perhaps”? Either he wants to come or he doesn’t. It’s up to him. And

if he doesn’t want to come, he only has to say so. He doesn’t understand

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

20 Uncommon Journeys

T HREE L ESSONS ( CONTINUED )
V OCABULAR Y

Staging: A three-day orientation session 

in the United States for new Peace Corps

Volunteers before they leave for a country

Eschew: [es-CHOO] To avoid

Unrelentingly: Unyieldingly

Auxiliary verb: A verb used to help form

the tense or condition of another verb. For

example: will do, have done,may happen

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

why I’m upset. And I don’t quite grasp “Perhaps.” Our two cultures

confront each other across the tea cups.

Only several years later did I understand. He would come, he meant,

if Allah willed it. His wanting to come and his being able to come

were not one and the same. In Morocco, unlike America, where there’s

a will there’s not necessarily a way. So who was I to demand an answer

to my question? And who was he to give one? When I understood

this—and realized how strange he would find my ethic—I had learned

my third lesson: I saw we can’t confidently speak of truth, only truths,

and I understood the power of culture. It was as if I had discovered a

parallel universe, one founded upon a different auxiliary verb, on may

rather than will. And where there was one different universe, might

there not be others?

But the feeling wasn’t at all what I expected; in embracing the possibility of countless other worldviews I should have loosened my grasp

on my own. But instead I embraced it with renewed confidence, not

in its rightness, of course, but appreciating anew the need to have a

perspective—your own perspective—on the world in order to entertain the possibility of others.

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 21
A Matter of Time and Fate

R EADING AND R ESPONDING TO

‘ T HREE LESSONS ’ 

O VERVIEW

A BOUT THE A UTHOR

Craig Storti served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Safi, Morocco, from

1970 to 1972. He is the author of several books about cross-cultural

understanding, including The Art of Crossing Cultures; Old World, New

World: Bridging Cultural Differences—Britain, France, Germany and the U.S.;

and Figuring Foreigners Out: A Practical Guide. He also wrote the Peace

Corps cross-cultural training workbook Culture Matters (available at

www.peacecorps.gov/wws/culturematters). Storti is founder and

director of the Washington, D.C., intercultural communication training and consulting firm Communicating Across Cultures.

A BOUT THE S T O R Y

Each of this story’s three sections focuses on a different lesson the

author learned from serving as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Morocco.

Morocco’s population is almost 99 percent Muslim. Religion permeates every aspect of the culture. In exploring some of the cultural features that shape the people of Morocco, Storti focuses on experiences

that made him aware of how people of a different cultural background

can view the world in fundamentally different ways. He describes his

growing realization that his own perspectives and tastes, which he had

always taken for granted as being fairly universal, don’t necessarily prevail in another culture.

Students will find more meaning in this story if they understand the

importance of prayer in Muslim culture—and that central to Islam is

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

22 Uncommon Journeys

T HREE L ESSONS ( CONTINUED )
S TANDARDS

English Standards: 1, 6 (see page 187)

Social Studies Standards: I, IV, IX 

(see page 188)

National Geography Standards: 6, 10 

(see page 189)

Enduring Understandings

• Everyone has a culture. It shapes how we

see the world, ourselves, and others.

• Living and serving in another culture can

teach important life lessons—if one is open

to learning.

• Living in another culture challenges us to

understand the world from that culture’s

point of view.

Essential Questions

• How do my cultural values and beliefs

shape how I view individuals from other

cultures?

• What can I gain from being open to learning from people who are different from me?

Materials: Photocopies of story,

Resource Sheets 1 and 2

Assessment Tools

Class discussion, journal entries, essay

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 23

the importance of the submission of one’s will to the will of Allah. In

submitting to the will of Allah, a Muslim expects to find peace.

Moroccans and other Muslims commonly end statements with the

term inshallah, meaning “God willing,” because, for them, Allah controls their destiny.

Muslims pray five times a day. Prayers are said at dawn, noon, midafternoon, sunset, and nightfall. Muslims are called to prayer by a

muezzin, or crier, who chants from the tower of a mosque.The chant

is often sung through a loudspeaker so that it can be heard throughout an entire town or a large part of a city. Although it is preferable to

worship together in a mosque, a Muslim may pray almost anywhere,

such as in a field, an office, a factory, or a university. Muslim children

are taught to pray when they are 6 or 7, and are expected to pray by

the time they are 10.

Wherever they are, Muslims face Mecca to pray. Mecca, in Saudi

Arabia, is the birthplace of the prophet Mohammed and the holiest

place on Earth to Muslims. Facing Mecca creates a sense of unity

among Muslims by providing a spiritual and social focus.

A BOUT THE S ETTING

Morocco, a monarchy on the northwest coast of Africa, has a population of some 30 million people, almost all of whom are Sunni Muslims

of Arab, Berber, or mixed Arab-Berber ancestry. Arabic is the official

language, though Berber is spoken in some areas, as well as French and

Spanish. The chief cities all lie along the Atlantic or Mediterranean

coasts: Rabat, the capital; Casablanca, to the south; and Tangiers, to the

north.

Morocco is a land of contrasts—from the range of the High Atlas

Mountains in the north, where the temperature may be extremely

cold, to the Sahara in the south, where the temperature and humidity

are characteristic of a hot desert.
A Matter of Time and Fate

The Peace Corps has been active in Morocco since

shortly after the agency began. More than 4,000

Volunteers have served in the country since 1963—

working and living in both large metropolitan cities

and the smallest traditional communities. Author

Craig Storti served in the coastal city of Safi, some

150 miles south of Casablanca.

Largely dependent upon tourism, Morocco also

exports citrus fruits and has a sizable bauxite mining

industry.

The current monarch, King Mohammed VI, is working hard to improve the quality of life in rural areas,

raise the social and economic status of women, and

relieve poverty.

L ESSON 1

P URPOSE

• To discover the three lessons Storti learned as a

Volunteer and find out how he learned them

• To reflect on the enduring understanding:“Living

and serving in another culture can teach important life lessons—if one is open to learning”

1. Using information from the overview section,

tell students about the author, the story, and the

setting. If students do not know about the Peace 

Corps, provide a brief overview, using information from the introduction on pages 8 and 9.

Explain that Peace Corps Volunteers usually gain

a broader worldview and a deeper understanding

of other cultures as a result of their service.

2. Point out the location of Morocco on a map of

Africa (see page 19).

3. Ask the students to read “Three Lessons.”

Provide a copy of the graphic organizer on

Resource Sheet 1 to guide their reading.

4. When students have finished reading the story,

have them work in pairs to complete the graphic organizer.

5. Conduct a class discussion on the three lessons

Storti learned. Consider addressing some or all of

the following questions:

• What were the three lessons Storti learned?

• How did he learn each of them?

• What does being “open to learning” mean?

• When did Storti learn his third lesson—about the

pervasive, or deep, meaning of inshallah? [It was

several years after the incident.] Why did it take

years to learn? What was it that Storti had to realize before he learned his third lesson?

• Do the three lessons Storti learned have anything

in common? If so, what is it? [Responses may

vary, but for those who see a commonality, it may

relate to having one’s eyes opened to new possibilities by exposure to someone else’s culture.]

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

24 Uncommon Journeys

T HREE L ESSONS ( CONTINUED )
U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 25

R ESOURCE S HEET 1

Lesson Storti Learned 

From Experience

How He Learned It Why Is This Lesson Important—

for Storti, for Me, for Others?

1.

2. 

3.

• What did Storti gain from being open to

learning from people who are different

from him? What can I gain from the same

kind of openness?

6. Journal Activity. Students will have concluded that the author learned about new

tastes, new values, and new outlooks by

being open to learning from people who

were different from him. For homework, ask

students to respond in their journals to the

prompt that follows. (Remind them that

their entries will be subject to being read by

others in the class.)

Describe a time when you were open to

learning something that changed your view

of your surroundings or changed your opinions about something important to you. If

possible, describe an experience that also

involved a person whose culture is different

from the culture of your home community.
A Matter of Time and Fate

L ESSON 2

P URPOSE

To relate the author’s lessons to students’ lives

1. Journal Walk. Have students open their journals

to their homework responses from the night

before.Ask the students to move around and quietly read the journal responses of six other students. (Masking tape arrows on the floor can

help provide an orderly progression.) Give students six to eight minutes to circulate around the

room, moving from journal to journal at equal

intervals.

2. Have students re-read the first lesson Storti

learned (page 19) as he became accustomed to the

sound of the muezzin’s prayer call.Ask students to

discuss with a partner a type of music they once

disliked but now enjoy.What happened to change

their minds? What happened to change Storti’s

mind? (Students can alternatively consider their

changed taste in art, or a change in perception of

a movie over a period of time.)

As a class, discuss Storti’s account of his first lesson, about the muezzin's prayer call. These

prompts may facilitate classroom conversation:

• What did Storti mean when he said:“You can

accommodate the strange, the unusual....You

are not irrevocably the way you started out.

With a little luck, you can grow”?

• How important is it to be able to get used to

what may seem strange or unusual at first? 

• Why did Storti feel this was an important life

lesson?

3. As homework, ask students to make a list in their

journals of 20 items in their bedrooms (including things in their closets and bureau drawers).

The following day, in class, ask the students to

put a plus sign next to the items in their lists

that they think they absolutely need for survival

and to be happy, and a minus sign next to those

things they think they might prefer to keep but

could do without. In small groups, have the students discuss their journal classifications. Have

them try to identify specifically the criteria they

used for deciding what they would absolutely

keep and what they could do without.

Then, in class discussion,ask the students to report

what sorts of things are essential to them—and

why—and what sorts of things are dispensable—

and why. Now re-read Storti’s second lesson

aloud, about getting by with less, and then ask

what Storti meant when he wrote, “Peace Corps

whittles away your list of necessities.... Then you

understand you can only be as free as that last list

is short.” Do students agree that it may be advantageous to have a short list of things they feel they

can’t live without? If so, why? If not, why not? If

opinions differ widely, point out that materialism may be partly influenced by our culture, and

partly by personal preference.

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

26 Uncommon Journeys

T HREE L ESSONS ( CONTINUED )
U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 27

L ESSON 3

P URPOSE

To learn: “Everyone has a culture. It influences

how we see the world, ourselves, and others.”

1. Write on the chalkboard the expression so commonly heard in American culture: “Where

there’s a will, there’s a way.” Ask students

whether they believe that if they want to do or

achieve something strongly enough, there’s

always a way to do or achieve it. If so, when have

they experienced this? If not, why not?

2. Ask students to re-read the third lesson of

Storti’s. Have students turn to the passage that

begins,“Our two cultures confront each other

across the tea cups.” Ask them to distinguish

between the meaning of the word “perhaps” as

Storti heard it and the way his friend meant it.

How do they think the saying “Where there’s a

will, there’s a way” developed in American culture? (To explain the differences in cultural

beliefs, you may want to review with students

the role of religion and the importance of prayer

and submission to Allah in Muslim culture,

explained in the overview.) What English language expression is similar to inshallah? [“God

willing.”] Is it used in the same literal sense that

it is used in Arabic? [Answers may vary here;

some users in English mean it literally; others

probably use it more freely to suggest that

something is up to fate.]

3. Introduce students to the enduring understanding:

“Everyone has a culture. It influences how we view

the world, ourselves, and others.” Explain the concept of cultural differences—differences among

deeply held beliefs about what is expected of us in

behavior, thought, music, art, dress, and the like.

Explain to students that one of the fundamental

ways cultures differ is in people’s beliefs about the

“locus of control.” In other words, where does control over one’s fate reside? Do individuals see themselves as actively in control of their lives, or is their

fate seemingly determined by forces outside their

control? Do students think that the locus of control

has changed in the United States over the past few

years? (For an explanation of the four fundamentals

of culture, see the Peace Corps publication Culture

Matters at www.peacecorps.gov/wws/culturematters.

For additional lesson plans on understanding culture, see the Peace Corps publication Building

Bridges: A Peace Corps Classroom Guide to CrossCultural Understanding at www.peacecorps.gov

/wws/bridges.) Ask students how Storti’s cultural

upbringing caused him to see things differently

from the way his Moroccan friend saw them.

4. Ask students to turn to the sentence in the nextto-last paragraph of the story: “It was as if I had

discovered a parallel universe, one founded upon

a different auxiliary verb, on may rather than

will.” Conduct a class discussion focused on the

following questions: What is the difference, to

Americans, between the sayings “You may reach

your goals” and “You will reach your goals”? 
A Matter of Time and Fate

5. Have students complete the graphic organizer

below in class in preparation for writing a story

about an important lesson they have learned in

their lifetime. For homework, ask students to

choose the one lesson of the three in the graphic organizer that they think is the best and write

a draft of the story.

The next day, ask students to exchange with a

partner the rough drafts of their own lesson

learned. Ask the partners to write constructive

observations and questions in the margins—in

particular, comments and questions that will help

their partners improve their story.

Provide students time in class to review their

partners’ feedback and revise their stories.

Mention to students that if they get stuck—or

want to make their writing better or their point

more strongly—they can go back to Storti’s story

to see how he did this.

The class might appreciate your binding the stories together for class visitors to read.

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

28 Uncommon Journeys

T HREE L ESSONS ( CONTINUED )

R ESOURCE S HEET 2

1.

2.

3. 

A Life Experience That

Taught Me a Lesson

The Lesson I Learned Why This Lesson 

Is Important to Me
U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 29

L ESSON 4 

P URPOSE

To learn how to model the structure of one’s own

writing on the structure used by an effective

author

Lesson 4 focuses specifically on the development of students’ writing skills—the writing of strong leads, in

particular. For additional short writing lessons, see

Fletcher and Portalupi (Bibliography, page 185).

1. Remind students that Storti’s story comprises

three mini-stories, loosely linked, each with its

own point.

2. Point out that as readers, students have a huge

selection of things to choose from. So if a passage

they pick up doesn’t interest them right away,

they can move on to something else. Therefore

the lead—the first few words—of what they read

is crucial to catching their attention.Writers use

many different kinds of leads to capture attention. They may begin gently, soothingly. They

may startle with an odd fact, an intriguing question, a disturbing detail, a clever expression, a

funny quotation, or unexpected grammar. Ask

students to look at Storti’s lead. What is unusual

about it? [Most obviously, it is only one word

long. It has no stated verb. Everything else about

it being September is simply understood. But

there are no verbs in the second or third “sentences,” either.] What is the effect of Storti’s 

strategy? [Students might suggest that the author

is painting a verbal picture, using words as

mosaics.] Why does he do it? [It’s punchy, direct,

attention-grabbing.] 

3. In Storti’s second “lesson,” ask students to focus

on the sentence: “And woke with the light.”

Where is the subject? [It’s in the previous paragraph.] What is the effect of this foreshortened

sentence? Why did Storti use it? Do students

think that it works? If so, why?

4. Ask students to look at the third lesson of

Storti’s, about the term inshallah.What is unusual about the lead:“The scene is a cafe in Tangiers.

It is Saturday”? [Help students discover that the

author has switched tenses.Whereas his first two

lessons were written in the past tense, this one is

suddenly in the present tense.] What is the effect

of this strategy? [Does it make the scene more

immediate? Does it startle or surprise the reader?

Does it distinguish this lesson effectively from

the other two? Could it relate to the fact that

Storti learned this lesson only years after he

learned the other two?]

5. Have students revise their composition from the

previous lesson, concentrating on their lead sentence or sentences.The job of the students’ leads

should be to ensure that readers stay with the passage. Encourage the students to emulate Storti’s

strategies in writing an arresting lead. When the
A Matter of Time and Fate

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

30 Uncommon Journeys

T HREE L ESSONS ( CONTINUED )

students have completed their accounts, have them share their

pieces in a class discussion, allowing them to critique each other’s

work constructively. Post the results on a bulletin board.

E XTENSION A CTIVITIES

• Interview and Essay Writing Project. Have students write and

illustrate an essay titled, “Three Lessons I Wish the Whole World

Would Learn.” As part of this project, invite students to interview

several people they admire to find out what their three lessons

might be. If, through this process, they discover lessons they

admire, they can include those in their essay.

• Some students may wish to research Islam and report to the class

on the Muslim religion.

• Ask some students to research the culture, history, and geography

of Morocco and report their findings to the class.

• Refer students to a Moroccan folk tale, “Tislet and Isli,” available

on the Web at www.peacecorps.gov/wws/folktales. Those who

choose to read it can report to the class on the geographical and

cultural history it seems to explain.
V OCABULARY

Wrench: To grab forcefully

Devushka: Young girl (a term used by a

stranger to address a young woman)

Tenge: [ten-GAY] Local currency.Two hundred tenge equaled roughly US$1.35.

Standing Out in the Crowd

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools

T H E T RAIN R IDE H OME

by Robin Solomon 

Peace Corps Volunteer, Kazakhstan (2001–2003)

As my taxi slows to approach the train station, it attracts a crowd of

young men who begin to run swiftly behind the car. Even before the

taxi stops, they are opening the doors and the trunk to grab my bags.

Since I’m traveling light, there aren’t enough of my bags to satisfy the

small crowd around the car. They begin to argue in sharp bursts of

Kazakh as to who will carry my bags to the train. Hastily paying the

cab driver, I jump from the car and wrench my bags free from the anxious porters. “Ni nada!” I repeat, over and over, “I don’t need your

help!” in answer to their insistent pleas.“Devushka, two-hundred tenge,

girl, let me carry your bags!” In the end I resort to silence and take my

bags myself into the train station.The frenzy of a Kazakhstani train trip

has begun, and as I cross through the station doors and free myself

from the porters, I have taken only the first small step in the 30-hour

journey ahead of me.

As a Peace Corps Volunteer, I’m supposed to travel as the locals do, and

in this country four times the size of Texas, the locals go by train, and

so must I. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, the fairly welldeveloped air-travel industry also collapsed, and

nothing has come about to replace it. So

when the need to travel is upon me, I grin

and bear it for days at a time riding the rails.

It’s really a lucky opportunity, I think to

myself, as I weave my way through the crowds

in the station—the grandmothers in their

shawls and valinki (winter boots), the young

merchants with their enormous suitcases

strapped to the backs of sweating porters, the

teams of football players in matching jogging
Standing Out in the Crowd

suits, and everyone bundled up in layers topped with fur coats and

hats. Traveling by train lets me see a great deal of this huge country,

sparsely populated and filled with seemingly endless expanses of barren landscape. It’s a wonder to behold, and a three-hour flight covering the same distance could never impress on me the vastness of

Kazakhstan’s uninhabited steppe.

Once past the customs officer who wanted to weigh my pack, I’m

onto the platform, filled to capacity with train passengers buying lastminute supplies, families and friends waving tearful farewells to their

relations sitting behind the windows of the train cars, merchants with

their hobbled porters hefting unreal-sized suitcases onto the train, and

people selling fruit, ice cream, beer, water, bread, fish, and anything else

you can think of. My journey to my train car is delayed by people

jumping in front of me, insisting I buy their apples or milk.

Having succumbed to the vendors, I arrive at my car with a bag of

famous Almaty apples, two lepyoshka (flat bread), a bottle of water, and

some juicy southern tomatoes. Assuredly handing my ticket to the

conductor, I climb onto the train, and I’m immediately greeted by a

wall of thick, hot humidity that results from 65 people in an airless rail

car for long periods of time. I gasp one last breath of fresh air and push

my way into the sweltering car to find my bench. I travel in sleeper

cars, as I need to lie down for such a long journey, but I don’t go first

class, where the sleepers are separated into compartments of four.

Instead, I ride in second class, with double the number of beds and

triple the number of people, without the privacy of enclosed compartments. I usually choose an upper berth, as the lower sleepers are usually taken over by the people without tickets, who opt to sit on the

feet of the ticketed passengers who unfortunately chose the lower

berth. On the upper, I don’t have to share my space with anybody, but

it’s pretty cramped.

Shortly after getting on the train, we pull out from the station. The

families and friends are still on the platform waving, but the vendors 

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

32 Uncommon Journeys

T H E T RAIN R IDE H OME ( CONTINUED )
V OCABULAR Y

Steppe: Grassland; plain; prairie

Hobbled: Hampered or hindered

Hefting: Lifting (a heavy weight)

Succumb: To give up; fall victim to

Sweltering: Extremely hot

Hobble:To walk unsteadily or with a limp

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 33

have already moved on to the next departing train. We roll out of

Almaty and I settle into my bed for the journey. Outside the window,

the city ends and the steppe stretches out on both sides. The stops

along the way are few, but all as interesting as Almaty, filled with activity and bustle and, most important, fresh air.

Some small villages we roar through without stopping, and I can’t help

but wonder what life is like there, in a place with five buildings and

nothing else for miles. I am reading a book by a Kyrgyz writer,

Chingis Aitmatov*, who writes of the Kazakh steppe: “The steppe is

vast and man is small. The steppe takes no sides; it doesn’t care if you

are in trouble or if all is well with you, you have to take the steppe as

it is.... Passengers look out from passing trains, shake their heads, and

ask:‘God, how can people live here? Nothing but steppe and camels!’”

As we pass the rolling hills around Chu, the red, rocky landscape

around Lake Balkhash, the stretches of uninhabited plains before and

after Karaganda, and the birch forests north of Astana, I wonder about

life here, and the sedentary Russian settlers who established many of

these cities along the train lines they built.The Kazakhs were nomads

before the Russians established towns. Sometimes I think that the

Kazakhs lived the way this land intended them to: It feels too harsh for

permanent settlement. But modernity means staying in one place, even

in the frightening emptiness of Kazakhstan’s steppe.

On the train, apart from my own thoughts, I climb down from my

bunk to squeeze onto the lower berths to drink tea, eat fish and meat,

and share conversation with my traveling companions.They are always

interested in my accent, and upon learning that I am far from home,

they instinctively reach out to me with their Kazakhstani hospitality

and offer me a boiled egg, a piece of candy, or some horse sausage. An

old Kazakh grandmother hobbles to the wagon conductor to obtain a

blanket for me, concerned that I will catch a cold, although I hardly

think that’s possible on the sweltering train.A funny Kyrgyz man prac-

* The Day Lasts More Than a Hundred Years, translated by John French
Standing Out in the Crowd

tices his English that he learned in school 30 years before.Two young

Russian women traveling back home with cheap Central Asian goods

tell me why I should come to Russia as soon as possible. After almost

two years here, I’ve learned to enjoy this journey home to my site.The

train, with all of its sweaty, noisy, and frustrating inconveniences, gives

me an uninterrupted 30-hour reminder of the vastness of this land and

the diversity of its people. The train reminds me why I want to be in

Kazakhstan.

After 30 hours of traveling, the train pulls into Kokshetau. I know

we’re coming close because the birch trees line the tracks and there are

still traces of snow on the ground. I see the hill that stands above my

town, and I know that I’m home. Inevitably, some of my friends are at

the station to greet me. They pull me out from among the bustle and

crowd and hug me and welcome me back. In one shared breath, they

buzz with news of the town since I’ve been away. I attempt to join the

flow of words to tell the tale of my journey, but what I have to tell isn’t

news. Traveling in the train is something they know; it’s an old story

for them. For me, it’s an experience limited to these two years. As I

approach the end of my service, I know that there are only one or two

more such trips ahead of me, and I can imagine that the train rides that

I do a fair share of complaining about will be an aspect of life in

Kazakhstan I miss the most.

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

34 Uncommon Journeys

T H E T RAIN R IDE H OME ( CONTINUED )
S TANDARDS

English Standards: 2,3,6 (see page 187)

Social Studies Standards: I, IV 

(see page 188)

National Geography Standards: 4, 6,

9, 10, 12 (see pages 189–190)

Enduring Understandings

• Living as local people do is an effective 

way to understand a culture different 

from one’s own.

• Being open-minded and resourceful can

help us cross cultures.

Essential Questions

• How can living as local people do in

another culture help a visitor understand

the people and their culture?

• In what ways can the ability to be open

and resourceful help us cross cultures?

Materials 

Photocopies of story, Resource Sheet 1

Assessment Tools

Class discussions, essay, original sentences

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 35

R EADING AND R ESPONDING TO

‘ T H E T RAIN R IDE H OME ’

O VERVIEW

A BOUT THE A UTHOR

Robin Solomon served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in the Central

Asian republic of Kazakhstan from 2001 to 2003. Her primary 

assignments focused on teaching English as a foreign language and

training Kazakhstani teachers in new teaching methods. While in

Kazakhstan, Solomon participated in the Coverdell World Wise

Schools CyberVolunteer program, offered by the Peace Corps at

www.peacecorps.gov/wws/cybervol. As part of this program, she

wrote letters about her life in Kazakhstan, which were then posted on

the Web and sent as e-mails to interested individuals and classrooms

participating in the program in the United States.

Solomon’s third letter, “The Train Ride Home,” is included here

because it provides keen insight into local culture and traveling overland in Kazakhstan.

The author’s biography and her first two letters can be read and downloaded in the archive section of the CyberVolunteer website:

www.peacecorps.gov/wws/cybervol.

Solomon now is a Foreign Service officer at the U.S. State Department.
A BOUT THE S TORY

Solomon tells about a cross-country journey by train in Kazakhstan

from the capital,Almaty, in the south, to her host city of Kokshetau, in

the northern part of the country. In vivid detail, she describes the

crowds in the station and on the train, the stifling heat in the coach,

the bustle, the generosity of the Kazakhstanis, the desolation of the

landscape, and the endearing qualities of a journey that appears on the

surface to be merely arduous.

Note about teaching:This lesson concentrates on the author’s writing

techniques; as such, it is ideal for language arts classes. However, social

studies teachers who are teaching about the post-Soviet era will find

in Solomon’s letters rich primary-source material for students to

investigate—along with related issues in John Deever’s chapter about

his Volunteer experiences in Ukraine (page 168).

A BOUT THE S ETTING

Covering 1.1 million square miles, Kazakhstan is the ninth-largest

country in the world, about the size of Western Europe or half the size

of the contiguous United States. Kazakhstan is a vast country of desert,

steppe, and mountains in central Asia. About 17 million people live

there in an area four times the size of Texas.

Kazakhstan was the second-largest republic of the Soviet Union. Upon

the dissolution of the U.S.S.R., Kazakhstan declared its independence in

December 1991.The first Peace Corps Volunteers arrived in the country in July 1993, and Volunteers have been there since, working with

communities to make the transition from communism to a free-market

economy. In collaboration with government ministries, local governments, and nongovernmental organizations, Peace Corps Volunteers in

Kazakhstan work in four program areas: English education, economic

development, environmental education, and public health.

Standing Out in the Crowd

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

36 Uncommon Journeys

T H E T RAIN R IDE H OME ( CONTINUED )
U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 37

In addition to their assigned tasks, Peace Corps

Volunteers engage in cross-cultural exchanges that

help Americans and Kazakhstanis better understand

each other’s history, languages, and cultures. Indeed,

given Kazakhstan’s isolation from the West when it

was part of the Soviet Union, Peace Corps Volunteers

often have been the first Americans that Kazakhstanis

encounter. The first meetings between Peace Corps

Volunteers and Kazakhstanis often provide an opportunity for Volunteers to break the stereotypes

Kazakhstanis might have about Americans—and vice

versa. Americans and Kazakhstanis can represent

their respective countries in a more positive and realistic light than stereotypes usually do.

For further information about Kazakhstan, visit the

country-information section of the Peace Corps

website at www.peacecorps.gov.

L ESSON 1

P URPOSE

• To stimulate reflection about the enduring

understanding, “Living as the local people do is

an effective way to understand a culture different

from one’s own.”

• To discover the author’s techniques in describing

people and events, in setting tone, and in establishing pace.

1. In preparation for reading Solomon’s story, provide students with information about the author

and the setting from the overview above. In addition, read to the class (or have them read) the

information in Resource Sheet 1.

2. Have students read “The Train Ride Home.” Ask

them to keep in mind Solomon’s statement, as

they are reading: “This country teaches me on a

daily basis, sometimes far more than I think I

teach people here.”

When the students are finished, ask them what

Solomon learned on this train ride.What do they

think she taught her traveling companions, if she

taught them anything? Who do they think

learned more from the encounters on the train

and in the station—Solomon or the local people?

Why?

3. Solomon’s essay is a fast-reading, engaging

account of a train ride in a country significantly

different from the United States. Students will

probably have a good sense of just how different

the cultural environment is after reading the

essay. Suggest to students that writing a text that

appears simple and easy to read is often the most

difficult to write, because it takes so much effort

by the author to craft. Much like detectives, students will analyze the text to see how the author

achieved her rich characterization of her Central

Asian surroundings.

a. Have students examine the first paragraph and

ask them what purposes it serves. How does it

engage the reader? How does it set the scene?

[Possible answers include: The lead sentence

immediately pulls the reader into the action
Standing Out in the Crowd

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

38 Uncommon Journeys

T H E T RAIN R IDE H OME ( CONTINUED )

R ESOURCE S HEET 1

R OBIN S OLOMON T ALKS A BOUT H E R L IFE IN K AZAKHSTAN *

I live in Kokshetau, Kazakhstan, a city in the north of the country, near the Russian

border. I write letters home to Texas describing my work in this town of about

130,000 people, where I work as an English teacher and jack-of-all-trades. The educational system of Kazakhstan has a lot to be proud of, but I work with English teachers on improving the quality and breadth of instruction. In my own classroom and

through teacher-training seminars, I show people how to teach English, health, leadership, and more, trying to give young people tools to improve their lives and the

future of their country. Besides teaching, I lead a girl’s club, work with the English

library in the city, volunteer in an orphanage, and organize summer camps, among

many other things. One of my most important jobs is being “the American,” who is a

constant source of information and support for people in Kokshetau who have ideas

to improve their community.

And what do I write home about this country? Kazakhstan is a fascinating place of

contrasts and bitter history. The country and its people lost a great deal when the

Soviet Union ended in 1991, and since then, they have struggled to build a prosperous nation from the meager remains of the great Russian empire. Russians and

Kazakhs live peacefully side by side with numerous other ethnicities, speaking many

different languages and practicing different religions, such as Orthodox Christianity

and Islam. Together, everyone battles the harsh, cold winters, and this gives people a

solidarity and toughness with which they live their daily lives. History has been hard

on this country, where nomads were forced to live in cities, exiles were sent to suffer,

and farmers were challenged to grow wheat on land that won’t support agriculture.

This country teaches me on a daily basis, sometimes far more than I think I teach people here.

* Excerpted from Solomon’s biography, posted in the archive of the CyberVolunteer website at www.peacecorps.gov/wws/cybervol.
U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 39

and sets the scene. The subject of the essay,

i.e., a train ride across Kazakhstan, is identified. The reader gets the impression of the

bustle and chaos that is characteristic of train

stations in Kazakhstan. The quotations give

the reader an idea of the independence and

assertiveness of the author, along with making

the text seem immediate and fresh.]

b. Ask the students to examine the second

paragraph and identify three things they

learn there. [Answers might include: The

author is a Peace Corps Volunteer. Peace

Corps policy calls for Volunteers to live and

travel as the locals do. During the Soviet era,

people traveled by air, using a decent network of airports. Air transportation in

Kazakhstan has deteriorated.]

Now that the students have begun to analyze

the text in detail, what conclusions can they

draw about the author’s strategy and style? In

discussion with the class, try to elicit, among

other things, that the author makes every

word count; she provides facts and detailed

descriptions to help the reader picture the

scenes; she makes the story both active—

through the details of her interactions with

people—and personal—through quotations—

attracting readers and holding their interest.

4. The author has used other subtle strategies to

convey information about the climate, the geography, and the nature of the people. In a class discussion or through journal entries, focus with

students on the following issues.

a. Ask students to identify specific details about

the people on the platform and the passengers

in the train that help them understand the

culture. Also have them search for two or

three details that let them know it’s cold outside. [Winter boots, fur coats, snow on the

ground.]

b. The author uses specific details to achieve the

transition from the station to the steppe. Ask

students to identify these. [Vendors leave, passengers wave, the author settles down, the

scenery changes. All these cues are key to

helping the reader sense the transition from

the city to the steppe.]

c. In paragraph seven, which includes the quotation from the Kyrgyz writer Chingis

Aitmatov, Solomon names at least four specific places the train passes through. Even if—or

especially if—students do not look for these

places on the map, what effect does naming

them have on the flow and impact of the

story? [Students might observe that it lends a

sense of place as well as emphasizing the

progress across the landscape.]

d. In the second-to-last paragraph, Solomon

writes: “An old Kazakh grandmother hobbles

to the wagon conductor to obtain a blanket

for me, concerned that I will catch a cold,

although I hardly think that’s possible on the

sweltering train.” Does the author’s treatment
Standing Out in the Crowd

of the old woman reveal anything about the

author’s respect for the local population, or

about her attitude toward strangers? Point out

to students that while the author makes fun of

the situation, she notably does not make fun

of the old woman. After all, the author might

have written: “How could I possibly have

caught a cold in that intense heat?” or “Catch

a cold?! What was she thinking?!”

In an interview, Solomon expanded on the

issue of the heated train.“In Kazakhstan, cold

is viewed as a killer, and people do everything

they can to protect themselves from the cold.

In the sweaty train car, the Kazakhstani perception was that it wasn’t warm enough to

keep you healthy. A slight draft coming in the

window could be the end of you! Also, the

simple fact that there were blankets available

told people that they ought to cover up more,

despite the heat, which was stifling to

me.Volunteers would get dirty looks for

cracking open bus windows (even in summer)

or for wearing short-sleeved shirts around the

house in winter.” Ask students, in pairs, to

reenact for the class the old woman’s offering

Solomon the blanket. Encourage them to

invent various responses to compare with

Solomon’s.Ask them also to take into account

the Kazakhstani veneration of age. Have some

of the students play the role of someone

Solomon’s age offering a blanket, or even

someone younger. In their role playing, how

might students alter Solomon’s reactions to

passengers of different ages offering her blankets?

e. In the same paragraph, the author says that the

other passengers reached out to her “upon

learning that I am far from home.”What is the

difference in effect between Solomon writing

that the others were hospitable because she

was “American,” and that they were hospitable

because she was “far from home”? [Students

might observe that Kazakhstani hospitality

extends to anyone from another place, not just

to someone from a well-recognized country.]

Consider holding a class discussion to elicit

from students what their own reactions might

be to meeting someone with an accent or

who evidently was “far from home.” Would

they share their brown-bagged food? Would

they invite the stranger home for tea—as

many did with Solomon? After students have

offered their own reactions, let them know

Solomon’s observation after she returned to

the United States: “Kazakhstani hospitality

knocked me off my feet for the most part, as I

was used to the more guarded American reaction to strangers.”

f. In the last paragraph, Solomon writes:

“Inevitably, some of my friends are at the station to greet me.” It is easy to gloss over that

sentence and miss its implications.Ask the students to think about the sentence, and then

discuss specifically why the author uses the

word “inevitably.”What does that tell students

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40 Uncommon Journeys

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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 41

about her life in Kokshetau? [Evidently, she

has many friends, and they were eager enough

to greet Solomon to come to the station and

wait there for her arrival.] Are these friends

fellow Peace Corps Volunteers or are they

locals? How do we know? [A few sentences

further, we learn that “traveling in the train is

something they know; it’s an old story for

them.”] Point out that the author didn’t tell

readers outright; readers have to infer the

answer from other information.

L ESSON 2

P URPOSE

To help students realize that open-mindedness

and flexibility can facilitate understanding

between cultures

1. Read aloud the statement: “Being open-minded

and flexible can facilitate understanding between

cultures.” Discuss with the class:

• In what ways was the author open-minded and

flexible in her story? Remind students to support their opinions with examples from the

text.

• In what ways might Solomon’s train ride have

been different if she had gone into the experience with a negative attitude rather than a positive one? If she had held on to the need for

creature comforts? If she had not been open to

seeing the good in cultural differences? 

2. Ask students what it would take for them to

adjust to life in another culture as well as

Solomon did.

3. Review with students the specific strategies

Solomon used in conveying a sense of place, of

movement, of desolation, of kindness.You might

want to list the strategies on the board as students

recall them, and have the students make notes.

4. For homework, ask students to write a letter

from the point of view of one of the

Kazakhstanis who were fellow travelers on the

train with the author. Point out that this will be

the same trip but from a different perspective—

that of a local person for whom the conditions

were familiar.What might a local person observe

about the foreign traveler in their midst? How

will the thoughts and observations of a local person differ from those of a traveler for whom most

of the experience is new and different?

Encourage the students to be inventive and to

employ many of the devices Solomon used in

her writing. Students can use the list of strategies

the class created in reviewing the letter.

5. The next day, have students divide into groups of

four or five and read their letters to each other.

Ask them to critique each other constructively,

especially acknowledging effective use of the

strategies they were asked to employ.
Standing Out in the Crowd

L ESSON 3

P URPOSE

• To understand the use of parallelism and balanced sentences

• To write balanced sentences and sentences using

parallelism

1. Put the following sentences on the board and ask

students to combine them grammatically into

one correct sentence.

A. I went to the bank.

B. I drove to the mall.

C. I returned to my house.

Put the new sentence on the board. It will probably read, “I went to the bank, drove to the mall,

and returned to my house.” Ask students to

explain why someone would combine sentences

in this way. [It’s more economical in the use of

words; it’s less repetitious; it saves time; it creates

a more sophisticated sentence.] Explain to them

that using parallelism with a conjunction like

and also shows that items are of the same weight

or value.

2. Underline “went to the bank,” “drove to the

mall,” and “returned to my house.” Ask students

to identify the parts of speech in each phrase and

mark them on the chalkboard. [Verb (past tense),

preposition, article, noun.] Point out that

because the phrases have the same grammatical

construction, they are called parallel, even

though the words are not the same.

3. Repeat the process using Abraham Lincoln’s

words from his Gettysburg Address—“government of the people, by the people, for the people”—so that students understand that parallelism may or may not include repetition of

words. Define parallelism as the repetition of

grammatical forms to achieve a desired effect in

writing.

4. Read aloud the first paragraph of “The Train

Ride Home” and ask students to find examples

of parallelism in this paragraph. [“I resort to

silence and take my bags”; “I cross through the

station doors and free myself from the porters.”

Both use similar verb phrases.]

Divide students into six groups. Assign each

group a paragraph, from the second to the seventh. Ask each group to do a close reading of

their paragraph to see if students can find other

examples of parallelism. Have student groups for

paragraphs two to six report to the class. For each

example of parallelism, ask them to state the purpose, e.g., economy of words, clarity, managing a

list.

5. Ask the group working with the seventh paragraph to list their examples of parallelism on the

board. Be sure they include “The steppe is vast

and man is small.”

Call students’ attention to this sentence. Review

one purpose of parallelism—to organize ideas in

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42 Uncommon Journeys

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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 43

an economical manner—and ask students if they

can see any other purpose in using it here.Try to

elicit these effects: the poetic nature of the sentence, the effective contrast, the rhythm the

writer achieves. Point out that writers may use

parallelism for purposes other than economy.

6. Explain that when a parallel sentence combines

contrasting ideas, it is called a balanced sentence;

ask students to identify another balanced sentence, in paragraph seven. [“... It doesn’t care if

you are in trouble or if all is well with you.”]

Point out that balanced sentences are often

memorable. One example is John F. Kennedy’s

inaugural speech, in which he said, “Ask not

what your country can do for you; ask what you

can do for your country.” Another example is in

the opening of Charles Dickens’s A Tale of Two

Cities: “It was the best of times, it was the worst

of times.” Martin Luther King Jr. provided a

good example when he hoped that his children

would “not be judged by the color of their skin,

but by the content of their character.”

7. When students are clear about what parallel and

balanced sentences are, have them write original

examples and share the results with the class.

8. Summarize the lesson by having students list reasons authors use parallel or balanced sentences.

E XTENSION A CTIVITIES

1. Question for discussion, or a short paper or class

presentation: If you were a Peace Corps

Volunteer in Kazakhstan, what would be the

most important thing about life in America that

you would convey to your host family?

2. Have younger students work in groups to illustrate the main ideas in Solomon’s story, using a

large piece of chart paper and colored felt-tipped

markers.
Standing Out in the Crowd

R UNNING

by Peter Hessler

Peace Corps Volunteer, China (1996–1998)

(Excerpted from Chapter Three in River Town:Two Years on the Yangtze)

In the mornings I often ran to the summit of Raise the Flag

Mountain. As I ran, I studied the propaganda signs along the route,

although at the beginning there wasn’t much about them that was recognizable.There were three signs on the road out to the mountain, and

to me they looked like this:

I finished my runs back in the center of campus, not far from the

teaching building, where a stone wall served as a backdrop for an

inscription of three-foot-high characters:

People,

People,

People,

People

That was how Chinese appeared in my first

few months. I arrived in Fuling able to recogCultu

Is Country

People Mouth

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

Uncommon Journeys
V OCABULARY

Waiguoren: [wy-GOOR-en] Chinese for

foreigner, or someone from out of the

country

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 45

nize about 40 characters, all of them simple: people, middle, country,

above, below, long, man, woman.There hadn’t been time for more; the

Peace Corps had given us an intensive course during our two months

of training in Chengdu, but the emphasis was on learning enough spoken Mandarin to function. We had to study written Chinese on our

own, and until I got to Fuling I simply hadn’t had enough time.

I came to Sichuan because I wanted to teach, but I also had two other

motivations: I thought the experience would make me a better writer,

and I wanted to learn Chinese. These were very clear goals, but the

way to achieve them was much less obvious. I hoped the writing

would take care of itself—I would keep my eyes open and take notes,

and eventually, when I felt I was ready, I would start to write. But

Chinese was a different matter altogether and I had never undertaken

something like that before.

That was one reason I had decided to come to China with the Peace

Corps, because I knew they would try to teach me the language. Their

Chengdu training course had been excellent; the classes were small and

the teachers experienced, and it had been easy to make progress. In

Fuling, though, language study was my own affair.The Peace Corps would

pay for tutors, but I had to find them myself, and I had to decide which

textbooks I would use and how I would structure my studies. It was a

daunting task—essentially, I had to figure out how to learn Chinese.

For the first few weeks, Dean Fu searched for tutors who could help

Adam* and me. He was as lost as we were—he had never known a foreigner who was trying to learn the language, and I suspected that secretly he felt the project was hopeless. Waiguoren couldn’t learn Chinese—

everyone in Fuling knew that. Our students found it hilarious that we

even tried.They would ask me to speak a little Chinese, or write a character or two, and then they would laugh at my efforts. At first this didn’t bother me, but quickly it became annoying. They thought I was

*Adam Meier, Hessler’s Peace Corps housemate and fellow-teacher
Standing Out in the Crowd

dabbling in the language when in fact I was serious: I knew that studying Chinese was one of the most important things I could do in

Fuling. So much depended on knowing the language—my friendships,

my ability to function in the city, my understanding of the place.

I also wanted to learn Chinese out of stubbornness, because as a

waiguoren you weren’t expected to do that. Such low expectations had

a long tradition; even as late as the early 1800s it had been illegal for

a Chinese to teach the language to foreigners, and a number of

Chinese were imprisoned and even executed for tutoring young

Englishmen. This bit of history fascinated me: How many languages

have been sacred and forbidden to outsiders? Certainly, those laws had

been changed more than a century ago, but China was still ambivalent

about opening to the outside world and language was still at the heart

of this issue. In good conscience I could not live there for two years

and not learn how to speak Chinese. To me, this was as important as

fulfilling my obligations as a teacher.

But this need wasn’t nearly as obvious to everybody else. Dean Fu

took a long time finding tutors, and perhaps he was hoping that we’d

forget about it. We didn’t need Chinese to teach, after all, and we

already knew enough to buy groceries and eat at local restaurants.That

should be adequate, people figured. In some respects, we were seen as

English-teaching machines, or perhaps farm animals—expensive and

skittish draft horses that taught literature and culture. We were given

cadres’ apartments, and we had our own Changhong-brand color televisions with remote. Our bedrooms were air-conditioned. Each of us

had a good kitchen and two beautiful balconies. Our students were

obedient and respectful. It didn’t matter that, even as we were given all

of these things, the leaders also gave quiet instructions to our colleagues and students that they should avoid associating with us outside

of class. Waiguoren were risky, especially with regard to politics, and in

any case we didn’t need close friends in the college. We could teach

during the day and return to our comfortable cages at night, and, if we

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46 Uncommon Journeys

R UNNING ( CONTINUED )
V OCABULARY

Ambivalent: [am-BIV-uh-lent] Having

mixed feelings about someone or something

Skittish: Easily excitable or made nervous

Cadre: a member of a small leadership group

Stick-stick soldier: A porter or laborer

in China who carries heavy loads in freight

yards or construction sites on short, bamboo

poles (sticks) tied together with rope

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 47

needed friendship, we always had each other. They even gave us telephones so we could call Peace Corps Volunteers who lived in other

parts of Sichuan.

Some of the more insightful students sensed that this did not make a

full life. In his journal, Soddy wrote me a short note, politely addressed

in the third person:

Pete and Adam come to our college to teach our English without pay.We

are thankful for this behavior. But we are worried about Pete and Adam’s

lives. For example: Pete and Adam know little Chinese, so they can’t

watch Chinese TV programmes. I think your lives are difficult. I want to

know how you spend your spare time.

It was a good question. My teaching and preparation time rarely took

much more than 30 hours a week. I ran in the mornings, and sometimes I went for walks in the hills. Adam and I played basketball and

threw the Frisbee. I wrote on my computer. I planned other diversions

for the future—subjects I wanted to cover in class, possible travel destinations. Mostly, though, I knew that there was plenty of exploring to

be done in the city, but at the beginning this was the hardest place of

all to open up.

Downtown Fuling looked good from my balcony. Often I’d gaze across

the Wu River at the maze of streets and stairways, listening to the distant hum of daily life, and I’d think about the mysteries that were hidden in the river town. I wanted to investigate all of it—I wanted to go

down to the docks and watch the boats; I wanted to talk with the

stick-stick soldiers; I wanted to explore the network of tangled staircases that ran through the old part of town. I longed to figure out how

the city worked and what the people thought, especially since no foreigner had done this before. It wasn’t like living in Beijing or

Shanghai, where there were plenty of waiguoren who had discovered

what the city had to offer. As far as foreigners were concerned, Fuling

was our city—or it would be once we figured it out.
Standing Out in the Crowd

But once I got there it didn’t look so good. Partly this was because of

the dirt and noise; the main city of Fuling was an unbelievably loud

and polluted place. There wasn’t as much heavy industry as in other

parts of China, but there were a few good-sized factories that spewed

smoke and dust into the air.The power plant on the banks of the Wu

River burned coal, as did all of the countless small restaurants that

lined the city’s streets, and automobile emissions were poorly regulated. In winter the air was particularly dirty, but even in summer it was

bad. If I went to town and blew my nose, the tissue was streaked with

black grease. This made me think about how the air was affecting my

lungs, and for a while I wondered what could be done about this.

Finally I decided to stop looking at tissues after I blew my nose.

Noise was even more impressive. Most of it came from car horns, and

it is difficult to explain how constant this sound was. I can start by saying: Drivers in Fuling honked a lot. There weren’t a great number of

cars, but there were enough, and they were always passing each other

in a mad rush to get to wherever they were going. Most of them were

cabs, and virtually every cabby in Fuling had rewired his horn so it was

triggered by a contact point at the tip of the gearshift. They did this

for convenience; because of the hills, drivers shifted gears frequently,

and with their hand on the stick it was possible to touch the contact

point ever so slightly and the horn would sound.They honked at other

cars, and they honked at pedestrians. They honked whenever they

passed somebody, or whenever they were being passed themselves.

They honked when nobody was passing but somebody might be considering it, or when the road was empty and there was nobody to pass

but the thought of passing or being passed had just passed through the

driver’s mind. Just like that, an unthinking reflex: The driver honked.

They did it so often that they didn’t even feel the contact point

beneath their fingers, and the other drivers and pedestrians were so

familiar with the sound that they essentially didn’t hear it. Nobody

reacted to horns anymore; they served no purpose. A honk in Fuling 

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48 Uncommon Journeys

R UNNING ( CONTINUED )
V OCABULARY

Blurt: To speak suddenly, often without

stopping to think first

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 49

was like the tree falling in the forest—for all intents and purposes it

was silent.

But at the beginning Adam and I heard it. For the first few weeks we

often complained about the honking and the noise, the same way we

complained about blowing our noses and seeing the tissue turn black.

But the simple truth was that you could do nothing about either the

noise or the pollution, which meant that they could either become

very important and very annoying, or they could become not important at all. For sanity’s sake we took the second option, like the locals,

and soon we learned to talk about other things.

I realized this in early November, when a college friend of mine

named Scott Kramer came to visit. For five years he had lived in

Manhattan, and yet the noise in Fuling absolutely stunned him; he

heard every horn, every shout, every blurted announcement from

every loudspeaker.When he left, we took a cab from the college to the

docks, and Kramer, who worked on Wall Street and had a mathematical turn of mind, counted the honks as our driver sped through the

city. It was a 15-minute ride and the driver touched his contact point

566 times. It came to 37 honks per minute.

If Kramer hadn’t been counting, I wouldn’t have noticed, and I realized that I had stopped hearing the horns long ago, just like everybody

else in town. In fact, Kramer was the only person in the whole city

who heard them, which explained why he was so overwhelmed. The

entire city had been honking at him for a week.

For me it wasn’t the same, and after a month or so the discomforts of

Fuling weren’t important enough to deter me from going into town.

Despite the noise and the pollution, it was still a fascinating place, and

I still wanted to explore its corners and learn its secrets. But the language was an enormous problem, and in the beginning it made the

city frustrating and even frightening.
Standing Out in the Crowd

Mandarin Chinese has a reputation as a difficult language—some

experts say it takes four times as long to learn as Spanish or French—

and its characters and tones are particularly challenging to a Westerner,

because they are completely different from the way our languages are

structured. In Sichuan, things are further complicated by the provincial

dialect, which is distinct enough that a Chinese outsider has trouble

understanding the locals in a place like Fuling.The variations between

Mandarin and Sichuanese are significant: In addition to some differences in vocabulary, Sichuanese slurs the Mandarin reflexive sounds—

sh becomes s, zh becomes z—and certain consonants are reversed, so

that the average person in Sichuan confuses n and l,and h and f.A word

like “Hunan” becomes “Fulan.” The Sichuanese tonal range is also

shorter, and most significant, two of the four Mandarin tones are

reversed in Sichuan. If Mandarin is your starting point, it seems that the

entire language has been flattened and turned upside down.

In addition, Sichuan is an enormous province where lack of development, particularly with regard to road and rail links, has resulted in vast

regional differences. The Chengdu dialect is distinct from that of

Chongqing, which is also different from that of Leshan, and so on.The

town of Fengdu is less than 30 miles downstream from Fuling, and yet

occasionally the residents of these places have difficulty understanding

each other. At a Fuling restaurant, if you want the dish known as hundun in Mandarin—translated in English as “wonton”—you have to ask

for chaoshou, but if you go another 30 miles to Fengdu you’ll have to

call it baomian. Or, more accurately, baomin, because the folks in

Fengdu slur the ian sounds.

The result is a hell of a mess that I hadn’t expected. I came to China

hoping to learn Chinese, but quickly I realized there was no such

thing. “Chinese” was whatever it took to communicate with the person you happened to be talking with, and this changed dramatically

depending on background and education level. Educated people usually could speak Mandarin, especially if they were from the younger

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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 51

generation—the walls of our classrooms had enormous signs that commanded:“Use Mandarin!” But the vast majority of Fuling’s population

was uneducated and functioned only in the dialect. It made going to

town a frustrating experience, because even the simplest conversations

were difficult, and it also made my goal of learning Chinese seem

impossible: I couldn’t imagine learning both Mandarin and Sichuanese

in two years. In fact, all I needed to do was improve my Mandarin,

which would naturally enable me to handle the dialect, but in the early

months I didn’t know that. It seemed that I was in hopelessly over my

head, and every trip into town was a reminder of that failure.

And Fuling was a frightening place because the people had seen so few

outsiders. If I ate at a restaurant or bought something from a store, a

crowd would quickly gather, often as many as 30 people spilling out

into the street. Most of the attention was innocent curiosity, but it

made the embarrassment of my bad Chinese all the worse—I’d try to

communicate with the owner, and people would laugh and talk among

themselves, and in my nervousness I would speak even worse

Mandarin. When I walked down the street, people constantly turned

and shouted at me. Often they screamed waiguoren or laowai, both of

which simply meant “foreigner.” Again, these phrases often weren’t

intentionally insulting, but intentions mattered less and less with every

day that these words were screamed at me. Another favorite was

“hello,” a meaningless, mocking version of the word that was strung

out into a long “hah-loooo!”This word was so closely associated with

foreigners that sometimes the people used it instead of waiguoren—

they’d say, “Look, here come two hellos!” And often in Fuling they

shouted other less innocent terms—yangguizi, or “foreign devil”; da

bizi, “big nose”—although it wasn’t until later that I understood what

these phrases meant.

The stresses piled up every time I went into town: the confusion and

embarrassment of the language, the shouts and stares, the mocking

calls. It was even worse for Adam, who was tall and blond; at least I had
Standing Out in the Crowd

the advantage of being dark-haired and only slightly bigger than the

locals. For a while we adopted the strategy of going into town together, thinking that between the two of us we could more easily handle

the pressure. This was a mistake, though, because adding another

waiguoren only increased the attention, and after a month of that we

started making our trips solo. Finally, as the fall semester wore on, we

did everything possible to avoid going to town.When I did go, I wore

headphones.That was the only way I could handle it; I listened to the

loudest and most offensive rap music I had—Dr. Dre, Snoop Doggy

Dogg, the Beastie Boys—and it was just enough to drown out the

shouts as I walked down the street. It made for surreal trips downtown,

listening to Snoop rap obscenities while I dodged the crowds, but it

kept me sane.

And so Soddy’s question remained: How do you spend your spare

time? When I finished teaching I would sit at my desk, which looked

out across the Wu River, and I would write:

While I wrote, I pronounced the word over and over, as carefully as I

drew it:

“Xue xue xue xue xue xue xue xue xue xue xue xue xue xue xue xue

xue xue xue xue.”

I would write the same characters about a hundred times total, and

then I would think of ways in which it was used: xuexi, xuesheng,

xuexiao. I would write it on a flashcard and put it on a stack that grew

steadily on my desk—between five and 10 a day, usually. I listened to

language tapes and reviewed the text that we had used during Peace

Corps training. I flipped through the flashcards. By early October,

when Dean Fu finally found two Chinese tutors, I had learned 150

characters.The signs on the way to Raise the Flag Mountain were still

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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 53

unintelligible, but the one in the center of campus had changed slightly:

Our tutors were Kong Ming and Liao Mei, and we came to know

them as Teacher Kong and Teacher Liao. They taught in the Chinese

department, and neither of them spoke any English. They had never

known a waiguoren before. Dean Fu had been unable to find tutors

who spoke English, and at last we told him it wasn’t important. We

wanted to get started and we knew that Chinese department teachers

had good Mandarin.

Teacher Kong was a short man who wore glasses and smelled of

Magnificent Sound cigarettes. He was 32 years old, and he taught

ancient Chinese literature. By Chinese standards he was slightly fat,

which meant that by American standards he was slightly thin. He smiled

easily. He was from the countryside of Fengdu, which was famous for its

ghosts—legend said that spirits went to Fengdu after death.

Teacher Liao was a very thin woman with long black hair and a

reserved manner. She was 27 years old, and she taught modern

Chinese. She smiled less than Teacher Kong. Our students, who also

had some courses in the Chinese department, considered Teacher Liao

to be one of their better instructors. She was from the central Sichuan

city of Zigong, which was famous for its salt. Every city and small

town in Sichuan claimed to be famous for something. Fuling was

famous for the hot pickled mustard tuber that was cured along the

banks of the rivers.

That was essentially everything we knew about Teachers Kong and

Liao for months.We also knew about their Mandarin, which was very

clear except for a slight Sichuanese tendency to confuse the n and l

sounds. Other than that we knew nothing. To us they were like

Teaching People, People,

People, Environment People
Standing Out in the Crowd

Chinese-teaching machines, or perhaps farm animals—a sort of inexpensive and bored draft horse that corrected bad tones. And to them

we were very stupid waiguoren from a country whose crude tongue had

no tones at all.

My first tutorial with Teacher Liao was scheduled for two hours, but I

lasted less than 60 minutes. I went home with my head reeling—had a

human being ever compressed more wrongness into a single hour?

Everything was wrong—tones, grammar, vocabulary, initial sounds.

She would ask me a question and I would try to process the language

to respond, but before I could speak she was answering it herself. She

spoke clearly, of course, and it was also true that during that hour not

a word of English had been spoken.That was what I wanted, after all—

a Chinese tutor. But I couldn’t imagine doing that for seven hours a

week and maintaining my sanity, and I looked at the pathetic stack of

flashcards on my desk and thought:This is hopeless.

For a solid month it looked that way. I was too self-absorbed to even

imagine what it was like from the other side, but later I realized that

it was even worse for my teachers. They weren’t under threat of execution for teaching the sacred tones to a waiguoren—that law, at least,

had been changed since Qing Dynasty days. But theirs wasn’t an enviable job. First of all, we underpaid them.This wasn’t intentional;Adam

and I had been given wrong information about the standard rate for

tutors.Teachers Kong and Liao, of course, were far too polite to set us

straight, which meant that for the entire first year they worked for

two-thirds of what they deserved. Even worse, though, they were

underpaid for seven weekly hours of boredom and frustration.The lessons in the book were simple—taking a train, going to a restaurant—

and yet I botched everything, and they had no idea how to steer me

in the right direction. How do you teach somebody to speak Chinese?

How do you take your knowledge of ancient poetry and use it to help

a waiguoren master something as basic as the third tone? 

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V OCABULAR Y

Cagey: Shrewd; sneaky; crafty

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We were all lost, and that failure seemed to be the extent of our relationship. Other Peace Corps Volunteers had tutors who spoke English,

so at least they could chat together after class.They heard about their

tutors’ families; they ate dinner together; they became friends. My

tutors didn’t seem like real people—it was months before I learned

that Teacher Liao was married and that Teacher Kong had a son. Here

the language problem was compounded by the fact that at the beginning they were somewhat cagey and distant; they had never known a

waiguoren before, and they weren’t at all certain how to approach us.

Chinese teaching styles are also significantly different from Western

methods, which made my tutorials even more frustrating. In China, a

teacher is absolutely respected without question, and the teacher–

student relationship tends to be formal. The teacher teaches and is

right, and the student studies and is wrong. But this isn’t our tradition

in America, as my own students noticed. I encouraged informality in

our classes, and if a student was wrong I pointed out what she had

done right and praised her for making a good effort. To them, this

praise was meaningless. What was the point of that? If a student was

wrong, she needed to be corrected without any quibbling or softening—that was the Chinese way.

I couldn’t teach like that, and it was even harder to play the role of a

student.Actually, this became worse after my Chinese classes started to

feel productive, which happened more quickly than I expected. The

characters in my book’s lessons had always been elusive, odd-shaped

scratches of black that drifted in and out of my head, calling up arbitrary allusions that were misleading. They were pictures rather than

words: I would look at and think of Kmart, and the 27th radical—

reminded me of the letter B, or perhaps an ax hanging on a wall.

looked like a man doing jumping jacks. was a marching spider carrying a flag across the page. I stared so long at those odd figures

that I dreamed about them—they swarmed in my head and I awoke

vaguely disturbed and missing home.
Standing Out in the Crowd

But at a certain point it was as if some of the scratchings stood up

straight and looked me in the eye, and the fanciful associations started

slipping away. Suddenly they became words; they had meaning. Of

course, it didn’t happen all at once, and it was work that did it—I was

studying madly in an effort to make the classes less miserable. But I was

so busy that I hardly had time to realize that progress was being made.

One day after more than a month of classes, I read aloud a paragraph

from my book, recognizing all of the characters smoothly except for

one. I sat back and started to register the achievement: I was actually

reading Chinese. The language was starting to make sense. But before

this sense of satisfaction was half formed,Teacher Liao said, “Budui!”

It meant, literally, “Not correct.” You could also translate it as no,

wrong, nope, uh-uh. Flatly and clearly incorrect. There were many

Chinese words that I didn’t know, but I knew that one well.

A voice in my head whined: All the rest of them were right; isn’t that

worth something? But for Teacher Liao it didn’t work like that. If one

character was wrong it was simply budui.

“What’s this word?” I asked, pointing at the character I had missed.

“Zhe—the zhe in zhejiang.”

“Third tone?”

“Fourth tone.”

I breathed deeply and read the section again, and this time I did it perfectly.That was a victory—I turned to Teacher Liao and my eyes said

(or at least I imagined them saying): How do you like me now? But

Teacher Liao’s eyes were glazed with boredom and she said,“Read the

next one.” They were, after all, simple paragraphs. Any schoolchild

could handle them.

It was the Chinese way. Success was expected and failure criticized and

promptly corrected. You were right or you were budui; there was no

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middle ground. As I became bolder with the language I started experimenting with new words and new structures, and this was good but

it was also a risk. I would finish a series of sentences using vocabulary

that I knew Teacher Liao didn’t expect me to know, and I would swear

that I could see her flinch with unwilling admiration. And yet she

would say, “Budui!” and correct the part that was wrong.

I grew to hate budui: Its sound mocked me. There was a harshness to

it; the bu was a rising tone and the dui dropped abruptly, building like

my confidence and then collapsing all at once. And it bothered me all

the more because I knew that Teacher Liao was only telling the truth:

Virtually everything I did with the language was budui. I was an adult,

and as an adult I should be able to accept criticism where it was needed. But that wasn’t the American way; I was accustomed to having my

ego soothed; I wanted to be praised for my effort. I didn’t mind criticism as long as it was candy-coated. I was caught in the same trap that

I had heard about from some of my Chinese-American friends, who

as children went to school and became accustomed to the American

system of gentle correction, only to return home and hear their

Chinese-minded parents say, simply, budui.That single B on the report

card matters much more that the string of A’s that surrounds it. Keep

working; you haven’t achieved anything yet.

And so I studied. I was frustrated but I was also stubborn; I was determined to show Teacher Liao that I was dui. Virtually all of my spare

time went to studying Chinese, and the stack of flashcards on my desk

grew rapidly. By the first week in November I knew 300 characters. I

had no clear idea what I was shooting for—I had a vague goal of reading a newspaper, which would require between two and three thousand. But mostly I knew that I needed more knowledge than I had,

and I needed it quickly.

In the mornings I ran to the summit of Raise the Flag Mountain,

charging hard up the steps, my lungs burning high above the Yangtze.

The effort was satisfying—it was challenging but uncomplicated, and
Standing Out in the Crowd

at the finish I could look down on the city and see where I had gone.

It was different from the work of learning Chinese, which had no clear

endpoint and gave me more frustration than satisfaction.

There was a skill to running, and in some ways it was the only skill I had

in Fuling. Everybody else seemed to have found something that he or she

was good at:The owner of the dumpling restaurant made dumplings, the

shoeshine woman shined shoes, the stick-stick soldiers carried loads on

their leather shoulders. It was less clear what my purpose was—I was a

teacher, and that job was satisfying and clearly defined, but it disappeared

once I left campus. Most people in town only saw my failures, the

inevitable misunderstandings and botched conversations.

And they always watched carefully. The attention was so intense that

in public I often became clumsily self-conscious, which was exacerbated by my suddenly becoming bigger than average. In America I was

considered small at five feet nine inches, but now for the first time in

my life I stood out in crowds. I bumped my head on bus doorways; I

squeezed awkwardly behind miniature restaurant tables. I was like

Alice in Wonderland, eating the currant-seed cakes and finding her

world turned upside down.

Mostly I longed to find something that I could do well.This was part

of why the simple routines of city life fascinated me; I could watch a

stick-stick soldier or a restaurant cook with incredible intensity, simply because these people were good at what they did. There was a

touch of voyeurism in my attention, at least in the sense that I watched

the people work with all the voyeur’s impotent envy.There were many

days when I would have liked nothing more than to have had a simple skill that I could do over and over again, as long as I did it well.

Running was repetitive in this way, and it was also an escape. If I ran

on the roads, cars honked at me, people laughed and shouted, and

sometimes a young man would try to impress his friends by chasing

after me. But crowds couldn’t gather around, and none of the young

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V OCABULARY

Voyeurism: [voy-ER-ihz-em] Watching

other people, especially secretly

58 Uncommon Journeys
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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 59

men followed for long. I ran alone, and in a crowded country that sort

of solitude was worth something. There was nobody in the city who

could catch me.

Usually I ran in the hills behind campus, following the small roads and

footpaths that wound around Raise the Flag Mountain. I ran past old

Daoist shrines, and atop the narrow walls of the rice paddies, and I followed the stone steps that led to the mountain’s summit. I liked running past the ancient stone tombs that overlooked the rivers, and I

liked seeing the peasants at work. On my runs I watched them harvest

the rice crop, and thresh the yellow stalks, and I saw them plant the

winter wheat and tend their vegetables. I first learned the agricultural

patterns by watching the workers as I ran, and I studied the shape of

the mountain by feeling it beneath my legs.

The peasants found it strange that I ran in the hills, and they always

stared when I charged past, but they never shouted or laughed. As a

rule they were the most polite people you could ever hope to meet,

and in any case they had more important things to do with their energy than scream at a waiguoren. And perhaps they had an innate respect

for physical effort, even when they didn’t see the point.

The air in the countryside was often bad, because the Yangtze winds

blew the city’s pollution across the Wu River, and I knew that running

did my health more harm than good. But it kept my mind steady,

because the fields were quiet and peaceful and the activity felt the

same as it always had. That old well-known feeling—the catch in my

chest, the strain in my legs—connected all the places where I had

lived, Missouri and Princeton and Oxford and Fuling. While I ran

through the hills, my thoughts swung fluidly between these times and

places; I remembered running along the old Missouri-Kansas-Texas

railroad pathway, and I recalled the rapeseed blooming gold on Boar’s

Hill, and the old shaded bridge of Prettybrook. As the months slipped

past I realized that even these Sichuan hills, with their strange tombs

and terraces, were starting to feel like home.
Standing Out in the Crowd

But still the signs on the way to Raise the Flag Mountain were foreign, and even as they slowly became familiar they reminded me how

far I still had to go:

During that semester there was a volatility to the written language; it

constantly shifted in my eyes, and each day the shapes became something other than what they had been before. Spoken Chinese was also

starting to settle in my ears, and soon I could make simple conversation with the owners of the restaurants where I ate. The same slow

shift was also happening with regard to my tutors, who finally started

to change from tone machines into real people.

As this happened, I began to sense an edge to Teacher Liao that I

couldn’t quite figure out. It wasn’t simply her tendency to say budui;

she seemed slightly uncomfortable around both Adam and me, and

there were moments where I almost thought she disliked us (which,

given that we didn’t pay her enough, would have been understandable). Later, I would come to recognize other reasons for this discomfort, but during that first semester I only sensed that there were complications in our relationship.

* * * 

... Classes were simpler with Teacher Kong, who alternated weeks with

Teacher Liao. He was slightly less inclined to say budui, partly because

he had a lazy streak, but also because the struggles of that semester

were slowly teaching us to recognize each other as people. Eventually

he would become my first real Chinese friend—the first friend who

Build Culture, New Give Birth

Population Increase, Society

Education Is a Powerful Country’s

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V OCABULARY

Propaganda: Ideas or information spread

specifically to promote one idea or point of

view exclusively or to discredit another one

Trite: Unoriginal, stale

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saw me strictly in Chinese. And even in those early months, before we

developed a true friendship, I could see his interest growing. He sometimes asked me about America, within the limits of my vocabulary, and

I sensed there were many questions he would ask once he had the

chance. Certainly I had a few of my own that were waiting for the language to catch up with my thoughts.

We had classes in my dining room, where the morning light was warm

after the sun rose above the shoulder of Raise the Flag Mountain.We

drank tea while we studied—jasmine flower tea, the tiny dried petals

unfolding like blooming lilies on the surface of the hot water. Before

he drank, Teacher Kong blew softly over the cup, so the loose leaves

and flowers floated to the far side, and this was something else I

learned in those classes. If he sipped a leaf by mistake, he turned and

spat lightly on the floor. I learned that, too—I liked living in a cadre’s

apartment and still being able to spit on the floor.

* * * 

... [One day] I came back from a run and realized that the sign in the

center of campus had become completely intelligible. This was a

moment I had always looked forward to—from the beginning, I had

seen that string of characters as a benchmark, and I traced my progress

in the way those words became meaningful.And one day all of it finally made sense:

Teaching Educates the People,

Administration Educates the People,

Service Educates the People,

Environment Educates the People

I stopped and took a long look. I read the sign again, waiting for the

sense of achievement. But nothing was there—it was simply propaganda, the same sort of trite phrase that could be found in the students’

textbooks or on billboards all across the city. I would react the same
Standing Out in the Crowd

way when the other messages on the way to Raise the Flag Mountain

came into focus:

Construct a Spiritual Civilization,

Replace the Old Concept of Giving Birth

Controlling Population Growth 

Promotes Social Development

Education Is the Foundation 

Upon Which a Powerful Nation Is Built

All of it was the same old cant. Every time one of the signs became

intelligible, I felt very little of the satisfaction that I had once imagined. Instead I heard Teacher Liao’s voice in my head: Read the next

one. You haven’t achieved anything yet. And so I kept writing the 

characters over and over again at my desk, gazing out my window at

the city.

* * *

... On the second day of January, the city of Fuling held a road race in

the center of town. It was the Twenty-second Annual Long Race to

Welcome Spring, and all of the city’s schools and danwei, or work

units, competed against each other. Two weeks before the race, Dean

Fu asked if I would run on the college team....

“You must understand,” he said, smiling uncomfortably.“There will be

many peasants and uneducated people. They don’t know anything

about sportsmanship, and perhaps some of them will be rough.Also, in

21 years they have never had a foreigner in the long race. They welcome you to participate, but I think it will be different from in

America.”

I could see that Dean Fu thought it would be simpler if I didn’t run,

and I knew he was right.... All of the difficult parts of my life were

already public; there wasn’t any reason to seek out more crowds.

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But there are no referees in running, and it is not a contact sport.

There would be crowds but I figured that at least I would be moving.

It couldn’t be much different from a race in America—and even if it

was, I was curious to see what it was like, at least once. I told Dean Fu

that I wanted to participate.

He explained that every runner had to have a physical exam, and a

week before the race I visited a doctor in the college infirmary. It was

a low, tile-roofed building next to the croquet court, one of the old

structures on campus that remained from the pre-Cultural Revolution

days when the college had been a high school.

The doctor checked my pulse and blood pressure. After each test he

smiled and told me that I was very healthy, and I thanked him. Then

he led me to a side room where a dirty white box-shaped instrument

hung on the wall. Dean Fu said, “Now you will have a chest X-ray.”

I stopped at the entrance of the room. “I don’t want to have a chest

X-ray,” I said.

“It’s no problem,” said Dean Fu, smiling. “It’s very safe.”

“I don’t want a chest X-ray,” I said again, and I looked at the dirty box

and thought: Especially I don’t want this chest X-ray. “Why is it necessary?”

“Everybody in the race must have one.To make sure they are healthy.”

“Everybody?” I asked, and he nodded. I asked how many people would

be running.

“More than two thousand and five hundred.”

“And all of them must have a chest X-ray before they can run?”

“Yes,” he said. “That is the rule. It is very safe.”

It struck me as a ludicrous notion—that a city with a per capita

income of about 40 American dollars a month would require a chest

V OCABULAR Y

Cant: meaningless talk or communication

63
Standing Out in the Crowd

X-ray from each of the 2,500 participants in a four-kilometer road

race. I had my suspicions about what was really happening: Some

administrator in the college was probably worried about me dropping

dead in the middle of the race, and they wanted to cover their tracks.

It was always Dean Fu’s job to convey such commands to the

waiguoren, and occasionally he served as a filter as much as a translator.

It was a lousy job and I always felt sorry for him when I sensed that

this was happening, but there was nothing to do about it except to find

a tactful solution.

We were at an impasse. Dean Fu could see that I was serious about

refusing to have an X-ray, and I knew that he couldn’t simply back

down and say that the procedure wasn’t in fact required. We stood

there for a moment, the doctor watching expectantly. Finally I told

Dean Fu that I would go to my apartment and call the Peace Corps

office in Chengdu.

I tried to call but the medical officer wasn’t in. I sat in my bedroom

for 10 minutes, reading a book, and then I returned to the infirmary.

“I’m very sorry,” I said, “but the Peace Corps told me I can’t have a

chest X-ray. I don’t know what we can do about this.”

“It’s no problem,” Dean Fu said. “I just talked to some of the people

in charge of the race, and they said it is fine if you do not have an

X-ray.They will give you an exception because you are a foreigner.”

I thanked him and apologized for the hassle, and he apologized back.

Both of us shook the doctor’s hand. He walked us to the door smiling

and waving as we left.

There was no scheduled time for the race to start.The runners assembled in a disorderly mob at the starting area, and at nine o’clock the

cadres began their speeches. The race would begin whenever the

speeches finished, and the officials droned on and on while the starting line repeatedly broke and surged. A small section would make a

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false start and the rest of the crowd would react, and then the police

would call everybody back. I tried to jog in place to stay warm, fighting with my elbows to keep position.

The starting line was spread across a massive construction site where a

new public park was being built.The entire left side of the line headed directly toward a six-foot drop—a small, crumbling cliff. On the far

right was a narrow dirt road that provided the only safe exit for the

runners, but it was so close to the start—less than 40 yards—that it

would be impossible for the crowd to funnel in such a short distance.

And even for the runners who did make it safely, the course immediately took a 90-degree turn that would claim more victims.

Without question it was the most dangerous starting arrangement I

had ever seen in a lifetime of racing. I was tempted to pull out, partly

for my safety but mostly because I wanted to be able to watch the disaster from the perspective of a spectator. Rob Schmitz, another Peace

Corps Volunteer, was visiting us that week, and he and Adam took

their cameras and gleefully waited across the road.

The college team had staked out a spot on the right side of the line,

directly in front of the exit. Most of them were physical education 

students, and usually we were the best team in the race, along with 

the Taiji medicine factory. All of us squeezed together, waiting for 

the start. It was a cool morning and the winter smog hung low over

the city.

Five minutes passed, then 10. The cadres kept talking, and the police

were having trouble holding everybody back. Either they were going

to start the race or it was going to start itself, and finally one of the

cadres must have realized this. He fired the gun.

It was China. Chaos, noise, adrenaline; fear and surprise and excitement; a mass of bodies, everybody yelling, horns sounding, the earth

pounding; all of us running madly, arms outstretched to clear room;

legs pumping, dashing, sprinting, trying to keep the back kick low to
Standing Out in the Crowd

avoid being tripped; some runners shouting as they stumbled over the

cliff, others skidding around the first turn, dodging the few unfortunate ones who fell and skidded below the rush of legs.The seconds slid

past, each moment an eternity of concentration and effort. We flew

down the street in a wild, charging mob, hit the second turn, and

headed west on Xinghua Road.

The course began to climb uphill. The scene was still shaky with

adrenaline but I realized that the eternity of the start was over, and that

I was no longer a part of the starting mob. After the beginning of a

race there is always that moment of disengagement, when the euphoria of being part of something massive is over and you realize that you

are alone, and you have your own race to run.

I slowed down. Suddenly I felt tired; the adrenaline evaporated and

everything slipped into focus. I checked myself—no scrapes, no bruises; no memory of exactly how I made it safely off the line. I glanced

around me. I was in the lead pack, a group of perhaps 50, and the others were also settling in after the rush of the start. We were climbing

steadily now and the pace was slowing. I felt my legs come back to me,

the numb excitement replaced by the rhythm of a long, hard run—

steady steady steady steady, up on my toes as the hill steepened. Police

cars rolled their lights in front of the pack. Far ahead, groups of school

kids were trying to cheat, jumping into the race with a lead of a hundred yards, but the cops pulled them out as they drove past.

The entire first half was uphill, and by the time I took the lead, perhaps two minutes into the race, I could see that the others were finished. It was a varied field—college students and danwei workers and a

few athletes who clearly could have been good runners with more

training—but all of them were done. Quickly I slipped ahead.

To lead any big race is a strange feeling. People speak of the loneliness

of running, but I’ve always felt that the sport is lonely only in the

races, and especially when the pack breaks and you find yourself alone

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in front. In the pack you usually feel some solidarity with the other

athletes, even though you are still competing, but in front there are no

illusions.That’s when the race becomes a chase—one man against the

rest of the field—and I’ve always felt that this is the loneliest feeling in

the world. And it’s even lonelier when you are the only foreigner in a

field of more than 2,000, and all along the course spectators are calling out, “Waiguoren, waiguoren, waiguoren.” Out-of-country person,

out-of-country person, out-of-country person.

I looked back. Behind me I could see the rest of the field—an endless

stream of people, a black-haired mob. The main pace car had slowed

and I was following a few strides behind its flashing lights. I looked

back again, so I would remember the strangeness of the scene.The hill

was steep now, climbing toward the pointed tower of the Monument

to the Revolutionary Martyrs.The street was lined with spectators and

I could hear the wave of surprise as I passed; they were talking excitedly and exclaiming with amazement: “Waiguoren, waiguoren,

waiguoren.”

And I thought: Not today. If you’re looking for people who are out of

their country, out of place, out of step, out of shape, awkward, clumsy;

if that’s what you’re looking for, look back there. Look for the ones

who started too fast, or the men who have smoked too many

Magnificent Sound cigarettes, or the people who are wearing too

many clothes and are choking with heat and sweat. Don’t look at me—

I’ve done this for many years in many places, and always it has been

exactly the same.There are no referees, no language barriers, no complicated rules of etiquette. All you do is run.

By the turnaround I had more than 30 seconds on the next runner,

and I took it easy from there. The second half was all downhill, and

because it was an out-and-back course I passed the rest of the field.

The ones who weren’t too exhausted joined in the chorus:

“Waiguoren, waiguoren, waiguoren.” But it didn’t bother me a bit,

because for those four kilometers I felt completely at home.
Standing Out in the Crowd

For the victory I won two pairs of polyester sports uniforms, both too

small, with the characters for Fuling City inscribed proudly on the

chest. I also received a certificate testifying that “Comrade He Wei,”

my Chinese name, had won the Twenty-second Annual Long Race to

Welcome Spring. The race organizers awarded me 20 yuan, and the

college gave me five for participating on its team. They also gave me

one and a half yuan for undergoing the medical exam, which made

me wonder how much I could have made if I had agreed to the chest

X-ray.All told I cleared 261

/2 yuan, which paid for two weeks of noodle lunches.

I was on the local TV news for the following week, and the next day’s

paper featured a front-page story about the race.They reported that an

American teacher from Missouri named H. Essler had participated, and

there was a detailed description of the way I had warmed up before

the start. They reported the excitement of the college representatives

when I finished in first place, and they quoted one of the other top

finishers, a young man from the medicine factory who said, “If this

race had been right after my military training, I definitely would have

beaten that foreigner.”The end of the article read:

The competition also succeeded in establishing patriotism in sports.When

our reporter asked, “What are your thoughts about a waiguoren finishing first?” a Trade School student named Xu Chengbo said: “To have a

sports competition in a Chinese area and allow a waiguoren to take first

place, I feel very ashamed.This gives us a wake-up call: Our students and

adults need to improve the quality of their bodies, because if we improve

our strength, we can be victorious!”... A Southwest Military School

teacher said: “The waiguoren took the initiative, and that sort of spirit

deserves to be studied. Only if we plunge into developing our bodies, and

have more diligent and scientific training, will we see the day when we

achieve the championship!”

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It wasn’t exactly the reaction I had hoped for, although I wasn’t surprised.There was a great deal of patriotism in Fuling, and sports always

made these feelings particularly intense. ... Sometimes I wondered if it

had been a bad idea to run in the race.A few of my Peace Corps friends

thought that at least I shouldn’t have tried to win. But I liked running

races hard, just like many others in the competition, and I saw no reason to treat the people in Fuling like children. I wanted them to know

that waiguoren were living in their city, and I wanted them to see that

despite all my struggles with the language, there was at least one thing

I could do well. If they reacted with shame, that was unfortunate, but

perhaps when they grew to know me better it would be different. I figured it was a good sign that my certificate read, “Comrade He Wei.”

A few days after the race, I had class with Teacher Liao, who beamed

when we started the lesson.

“I saw on the department message board that you won the long race

in Fuling!” she said. “I hadn’t heard—why didn’t you tell me?”

“It’s not important,” I said. “In fact, I didn’t run very fast at all.”

“Yes, you did!” she said, doubly pleased by my false modesty, which

followed the appropriate Chinese custom. “That’s a very big race—in

all of Fuling City, you are the fastest person!”

“There are probably better athletes who didn’t participate,” I said.

“And you know,Wang Junxia is still faster than me.”

Wang Junxia was the Chinese woman distance runner who had

recently won gold and silver medals in the Atlanta Olympics, and this

reference made Teacher Liao even happier. She praised me again, and

finally we settled down to a chapter on how to say goodbye. Either I

did unusually well or she was in a particularly forgiving mood; on that

day she hardly said budui at all.
Standing Out in the Crowd

R EADING AND R ESPONDING TO

‘ R UNNING ’ (F ROM R IVER T OWN )

O VERVIEW

A BOUT THE A UTHOR

In 1994, two years after graduating from college, Peter Hessler traveled

to China for the first time. Fascinated by the country, he applied to the

Peace Corps in 1996 and asked to be assigned to China.

For two years he served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in the remote city

of Fuling, at the intersection of the Yangtze and Wu Rivers, in China’s

south-central Sichuan Province. Hessler and another Peace Corps

Volunteer, his fellow-teacher Adam Meier, were the first Americans to

live in Fuling since the 1949 Communist Revolution. Hessler taught

English and American literature to students at Fuling Teachers

College. Most of his students were from peasant homes, and after graduation, they planned to return to their hometowns to teach English in

rural middle schools.

As a Peace Corps Volunteer, Hessler kept a detailed journal of his

experiences, with the goal of writing a book about China.The resulting book, River Town:Two Years on the Yangtze, won the 2001 Kiriyama

Pacific Rim Book Prize for Non-Fiction and the Paul Cowan NonFiction Award from PeaceCorpsWriters.org in 2002. Hessler lives in

Beijing, where he writes for the Wall Street Journal, the New Yorker,

National Geographic, and other publications.

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70 Uncommon Journeys

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S TANDARDS

English Standards: 1, 2, 3, 6 (see page

187)

Social Studies Standards: I, IV, IX

(see page 188)

National Geography Standards: 4, 6,

9, 10, 12, 14 (see pages 189–190)

Enduring Understandings

• Learning the language of another culture

helps in understanding that culture and in

being accepted by the people.

• Cultures differ in their approaches to

teaching and learning.

• Achieving one’s goals takes persistence and

determination.

Essential Questions

• What factors affect how hard it is to learn

another language? 

• Is learning another language worth the

effort? Why, or why not?

• What does it feel like to be an outsider?

• What does it take “to belong”?

Materials

Photocopies of story, Resource Sheet 1

Assessment Tools

Class discussion, essays, news report, journals

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 71

A BOUT THE S TORY

“Running” is excerpted from Chapter Three of Peter Hessler’s memoir River Town: Two Years on the Yangtze. Hessler describes his experiences as a Peace Corps Volunteer from 1996 to 1998 in south-central

China. He discusses his adjustment to life in China as a Peace Corps

Volunteer and the challenges, in particular, of trying to understand and

learn Chinese. Hessler describes his relationship with his Chinese language tutors and his determination to learn despite his discomfort

with local teaching methods, which rely on criticism rather than

praise. Hessler also addresses his participation in the Annual Long Race

to Welcome Spring and how that challenge relates to his struggle to

learn the language.

Dean Fu, in the story, is identified earlier in the memoir as Dean Fu

Muyou, head of the English department at the college where Hessler

taught.

A BOUT THE S ETTING

China, the fourth-largest country in the world in area (after Russia,

Canada, and the United States) has a population of close to 1.3 billion.

Beijing, the capital, has a population of more than 13 million; that is 5

million more than New York City and 9 million more than Los

Angeles.

China is divided into 23 administrative provinces. It has one of the

world’s longest rivers, the Yangtze, and it shares the world’s highest

mountain range—the Himalayas—of which Mount Everest is a part.

The climate ranges from desert to tropical to subarctic.

With one of the world’s oldest civilizations, China has a written history of more than 4,000 years. The country has had a long history of

being wary of foreigners—and for much of its history it has been iso-
Standing Out in the Crowd

lated from the outside world.To this day, the Chinese

term for foreigner, waiguoren, has negative connotations in many places.

In 1993, the first Peace Corps Volunteers arrived in

China to assist in a teacher-training project.

Volunteers have taught at more than two dozen colleges and institutions across southwestern China.The

primary goal of the English education project is to

teach English to students at teacher-training colleges, who plan to become English teachers themselves upon graduation. To learn more about the

work of Peace Corps Volunteers in China, go to the

country-information section of the Peace Corps

website at www.peacecorps.gov.

A BOUT THE C HINESE L ANGU A G E

A major portion of “Running” addresses how difficult it was for Hessler to learn Chinese—and his

dogged determination to conquer the task. Students

will better appreciate the author’s challenge if they

understand the complexity of written and spoken

Chinese.

The Chinese language encompasses seven major

dialects. At the beginning of the 20th century,

Mandarin Chinese, spoken in Beijing and its adjacent

provinces, was mandated by the government to be

China’s official spoken language. Seventy percent of

China’s population speaks Mandarin Chinese. Other

dialects, such as Cantonese and Shanghainese, are

completely different spoken languages. Mandarin

and Cantonese are not mutually intelligible. The

province of Sichuan, where Hessler lived, has its own

dialect, Sichuanese, which was initially problematic

for Hessler, since he had been trained in Mandarin

Chinese.

Even without the issue of dialects, spoken Chinese is

one of the most difficult languages for Westerners to

learn. It is a tonal language, in which the tonal

inflection of a word changes its meaning. Spoken

Mandarin Chinese has four common tones, which

can be applied to the same general sound to effect

four different words and meanings.

Chinese also is difficult for Westerners because the

written language is based not on an alphabet but on

symbols, called characters.The Chinese language has

more than 50,000 characters, most of which are

known only to scholars. However, even reading a

newspaper or a book requires a person to know

between 3,000 and 5,000 characters.

About learning Chinese, Hessler wrote: “In good

conscience I could not live there for two years and

not learn how to speak Chinese. To me, this was as

important as fulfilling my obligations as a teacher.”

L ESSON 1

P URPOSE

• To examine the rigors involved in learning

another language—particularly one as notoriously difficult as Chinese

• To compare aspects of Chinese culture, such as

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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 73

teaching style and treatment of foreigners, with

those in the United States

1. Have students skim the essay, recognizing that

there are several sets of Chinese characters. Ask

the students why they think the sets change in

composition [from mostly Chinese characters to

English words] through the course of the essay.

Then have the class take Hessler’s selection home

to read overnight to be ready to work on it the

next day. Although the story is the longest selection in this volume, students will profit from

reading the piece straight through in order to

balance the section on learning the language

with the section on running.

2. Have students review the linguistic areas of China

described by Hessler (see pages 49–51), and then

ask one or two volunteers to come to a map at the

front of the room to identify the areas of China in

which Mandarin, Sechuan, and Shanghainese are

spoken. On page 50, the author states that lack of

development in road and rail transportation had

resulted in vast regional differences in dialect. Ask

students why that would be so. Even without the

limitations imposed by rudimentary transportation, dialects can be remarkably distinct between

adjacent, small regions. Can students identify such

areas in the United States? [In New England, the

Maine accent differs from that in New

Hampshire, which, in turn, is distinct from dialects

in Massachusetts. Even little Rhode Island has

regional dialects distinct from those in neighboring states.]

3. Ask students what problems Hessler encountered

in studying Chinese in Fuling. [The language has

characters instead of an alphabet; the language is

tonal; dialects differ from place to place; the

teachers’ philosophies were unsympathetic and

unrewarding; local citizens made fun of his

efforts in speaking the language.]

4. Ask why Hessler worked so diligently to learn

the language, when he could get by with English

and the little Chinese he already knew when he

arrived. What are the author’s incentives for

learning the language?

5. What are the students’ own experiences in learning a second or third language? How were their

motivations similar to, or different from,

Hessler’s? Did their experience in being taught

the language resemble Hessler’s?

6. In class discussion, compare Hessler’s experience

learning Chinese with what the students imagine it

must be like learning English. Students in your class

from other cultures, who might actually be learning

English as a second language, might add significantly to this discussion.What do students think might

be the more difficult aspects of learning English?

[Point out that, unlike English, Chinese is tonal and

has characters rather than the English alphabet, and

languages such as French, German, and Spanish

have endings and forms that distinguish genders.

Although English does not have those features, it is

particularly difficult because it is often not pronounced as it is spelled, and similar spellings do not

necessarily denote similar pronunciations. As an
Standing Out in the Crowd

example, show students how “-ough” is pronounced

differently in the words bough, cough, dough,

rough, through, and hiccough.Also, there is a clever

poem titled “The Chaos,” by Gerard Nolst Trenité,

which illustrates extensively the vagaries of English

pronunciation.The poem, which is likely to be popular among students, is available on the Web and can

be located easily by searching for the alternate title

“English Is Tough Stuff.”]

7. If you know a speaker of Chinese or speak

Chinese yourself, introduce a lesson on Chinese

language, especially tones and written characters.

A speaker of Chinese could demonstrate tones

and teach a few essential words.

8. Discuss with students how the local Chinese on

the street treat the waiguoren, and why they act so

rudely—from Hessler’s point of view. [Possibly

because they have never seen a Westerner, and

certainly a Westerner who speaks Chinese.] Do

students think the people on the street consider

their own behavior rude? How did Hessler

respond to the pointing and shouting? How do

the students think they themselves might have

responded to being pointed at and shouted at?

9. Ask students how Hessler’s language teachers—

Teacher Liao and Teacher Kong—differed from

teachers he might have had in America. Do students think the Chinese teachers’ approach would

work in the United States? Why, or why not? 

L ESSON 2

P URPOSE

To examine how the author’s penchant for running featured in his adjustment to the culture of

Fuling and in his learning of the Chinese language

1. Identify students in the class who enjoy running

as a sport or pastime, including any on the school

track team.Ask them to think about and explain

to the rest of the class why they run—the incentives, the sacrifices, the euphoria, the pain, the

injuries, the rewards. See if you can elicit from

the class some of the aspects of running that

Hessler experienced: the personal satisfaction,

the bolstering of self-confidence, the time for

reflection, the privacy from the hubbub of daily

routines, the sweetness of victory.

2. Ask the class what obstacles to racing Hessler

faced. [Standing out in the crowd; dangers of

large crowds on an unsafe course; consequences

of possibly beating all the local competitors; the 

X-ray.] How does he address each issue?

3. How did the opening of the race strike the

author? How was it different from those he had

experienced in the United States? Why does he

say about the start, “It was China”?

4. Why does the newspaper article about the race

suggest that patriotism is an element of the competition? Do students think this is something

peculiar to Chinese culture or does patriotism

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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 75

feature in other sports? If students think that

patriotism is common in sports, can they name

sports and events in which patriotism has played

a large role? [World Cup soccer; America’s Cup

sailing competition; Olympic events.]

5. Does the class think Hessler should have run the

race? Should he have won, knowing how important winning was to the Chinese? Ask students to

explain their opinions. What would the students

have done in Hessler’s place?

6. Have students write a short essay about a time

they participated in a contest—any contest, for

example, art, chess, writing, sports, spelling,

math. Ask them to describe their motives; difficulties they had to overcome, including nervousness; their feelings before or during the competition; whether they won or lost; what difference,

if any, the outcome made in their life.

7. Ask the class what difference there was for

Hessler between his daily runs and the organized

race in which he participated—on a personal

level, in the community, in his relationship with

Teacher Liao.

8. Much of the chapter called “Running” is actually devoted to the author’s struggle to learn the

Chinese language. Ask students to explain why

Hessler chose to combine running and the challenge of studying the local language in the same

chapter. What did running and studying have to

do with each other for the author?

L ESSON 3

P URPOSE

To examine the author’s writing style and techniques to learn some effective strategies for

description and for conveying mood

1. Have students take Hessler’s selection home and

study it in preparation for the next day’s class.

For homework, ask the students

• To look for specific ways in which the author

describes details of life in Fuling. Suggest that

among other things to look for are how Hessler

conveyed an idea of how dirty the air was and

how noisy the automobile traffic was.

• To identify particular ways in which the author

measured progress in learning the language.

[The propaganda signs slowly became comprehensible; his teachers began to change their

attitude toward him; the characters on his pages

took on meaning; his stack of flashcards grew

ever thicker.] 

• To note how the author conveys his eventual

adjustment to life in Fuling. [The scenes along 

his running route became familiar; he stopped

noticing pollution and noise; he became

friends with Teacher Kong.]

• To find where the author foreshadows his victory

in the race. [On page 59, he writes: “There was

nobody in the city who could catch me.”]
Standing Out in the Crowd

2. In a class discussion, ask students to offer observations about how Hessler achieved his vivid

description of events and the atmosphere in

Fuling. Note the students’ points on the board.

Then have students write an essay of one page or

less, incorporating quantitative and qualitative

detail of observation in the style of Hessler.

Although the class should be encouraged to write

about whatever comes to mind, you might prompt

students who have a hard time starting with the

following topics: My Most Uncomfortable Day;

Adjusting Wasn’t Easy; Wow, Did I Ever Feel

Different; The Day Everything Felt New. Ask

them to limit their choice of topics to one they

will be comfortable sharing with the class.

Allow students to trade papers and critique each

other constructively before polishing their

efforts. Have a few volunteers read their essays to

the class, and post the essays on a bulletin board

for students to read at their leisure.

L ESSON 4

P URPOSE

To practice thinking about an issue from different perspectives

1. Begin by reviewing with the class their responses

to the questions they have addressed previously:

• Should Hessler have run the race? 

• Would there have been an advantage in letting

a Chinese person win? 

• What would you have done in the race in

Hessler’s place?

• How did Hessler feel about winning the race?

• How did the Chinese press feel about Hessler’s

victory? How did his teachers feel?

2. Point out to students that every story can be

interpreted from more than one perspective.Tell

them you would like them to practice thinking

about the story from an American person’s perspective and from a Chinese person’s perspective.

Ask students to act as newspaper reporters covering the story of Hessler’s race for the next day’s

edition of their local newspapers. But before distributing press cards (and thereby identifying for

students which perspective they will adopt), have

them fill out the pre-writing graphic organizer

on Resource Sheet 1, at right. In a class discussion, ask students for their ideas on first the

American perspective and then the Chinese perspective. During the discussion, ask students to

take notes in their graphic organizers in preparation for writing their individual articles. This

pre-writing activity should assist them when

they write their articles.

3. Randomly distribute copies of the press cards on

the next spread—one to a student, thereby identifying which students will adopt which perspective.

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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 77

R ESOURCE S HEET 1

P R E - W RITING G RAPHIC O RGANIZER

Important Things About the Race 

From an American Reporter’s

Perspective

Important Things About the Race 

From a Chinese Reporter’s

Perspective

Directions: Brainstorm ideas as a class and write notes below for an article.
Standing Out in the Crowd

4. Now ask the students to write up their articles

on their own, as reporters from either America

or China. As an aid, provide them with the

checklist, below right, of writing criteria to

incorporate in their compositions.

The articles will take some time to write.

Depending on how much time you have, you

may want to have students discuss their articles in

another class period to examine how the

American perspective compares with the

Chinese perspective and to obtain feedback for

revision and editing purposes.

5. Concluding Journal Activity. Ask students to

respond to the following prompts:

• What were Hessler’s specific goals in going to

China? [He states them early on.] How important do you think it is to set personal goals?

Why?

• How far would you be willing to go to achieve

your goals? As far as Hessler?

• What new perspective have you gained on life

or on the world as a result of reading

“Running”?

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

78 Uncommon Journeys

R UNNING ( CONTINUED )

PRESS CARD

Name:_______________________

Yangtze Gazette

PRESS CARD

Name:_______________________

The American Chronicle

C HECKLIST FOR W RITERS

O F A RTICLES A BOUT THE R ACE

The article has a lead sentence that captures the reader’s attention (for example, a

quote from one of the onlookers, a quote

from Hessler, or a startling statistic).

The article answers the questions: Who?

What? Where? When? Why? 

The article contains quotations from a

variety of people (for example, onlookers;

Hessler’s teachers; the mayor of Fuling;

Hessler’s roommate, Adam).

Language is simple and direct, not flowery.
U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 79

E XTENSION A CTIVITIES

1. Imagine that you are Hessler and write a letter

home to a friend explaining your life in China as

a Peace Corps Volunteer. Include both facts and

feelings.

2. Write a poem or song capturing the essence of

the story “Running.”

3. Working with a partner, create a script that can

be used to dramatize for the class one of the

events in “Running.”

4. Draw an 8-block cartoon depicting the events in

“Running.”

5. Service Learning

• Investigate the organizations in your community that help immigrants adjust to American

life.

• Check into the ways your school helps immigrants or new students feel accepted.What can

students do to help?

• Suggest that students join a walk or a run to

raise money for a charity of their choice.
Generations Apart

S OCCER U NTIL D USK

by Mark Brazaitis

Peace Corps Volunteer, Guatemala (1991–1993)

My father laughs when I tell him 

how in Santa Cruz Verapaz 

men quit work at noon, and after lunch 

play soccer until dusk.

My father is a reporter,

follows senators around,

sits in the White House press room;

the president calls him by name.

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

Uncommon Journeys
V OCABULAR Y

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

81 Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools

In 30 years, he has written thousands of stories,

small testaments to the lives of other men.

Before he divorced my mother,

before computers,

he would go afternoons into the den,

sit at his desk,

and type deep into the night.

I would fall asleep to the rhythmic thwack of keys,

my bedtime song.

From time to time he complained about working too hard,

spoke of wanting an alternative to 12-hour days.

In the months after the divorce, when our lives 

seemed to have been sliced open like fruits,

spilling our secret juices,

he saw Gandhi and thought of giving everything,

house and car and savings, to my mother.

Testaments: tributes; statements about

something’s worth

Gandhi: a 1982 film about the life of

Mohandas Gandhi, who used nonviolence to

bring about the independence of India.

Gandhi’s philosophy stressed service to others

and the elimination of the extremes of wealth

and poverty. Gandhi lived a simple life with

few material possessions.

(Continued on next page)
Generations Apart

When I tell my father about the men playing soccer,

he follows his laugh with a stern look,

as if to ask whether I think kicking off work after half a day 

and chasing a ball around a field 

is any way a man should spend his life.

I don’t argue; I never have.

Instead, I remember how I followed Pablo 

and his father one afternoon to the stadium,

sat in the concrete stands as the men huddled,

picked sides.

I could have played; I’d been invited.

But soccer had never been my game,

so I watched as the men ran up and down the field,

their shirts off, their backs lit up by the sun,

and listened to their curses and shouts 

as I would to a piece of exotic music,

strange sounds from another world.

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82 Uncommon Journeys

S OCCER U NTIL D USK ( CONTINUED )
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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 83

R EADING AND R ESPONDING TO

‘ S OCCER U NTIL D USK ’ 

O VERVIEW

A BOUT THE A UTHOR

Mark Brazaitis served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in

the small town of Santa Cruz Verapaz, Guatemala,

from 1991 to 1993. In his essay “‘Magic’ Pablo,”

Brazaitis described Santa Cruz Verapaz as a remote

farming community, lacking many of the conveniences of the urban capital, Guatemala City. (To read

“‘Magic’ Pablo” and accompanying lesson plans, see

the Peace Corps publication Voices From the Field on the

World Wise Schools website: www.peacecorps.gov

/wws/guides/voices.)

As a Peace Corps Volunteer, Brazaitis taught English

to high school students and trained local farmers in

the use of advanced agricultural techniques. The

author of the widely acclaimed The River of Lost

Voices: Stories From Guatemala, Brazaitis received the

1998 Iowa Short Fiction Award. He was a National

Endowment for the Arts Fellow, and his stories,

poems, and essays have appeared in the Sun, Notre

Dame Review, Atlanta Review, Western Humanities

Review, Beloit Fiction Journal, Shenandoah, and other

literary journals. His writing has also appeared in the

Washington Post and the Detroit Free Press. Brazaitis

teaches English at West Virginia University.

S TANDARDS

English Standards: 1,2 (see page 187)

Social Studies Standards: I, IV (see page 188)

National Geography Standard: 10 (see page 189)

Enduring Understanding

• The concept of time differs among cultures.

Essential Questions

• How does our culture influence the way we choose to spend time?

• Why do some people choose to work more than they have to? 

• What makes a well-balanced life?

• What can be learned from the way people in other cultures view

and spend time?

Note: This poem provides an apt comparison with the story “The

Meaning of Time” (see page 10). Both pieces explore how culture

influences the way people use time, and both provide contrasts

between life in the United States and in other cultures. Just as the

pace of life in Guinea is slow moving, so too is it in Santa Cruz

Verapaz, Guatemala—the setting of “Soccer Until Dusk.” Generally

speaking, in these cultures, taking enough time to greet people, to

talk with them, or to help them is considered more important than

rushing to be on time for a meeting or another event.And the efficient use of time, in general, is much less important there than in

many industrialized cultures.

Materials 

Photocopies of poem

Assessment Tools

Class discussions, journal entries, extended written responses to

the poem
Generations Apart

A BOUT THE P OEM

In “Soccer Until Dusk,” Brazaitis reflects on the stark differences

between the life his father chose and that of the men who gather after

lunch each day in Santa Cruz Verapaz to play soccer all afternoon.

Brazaitis describes his father as a White House reporter who finds it

difficult to comprehend the relaxed work ethic that exists in the small

Guatemalan village.The author compares his father’s ambitious career

with his own fond remembrance of the leisurely afternoon soccer

games he watched as a Peace Corps Volunteer.

A BOUT THE S ETTING

Guatemala is the most populous of the Central American countries.

Almost 14 million people live there in an area about the size of

Tennessee. Guatemala has coastlines on both the Pacific Ocean and the

Caribbean Sea.

More than half of Guatemalans are descendants of the Maya. Many are

of mixed Spanish and other European descent. Although many live in

rural areas, urbanization is steadily increasing as rural Guatemalans

seeking employment move into cities. Nearly 1.5 million live in the

capital, Guatemala City. Throughout the country, there is a contrast

between the old and the new. In the capital, home to major television

stations and newspapers, there are skyscrapers, supermarkets, and

streets crowded with cars and buses. In contrast, Santa Cruz Verapaz,

the rural town of 4,000 people where Brazaitis served as a Volunteer,

had few modern conveniences.

The Peace Corps program in Guatemala, which began in 1963, is one

of the agency’s oldest. Nearly 4,000 Volunteers have served in

Guatemala.Volunteers are focusing their efforts on helping rural communities move from subsistence to small-scale commercial agriculture,

manage and conserve natural resources, improve health and nutrition,

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84 Uncommon Journeys

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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 85

and increase off-farm incomes. To learn more about

the work of the Peace Corps in Guatemala, visit the

country-information section of the Peace Corps

website at www.peacecorps.gov.

L ESSON 1

P URPOSE

• To help interpret the meaning of the poem

“Soccer Until Dusk”

• To explore the influence of culture on how people use time 

1. A day or two before you address the poem,

videotape a segment from a national news program featuring a journalist reporting from

Washington, D.C., preferably from the White

House. Show the video clip in the classroom and

ask students how they think one would go about

getting a job similar to this reporter’s. Ask

whether they think they’d like a job like this.

2. Using the information from the overview, introduce the author, the poem, and the setting. Have

students locate Guatemala on a world map. If students have not heard of the Peace Corps, provide

background information from pages 8 and 9.

3. Have students read silently the first two pages of

the poem.Then read the poem aloud to the same

point. Discuss this section of the poem, addressing the following questions. Ask students to cite

evidence from the text to support their opinions.

• What are the positive aspects of the father’s job?

• What clues does the poem give about the effect

of a reporter’s job on the author’s parents’ marriage? On the father’s relationship with his son?

On the father himself? 

• Why does the father work such long hours? 

• How does Brazaitis view his father’s job? What

evidence do you see for your opinion?

• Who was Gandhi? 

• Why does the movie about Gandhi affect the

father? Do you think the father gave his possessions away as he considered doing?

4. Have students read the rest of the poem silently.

Then read it aloud to them, with cadence and

feeling. Have the class discuss this section of the

poem, using some or all of the following

prompts:

• Describe the soccer games that the men of

Guatemala play in the afternoons.

• Why does the father give Brazaitis “a stern

look” when Brazaitis tells him about the games? 

• Why does Brazaitis call his surroundings “another

world”? What world is he referring to?

• If students have read “The Meaning of Time” (see
Generations Apart

page 10), ask them how they think the culture of

Santa Cruz Verapaz, described by Brazaitis, compares to the culture of Guinea, described by

Kimberly Ross Camara.

• How do you think the men playing soccer

view time? 

5. Read aloud the following line from Kimberly Ross

Camara’s description of life in the United States

compared with life in Guinea.

In the U.S., life tends to be fast paced and always

changing.Also, we Americans generally put work before

play. Guinean customs and perspectives of the world

are almost the complete opposite of ours. Life is slow

moving and things rarely follow a set schedule.

Ask students if they can think of reasons some cultures are more task-oriented and work-driven than

others.Why do some people choose to work more

than they have to? In some cultures, do people have

a choice over how much time they spend working?

Do people struggling to emerge from poverty and

to provide for their families in the United States and

other cultures have a choice over how much time

they spend at work?

6. Journal Activity. Ask students to respond in their

journals to the following questions:

• In focusing on work the way Brazaitis’s father

does, what is gained? What is lost?

• In focusing on leisure time the way the men playing soccer do, what is gained? What is lost?

• What do you think Brazaitis wanted you to be

thinking about as he wrote this poem?

• How do you think he was feeling about his father?

About Guatemala? About the soccer players?

Have students compare their journal responses in

small groups. Then conduct a class discussion

focused on these questions.

7. Journal Activity. For homework, ask students to

select the two or three lines in the poem that had

the strongest impact on them and to describe in

their journals the thoughts, feelings, and questions

these lines evoked. Model to the class what you’d

like students to do by doing a “think-aloud”

demonstration for the class. For example, tell the

class you chose the lines, “I don’t argue; I never

have. / Instead, I remember how I followed Pablo /

And his father one afternoon to the stadium.”Then

say to the class something like this:

These lines make me wonder why Brazaitis doesn’t tell

his father he disagrees with him.They make me wonder

whether Brazaitis thinks his father will never change. I

wonder whether Brazaitis changed his attitude toward

work as a result of the time he spent in Guatemala.What

if his father had gone to Guatemala? I wonder if he would

have changed his attitude toward work.This makes me ask

myself: How do we know when we’ve worked hard

enough? How do we know when we’ve played enough? 

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S OCCER U NTIL D USK ( CONTINUED )
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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 87

L ESSON 2

P URPOSE

To explore the kinds of choices students will

make about their use of time

1. Begin by posing the following questions in class

and holding a discussion with the students.

• How would you define a workaholic? 

• Is Brazaitis’s father a workaholic? 

• Do you think workaholics exist in all cultures,

or is this an American phenomenon? How

would you go about finding out the answer to

this question?

• Why might someone choose to live his or her

life as a workaholic? 

• Do most Americans approve of people who

seem to devote themselves to work over all

else? Do you approve? If so, why? If not, why

not?

• Do you think the workers in Guatemala should

work longer hours? 

• Why do the Guatemalan men in the poem

choose to play soccer all afternoon? 

• Considering economic conditions that exist in

Guatemala (and other developing countries), do

you think these men have a choice about how

much time they spend at work? What role could

the unemployment rate in Guatemala play?

2. Ask the class to consider the statement: “We are

shaped by the values of the culture in which we

live.” Have the class discuss in what ways this

statement applies to the characters in Brazaitis’s

poem: the father; the soccer players; Brazaitis

himself. In what ways does the statement apply

to the students themselves?

3. Journal Activity. Ask students to free-write in

their journals for several minutes on the following topic:

What makes a well-balanced life?

4. Have students form groups of five or six. Provide

each group with a large piece of chart paper and

felt-tipped colored markers.Ask students to make

a pie chart in which they allocate sections of the

pie to specific ways they think time might be

spent for a well-balanced life. To get started, you

can provide the students with this list: work, play,

friendships, family life, physical fitness, service to

others, self-improvement, relaxation, religion.

• Before they begin drawing their pie charts, ask

students to imagine that they are adults 15

years in the future. Have students debate with

their group members the percentage of adult

time that might be allocated to some of the

items for a well-balanced life. Ask students to

ensure they have reasons to support their

choices.

• Point out that since it may be difficult to reach

agreement, they should try to work through

their differences through both careful listening
Generations Apart

and open-minded discussion. Assign group

members roles, so that the discussion is not

dominated by one or two vocal people. Roles

can be discussion facilitator, mediator, summarizer, recorder, reporter.

When the groups have finished their charts, ask

them to show their results to the rest of the class,

explaining the reasoning behind their choices.

E XTENSION A CTIVITIES

1. Ask students to think about a person they know

who has a full-time job. This can be someone

they know personally or someone they have

learned about through the media. Have them list

10 significant details about the person and the

person’s job.Then have them write a poem about

that person, using “Soccer Until Dusk” as a

model.

2. Students can learn more about Brazaitis’s experience in Guatemala by reading his short story

“‘Magic’ Pablo” in the Peace Corps publication

Voices From the Field.You can find this story and the

lesson plans based on it at www.peacecorps

.gov/wws/guides/voices. After students have read

“‘Magic’ Pablo,” ask them to describe what more

they have learned about the culture of

Guatemala. What more do they know about the

author? Do they have more thoughts as to why

the author might have chosen to write “Soccer

Until Dusk”? 

3. Use this poem as a starter for a research paper on

future careers. The students should understand

how the choice of a career affects other aspects

of life. As part of their research, ask students to

consider these questions:

• What is most important to me? 

• What will make me happiest in life?

• What personal values will influence my career

choice?

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88 Uncommon Journeys

S OCCER U NTIL D USK ( CONTINUED )
U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools

H ELP ! M Y F ATHER I S C OMING ! 

by Jim Toner

Peace Corps Volunteer, Sri Lanka (1989–1991)

(Excerpted from Chapter One in Serendib)

I didn’t invite him.

The idea was all my father’s, my 74-year-old father who had never

been outside America and who suddenly thought that Sri Lanka,

where I was a Peace Corps Volunteer, would be a jolly place to visit.

He didn’t know where it was, though he’d heard of its former name,

Ceylon. He didn’t know about the hepatitis and typhoid shots he’d

have to get. And he certainly didn’t know [about] its two civil wars.

“You’re coming?” I asked him over the phone. “Are you kidding?”

“Kidding? Sounds like a real adventure to me. Monkeys, parrots, all

those monk fellows wandering around. Malone, he’s been there. He

tells me there’s elephants strolling the boulevards like shoppers. Say

Jimmy, should I bring a tie?”

“Dad, maybe you ought to—”

“And cobras! No cobras here in Cleveland, Jimmy. Now Malone, he

tells me to bring over my Irish flute, conjure those

little buggers right out of their holes. How

about my Hush Puppies? Think I’ll be needing them, or should I just go with the

wingtips? I’m figuring a tie doesn’t take up

much space and well, whadya think, Jimmy?”

My wife, Cindy, sitting next to me in the

Peace Corps office in the capital city of

Colombo, jumped up and clapped. “He’s

coming? He’s really coming?”
Generations Apart

I held my hand over the receiver and told her again that I thought the

idea was trouble, big trouble. “He’s old and he hates heat, and, God,

what could I even say to the guy for—”

“Jimmy? Jimmy, are you still there? Listen, I know the Hush Puppies

may not be the most practical choice. But they sure are comfortable as

slippers, and my bunions, jeez, they’re acting up these days, and so ...”

And on he went. But I was barely listening. My head was filled with

the preposterous image of my father on Sri Lankan soil. I reminded

him about how genuinely bleak and violent this place really was: Sure,

Dad, come on over and see two civil wars up close. Go get those

typhoid shots and then come face-to-face with the malaria and the

rabid dogs, the buses without brakes, the suffocating tropical heat.

There are wooden beds waiting for your bony hips, Dad, and no

English, and no toilet paper, and no forks—but enough snakes to fill

up your nightmares. So come. Come where the cockroach is king.

Come spend 700 uninterrupted hours with the last of your seven kids,

the one you vaguely know and who vaguely knows you. For the first

time in your life, leave America. Come, Dad. Come to the other side

of the planet.

“Dad, I’m just a bit worried—”

“Jimmy, we’ve all got our problems. Jeesh, I’m driving your mother

nuts sitting around here all day, and with all this retirement money I

thought about Florida. Florida, Sri Lanka—it doesn’t matter to your

mother. She’s just tickled pink to be getting me out of her hair for a bit.”

“Save me, Jimmy. Save me now.” It was my mom.

“Hi, Mom. How’s life in Cleveland?”

“Jimmy, your father’s driving me nuts. Get this: He’s starting to vacuum. Can you imagine your father with a vacuum? And last night, get

this: He decides to cook us dinner. First time in his life. So what does

the nut make? Tomato soup. Straight from a can.”

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H ELP ! M Y F ATHER I S C OMING ! ( CONTINUED )
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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 91

“With crackers,” my dad said. “Cheese flavored.”

“Thinks he’s a chef now, the royal nut.Time to get him out of my hair

before we both get shipped to the loony bin.”

My dad said, “Now listen, don’t you let me upset your life over there.

You just keep on working and ... Hey, what is it you kids do over

there, anyhow?”

I rolled my eyes. For the hundredth time over the course of the past

two years I repeated, “Teachers, Dad.We’re teachers!”

“Jimmy, that’ll be some kind of a treat to see you kids up in a classroom. Say, you folks got computers over there? I understand they’re all

the rage these days.”

“Computers? Dad, we don’t even have books or enough desks, and the

goats keep eating the chalk. And most of the time the schools are shut

down, anyway—you know, that little inconvenience of a civil war.

You’ll be lucky to catch us in action at all.”

It was true. We had an official job title as Peace Corps Volunteers—

“English teachers” to Sri Lankan adults preparing to become teachers.

“Hey, Dad,” I said,“we’re really overjoyed you’re coming here”—Cindy

snorted at my lie—“but, you know, are you sure you’re up for all these

bugs and heat and all that war stuff I’ve told you about?”

“Aw, heck, Malone tells me—you know Malone, Gus Malone, fella

who works at the court? He’s been to that Sir Lanker place—”

“‘Sri,’ Dad. It’s ‘Sri Lanka.’ At least get that much straight.”

It was too late for me to deter him from coming to a place where he

really didn’t belong, a place too primitive and too hazardous for anyone’s father. His was a world of the microwaved potato and the sanitized toilet bowl, of leather recliners and automatic garage-door openers, of air conditioning and cruise control. But maybe, just maybe, he
Generations Apart

was tired of it all. Maybe he sensed that a lifetime of storm windows

and neon-blue bug zappers had kept him disconnected from nature

too long. Maybe in coming to Sri Lanka he was questioning whether

all those protections had been necessary after all.

In a few minutes my dad would step through that customs door and

be the responsibility of this teacher and rather dull boy for the next

700 hours. I turned that figure over in my head: seven hundred consecutive uninterrupted hours. That is a lot of time. I worried that if the

snakes and heat and intestinal worms didn’t get to him, then simple

boredom with me might do him in.

T H E V ISIT T O V I J A Y ’ S

by Jim Toner

(Excerpted from Chapter Six in Serendib)

The path to Vijay’s house was overrun with lemon grass as tall as our

eyes. My father and I thrashed through it, unable to see two feet ahead

of us until we reached a clearing.There we saw a Tamil family frozen

at the impossible sight of us, two tall, white, hairy, blue-eyed men. All

of them were crammed into two railroad boxcars called line houses.

The British had installed them a century ago to shelter the thousands

of southern Indians imported to pick tea.Today, the Sinhalese government did little to improve their situation. Jobs, roads, schools, houses,

medicine—the Tamil tea picker living on the sides of these steep hills

was sure to get nothing, especially during this heightened stage of civil

war. They were the shadow people of Sri Lanka, the poorest and the

least educated, the most isolated and the most ridiculed. Even the civil

war wasn’t interested in these ragged hills. In this and many ways, these

Tamils regarded themselves as invisible to the outside world, so that

whenever Cindy and I would greet them with wanacome (the Tamil

version of ayubowan), they’d be astonished that we had noticed them at

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92 Uncommon Journeys

H ELP ! M Y F ATHER I S C OMING ! ( CONTINUED )
V OCABULAR Y

Lemon grass: A coarse, tall grass that

smells like lemon and is often used in

Southeast Asian cooking

Tamil: [TAM-uhl] A member of Sri Lanka’s

largest minority ethnic group.Tamils make

up about 18 percent of the population.

Sinhalese: [sin-ha-LEEZ] A member of

the majority ethnic group of Sri Lanka.The

Sinhalese make up about 74 percent of the

population.

Wanacome: An important Tamil greeting in

Sri Lanka, which means “the god in me welcomes the god in you”

Ayubowan: An important Sinhalese greeting

Mesmerized: Awestruck; spellbound;

captivated

Skewer: To pierce with a long pin or object

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 93

all. I ached at their neglect, and I knew how much a greeting from my

dad would mean to them, bearing the multiple status of old and white

and male and American—plus he was a guest.

“Just try it, Dad. It’s easy: ‘Wanacome.’”

“No, no. Don’t start in with the language lessons now.”

“Just pretend you’re a barber back in Cleveland asking for a comb.

‘Hey, you want a comb?’ Get it? Want a comb, wanacome. Give it a try.”

“Listen, Jimmy. All I want to try now is a bed. I’m exhausted.”

The entire family stood mesmerized as we walked by. Out of respect

for us they stayed inside their boxcars, their blue-black faces filling the

windows and the open door.The only one left outside was a deformed

girl sitting on the ground, rocking herself in the shadow of a tree.

Suddenly a little boy sprinted out from the house toward us, offering

a mango, until his father snatched him up in midair and spanked him

all the way back inside.

From across the valley came the noon broadcast of the Muslim call to

prayer. My dad, walking backward to keep an eye on the Tamil family,

paid no attention to the music of the prayer. Instead he stepped square

into a mound of cow dung and, until I redirected him, was nearly

skewered on the horn of a water buffalo.A mongrel dog bared its fangs

at him. A woman who was scraping up the dung to use as fuel threw

a coconut shell at the dog, then bowed to my father and slid away into

the tall lemon grass. My dad tipped his Indians cap at her, but the grass

had already swallowed her up.

We saw Vijay’s five sisters before they saw us.They were sitting toboggan-style on their front porch, each searching for ticks in the other’s

hair. My dad knew what they were up to.

“Say, Jim,” he said, tightening his baseball cap, “aren’t those hair bugs

able to jump?”
Generations Apart

“Yeah, but just short distances.”

“That’s the only distance I care about right now. From Delaware to

Louisiana, I don’t care, but head to head, that’s suddenly my business.”

When we entered their yard all five girls darted inside.Vijay’s mother

then shuffled out to greet us, wiping her hands on the skirt of her sari.

Her five daughters followed closely behind, their eyes on the ground.

A couple of hens squawked out of the way and ran into the house. I

thought I heard a goat screeching inside one of the two outhouses.

Vijay emerged from indoors, smiling and enthusiastic, his arms spread

wide. “Jim and Mr. Jim’s father! Oh, this is the greatest of honors to

have you visit my house.”

We embraced. I could see up close that his 22-year-old face, black and

hairless, was already wrinkled from the burden of being the eldest son

in a family without a father. His family managed to live on his meager

salary as a teacher, earned from three months teaching Sinhala to Peace

Corps Volunteers, then nine months teaching every subject to tea

plantation children. Though talented and bright,Vijay could reach no

higher position in this country that based promotions more on race

than on merit.

He introduced us to his family. They were all on their knees, bent at

the waist, hands together in prayer. To them we were gods—not just

demigods, but manifestations of real gods.As Vijay went down the line

introducing his sisters to us, I instructed my dad to touch their heads

lightly with his fingertips. He whispered to me that he would do no

such thing.

“Dad, please. It’s their custom, and if you don’t they’ll see it as an insult.”

“Yeah, well, I’m in no hurry to make friends with those hair critters.

Besides, whatever happened to the handshake?”

His uneasiness was a revelation to me.The slippery art of the introducP EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

94 Uncommon Journeys

T H E V ISIT TO V IJAY ’ S ( CONTINUED )
V OCABULARY

Sari: A style of dress—a long piece of cloth

wrapped around the body and draped over

the shoulder—worn by women in India, Sri

Lanka, and Pakistan

Sinhala: [sin-HAH-luh] The official language of Sri Lanka, spoken by the Sinhalese

Tea plantation children: Children

whose parents work as tea-pickers (who earn

little money)

Demigod: A godlike person

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 95

tion, which he had mastered as a Cleveland judge, now confounded

him here in Sri Lanka. For years he had been the smooth one, and

when I accompanied him to political rallies or funerals (especially

funerals; the Irish can’t get enough of those funerals), he would meet

new people with grace and ease. He remembered names. He knew

how to touch elbows, how to tilt at the waist, how to lilt his voice.

“Clair! Clair Kennedy!” he’d say, his two hands gloving her one. “My

oh my, Clair, your brother and me went back to the days at Cathedral

Latin when ...” Eventually he’d get around to introducing me, panicked and blinking, overwhelmed as if Clair were delivering a baby on

the spot.To Clair, whose name I had forgotten the moment I heard it,

I would extend my limp, clammy hand, and look away.

Here on this hillside of tea, then, I rather liked my dad’s distress. I

wanted him to feel like slithering into the lemon grass.

Eventually, after more nudging from me, my dad touched the daughters’ heads as if each were a hot stove.When he stood before the mother, she looked up into his eyes and, pressing her hands together

beneath her chin, said, “Wanacome.” My dad’s hands came halfway

together. His lips moved into some vague shape of “wanacome,” though

it could have likely been “want a hairbrush.”

Vijay led us indoors, kicking a chicken out of his way. My father and

I ducked our heads beneath the entrance and then stood in the fourroom house, its walls and floor made of mud, its roof of asbestos sheeting.

He peeked his head into the dark rooms to scout the horrors awaiting

him here, like whether his bed for the night would be made from a

hollowed-out cow. All seemed fine for the moment. Then he saw a

table of food covered with newspapers dotted with hundreds of flies.

While backing away in disgust, he bumped his head into a bizarre decoration hanging from the ceiling. It was Vijay’s art, an IV tube that he

had twisted and knotted into the image of a fish. It too was black with

flies, all rising when my father knocked the fish with his head. For a
Generations Apart

few seconds the flies buzzed madly around my dad’s head like electrons, then settled back down on the fish.

“Holy God,” he growled, swatting the air. “How did I end up in this

stockyard at my age?”

Vijay led us into the kitchen to meet his grandmother. We peered in

from the doorway, adjusting our eyes to the dimness and the smoke. In

the far corner, lit by a small fire, squatted the grainy shape of an old

woman. She was cutting vegetables in the Sri Lankan way: anchoring

the knife on the ground between her splayed toes, blade side up, and

swiftly moving the onion across the blade with her hands.

“Now that’s a new one,” my dad whispered to me.“Never thought you

could use a knife like that, turned upside-down. Here I go a whole

lifetime thinking there’s only one way to cut an onion. Jimmy, remind

me to tell your mother about this one.”

The grandmother’s toes made fresh imprints in the layer of cow dung

spread thinly across the mud floor. She glanced up at us, the gold hoop

in her nostril glinting in the firelight. My dad tipped his Indians cap

to her. She stared at him, stared a little longer and a little more deeply,

then turned her shoulder into the corner of the room and spat red

betel juice into a tin can. She hid her mouth behind a flap of sari and

resumed cutting.

I looked at her and my father.What was happening here in the doorway, between light and dark, between civilizations, between centuries?

Though of the same age, what could this woman be to my dad: more

mushroom than woman? More dung and darkness than a lady with wit

and fire? In that moment when their eyes met, what secret language

did they exchange?

“I have to sit,” my dad said. A hen ran out from beneath the grandmother’s sari, squawking.“I have to sit now. Better yet, can you find me

a bed?”

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96 Uncommon Journeys

T H E V ISIT TO V IJAY ’ S ( CONTINUED )
V OCABULARY

Splay: To spread apart

Wadee: A hamburger-sized clump of fried

lentils or beans

Betel: The betel palm bears a fruit called

the betel nut, which many people in

Southeast Asia chew for its mild stimulant

effect.

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 97

Vijay, worried about his hospitality, asked if he could get my dad some

water or tea.“Or food. Perhaps the sir needs some rice or wadees or—”

“Sleep. All I need is a little catnap,Vijoo.”

“Dad, it’s ‘Vijay.”’

“Vijay,Vijoo—whatever. All I know is that I’ve been put through the

wringer all day, so just point me to the nearest bed and clear the way.”

En route to the bedroom my dad once again hit his head against the

plastic fish, releasing the flies. Swatting and cursing he bumped into

the table of food, jarring all those flies resting on the newspaper into

orbit around his head.“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph!” he cursed, beating the

air. “May God in heaven give me strength.”

I closed the bedroom door behind him.Vijay motioned me over to the

front window, where we stood watching his little sisters outside mimicking my dad, wildly swatting imaginary flies. They laughed so hard

that they all fell down. “I’m sorry, Jim,” Vijay said, “if we disrespect

your ... your ...” But he too started to giggle, then to laugh hysterically, and so did I, though I think my laughter came more from the

pleasure of seeing these people full of joy in a time when joy was

scarce.

Vijay and I sat and talked. While catching up on our lives we let our

fingers entwine around each other’s in the custom of good Sri Lankan

friends—strictly male to male, that is, or female to female. Eventually

our discussion led to Ranji.

“I have seen her, Jim,”Vijay whispered. “For the last couple of weeks,

every day we meet while her father is cutting rice.”

“Does he know? The father?”

“I’m sure he does but she doesn’t care.” For a year Vijay had been in

love with a woman whose father had already chosen her mate.Vijay,

too, had an arranged partner, though as the eldest son he first had to
Generations Apart

wait until all five sisters were married. If Vijay broke all the rules and

did marry Ranji, both families would banish them, a consequence too

grave in this small, religious society. He tightened his fingers around

mine. “I must be with her, Jim. I must be with her or I die. I know it

is not right for her, for my sisters, for our ...”

One of Vijay’s sisters entered the room, kneeling at his feet for permission to leave the house. After he lightly touched her head, she backed

out of the room without raising her eyes, her front always facing us.

“For that sister, for the others, I must wait,”Vijay said.“But how many

more years must I wait for my freedom? Ten? Fifteen? And then my

wife is chosen for me. Do you see how I am trapped, Jim? Do you see

how in my world Ranji is an impossibility but Ranji is all that I

want?”

Another sister, barefoot and eyes down, drifted in with a tray of tea and

wadees. Flies dotted her arms like freckles, and as she turned to leave,

the scent of kitchen smoke and wadee grease rose off her sari.

“You in America have it right,”Vijay said between sips of tea.“You are

free to do what you want, not what your mother or your culture tells

you to do. It is primitive, this system. Imagine: You meet Cindy and

you love Cindy and then you can’t marry her because your parents

have a strange woman chosen for you, a woman you’ve never seen

before.This is barbaric. Why does God put love inside of us if not to

be used? Is it only for suffering that God makes me love Ranji and she

love me?”

“But, Vijay, look how love fails in America.” I explained what I had

often told Sri Lankans, that America is not the love paradise Vijay may

think it is, that it is a land of disillusionment and divorce and families

spread thousands of miles apart. “Over here these arranged marriages

seem to work. The partners stay together and love usually grows

between them.”

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T H E V ISIT TO V IJAY ’ S ( CONTINUED )
U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

“It is a business arrangement, Jim. It gives me a business partner, not

Ranji, the woman I love. It places business above love, and I cannot

live that way.This is torture for me.This is not life for me.”

The highest suicide rate in Asia belongs to Sri Lanka, almost all

because of this situation Vijay was in.These young, trapped lovers most

often swallowed DDT, the pesticide banned in America but sold by

American companies to Sri Lankan farmers.

“So, Jim, I must ask you again to help me get to America.You see that

I have no future here. Find me a university, a job, any job. I will work

in your McDonald’s. I’ll do anything.”

“You know I’ll never do that,Vijay.” He knew my stance on the immigration topic: I wouldn’t contribute to the “brain drain” of Sri Lanka’s

brightest, even though I was badgered daily by desperate Sri Lankans

and offered plenty of bribes. Personally, I wanted Vijay alongside me in

America, hiking in Yosemite and shelling peanuts at a baseball game.

But to do so would dishonor the Peace Corps and wound his sisters,

his students, and his Tamil community at a time when they most needed him. I was there to celebrate and reinforce his culture, not to chip

it away. “I’m doing you a favor by doing nothing,Vijay.”

“I know, I know.And I respect you and I know I belong here, with my

people. But look at it this way: Who’s going to introduce wadees to

America if I don’t come over? And who’s going to teach your father

how to make fish out of IV tubes?”

My father! I suddenly remembered that I had a father in the next

room. I rose to check on him, concerned that the flies might have nibbled through to his intestines while he slept. When I peered into his

room, however, I saw that my dad had solved the fly problem for the

Third World napper. He had covered himself from head to toe with

newspapers like the food on the table.

V OCABULARY

brain drain: the departure of experts 

from a country, often through emigration

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 99
Generations Apart

“Vijay,” I whispered, “come here and see an American judge in all his

glory. Call your sisters, too.”

Together the seven of us watched from the door, pinching our noses

to keep from laughing at this body shrouded in newspaper.The paper

crackled with the rising and falling of his breath. Gradually, his hand

slid down from his stomach and dangled limp near the floor, his rosary

still encircling his wrist. A couple of flies landed on his thumb.

“Holy God,” he moaned, flicking his fingers. He returned his hand to

his chest and murmured some prayers in time with the clicking of his

rosary.

We all snickered. But at this moment, seeing my dad on a hard wooden bed, his body wrapped in paper like meat from a butcher’s, I couldn’t help but love the old guy. In such weak, exposed moments I loved

him the most. My pinched snicker nearly made the short leap to tears,

and all I wanted to do was toss aside the newspaper and fan my father

like a pharaoh, all day and all night.

* * *

We returned to our chairs and soon heard my dad stirring.The newspaper rustled, the wood slats creaked, my dad pleaded to God, and

soon he was standing before Vijay and me with his pants twisted to one

side and his hair tousled high and wild. He wagged a finger at both of us.

“Think I didn’t hear you in there, laughing at your old man like that?”

His serious expression gave way to a laugh. “I wish I could’ve seen it

myself, me, and a bedsheet made of the day’s news. If you ask me it’s a

pretty clever fly repellent. Now, Jimmy, don’t you be babbling about this

back home or Malone, he’ll get wind of it and it’s yammer yammer

yammer up and down the courthouse halls. I can hear that jackass now.”

I was glad he was in a good mood because we were about to eat, a cultural experience that was sure to set him back. My dad and I sat down

at the table, the cane on the seat of our chairs creaking beneath our

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weight. I didn’t trust the frayed cane, so I sat on the wooden edge and

left fate to deal with my dad.

No one ate with us.Vijay’s mother and sisters would eat later in the

kitchen squatting on inch-high benches;Vijay would follow us at the

table. But for now the entire family had the single-minded duty of

serving us. They brought in plates of curried vegetables in coconut

milk, saffron rice with cashews and raisins, fish, fruit, avocados, and tea,

all laid on a new tablecloth which I’m sure Vijay’s mother had sewn

just for our arrival. Once our plates were full, the entire family stood

against the walls waiting for our next need.

My dad elbowed me. “Where are the forks?”

“Attached to your wrists.”

“Wrists? What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You use your fingers, Dad. Just pretend you’re eating a hamburger or

pizza.You wouldn’t want a fork for a burger, would you?”

He looked at his plate. “This here is no juicy burger, believe you me.

Malone, I remember him telling me all about this. Told me to bring

my own fork wherever I went. ‘Bring a dozen, John,’ he said, ‘or else

you’ll come home with food stuck under your nails for months.’” He

lowered his eyes to the plate. “I just hope there’s nothing moving in

there. Malone told me all kinds of stories about microbes that turn

into big eels once they get inside the human belly.”

I wanted to slap him—nothing hard, just a light, friendly smack or

two. I just couldn’t understand how he could be so afraid of food. Here

was the judge who stared down all those criminals in his Cleveland

courtroom, those hatchet murderers eager to rip off his head. Then

he’d go to lunch (every day a tuna sandwich from Wally the blind vendor) before returning to an afternoon docket of rapists and wife bashers. All these thugs cowered before him, and yet now he trembled in

front of a plate of rice.
Generations Apart

“Take the plunge, Dad. It’s time for all good men to be courageous.

Just gather the food at the tips of your fingers, like this, and—”

“Hold it, hold it, hold it,” he said, raising his hand. “I believe you’re

forgetting something here, Jimmy.”

“What?”

“Does the word ‘grace’ ring a bell around here, as in ‘grace before

meals’?” He cleared his throat, straightened his back, and adjusted his

butt on the creaking cane. He shut his eyes tight. “Let us begin. Dear

Jesus, we are gathered here before you ...”

This worried me. I was hungry, I was salivating, and this guy’s longwinded grace was going to keep all this exquisite food out of my

mouth. He had done this before. I remembered all those Thanksgivings

when the steam rising off the sliced turkey would disappear while my

father prayed on and on and on.

“The good Lord has brought us safely from another continent to sit at

this Sri Lankan table with my Jimmy. Our Lord has gathered us to give

him thanks, and to thank Voojoo and his family for this wonderful

food”—his eyes opened, as if hoping to find corn on the cob and steak

and a pitcher of Ohio spring water, then he shut them tight—“food

which the good Lord in all His mystery has seen fit to provide for us.

In addition, let us pray ...”

He was just warming up. It would be a while before he would dismount from this horse—so familiar, so satisfying, so free of eels. But it

was torturing me, and I thought of screaming a samurai scream and

burying my mouth in the mountain of food on my plate. I glanced

everywhere else to get my mind off the food, first up to see the house

cat leaning down from the space between the roof and wall, then over

to see Vijay and his sisters biting their lips not to laugh.

“Let us pray with all our fervent hearts for the poor people up here in

the mountains of Sri Lanka who have little money and little houses

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full of chickens and flies and hard wood beds and yet who provide us

with food which the Lord in all His goodness ...”

The cat on the wall pawed downward. My stomach growled.The cane

beneath my dad’s butt creaked. My stomach growled.

“Let us never forget what the Lord taught us about the least of thy

brethren being the first in the Kingdom”—he sagged lower into the

chair, and the cat leaned farther—“to stand alongside God who in all

His majesty has made all things possible. Let us never forget”—lower,

a gentle oozing, a popping of threads—“that Christ Jesus saw fit to—”

Twang! The cane gave way and my dad fell through and the cat jumped

into a bowl of fish. Everybody froze. In that frozen moment I marveled

that the stuff of bad slapstick could happen in real life. And in that

moment I thought: My kingdom for a camera.Then the scene unfroze

and the cat leaped into a corner, leaving curried paw prints on the

new tablecloth. My father could see those prints quite well because his

head had dropped to the level of the table. He wasn’t laughing. No one

in that room was, least of all Vijay’s mother, who was so mortified that

she shrunk into the corner with the cat. But from another room there

was a high-pitched whoop, and there inside the doorway to the smoky

kitchen squatted the grandmother on her haunches, rocking, laughing

herself to tears, pointing at my father with her crooked brown finger.

My dad squirmed. “Get me out of here, Jimmy.”

I tried to pry him out of the chair but all that lifted was the entire

apparatus, twanged chair and white rump now united like a mythological creature.Vijay’s mother shrunk farther into the corner, wringing

her hands on the skirt of her sari.

“Oh God, Dad,” I said, “you look ridiculous.Wait’ll I tell Mom about

this one. And Malone.”

“Don’t you dare. Don’t you dare whisper one word to Malone or I’m

done for sure. Now get me out.”
Generations Apart

“Sorry, can’t.You’re stuck in this chair for life, so may as well get used

to it. Hey, look at the bright side:You’ll never have to stand on a Sri

Lankan bus again.”

Word was already spreading throughout the tea estate of what had just

happened. A few neighbors leaned through the open window, and I

could see behind them a dozen more running up from the road. This

was an event, maybe the event of their lifetimes, and no one was going

to miss the chance to be an eyewitness. By now Vijay’s mother was in

hiding; the grandmother was out in the open, howling in laughter; and

I was suggesting to Vijay that he ought to charge admission.

“Like the baboon lady at a carnival side-show,” I said, then turned to

my dad as he was inching his way out of the chair. “Not so fast, Dad.

We’ve decided to wrap a cobra around your neck and have you juggle

swords, just to make a few bucks. So settle back on down and be a

sport, okay?”

“It’s not funny, Jimmy. And it’s starting to hurt.”

* * *

We did free him, eventually, and all the eyewitnesses went home to

spread the gospel of the Cane Chair Plunge. It wouldn’t take long for

this story to reach the farthest edge of Sri Lanka.

We still had to eat.Vijay brought in a new chair for my dad, this one

reinforced with enough two-by-fours to support an elephant. Then I

taught him how to eat: mash together some of the curries and rice into

a ball, twirl it tight, move it up to the tip of the fingers, keep your

elbow high, then pop it like a marble with your thumb into your

mouth. “See, Dad,” I demonstrated. “It’s neat and clean.”

But nothing he did was neat or clean. Rice kernels fell on his lap and

on the floor, bouncing into corners for the chickens to fight over.Very

little ended up in his mouth.

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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 105

“Keep your elbow up higher, Dad, and pack the food tighter.”

He tried again.This time he flicked the food with his index finger, not

his thumb, sending a missile of rice across the room.The chickens were

upon it in seconds.The grandmother was watching all of this from the

kitchen entrance, shaking her head.

“Use your thumb, Dad, your thumb. Not your pinky, your thumb!”

Finally, after more misfires that shot rice up to the ceiling, he got it:

The ball of rice landed in his mouth, and from down on her haunches the grandmother applauded.

“Oh yes!” my dad gloated.“Looks like this old dog can still learn a few

tricks.”

But on his own without my guiding hand he never really got it. He

sprayed rice on the floor and in his lap and in my hair, and when the

curry juices started dribbling down his chin, I thought, “My father, a

baby in a high chair.” Yet I was worried about this baby who hadn’t

eaten much since he arrived. I mashed a solid ball of food from my

plate and held it up to his mouth.

“C’mon, Dad.You have to eat.”

He pushed my hand away. “I’ll be fine, Jimmy. I’m sure I’ll be fine.”

* * *

After dinner my dad and I petted the cow and talked baseball, and

when it was time for him to prepare for bed, I showed him to the outhouse.

There were two of them, and it was very important to keep them

straight.The smaller one was for the women of the house, but it also

doubled as a cage for the goat, though no one ever explained why the

goat had to be “outhoused” at night. Next to it stood the men’s room.

Unlike the open-pit toilet in the women’s, ours had a porcelain, water-
Generations Apart

sealed basin cemented into the ground straddled by a pair of large

footprints. “This toilet comes from India,”Vijay boasted. “The first on

the plantation.” In the corner stood a 55-gallon drum containing all

the water for all the ablutions. I told my dad to scoop out a handful to

brush his teeth.

“That water?” he said. “In my mouth? You’ve got to be kidding.”

“Just swish it around a little and don’t drink it.Trust me.You’ll be fine.”

He had that look of someone who’s not sure if he’s the butt of a practical joke. I had seen it before in five-year-old Jackie Carlin, the neighborhood sucker, when he inspected an Oreo cookie from us older

boys. Jackie would sniff and squish the Oreo, half-certain that we had

laced the white inner cream with dish soap and cat food. He was right,

but he usually shrugged and ate it anyway.

“If I do any swishing,” my dad said, “I’ll be on the pot all night.

Malone warned me about this. ‘John, better to put a loaded gun to

your head than drink a spot of that gutter water.’” In the neighboring

outhouse the goat was getting restless, thumping his legs against the

wall. “I’ll bet that damn goat is trying to tell me a thing or two.”

“Dad, I promise that you won’t get sick. I’ve been swishing this stuff

for two years now and,” I lied, “I’ve never been sick.”

“Malone wouldn’t lie.That goat wouldn’t lie.You, I’m not so sure about.”

Eventually he dampened his toothbrush with a few sprinkles of water,

brushed, then spat it all out a dozen times.“Oh good God in heaven,”

he sighed wearily, “bless my poor belly tonight.”

With his teeth cleaned we turned to the toilet.At the mention of it he

looked very old and very sad—sad that the human body couldn’t hold

its own waste for a month, sad that there wasn’t a commode on which

to sit for an hour and read the sports page. He moaned and said, “Just

show me what to do and leave me a little privacy.”

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V OCABULARY

106 Uncommon Journeys

Ablutions: [ab-LOO-shuns] The washing

of the body
U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 107

“Okay. The trick is to put both feet on the prints, like this, and then

squat all the way down like a grasshopper, or a catcher.”

“Yogi Berra I’m not, or that cricket fella—Timony? Bimony? Look,

Jim, I’m 74 years old and if I get down like that you’ll need a crane to

hoist me back up.”

“You’ll get the hang of it in no time.”

He stared down at the toilet. “Where does it all go? Are there pipes

down there? Filtration plants?”

“Filtration plants! Are you putting me on?” Whenever I told Sri

Lankans about the “modern advancements” in America—ATM

machines, cable TV, funeral homes, poodles groomed to look like

shrubbery—they thought I must be inventing it all. “I don’t know,

Dad. I guess it just goes right into the ground beneath us.”

“Raw sewage straight into the soil? Is that what you’re telling me?”

“Well, yeah, but it’s not as gross as you make it sound. I guess it turns

to manure down there, and, you know, nourishes the earth.”

“Nourishes! Hey, I don’t care if it turns to Lemon Pledge down there,

it still is raw sewage going right into the ground and into rivers and

eventually”—he looked at the 55-gallon drum—“into the water I just

used to brush my teeth.”

While he spat out every atom of moisture from his mouth, I told him

that some things were best left unexamined. “Now do your business

and give a holler if you need me.”

* * *

Later that night my father and I slept in the same room on twin beds,

our only cushion a thin grass mat over the wooden planks. On the

table between us Vijay had dimmed the oil lamp down to a point. He

reminded us to avoid the left outhouse during the night—“The goat
Generations Apart

is sure to kick you”—and then tugged on my toes and wished us good

night. I asked him where he was sleeping.

“In the next room, on the floor. I’m used to it.”

“Oh, don’t be a martyr. Come sleep here and I’ll sleep with my dad.”

“No, no, no. I like to be close to the earth. I’m not as soft as you

Americans.”

My dad turned on his side. “Soft? Is this your idea of soft? Holy God,

I feel like I’m sleeping on nails.”

Vijay closed the door on the way out. For a long time I stared at the

point of light in the oil lamp, thinking too much. My dad never really fell asleep, moaning “Holy God!” every few minutes above the creak

of his bed’s wood planks. Each “Holy God” pricked me in the organ

that holds Catholic guilt in a child, especially when he sat up on the

side of the bed, digging his knuckles into his eye sockets. “Holy

Mother of God, pray for me.”

* * *

He woke up with the slightest of smiles and the slightest skip in his step.

Maybe the smile was from [a dream]. But more likely that smile

reflected the start of a shift within my dad during the night.The flies,

the harsh bed, the journey to the outhouse—to him these were horrors, and yet by being forced to face them all alone, maybe he was

coming to realize that the horrors he’d been guarding against all this

time were really thin as masks. Hey, he could do this Sri Lankan thing

after all—and live! Perhaps a little unsanitary, perhaps a bit uncomfortable, but nothing lethal and nothing more frightening than one’s own

shame. I’d like to think that the skip in his step that morning came

from his having started to shed the weight of all the artillery he’d been

lugging around to fight these phantom fears. Now he could skip, and

now he could float. He could let go of that rope tying him back to his

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Cleveland condominium and just float in this new land with hard beds

(you get used to them) and outhouses (fresh air) and new toilet customs.

Over the next few days, bit by bit, I saw my father meet Sri Lanka. He

mastered the art of finger eating and even asked for seconds. He studied the grandmother cleaning rice in the kitchen, at first standing over

her blocking the doorway, later on his own haunches next to her by

the fire, helping her pick out stones. He named the goat “Malone” and

took it for long walks on a rope through the tea bushes. He asked the

tea plantation manager how tea is dried, asked Vijay what it was like to

grow up surrounded by tea, and, to my surprise, asked me if I missed

America.

One day at my father’s request we walked three miles down a steep

embankment to visit Vijay’s school. Since the school relied on the

Sinhalese government for funding, it had nothing. No desks, no chalk,

no books. The 68 children, all wearing perfectly pressed white uniforms, were clustered in the shadow of a tin overhang, sitting on handkerchiefs that they had spread with great care. Only Vijay taught.There

was one other teacher, but he hadn’t shown up for 10 weeks because

the government had stopped paying him.Vijay had also not been paid,

though he went home each night with both arms full of potatoes and

beans and chickens, an occasional rupee, an occasional statue of a

Hindu god.

We watched him teach. In this bleak, overcrowded setting with every

imaginable obstacle to teaching,Vijay found a way to teach. He drew

world maps in the dirt. He taught math by subtracting and adding students standing in front of the class. He acted the part of an elephant in

a student drama of the Ramayana. Finally, using a goat’s bladder stuffed

with tea leaves as a soccer ball, he let students play soccer only after

they correctly translated some English verbs.

My dad observed all of this very intently.“God bless that boy,” he said,

V OCABULARY

martyr: [MAR-tur] a person who chooses

to suffer (or die) for a cause

rupee: local money

Ramayana: an influential epic poem

important in Indian culture

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 109
Generations Apart

and said it in a way that indicated things inside of him were getting

shook up. How minor must his own trials have now seemed when

compared with the trials of these children, and to Vijay. “He’s a magician, that’s what he is. Out of nothing he creates so much. And look at

those little girls over there, how much fun they’re having and learning

at the same time.”

“He was trained by the Peace Corps,” I said.“A lot of what he’s doing

is what I’m teaching my students up at Bandarawela.We improve their

English, but mainly we teach them how to teach in primitive schools

like this one. Vijay’s a natural teacher, but without the ideas Peace

Corps gave him, I think he’d be overwhelmed.”

My dad nodded but had no reply. I tried to find in the slant of his head

or the narrowing of his eyes some measure of validation for my work,

but I found none. I told myself that it really didn’t matter. And I

repeated that it didn’t matter, repeated it so often on our walk home

up the mountain path—carrying Vijay’s booty of mangoes and bread,

passing the tea-pickers spitting betel juice into the tea fields—that I

nearly came to believe my own lie.

* * *

On our last night at Vijay’s house, the three of us walked at dusk to the

Hindu temple, the center of the tea estate community. Vijay knew

everybody on the walk: the family of five riding on a bike, the old lady

toting a small tree on her head, every tea-picker, every child. Out of

respect for the white men they all stood to the side as we passed, looking down at the ground.

We smelled the temple long before we reached it. A thick cloud of

incense had spread out from the gates and across the tea fields.When we

arrived at the temple, the incense partly obscured our view of the statues on the roof, an astonishing array of colorful Hindu gods that were

dancing or sitting or balancing on one foot. My dad marveled at them.

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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 111

“Look at the monkey face,” he said, “and the elephant. And that one

with all those arms. Amazing, all this art in the middle of nowhere.

Who paints these things,Vooji, and how often?”

Vijay answered these questions and more, patiently teaching my father

about this new world of Hinduism. His curiosity surprised me. I had

expected him to be repulsed by it all, to regard it as the kind of barbaric and pagan religion that Christianity ought to convert.

We placed our shoes outside the gate and entered the temple. The 50

or so Tamils didn’t know where to look, either down at the ground as

they had been taught, or up at this mesmerizing sight of two white

men with blue eyes and hair on their arms. To them this must have

been a miracle, two Americans come to worship in their temple here

on their forgotten plantation.

The Hindu priest approached. He stood before my father in just a

loincloth, his face and body streaked with ash. For a moment these two

opposites stood eye to eye—a nearly naked holy man facing a white

man in wool pants holding a Gatorade bottle—and I wondered what

sense either could possibly make of the other.

The priest bowed low to my father and chanted some prayers. When

he arose, he laced around my dad’s neck a garland of brilliant red flowers. He then pressed his thumb into a bowl of golden dust and, reciting a prayer, dabbed a spot of yellow saffron on the center of my dad’s

forehead.

Vijay said to my father,“The priest is telling you that you are a god in

his temple, that the god inside you has met the god inside of him.”

My dad appeared moved by this. He pressed his hands together in front

of the garland and, bowing to the priest, said, “Wanacome.”

The priest didn’t appear surprised, but the rest of the crowd froze.This

one holy Tamil word, wanacome, this mere puff of air out of my dad’s
Generations Apart

mouth, had now become as sacred as incense. It settled softly on the

heads of these maligned people, settling over their black faces and

splendid saris, over their hands callused from picking tea. For a

moment their hard lives were full of majesty, full of peace. For a

moment that contained eternity, the vast distance from black to white,

from Hindu to Catholic, from tea-picker to judge, from Sri Lanka to

America—all was ultimately no further than the utterance of a word.

* * *

Later that night my father and I went to sleep in our twin beds.

Though he had washed his face with water from the drum, my dad

went to bed with the saffron dot still centering his forehead.The garland of red flowers leaned against his Gatorade bottle.

The next morning we left Vijay’s home. In an act that was not silly, my

dad opened the left outhouse door and put his garland of flowers around

the goat’s neck. He said good-bye to the chickens and the cow, flicked

the flies off the plastic fish just for fun, and pulled a strand of cane from

the notorious chair and put it in his mouth, Huck Finn-style.

Outside,Vijay’s sisters lined up on their knees. My father stood before

each one, firmly touching each head with all his fingers. He accepted

a packet of wadees from Vijay’s mother and an embrace from Vijay

before starting to leave.

Sir.

We turned around. There, standing in the doorway with her hands

pressed together, was the grandmother. She raised her eyes from the

ground and said through Vijay’s translation,“Sir, you have honored my

family by coming here.You are old, and I know it is not easy for the

old to learn the new.You are a good and holy man. May Krishna bless

your many lives.”

My dad approached her.The wind uplifted some strands of gray hair

not covered by his Indians cap; it uplifted some strands of her gray hair

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not bound in a bun. These were the elders, standing in their own

sacred circle. He bowed to her with his palms together, saying in a very

familiar way, “Wanacome.” She shook his hands and then hugged him,

crying, her head somewhere at the level of his navel. And then, in a

gesture of either comedy or sanctity, my dad placed his Indians cap on

her head.Vijay and I laughed, but from her reaction you’d think she’d

just been crowned with a tiara of diamonds.

As we walked away she waved the cap up high, an old exuberant Tamil

woman with rings in her nose, standing on the tips of her toes, waving an American baseball cap higher and higher until we turned a

bend and were out of her sight forever.

V OCABULARY

Krishna: An important god in the Hindu

religion

Sanctity: Holiness

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 113
Generations Apart

R EADING AND R ESPONDING TO

‘ H ELP ! M Y F ATHER I S C OMING ! ’

AND ‘ T H E V ISIT TO V IJAY ’ S ’

O VERVIEW

A BOUT THE A UTHOR

Jim Toner and his wife served as Peace Corps Volunteers from 1989 to

1991. They lived in a remote village in Sri Lanka, formerly Ceylon,

teaching English to adults who were in training to be teachers. The

excerpts from Toner’s memoir, Serendib, that constitute the entries here

are an account of a visit by Toner’s 74-year-old father to Sri Lanka

during the couple’s Peace Corps service. Toner currently teaches

English at Columbia College, in Sonora, California.

A BOUT THE S T ORY

“Help! My Father Is Coming!” and “The Trip to Vijay’s” are excerpted

from Chapters One and Six, respectively, of Jim Toner’s memoir,

Serendib.

Toner’s book is an engaging story of how a largely estranged father

and son came to understand, accept, and respect each other under the

most unlikely of circumstances.The curmudgeonly, elderly judge from

Cleveland, Ohio, had never been out of the country and appeared illprepared to visit the rural parts of a land where he would be besieged

by flies and all sorts of imagined crawling dangers, as well as no electricity or running water, no plumbing, and the ravages of a civil war.

Nevertheless, he adjusts to cultural mores remarkably different from

his own during the course of his monthlong visit.

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A BOUT THE S ETTING

Serendib, or Serendip, is the name by which Sri

Lanka was known centuries ago. The name is the

source for the word “serendipity,” which means the

accidental finding of something good. The country

was subsequently named Ceylon. First under

Portuguese influence in the 16th century, then under

Dutch influence in the 17th century, the country

became a British colony around the beginning of the

19th century. It gained independence in 1948.

Sri Lanka is an island about 270 miles from north to

south, and 140 miles from east to west, some 18 miles

off the southeast coast of India. Largely flat or with

rolling hills, Sri Lanka has high mountains in the

south-central region of the island. Its exports are mostly agricultural, consisting of tea, rubber, and coconuts.

Sri Lanka, with a current population of just under 20

million, experienced many years of conflict between

the minority Hindu Tamils, of the north and east,

and the majority Buddhist Sinhalese. The Tamils

were fighting for independence. That long-standing

struggle was exacerbated in the late 1980s by infighting among the Sinhalese.A cease fire and efforts at an

enduring peace are under way today.

Greetings in Sri Lanka are an important ritual.Toner

writes that when he encountered his father at the

airport, “Before I knew what to do, before I knew if

I should shake his hand or embrace him or hoist him

onto my shoulders, I pressed my palms together

beneath my chin and said, ‘Ayubowan, Dad.’ Cindy

smoothed down his wild hair and explained that 

S TANDARDS

English Standards: 1, 3, 6 (see page 187)

Social Studies Standards: I, IV, IX (see page 188)

National Geography Standards: 4, 6, 10 (see page 189)

Enduring Understandings 

• Understanding and respecting the customs of another culture

requires flexibility, compromise, sensitivity, and hard work.

• It is easy to make judgments about people and places that we 

later learn are inaccurate.

Essential Questions

• How flexible do you think you would be in another culture? 

• What can one gain from being open to people or customs that, at

first, seem strange?

• What kinds of compromises might you have to make in order to

fit in to life in another culture?

• What might happen when we make snap judgments about people

or places?

Materials

Photocopies of story, Resource Sheet 1, carousel brainstorming 

discussion guide

Assessment Tools

Class discussions, journal entries, graphic organizer: comparison

matrix, report or skit, personal narrative

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 115
Generations Apart

ayubowan is the Sri Lankan welcome. ‘It means that

the god in me is greeting the god in you,’ [she said].”

(Ayubowan is the greeting used by the majority

Sinhalese population. The minority Tamils use the

greeting wanacome.)

Vijay, who features in the second selection, is a native

of Sri Lanka, a member of the minority Tamil population, and a close friend of the author’s.

Peace Corps programs in Sri Lanka have been active,

on and off, since 1962.They have focused on English

language improvement, agricultural and environmental projects, education and teacher training, and

youth work projects.

L ESSON 1

P URPOSE

• To explore the concept of crossing cultures

• To examine how Americans may be viewed by

people in another culture

1. Using information from the introduction to this

book and the overview above, introduce students

to the author, the Peace Corps, and the setting.

2. When the author’s father left the familiar culture

of the United States and entered the culture of

Sri Lanka so unfamiliar to him, he experienced a

phenomenon called crossing cultures.

• Ask students what they think the term “crossing cultures” means.

• Ask students whether they have ever traveled to

a place in their city, state, or country—or outside their country—and noticed behaviors or

customs that seemed unusual or different from

what they were used to. If so, what was their

reaction? What challenges did they encounter? 

Clarify first that culture is the behaviors, customs, and beliefs that a group of people have in

common. Culture is demonstrated in daily living

patterns, traditions, values, worldview, styles of

dress, attitudes toward education, beliefs about

the responsibilities of children and the role of the

family, as well as celebrations, music, art, and

much more.To help students explore the meaning of culture and to build cross-cultural understanding, see Building Bridges: A Peace Corps

Classroom Guide to Cross-Cultural Understanding at

www.peacecorps.gov/wws/bridges (or available

from the World Wise Schools program at

800.424.8580, x1450).

Explain that crossing cultures is the experience

of going from one’s own culture into another

that may be quite different in customs, language,

behaviors, and beliefs. People in one culture

often think someone from another culture is

unusual because of these differences. However,

people from the other culture may think the visitor is unusual for the same kinds of reasons.

3. Emphasize that Peace Corps Volunteers are

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

116 Uncommon Journeys

T H E V ISIT TO V IJAY ’ S ( CONTINUED )
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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 117

trained to cross cultures respectfully so that they

are accepted in their host culture, and that misunderstandings are minimized.

Note: Students who have come to the United

States from another culture can be an excellent

resource for explaining these concepts. Invite

them privately, ahead of class, to share their experiences if they are comfortable doing so.

4. Have students read “Help! My Father Is

Coming!” When they have finished, ask them to

predict what might happen to the author’s father

in “The Visit to Vijay’s,” after the father’s arrival

in Sri Lanka and when he’s accompanying his

son in the rural countryside. Students should

write their predictions on index cards.Then have

the students share some of their predictions with

the rest of the class. Ask the students to keep

their predictions in mind as they read the rest of

the story.

5. Have students read “The Visit to Vijay’s.” Have

older students read the story in its entirety.

Younger students may profit from reading it in

sections, as follows:

a. From p. 92 to p. 97, ending with the sentence:

“I think my laughter came more from the

pleasure of seeing these people full of joy in a

time when joy was scarce.”

b. From page 97 to page 100, ending with the

phrase:“...all I wanted to do was toss aside the

newspaper and fan my father like a pharaoh,

all day and all night.” See the end of this lesson plan for background information on Sri

Lankan marital customs.

c. From page 100 to page 105, ending with the

sentence: “He pushed my hand away. ‘I’ll be

fine, Jimmy. I’m sure I’ll be fine.’”

d. The remainder of the story.

Dividing the story may help students take notes

by providing a break from reading, and it will

give you an opportunity to check for understanding.

6. When the students have finished reading the

story, ask them to discuss the following questions

in small groups. Then have a class discussion on

students’ group observations.

• How did Toner’s father view Vijay and his family? (Give examples from the text.) 

• How did Vijay and his family view Toner’s

father? (Give examples from the text.)

7. Discuss with students the idea that we take many

journeys in our lives, and that these journeys can

shape who we are. (See discourse about types of

journeys in the Introduction, on page 6.)

8. Journal Activity. For homework, have students

respond in writing to one or more of the following prompts, in preparation for a class discussion

in the next lesson.

F O R Y OUNGER S TUDENTS
Generations Apart

• How did the story compare with the predictions you made on your index cards after you

read the first section? On the back of your

index cards, describe what surprised you about

the story.

• Before the author’s father traveled to Sri Lanka,

what did he think the country would be like?

What did he find it was really like?

• What surprised Toner most about his father’s

reaction to life in Sri Lanka?

F O R O LDER S TUDENTS

• What did Toner want his readers to be thinking

about as they read?

• What parts of the story made the deepest

impression on you as you were reading? Why?

• Describe the external journey the father experienced in the story.

• Describe the internal journey he experienced.

How did he change deep inside?

• What surprised Toner most about his father’s

reaction to life in Sri Lanka after his father had

been there a while?

• Review the story and find the image that is

most vivid to you. Describe the image and the

reason it stands out so strongly in your mind.

L ESSON 2

P URPOSE

• To analyze the story using a cooperative learning

strategy

• To analyze the change that the father experiences

during the course of the story

• To reach the enduring understanding, “It is easy

to make judgments about people and places that

we later learn are inaccurate.”

1. Have students share their journal responses from

the previous lesson with a partner.Then conduct

a class discussion addressing these questions:

• As you read this story, what did you learn about

going from a familiar culture to an unfamiliar

one?

• What picture stands out most in your mind as

you think back on the story?

• After reading the first few pages of the story,

were your predictions confirmed about how

the father would manage? If not, what surprised you?

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118 Uncommon Journeys

T H E V ISIT TO V IJAY ’ S ( CONTINUED )
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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 119

2. Carousel Brainstorming. This strategy (see

below) is a useful and active way to elicit divergent viewpoints on a story’s multiple meanings

while allowing students to move around the

room. Use the five quotations and accompanying

questions from Resource Sheet 1 as the basis for

this activity.

I NSTRUCTIONS FOR CAROUSEL

BRAINSTORMING ACTIVITY

• Prior to class, photocopy the quotations in

Resource Sheet 1, separate each quotation with

its accompanying questions, as indicated by the

solid lines, enlarge them on a copier, and paste

each quotation and its accompanying questions

on the top of a separate sheet of chart paper.

Make sure the number of each quotation is large and

easy to see.

• Post the five sheets of chart paper around the

room, with ample space between them. Place

extra sheets of paper, masking tape, and a felttipped marker on the floor below each sheet.

• Assign students numbers from 1 to 5.Ask them to

move to the chart paper on which their number

is written.

• Have students discuss their group’s quotation and

its accompanying questions. Each group should

select a recorder to write down ideas they raise,

using the felt-tipped marker you’ve provided.

Make sure students know they should help the

recorder in summarizing the group’s best ideas.

• Call time after a few minutes. Ask students to

move to the next piece of chart paper, so that

each group will be facing a new quotation.

• Repeat the process until all groups have discussed

and responded to all questions—then have the

groups move back to their original quotation and

questions.

• After collecting markers, ask each group to read

the responses of the other groups and to compare

those responses with their initial answers.
Generations Apart

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

120 Uncommon Journeys

T H E V ISIT TO V IJAY ’ S ( CONTINUED )

R ESOURCE S HEET 1

C AROUSEL B RAINSTORMING D ISCUSSION Q UESTIONS

1. Quotation: The grandmother ... glanced up at us, the gold hoop in her nostril glinting

in the firelight. My dad tipped his Indians cap to her. She stared at him, stared a little

longer and a little more deeply.... I looked at her and my father.What was happening here

in the doorway, between light and dark, between civilizations, between centuries?

Questions: At the beginning of the visit to Vijay’s, what was the relationship

between the grandmother with the gold hoop in her nostril and Toner’s father

with his Cleveland Indians baseball cap? How did it change? What was it like at

the end? What does the author mean by the phrase “between light and dark”?

2. Quotation: He woke up with the slightest of smiles and the slightest skip in his step.

Maybe the smile was from [a dream]. But more likely that smile reflected the start of a shift

within my dad during the night.... Over the next few days, bit by bit, I saw my father meet

Sri Lanka.

Questions: What was the shift the author saw taking place within his father? In

what ways did his father “meet” Sri Lanka?
U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 121

3. Quotation: To them this must have been a miracle, two Americans come to worship in

their temple here on their forgotten plantation.

The Hindu priest approached. He stood before my father in just a loincloth.... For a

moment these two opposites stood eye to eye—a nearly naked holy man facing a white man

in wool pants holding a Gatorade bottle—and I wondered what sense either could possibly

make of the other.

Questions: What message is the author trying to convey in this passage? What

does he want his readers to be thinking about? Aside from their outward appearance, how were the Hindu priest and the father different from each other? How

were they similar to each other?

4. My dad ... pressed his hands together in front of the garland and, bowing to the priest, said,

“Wanacome.” ...The rest of the crowd froze. This one holy Tamil word, wanacome ...

had now become as sacred as incense.... For a moment that contained eternity, the vast distance from black to white, from Hindu to Catholic, from tea-picker to judge, from Sri Lanka

to America—all was ultimately no further than the utterance of a word.

Questions: What is the significance of this passage? Why did the crowd freeze?

What did the father’s use of the greeting “Wanacome” mean to them? What is “the

vast distance” the author refers to? 

5. There, standing in the doorway ... was the grandmother. She raised her eyes from the ground

and said through Vijay’s translation,“Sir, you have honored my family by coming here.You

are old, and I know it is not easy for the old to learn the new.You are a good and holy

man.... [My dad] bowed to her with his palms together, saying in a very familiar way,

“Wanacome.” ... And then, in a gesture of either comedy or sanctity, my dad placed his

Indians cap on her head.Vijay and I laughed, but from her reaction you’d think she’d just

been crowned with a tiara of diamonds.

Questions: What is the significance of this passage to Toner’s story? What change

does it symbolize? Why was the grandmother so moved by the gift of the father’s

Indians cap? What did giving the cap away symbolize for the father? How far had

he come on his journey?
Generations Apart

3. Journal Entry. For homework, ask students to

respond to one or more of the following

prompts:

• As I think about the carousel brainstorming

activity we just completed, here are some things

that I came to realize about the story’s meaning

that I hadn’t thought of before.

• Explain whether you agree or disagree with the

following statement: “It is easy to make judgments about people and places that we later learn

are untrue.”What judgments about Sri Lanka had

Toner’s father made that he later learned were

untrue? What judgments did Toner make about

his father that he later learned were not valid? 

• In this story,Toner’s father experiences an external journey and an internal journey. What is the

nature of the internal journey that he experienced? 

L ESSON 3 

P URPOSE :

• To examine the cultural differences between the

United States and Sri Lanka using a comparison

matrix

• To compare students’ perspectives on cultural differences

1. Have students compare their journal responses

from the previous lesson in small groups.

Conduct a class discussion eliciting responses to

the journal prompts.

2. Suggest to students that crossing cultures is a

complex process—one that can cause us to view

ourselves and our own culture in new ways.

• Ask students if they think living in the culture

of Sri Lanka changed Toner’s father’s view of

the world.

• Ask in what ways the father might have seen

the culture of Cleveland, Ohio, in new ways

when he returned to the United States.

Explain the concept of culture shock to students—the surprise and stress a person may feel

upon entering another culture, encountering

customs and values he or she had not expected.

In the context of the question about Toner’s

father’s return to Ohio, tell students that Peace

Corps Volunteers—and others who live overseas—often are well prepared for the differences

they encounter in other cultures, but do not

expect to be surprised by cultural issues when

they return home. Nevertheless, many Americans

who live overseas, including Peace Corps

Volunteers, do experience culture shock when

they return home—confronted by customs and

values at home that differ from those they had

adjusted to in other countries.

• What do students think the father focused on

in describing his experiences to his wife and

his friend Malone?

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122 Uncommon Journeys

T H E V ISIT TO V IJAY ’ S ( CONTINUED )
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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 123

• Ask students to pretend they are Toner’s father

and write a short report on their experience in

Sri Lanka. Alternatively, students can prepare a

skit for the class, enacting Judge Toner’s report

to his wife.

3. Reading Comprehension Activity:

Comparing Cultures

Suggest to students that the comparison matrix

they will use might help them in gaining insights

not only into Toner’s writing, but also into reading other materials—and into their writing.

Provide students with a copy of the comparison

matrix (Resource Sheet 2). A sample entry is

included to show how the matrix can be used.

Point out that although the left-hand column has

been filled in—the criteria on which the comparisons will be based—the students can add to them.

Have students work in groups to complete the

comparison matrix.When they have finished, have

each group compare its matrix with another

group’s.

Then ask students what conclusions they have

reached about the cultural similarities and differences between the United States and Sri Lanka.

It is at this stage of using the comparison matrix

that students may see for the first time how the

cultures resemble each other despite obvious differences, or, to the contrary, how the cultures

may appear similar in some respects but actually

differ markedly.

4. Focus on One Cultural Trait. In preparation

for an activity on marriage customs, you may

want to review (for yourself) the background

information on arranged marriages (see box on

page 125). Then conduct a class discussion on

arranged marriages and those based on mutual

choice. In the discussion, try to help students

think about this concept: “It is easy to misinterpret customs in a cross-cultural setting. To avoid

misunderstanding the behavior and beliefs of

others, you have to try to see the world from

their point of view as well as your own.”

Have students re-read from mid-page 97 (“Vijay

and I sat and talked.”) through mid-page 99,

ending with “I’m doing you a favor by doing

nothing,Vijay.”With the class:

a. Discuss how Vijay feels about the tradition of

an arranged marriage and about the contrasting freedom that Americans have. How does

Toner view the American way? Do you agree

that America is not a “love paradise” but a land

of disillusionment and divorce? Evaluate this

statement: “Romantic love tends to blind the

partners to the realities about one another as

persons.”

b. Brainstorm three reasons why parents in a traditional culture would feel that they are better able to choose a spouse for their child than

their child could do for him- or herself.Try to

think of three reasons a son or daughter might

see some advantages in such an arrangement.
Generations Apart

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

124 Uncommon Journeys

T H E V ISIT TO V IJAY ’ S ( CONTINUED )

R ESOURCE S HEET 2

Hospitality to

strangers

Respect shown 

to elders

Behaviors at meals/

Food and eating

Relationship between

brothers and sisters

Religion

Marriage

We might provide water

and a snack, but would

be wary of a stranger.

A stranger is welcomed

and fed.

C OMPARISON M ATRIX : C ULTURAL S IMILARITIES AND D IFFERENCES

How do the cultures of the United 

States and Sri Lanka compare with 

respect to the factors below?

Examples from the 

United States

Examples from 

Sri Lanka
U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 125

B ACKGROUND FOR T EACHERS ON A RRANGED M ARRIAGES

• In Marriage East and West, authors David and Vera Mace note that many women in

cultures where arranged marriages are the norm believe that Western marriage customs can put girls or women in a humiliating position.They believe a girl or woman

has to be constantly concerned with the pressure of looking pretty, calling attention

to herself, and attracting a boy or man so that she will get married.They think that

in the Western way, it is hard for a girl or woman to relax and be herself.A shy female

who does not push herself forward might not be able to get married at all.

In addition, many women, the authors say, believe that Western customs can be very

competitive, with girls or women fighting each other over boys or men. Finally,

many girls in the traditional system believe it is unfair that in modern ways, the male

seems to do all the choosing. Romantic love is viewed by some traditional societies

as superficial, obscuring a true understanding of who the partner really is.

• From the traditional view, romance is seen as an untrustworthy factor in choosing a

marriage partner and, for this reason, it should be eliminated completely. It is

believed that parents are much more prepared, because of their age, experience, and

concern for their children, to find suitable mates for them. It is therefore thought

that the families of both parties are in the best position for doing the choosing.The

differences between traditional and Western views can be summed up by saying that

in the traditional way, you marry, then fall in love, while in the modern way, you fall

in love, then marry.
Generations Apart

c. Discuss how your life would be different from

the way you expect it to be if you knew that

your parents would find a spouse for you.

d. Discuss recent American television programs

on which contestants marry strangers chosen

for them by the audience or by a competition.

From what you have learned about modern

and traditional marriages, do you believe

these marriages have a chance for success?

5. Journal Activity. Conclude this lesson by asking students to consider the following statement:

“Understanding and respecting the customs of

another culture requires flexibility, compromise,

and hard work.”Then ask students to respond in

their journals to the following questions:

• How flexible do you think you would be in

adapting to the customs of another culture—

such as the cultures in Sri Lanka? Do you think

that if you had been in Toner’s father’s shoes, you

would have been able to adapt as well as he did?

• What did Toner’s father gain from being open

and adaptable to learning from the Sri Lankan

people and their cultures? What, if anything,

did he have to compromise?

• What are some ways that we can help students

from other cultures in our own school adapt to

American customs that might seem different to

them? How can we give these students a sense

of belonging? 

• What kind of hospitality could we show students from other cultures that would compare

with the hospitality Vijay’s family offered

Toner’s father?

L ESSON 4

P URPOSE

• To examine the ways a writer can capture and

hold a reader’s attention

• To write a short personal narrative using some of

the techniques Toner used as a model

1. Ask students how Toner captured and held their

attention in his story. Give them time to examine

the story and respond with detailed examples.

Students will probably focus on the following

techniques, among others:

• The lead sentence, “I didn’t invite him,” is

short, punchy, and intriguing, all at the same

time.Who wasn’t invited? Why not?

• Liberal use of dialogue lends immediacy to the

characters. Rather than describing his father,

Toner lets his father talk, and we learn what

he’s like from apparent first-hand experience.

• Description is rich and vivid, and makes use of

similes. For example, on page 92,Toner writes,

“lemon grass as tall as our eyes.” That conveys

information much more evocatively than saying the grass was more than five feet tall.

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

126 Uncommon Journeys

T H E V ISIT TO V IJAY ’ S ( CONTINUED )
U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 127

• Toner’s imagery is exact. Describing Vijay’s sisters sitting in a row, one behind the other, the

author writes, simply, that they were “sitting

toboggan-style.”

2. Discuss with students in what ways Toner’s writing is humorous. Can students identify some of

the particular ways Toner achieved these effects?

[Toner uses hyperbole and sarcasm to add humor

to his story.] Ask students to select a scene they

thought particularly funny in “The Visit to

Vijay’s” and study it in depth. Have them note in

the margins how Toner structured his writing—

his description, his use of dialogue, for example.

Have them underline places where Toner used

hyperbole or sarcasm to make the scene even

more humorous.Then allow the students to share

their observations in a class discussion.

3. Ask students to write a first draft of a brief personal narrative. Have them try to incorporate as

many of the devices Toner used to capture and

hold his readers’ attention. Point out that one

way to become a better writer is to model one’s

writing on the works of an author you admire.

4. To provide students with further guidance in

drafting their personal narratives, you might consult author Nancie Atwell’s checklist “Qualities of

a Memoir That Works” (Atwell, 2002, page 100).

5. For homework, have students draft their narratives. When they return to class, students should

pair up and review one another’s papers. Remind

them to use Toner’s techniques as criteria for

their feedback.

6. Journal Activity. Conclude the study of “The

Visit to Vijay’s” by asking students to respond in

their journals to the following prompts:

• As a result of reading this story, I learned that

when people from different cultures meet, ...

• As a result of reading this story, this is what I

became aware of about how good writers

write:

• Reading this story has made me want to know

more about ...
Giving and Receiving

S HARING IN A FRICA

by Mike Tidwell

Peace Corps Volunteer, Zaire* (1985–1987)

(Excerpted from Chapter Four in The Ponds of Kalambayi)

People in villages across Kalambayi were trying to kill me. They were

feeding me too much.With little in the way of possessions, but driven

by a congenital desire to share what they could, villagers gave me

fufu—teeming, steaming metric tons of it.

Fufu was the doughy white substance served at every meal. Women

made it by pouring corn and manioc flour into boiling water, stirring

the mixture with wooden spoons, then lumping the gummy results into

calabash bowls where it assumed a size, shape, and weight not unlike

small bowling balls. It had little taste but filled you up and that was its

purpose: to compensate for the dishearteningly small servings of manioc leaves or dried fish that came with it. Kayemba Lenga told me a

funny fable about how Kalambayan ancestors stole the recipe for fufu

from mosquitoes long ago. Now, in protest, the bothersome insects buzz

one’s ears every night. Not being overly fond of fufu, nor the recurring

malaria protesting mosquitoes had already given me, I asked Kayemba

half-jokingly if it wasn’t possible to give the recipe back.

But it wasn’t possible. Fufu was as much a part

of the landscape as the grass and rivers. In

every village, around every corner, it was

there, waiting for me, widening my waistline.

Without exception, the villagers I visited

each day insisted I have some before moving

on.As in most traditional societies, the giving

was ungrudging and automatic—born of

kindness—and saying “no” simply was out of

the question.

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

Uncommon Journeys

*now the Democratic Republic of the Congo
V OCABULARY

Congenital: Existing at the time of birth

Manioc: [MAN-ee-ahk] Also called cassava; a tropical plant with a starchy root used

for making bread and tapioca

Ungrudging: Willing; generous

Incapacitate: To make unable or unfit

Regime: [ray-ZHEEM] French for a bunch,

such as bananas (an entire bunch, as it grows

on a banana tree)

Absurdity: Ridiculousness 

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 129

Here is how a fairly typical day goes for me:

I arrive at Bukasa’s house at 8 a.m. and a bowl of fufu awaits me, releasing hot wisps into the morning air. “Come,” he says. “Sit down. You

need to eat before we go to the ponds.”We eat and leave for work. At

the ponds I meet Kayemba and Mulundu Ilunga, who cheerfully drag

me back to their houses for large, back-to-back servings. I thank them

afterward and leave for the next village, Bena Ngoyi. By the time I pull

up to the huts it’s 1 p.m.—lunchtime. Two more bowls of fufu.

Sluggishly, my shirt buttons threatening to launch, I move on to

Milamba for a quick look at a fish pond and a torturous sixth bowl.

At the end of the day I’m transporting my bulk home under depressed

tires when a man in Kalula flags me down. He wants to discuss 

digging a pond.We sit and talk, and when I rise to leave he tells me 

to wait. I panic. “No, seriously,” I protest. “I’m not hungry. Really,

no, please. Please don’t.” But he knows I’m just being polite. He has

two wives and they both bring out fufu. I wash my hands. Bon appétit,

he says.

This was something I hadn’t counted on. I had expected a lot of challenges living in rural Africa, but being incapacitated by too much generosity, too much fufu, just wasn’t one of them.And fufu wasn’t the only

thing weighing me down. Relentlessly, Kalambayans shared all their

food, unloading on me whatever happened to be around when I rolled

into view. They put oranges in my hands, peanuts in my pockets,

stuffed sugarcane in my knapsack.

“It won’t fit,” I told Kayemba one day as he tried to tie an entire regime

of bananas across my motorcycle handlebars. “I’ll crash. Just give me

five.That’s enough.”

“No, it’s all right,” he said. “I’ve got another regime in the house.”

“I’ll crash, Kayemba. Don’t do it.” I wasn’t just being polite this time.

He yielded and sulked for a moment until the absurdity of his attempt
Giving and Receiving

caught up with him and we both laughed so hard tears welled in our

eyes.

It was truly overwhelming, all this giving.The Kalambayans were some

of the poorest people anywhere in the world, and yet they were by far

the most generous I had ever met. Indeed, each time I thought I had

been offered everything they had to share, something new was laid at

my feet.

Barely three months after I moved into the Lulenga cotton warehouse,

the village chief, Mbaya Tshiongo, appeared at my door dressed in his

threadbare trench coat and ripped tennis shoes. He was a meek, doddering septuagenarian with whom my previous contact had been limited to conversations in the market where I told him repeatedly that,

yes, everything was fine and, no, I didn’t need anything. Now he had

come to my house with something more dramatic on his mind.

Standing at his side were his four eligible daughters, shy and fresh as

daisies.

“Michel,” he began, leathery half moons sagging under his eyes, “you

live in my village and I am responsible for you.Take one of my daughters.You’re alone. A wife will make your life better. Choose one and

she will stay with you.”

Half the people in the village were standing behind the chief waiting

to see whom I would choose. Flattered and panicked in equal measure, my chest thumping, I fumbled for a way out of this with minimal

loss of face. I walked up to the chief, put my arm around his shoulders

and quietly guided him inside, where I explained things: “I can’t

accept, Chief. Really.They’re beautiful women. But I’m fine by myself.

I don’t need a wife right now.”

A cloud of perplexity crossed his face. He tried to reason with me.

“But you do need a wife, Michel. Every man does. Look, I’ll waive the

dowry.You won’t even have to pay me anything. Just take one.” But I

wouldn’t budge. Standing to leave, the chief asked me to at least promP EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

130 Uncommon Journeys

S HARING IN A FRICA ( CONTINUED )
V OCABULARY

Doddering: Feeble 

Septuagenarian: A person whose age 

is in the 70s

Michel: [mih-SHEL] French for the 

name Michael

Perplexity: Confusion; bewilderment

Waive: To give up a right to something

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 131

ise to let him know if I ever changed my mind. I said I would.

After the crowd dispersed and Chief Mbaya led his daughters, now

wilted by rejection, back home, I was left alone in my house convinced

there really were no limits to what these people would have me have.

The intense desire to give moved me to admiration, especially because

I knew villagers shared with each other with almost the same zeal they

did with me, the visitor. It was a social habit lacking in my own culture and I was curious to know what it was, exactly, that produced it

in Kalambayi.

Kazadi Manda, a lean, square-jawed fish farmer in Ntita Konyukua

who had a mile-wide smile, provided part of the answer early one

morning about a week later.We were sitting at his pond, tossing stones

at toads and watching his tilapia eat a batch of papaya leaves spread

across the liquid light of the pond’s surface. His fish, like those of Chief

Ilunga and the other new farmers, were coming along nicely, getting

fat for the upcoming first harvests. After talking shop for a while,

Kazadi and I turned our attention to other matters. I told him about

Chief Mbaya coming to my house with his daughters.

“You’re joking,” he said.“He just walked up and said pick one and you

refused?”

“Yes.”

“But why? Why didn’t you take one? It is a little strange that you live

alone in that warehouse the way you do, don’t you think? Nobody can

understand it. Don’t you want a wife?”

“Of course,” I said. “Someday. If I can find the right person. But I

barely know these women.”

“So?”

“I can’t marry a woman just like that. I have to be in love first and she

has to be in love with me. It takes time.”
Giving and Receiving

Kazadi didn’t get it. The look of blank incomprehension on his face

told me the relationship I was talking about didn’t exist in his universe.

He had no conception of the self, of the individual. Nor, by extension,

did he fully understand the Western notion of romantic love between

an individual man and woman.

“You don’t get married for love,” he told me. “You get married

because you need a woman to cook your food and bear your children.

Love is what you feel for your whole family. The happiness of your

children and brothers and parents and grandparents—of all of them

together—is what brings your own happiness. You can’t get that by

yourself or from a woman.”

“So until I have a lot of children and a big group of relatives all around

me I can never hope to be happy?” I said.

“That’s right.”

“Never?”

“Never.”

Sitting at the pond, listening to Kazadi pass on this truth with the conviction of an inspired cleric, I began to better understand the fabric of

life in Kalambayi. The family was indeed paramount. Kazadi was wed

to his relatives. And because each village was nothing but a collection

of several extended families, and because it was often difficult, due to

their size, to tell where one family began and another left off, this concern for the group was extended in large measure to include all members of the village and, ultimately, all people. Everyone treated everyone else more or less like a relative, whether he was or not. Everyone

was taken care of, even Kalambayi’s strange, white, American visitor—

me.

Kazadi and I talked a while longer before spreading a final bundle of

papaya leaves across the pond.When we finished he told me he wanted to harvest some peanuts from his field a short distance away. I didP EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

132 Uncommon Journeys

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V OCABULARY

Reciprocate: To give or act in return

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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 133

n’t have to be in the next village for another hour, so I offered to help.

He led the way up the valley.

Kazadi and I moved through a stand of banana trees, then a cotton

field, then a stretch of grass that left our pants wet with dew by the

time we reached his small plot of peanuts. We walked to the distantmost corner of the field and went to work, pulling the plants from the

ground with our hands. The soil was poor here, sandy as in most of

Kalambayi, and the stems lifted easily.Working 15 feet apart, we placed

the plants in separate piles, first shaking dirt from the dangling shells.

When each pile had roughly 20 plants, I figured we had about as many

as Kazadi could carry comfortably back to his family. But he kept

going. I did the same.

A moment later he finally stopped and tied the piles together in a large

bundle. I went down to the spring to wash my hands.When I walked

back up the hill to my motorcycle, the entire bundle of peanuts was

tied, to my surprise, above the rear fender. Kazadi was hoeing in a field

a little farther up. He stopped to wave goodbye.“They’re raw,” he said,

pointing to the peanuts, “so boil them first and add a little salt before

you eat them.”

Curiously, this habit of giving in Kalambayi didn’t rub off on me. Even

as I watched, and was moved by, the sacrifices villagers like Kazadi

made to keep me stocked with produce and filled with fufu, I didn’t do

the same. I didn’t reciprocate. I accepted the food and other gifts when

I could, but the idea of spreading around my own wealth in the same

free and automatic manner didn’t take hold. I hadn’t been sent to

Kalambayi to become like the people exactly. I taught fish culture. I

shared an expertise.That was enough.

So on the off chance that I was hungry at the end of the day, I didn’t

eat in my yard like most people, inviting passersby to join me. I took

my tin of sardines and plate of fried rice and stayed inside behind a

curtain pulled across the front door. I was glad to be alone and eating
Giving and Receiving

something other than fufu, glad to be listening to the BBC’s “Globe

Theatre” blessedly broadcast in English over my short-wave radio. If

someone came while I was eating, a friend or fish farmer, I stood at

the door and told him that, well, I was having dinner and could he

please come back later. Lifelong experience at suburban dinner tables

had taught me that mealtime visitors meant embarrassment.You made

apologies and they went away or waited until you finished.

I didn’t really care or really wasn’t conscious of the fact that the villagers around me thought this habit was a little strange, a bit obscene,

even for a visitor. Mbaya, my worker, didn’t tell me. Nor did any of my

neighbors. And no one said anything about the fact that I smoked

whole cigarettes by myself, not passing a portion of each one to other

men in my company as was the local habit. I just did these things. Just

like I socked away my money, saving as much of my living allowance

as I could for the beer and french fries it would buy on my next trip

to Mbuji Mayi.

To be sure, I had made a lot of changes since arriving—adapting to

strange foods, learning to bathe in cold rivers, surrendering my native

tongue for two years. But my attachment to the word “mine” was

strong and stubborn. Whatever the villagers did, I had my things, I

needed my things, and I didn’t give them away. So much was this attitude a measure of who I was and the Western culture that produced

me that during my early months it simply never occurred to me to try

to change.

I suppose it’s no wonder then that I treated Mutoba Muenyi the way

I did. She was a beggar—a haggard, unkempt, insane beggar who

roamed pretty much aimlessly through the villages of Kalambayi,

sleeping in other people’s huts or in the cotton storage house. Mbaya

told me she was the daughter of a nearby village chief and had been

made crazy years ago by the curse of a disgruntled husband.

I did my utmost to avoid Mutoba on those occasions when she came

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S HARING IN A FRICA ( CONTINUED )
V OCABULARY

Haggard: gaunt; tired looking

Unkempt: Untidy; messy

Intimidate: To make someone afraid 

Improvise: To make up on the spur of the

moment

Bludgeon: To strike, as if with a club

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 135

to Lulenga and stood under the cluster of palm trees in the center of

the village, babbling nonsense in her high-pitched voice while gesturing for food and money. I avoided her because I’ve never handled beggars well. They intimidate me. I had moved through the streets of

enough American cities to know that the usual response when confronted by a bedraggled panhandler is to hang on to your money and

keep walking.

So when I turned to answer a tap on my shoulder one afternoon in

the Lulenga market and saw Mutoba—clothes unwashed, teeth rotten,

arms motioning toward the avocados I was buying—I ignored her.

When she followed me through the market, creating a scene, I told her

to stop and quickly made my way home, embarrassed by her presence.

A few weeks later she appeared again, this time planting herself at my

door, asking for money. Again I shooed her away. It wasn’t until our

third encounter that things began to change. Mutoba involved me in

a small nightmare. She made me pay, in a sense, for all my previous

behavior.

It happened in Lulenga, early one morning in June. The village was

silent and still in the predawn darkness, everyone asleep, when Mutoba

crept to my house, pressed her face inches from my door and started

singing loudly. Her harsh voice woke me as if cymbals crashed above

my bed.The song she sang was improvised, with lyrics telling how she

was hungry and how I should give her something to eat.

Sleepy and annoyed, I lay in bed listening, cringing at the thought that

half the village was doing the same thing. My clock said 5:45.

“Sssshhhh,” I hissed from my room, “be quiet. Go away. I don’t have

any food.”

But the singing didn’t stop. Not after five minutes. Not after 10. It

went on and on, bludgeoning the morning quiet.Then something terrible happened.With mounting urgency, pushed on by the impurity of

the local water, my body began signaling that it had something to con-
Giving and Receiving

tribute to the backyard outhouse—now. Cursing, I got up, grabbed my

flashlight and began looking for the padlock to my door. Because the

outhouse was around back, I would have to lock the front door on my

way out, preventing Mutoba from entering while I was away. But suddenly there was a problem. I couldn’t find my padlock.With my bowels approaching critical mass and Mutoba’s hideous singing continuing

outside, I searched everywhere, finding nothing. I had misplaced 

the lock.

There was nothing left to do but go outside. I opened the door.There

she was. My flashlight revealed Mutoba’s bare feet, her startled eyes.

She didn’t move. She just kept singing as I shut the door behind me. I

dared not go to the outhouse now, leaving this crazy woman

unwatched by an unlocked door. I sprinted past her one hundred feet

to the far end of the cotton warehouse.There, off to the side in a patch

of knee-high grass next to a palm tree, I turned facing her and lowered myself to my haunches. All the while I kept my flashlight fixed

warily on her at the doorstep. I squatted and Mutoba sang, each of us

staring with equal shock at the spectacle before us.

And that’s how most of the village found us.To my yard they came—

mamas and papas and their children rubbing sleep from their eyes.

They filed out of their houses to see what all the commotion was

about. A minute or so after the performance started, just as the rising

sun was providing rosy light by which to see, there were several dozen

thunderstruck people gathered along the edges of my yard, watching

the mad showdown between the crapping foreigner and the crowing

bag lady.

I was beside myself with humiliation and anger by the time I finished

and stood. I walked straight to Mutoba.With the crowd looking on, I

yelled at her to leave immediately. She, in turn, yelled back, calling me

a muena tshitua over and over again. It was a name I had never heard

before. After a moment, she finally left. The crowd, guffawing and

embarrassed by all the ugliness, walked away.

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S HARING IN A FRICA ( CONTINUED )
V OCABULARY

Permeating: Penetrating; spreading through

Mitigating: Making less severe; moderating

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 137

About 30 minutes later, while I was sitting inside my house still trying

to figure out what had just happened, Mbaya came by. He already had

heard about the affair with Mutoba, but insisted I recount the story in

full.”You look a little ill,” he said when I had finished.

“I feel ill.”

Then I asked him a question:“What’s a muena tshitua?”The words had

stuck in my mind since Mutoba spoke them. “She called me a muena

tshitua. What’s that?”

Mbaya grew noticeably uncomfortable at this and heaved a forced

laugh. “Oh it’s nothing,” he said. “You didn’t know.”

“Know what? What does it mean? What did she call me?”

Reluctantly, he told me. Mutoba had delivered one of the most serious charges one can make in Kalambayi.“A muena tshitua,” he said,“is

someone who doesn’t share. She said you were stingy.”

There was a brief pause after this, a few seconds when Mbaya avoided

my eyes and I folded my arms. Hanging in the silence and permeating

Mbaya’s awkward manner seemed to be the suggestion that the muena

tshitua label wasn’t such a bad fit, that perhaps Mutoba was right.

“But how could I give her anything?” I asked him, breaking the

silence. She had come at an outrageous hour, singing like a wild soul

and wresting me from sleep, I said. Running her off was the only thing

I could have done.

But even to myself my argument sounded a bit feeble.There were no

mitigating circumstances to explain my other encounters with her, nor

my conspicuously selfish behavior in general.

When I finished, Mbaya responded cautiously. Like most Kalambayans,

he was often hesitant to openly criticize or correct. He softened what

he was about to tell me by stressing that he thought I was basically a

great guy and I shouldn’t worry too much about what a deranged old
Giving and Receiving

woman told me. Then, delicately, he explained that I hadn’t done the

right thing that morning. It was all right to shoo Mutoba away, but the

proper response was to give her a little food or whatever she needed

first.That’s what most people did.

He was right, of course. The same villagers who vigorously plied me

with fufu and peanuts everywhere I went also took care of Mutoba. It

wouldn’t occur to them to do otherwise. She couldn’t farm or provide

for herself, so when her clothes became too torn, someone, somewhere, gave her new ones.When her filth became excessive, someone

placed a piece of soap in her hand. The sense of familial generosity

flowing through every village protected her.

But wrapped up in my own notions of privacy and propriety, trying to

live in this culture without really being a part of it, I gave nothing to

Mutoba. My problem, in a big sense, was greed. Not just greed toward

the things I wanted to keep for myself, but toward this whole two-year

trip abroad. I wanted to take as much from this African world as I

could, to learn and experience, without surrendering any large part of

myself, without making significant changes like replacing the faulty

moral compass I had come out with with one that made more sense

in this poor setting. Clearly, this resistance was bound to fail me. I had

no desire to “go native,” to become like a typical villager in every way.

But to have any meaningful experience here, to leave with true friends

and true insights, I had to let go of some strong habits. I had to rip

something out in order to add something new.

This wasn’t the message Mbaya had in mind, really, when he tried to

educate me on that strange morning Mutoba Muenyi came to my

house, but it’s the one that started to sink in. His message, though not

in as many words, was more simple: “You’ve been here long enough,

Michel. It’s time you stopped being such an appalling tightwad.”

So, like learning to navigate bad roads and speak the local language, I

had to learn to share in Kalambayi. I had to learn to put aside my

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V OCABULARY

Appalling: Dismaying; shocking

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 139

excessive concern for my own interests and to open up my house and

cupboards to people who did the same for me. Needled with shame

after my talk with Mbaya, I began with Mutoba. The next time she

came to my house—this time knocking on a moonlit evening—I 

shuffled into the kitchen and brought back a papaya and some dried

fish. On following visits, I gave whatever else I had on hand. Weeks

went by and there were other changes. I stopped the awkward practice

of blocking my door when friends and neighbors came at dinnertime.

When they arrived, they entered and ate with me. There was always

more rice or fufu in the kitchen I could eat later. Similarly, I stopped

smoking whole cigarettes. I started passing half of each one I lit up to

whatever men happened to be around me at the time.

And, eventually, I took the big step. A good part of my 70-dollar

monthly salary started sneaking away from me. It found its way to my

closest friends, people who began to represent something of my own

extended family: five dollars to Kazadi Manda to buy malaria medicine

for his daughter; three dollars to Mbaya’s brother to pay school fees; 50

cents of dried fish to poorer farmers whose children I knew had eaten

nothing but manioc leaves for weeks. Saving money for a row of cold

beers in Mbuji Mayi gradually lost its importance.

As time passed, it grew easier and easier to let go of what I had. The

reason was simple: I had a lot. Like most people who go overseas to do

development work, I did so expecting to find out what it’s like to be

poor. But awakening to my surroundings after a few months, I discovered that that’s not what happens. Instead you learn what it’s like to be

rich, to be fabulously, incomprehensibly, bloated with wealth. Into this

jumble of backwater villages, where every man had a mud house, a

hoe, and 10 kids, I came stomping and rattling with a motorcycle and

cassette tapes and books to read and boots to wear and a bed to sleep

on. I had two kerosene lamps and kerosene to put inside them. I had

tools to fix my motorcycle and a 200-liter barrel of gasoline to make

it run. I had a tin roof over my head. No one in Kalambayi could

afford to share more than I.
R EADING AND R ESPONDING TO

‘ S HARING IN A FRICA ’ 

O VERVIEW

A BOUT THE A UTHOR

Mike Tidwell served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in the chiefdom of

Kalambayi, in Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo), as

an agriculture extension agent. His Peace Corps assignment, from

1985 to 1987, was to help the central African villagers increase their

protein consumption by showing them how to build ponds and raise

fish. Since that time, he has written several books, including a Peace

Corps memoir, The Ponds of Kalambayi:An African Sojourn, which won

the 1991 National Peace Corps Association’s Paul Cowan Non-Fiction

Award. “Sharing in Africa” is excerpted from Chapter Four of The

Ponds of Kalambayi. His most recent book, published in 2003, is Bayou

Farewell: The Rich Life and Tragic Death of Louisiana’s Cajun Coast.

Tidwell is executive director of the Chesapeake Climate Action

Network, a grass-roots organization in Maryland and the Washington,

D.C., region dedicated to fighting global warming.

A BOUT THE S TORY

In “Sharing in Africa,” Tidwell tells how he experienced the overwhelming generosity of the local villagers, who plied him repeatedly

with offers of food—and even of wives. Despite the generosity that

surrounded him,Tidwell describes how he could not bring himself to

share his food, belongings, or living allowance, until an embarrassing

encounter with a beggar helped him question his own cultural values.

Students will appreciate Tidwell’s insight and humor and his ability

Giving and Receiving

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140 Uncommon Journeys

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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools

S TANDARDS

English Standards: 1, 3, 6 (see page 187)

Social Studies Standards: I, IV, IX (see page 188)

National Geography Standards: 4, 6, 10, 11, 13

(see pages 189–190)

Enduring Understandings

• People of different cultures have different attitudes toward

sharing.

• To understand people from other cultures—and to avoid

misunderstandings—sometimes we have to try to see the

world from their point of view as well as from our own.

• In some cultures, people believe the group is responsible

for the well-being of each individual. In other cultures,

people believe that individuals are primarily responsible for

themselves.

Essential Questions

• What are attitudes toward sharing in the United States?

How is sharing viewed in another culture you might be

familiar with?

• How do we know when we’ve shared enough? How do

we know when we’ve been generous enough?

• What, if anything, do we gain from trying to see the world

from another person’s perspective?

• When is taking care of the individual more important than

taking care of the group? When is taking care of the group

more important than taking care of the individual?

• What does this story teach us about the challenges of serving as a volunteer in another culture?

Materials: Photocopies of story, Resource Sheet 1

Assessment Tools

Journal entries, graphic organizers, extended written

responses to the text, personal narrative

both to analyze his reactions and to laugh at himself as he

discovers the nature of true sharing.

Two other excerpts from The Ponds of Kalambayi, with lessons for the classroom, are available in the Peace Corps

publication Voices From the Field (available from the Peace

Corps or online at www.peacecorps.gov/wws/guides

/voices).

A BOUT THE S ETTING

“Sharing in Africa” takes place in the remote chiefdom of

Kalambayi in the heart of Zaire, now the Democratic

Republic of the Congo (and before that, the Belgian

Congo). Straddling the Equator, Congo has the third

largest population, and the second largest land area, in subSaharan Africa. It includes the Congo River Basin, which

encompasses an area of almost 400,000 square miles.

Despite vast natural resources, including copper, cobalt,

diamonds, gold, and petroleum, Congo at the beginning of

the millennium had a per capita annual income of $82.

Agriculture, the main occupation, includes cash crops such

as coffee, palm oil, rubber, cotton, sugar, tea, and cocoa, as

well as food crops such as cassava, plantains, and groundnuts—the term in Africa for peanuts.

In recent years, Congo has sustained brutal internal strife,

with a lingering civil war producing high numbers of casualties, massive dislocation of the population, and starvation

on a broad scale.
Giving and Receiving

Suggestion for teaching the lessons: Copy the

story from this volume in three sections or download

it from the website www.peacecorps.gov/wws/journeys.The three sections:

1. To the end of the paragraph that starts: “It was

truly overwhelming....” (page 130)

2. From “Barely three months” to the end of the

paragraph that starts: “A moment later he finally

stopped....” (page 133)

3. The remainder of the story.

L ESSON 1

P URPOSE

• To examine how different cultures have different

attitudes toward sharing

• To question limits on sharing and if it is possible

to be too generous

1. In preparation for reading the story, have students

brainstorm a list of celebrations and holidays. List

them on the board as students suggest them. Have

students also come up with some foods associated with those days. Students may suggest items

such as Valentine’s candy; Easter eggs; matzoh for

Passover; Halloween candy; Thanksgiving turkey;

Christmas candy canes and fruitcake.Ask students

why particular foods are served on these holidays.

Emphasize that this is part of culture—and that

those who are part of a culture share in the celebrations. Explain that certain foods have symbolic meaning for different groups, and that food is

part of tradition in social gatherings.

2. Ask students what they think is meant by the

term “breaking bread.” Point out that in many

cultures, eating together goes far beyond merely

satisfying hunger; it provides reinforcement of

the ties of family and friendship and involves the

act of sharing. Suggest to students that this will

be a theme in the story they will read.

3. To help students understand the context of the

story, give them background on the author,

Congo, and the Peace Corps, provided on the

previous two pages. Point out the location of

Congo on a map of Africa (see page 128). Then

read them the following passage, which is

excerpted from Tidwell’s introduction in The

Ponds of Kalambayi.

T H E C ONGO R IVER

Bending and arching, looking curiously confused,

the Congo River makes its way through central

Africa, crossing the Equator twice. It’s an enormous

river, dominating both geography and human life in

Zaire. In his famous novella Heart of Darkness,

Joseph Conrad wrote of the Congo: “There was in

(the world) one river especially, a mighty big river,

that you could see on a map, resembling an

immense snake uncoiled, with its head in the sea,

its body at rest curving afar over a vast country, and

its tail lost in the depths of the land.”

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Actually, the Congo has several tails. A dozen

major tributaries spill into its serpentine body.

These tributaries are themselves fed by other rivers,

each farther and farther lost in the depths of the

land. One such branch, running through the grasslands of south-central Zaire roughly 1,000 miles

east of the Congo’s main body, is the Lubilashi

River. On a map the Lubilashi appears as an unremarkable ribbon meandering among the others. But

on the ground it is wide and powerful; an impressive river.At one point along its banks live 20,000

people banded together in a chiefdom called

Kalambayi. Like the river along which they live,

the people of Kalambayi are lost, their lives barely

touched by the hands of the 20th century. To this

place I journeyed with my newly acquired duffel

bag as a Peace Corps Volunteer....

For two years, I lived among the Kalambayan people. I spoke their language and taught many of

them how to raise fish. My goal was to increase

family protein consumption. But what I gave these

people in the form of development advice, they

returned tenfold in lessons on what it means to be

human. There, at the center of the continent, they

shared with me the ancient spirit of Africa’s heart.

They shared its hopes, its generosity. Above all,

they shared its unbending will to survive in the face

of adversities so severe I nearly lost my life more

than once just passing through.

4. Ask students to read the first section of “Sharing

in Africa.” (Point out that the author is called

Michel because French is widely spoken in

Congo.) Have them consider these questions to

guide their reading:

• How does Tidwell feel about fufu?

• Why do the villagers offer it to him?

• Why does he keep eating it?

• What is the meaning of sharing food in

Kalambayi?

5. Hold a class discussion addressing these points:

• What does Tidwell want us to understand about

fufu—and about the local culture’s values

regarding sharing? 

• Why doesn’t Tidwell just refuse the food and

explain that he is not hungry?

• What foods do we eat that are similar in texture

to fufu? [Oatmeal, cornmeal mush, polenta,

mashed potatoes.] What would it be like to eat

this staple three or more times a day?

• What would a villager from Kalambayi think if

you took him or her into a modern American

supermarket? 

6. Comprehension Strategy. Explain to students

that in order to go deeper into the meaning of a

story, readers sometimes take a paragraph or part

of the story that seems important and study it in

depth.They think about what the author means

and how it relates to their own lives and their

own thinking. By way of example, read aloud

Tidwell’s words:
Giving and Receiving

It was truly overwhelming, all this giving. The

Kalambayans were some of the poorest people anywhere in the world, and yet they were by far the

most generous I had ever met. Indeed, each time I

thought I had been offered everything they had to

share, something new was laid at my feet.

D ISCUSSION WITH THE CLASS

• Why did Tidwell encounter such incredible generosity?

• How can we know when we’ve shared enough?

• Is it ever possible to share too much?

• What did Tidwell mean by his “being incapacitated by too much generosity”?

7. Journal assignment. For homework, ask students to read the next section of the story, ending with the phrase “... so boil them first and

add a little salt before you eat them.” Have them

highlight the sentences that have the most meaning for them, or write them in their journals, for

discussion in the next day’s class.

8. Optional Journal Activity. For homework,

have students write a journal entry as follows:

Describe an occasion when someone was

extremely generous to you, or you were

extremely generous to someone else. What were

the circumstances? How was the giver generous?

Why? What difference did this make to the

recipient? Who do you think got more pleasure—the giver or the receiver? Why? Try to use

concrete details, as Tidwell did, to make your

narrative seem real to the reader.

L ESSON 2

P URPOSE

• To examine differences between cultures

• To see the same situation from different perspectives

• To question what we gain from trying to see the

world from the perspective of another person or

culture

• To understand the challenges Peace Corps

Volunteers face when serving in a culture outside

the United States

1. Conduct a class discussion about the sentences

(or paragraphs) from the second section of the

story that students underlined in their homework—the parts they found most meaningful.

2. Discuss the incident in which the village chief,

Mbaya Tshiongo, offers Tidwell one of his

daughters in marriage.What options did Tidwell

have? What would have been the consequences

of each option? 

To facilitate the students’ answers and elicit a

broad range of thoughtful responses, ask the students to pair up and use Resource Sheet 1, a

graphic organizer that may help them analyze

the incident and the attendant issues in the story.

3. When the students have completed the sheets,

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R ESOURCE S HEET 1

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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 145

What did Tidwell think about the

offer of a wife?

How did Tidwell feel when he

declined the offer?

Why did Tidwell feel the way he did

about Mbaya Tshiongo’s offer?

How effective was Tidwell’s response ? Do you think Mbaya Tshiongo thought

this was a respectful response?

What cultural differences made it difficult

for Mbaya Tshiongo to understand Tidwell?

What cultural and professional issues did

Tidwell have to consider in responding to

Mbaya Tshiongo?

Why did Mbaya Tshiongo feel

the way he did?

How did Mbaya Tshiongo view his

offer of a wife to Tidwell?

How did Mbaya Tshiongo feel when

Tidwell declined the offer?

S ORTING O U T P ERSPECTIVES

Directions: Use this graphic organizer to help analyze the story. With a partner,

respond to each of the prompts in order, left to right, top to bottom.
Giving and Receiving

debrief the class as a whole, inviting contributions from the resource sheets. What were the

issues Tidwell had to consider as he tried to figure out what to do? What risks were involved for

Tidwell? For the chief? For the Peace Corps program in Kalambayi? Why did Tidwell need the

ability to see the world from the chief ’s perspective, as well as from his own?

Explain that Peace Corps Volunteers often face

cultural situations they don’t anticipate, and they

need to be able to respond with respect and sensitivity. The problem they face is how to show

respect for the cultural values of their hosts while

not compromising their own values in the

process. A critical skill for a Volunteer is the ability to see the world from another culture’s perspective and respond appropriately.

4. Ask students what can be gained from trying to see

the world from another person’s perspective—and

from another culture’s perspective. Can students

identify how this might benefit them on a personal

level—as a Peace Corps Volunteer or even just as a

traveler? Can they suggest how this kind of understanding could affect a country’s foreign policy?

Prompt students to think of a time when they’ve

had to see the world from another person’s point of

view at home in their own country.This discussion

can be concluded by providing students with the

enduring understanding: “To avoid misunderstanding—and possibly offending—someone from

another culture, we need to try to see the world

from their point of view as well as from our own.”

About Graphic Organizers: Ask students if

the graphic organizer helped them gain a better

understanding of one of the complex issues in

the story. How might they adapt this graphic

organizer for use in a different class in which

they are presented with a complex issue? Let the

students know that research has shown that

graphic organizers aid appreciably in reader

comprehension and retention.

5. The Individual and the Community: Who

Comes First? In class discussion, ask students

whether Kalambayans live under the principle of

the group being responsible for individuals, or

individuals being responsible for themselves.

Students will observe that Tidwell lived in

Kalambayi in a culture where people believe the

group is responsible for the well-being of each

individual.This created a challenge for him, since

he had grown up in a culture where emphasis lies

on the responsibility of individuals for themselves.

Ask students to jot down on paper examples in

American culture of how individual responsibility for ourselves is valued. [Examples: the pioneering spirit of families settling territories new

to them; the praise directed to individual

achievement in business and in school; stardom

of individuals in sports, movies, music; the tendency for nuclear families to disperse and for

grown children “to make it on their own.”] 

Discuss the students’ observations, then read

aloud the following quotations from Tidwell:

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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 147

This concern for the group was extended in large

measure to include all members of the village and,

ultimately, all people. Everyone treated everyone

else more or less like a relative, whether he was or

not. Everyone was taken care of, even Kalambayi’s

strange, white, American visitor—me.

[This] was a social habit lacking in my own culture, and I was curious to know what it was, exactly, that produced it in Kalambayi.

Draw the attention of the class to the second

paragraph in particular. Ask students to speculate

as to why the Kalambayans practice communal

sharing so thoroughly, and in such contrast to the

culture from which Tidwell came. Why might

the complete sharing of material goods and food

have evolved in the heart of the chiefdom of

Kalamabayi and not in the American landscape?

Further questions for discussion:

• In the United States, under what circumstances

does taking care of the group take precedence

over taking care of the individual?

• Do you think the villagers in Kalambayi would

have characterized themselves as generous?

Why or why not? (If Tidwell had said to them:

“You are very generous people,” would they

have agreed?)

• Tidwell wrote: “But to have any meaningful

experience here, I had to let go of some strong

habits.” What habits were those? Why did he

have to let go of them to succeed as a Peace

Corps Volunteer?

6. The Peace Corps Experience. Read aloud to

students the following, from Tidwell’s introduction to The Ponds of Kalambayi:

For two years, I lived among the Kalambayan people. I spoke their language and taught many of

them how to raise fish. My goal was to increase

family protein consumption. But what I gave these

people in the form of development advice, they

returned tenfold in lessons on what it means to be

human.

Compare this quotation for the class to a comment from author and returned Peace Corps

Volunteer Carrie Young, who served in Mali

(page 161):

Even though I tried to teach the villagers things

that they didn’t know about, they taught me so

much more than I could have taught them—like

how to care for one another, work as a community,

and be happy with what I have no matter how

great or small.

(You might want to provide students with a small

handout containing both quotations, so they can

review and compare them.)

D ISCUSSION WITH STUDENTS

• Do you think Tidwell and Young expected to

learn these life lessons—and to learn more than

they taught—when they first went to their posts?

• Did Tidwell have to give up his own culture in

order to fit in among the Kalambayans? If you

think so, in what ways did he have to “give up”
Giving and Receiving

his culture? If you think not, what did he do

instead? How did he adjust? 

L ESSON 3

P URPOSE

To show how richly written literature can be

used as a mentor text, or model, for improving

one’s own writing

1. Ask students to read the rest of Tidwell’s story.

Then introduce them to the “So what?” rule of

writing presented by educator Nancie Atwell.

Here is her proposition:

Good writing in every genre answers the question

So what? Good writing has a purpose, a point, a

reason it was written.... Sometimes the So what?

is subtle and implicit. Sometimes it’s explicitly stated. But always a good reader finds something new

to think about because a good writer has found

something important to think about. [Lessons That

Change Writers, page 40.]

2. Tell students you’d like them to think about

Tidwell’s story “Sharing in Africa” and then ask

themselves: “So what?” Help students determine

if they see a “So what?”—“a purpose, a point, a

reason it was written.” Assist them with sample

questions: How did Tidwell challenge you to

think about your world? Your values? Did you

learn something about another part of the world?

Did the author entertain you? Did he employ a

writing style you noticed and learned from? 

3. Suggest to students that Tidwell’s story serves as

a “mentor text”—literature that exemplifies elements of the writer’s craft that students can emulate. Students don’t just read a mentor text; they

study it and write their own composition

employing some of the same stylistic devices of

the mentor author.You can have students return

to Tidwell’s story repeatedly to tackle the following writing issues.

• How do you write an engaging lead? Do you

start with a question? A short sentence about

the setting? A mysterious line? 

• How do you introduce a new character? Do

you describe the character first, or do you have

the character talk first? Or do you describe

what others think about him or her?

• How do you use hyperbole to engage the reader or add humor? “Sharing in Africa” has many

examples of hyperbole (“People in villages

across Kalambayi were trying to kill me.”“Fufu

... a doughy white substance ... not unlike

small bowling balls”). Have students find more

examples of hyperbole and then think about

what effect it has and how they could use

hyperbole in their own writing.

• How do you handle transitions in time? How

did Tidwell do this?

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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 149

• How do you slow down the action at a critical

moment? How did Tidwell do this?

• How do you vary your sentence length to add

interest? How did Tidwell do this?

4. Ask students to think of a time when they unexpectedly learned something that was important

to them (a “So what?” time they will never forget) and to write a short personal narrative about

it. Have them try to look for ways to make their

writing engaging by imitating the way Tidwell

held his readers’ interest in “Sharing in Africa.”

5. Once students have a first draft, ask them to

exchange papers with a partner for feedback, then

to revise their texts, edit and proofread, and prepare the text for submission to their teacher.

E XTENSION A CTIVITIES : 

C HOICES AND E XPLORA TIONS

1. Students who wish to know more about life in a

traditional African community can read Chinua

Achebe’s Things Fall Apart—a book on many

middle school and high school reading lists.The

themes that Tidwell introduces in his story are

developed in Achebe’s novel: the role of family,

the nature of marriage, the individual’s responsibility to the group. The contrast of these cultural traits with Western values in the novel invites

comparison as well. Tidwell’s story provides an

excellent introduction to the novel.

2. Have students select from the following options:

• Working in small groups, develop a written

script for the dramatization of sharing fufu,

bananas, and other foods from one’s home.

Make sure you illustrate the deeply held ethic

that it is socially proper to share what you have.

Perform this dramatization for a class of

younger students. Each student in the group

should be able to summarize the main ideas in

the story and explain their significance.

• Imagine that you are Mike Tidwell at the end

of your two years of Peace Corps service.Write

a letter to your replacement who is preparing

to come to Kalambayi. In the letter, include a

description of Kalambayan culture and how it

differs from the culture of the United States,

and provide advice and recommendations for

success. Do you think it is possible to convey

adequately in writing the importance of sharing in Kalambayan culture, or does one have to

experience it to understand it fully?

• Write a short essay addressing the question:

How would life in our school be different

today if everyone in our school shared the values of the people of Kalambayi?

• Working with a partner, illustrate the most

important events of “Sharing in Africa” on a

large piece of chart paper, using felt-tipped

markers in various colors. The drawing should

serve as a visual summary of the story.
Giving and Receiving

T H E S ENEGALESE M IRACLE

by Leita Kaldi 

Peace Corps Volunteer, Senegal (1993–1996)

I was one of 60 new Peace Corps trainees who landed at Dakar-Yoff

Airport at midnight, excited and tired. As we stood jammed in the

aisles, the plane door finally opened and the hot night air blasted

through the cabin.The airport looked more like a hangar with a baggage conveyor belt winding through its middle. Peace Corps officials

waited there to meet us, help us with baggage, and shepherd us

through customs. Outside, wiry Senegalese porters loaded our bags

onto the tops of two rickety buses, while clots of taxi drivers leaning

against yellow, broken-down cars smoked hand-rolled cigarettes and

spoke a language I’d never heard before. Beggars, black figures clad in

rags, stood against the airport wall like a row of exclamation marks.

Once the bags were tied down with ropes on top of the buses,

apprenti, or drivers’ helpers, ushered us into the vehicles, where we sat

on metal benches covered in vinyl with bits of sponge peeking

through the rips. In a roar of unmuffled engines, we were off.

Skirting the city of Dakar, we trundled down a dark country road, or

so it seemed, until I learned that this road was, in fact, one of the

country’s few national routes. Low-hanging

clouds hid the dark sky. All I could see from

the window were shadows of queer baobab

trees, massive, with clumps of leaves bursting

from their thick limbs.The smells assailed me.

They say that the way you react to the smells

of Africa will determine whether you love or

hate it. Among the odors I detected peanuts,

mucky earth, an elusive scent of the sea, the

occasional waft of night-blooming jasmine,

the not unpleasant body odor of a young

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

Uncommon Journeys
V OCABULARY

Wiry: Thin, lean, sinewy

Apprenti: [uh-PRON-tee] French for

apprentices to the bus or truck driver, who

collect the fares and assist passengers with

luggage

Baobab: [BAY-uh-bab] A tree indigenous

to semi-arid parts of Africa, which develops

an enormously thick trunk and has a life

span of perhaps a thousand years 

Ignoble: not grand 

Swale: a depression in the land

Boubou: [BOO-boo] A long, flowing robe

that is traditional clothing in Senegal 

Proffer: To offer; give

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 151

Senegalese man sitting behind me, and, from somewhere, cinnamon. I

found it all delicious; I loved it.

Bam! An explosion rocked the bus.The bus careened from one side of

the road to the other. My heart in my throat, the thought flashed

through my mind of an ignoble end to my adventure before it ever

began. The driver wrestled with the steering wheel and after what

seemed like a long roller-coaster ride, the bus coasted into a swale. A

flat tire. We filed off the bus so the crew could jack it off the ground

and change the tire.

As we milled around by the roadside, sticking close to each other, a full

moon parted the curtain of clouds and flooded the sky with light. It

illumined a nearby cement-block house with a pointed straw roof, in

front of which a group of people squatted around a fire. Their faces

shone in the blaze—angled cheekbones, chiseled noses, high-curved

brows, white glints of eyes. One by one, the people rose and strolled

toward us, men in flowing robes, women in wraparound skirts and

long matching blouses or T-shirts that fell around their narrow hips. A

tall, slim young man in a white boubou led the others. He greeted us in

French. As the only person in our group who already spoke French, I

approached him. He introduced himself as Mohammed Sy and said

that he and his neighbors were amazed to see so many foreigners clustered in front of their compound. I explained who we were and why

we were there. He had heard of Peace Corps. As we stood there waiting for the flat tire to be fixed, I translated his words for the other

Volunteers who huddled around.

Mohammed expressed gratitude for the sacrifices he presumed we had

made to come and help his country. He turned to a young woman

behind him and spoke words incomprehensible to me, to which she

responded by leaving the group and heading back to the house. A few

minutes later she moved like a shadow through the darkness carrying

a platter of small green oranges, which she proffered to us with a serious face. Her sober expression made me wonder if the fruit came from
V OCABULARY

Giving and Receiving

some vital store that would otherwise have fed her family or been sold

in the roadside market.

Mohammed confirmed my suspicions when he told us something that,

in time, would become a familiar phenomenon to us all, though at that

moment it sounded like a mystery. Mohammed called it the miracle of

Senegal.

“Like most Africans,” he explained in elegant French,“we are poor, but

we believe in sharing.Whatever I have never belongs to me alone, but

to my family and all my brothers and sisters who have less. You will

find families of, say, 10, with only one person who works, who earns

some money. That person will feed his entire family on his meager

income and send as many children as possible to school. He will keep

nothing for himself.”

Mohammed held up his hand to us, in a biblical posture. “But that is

not the miracle,” he continued. “The miracle happens when others

besides the immediate family come into the household—needy relatives, children whose parents cannot feed them.Then the same person

with the same income feeds 20, instead of 10. And everyone eats.

Everyone survives.” He laughed. “It’s a miracle, n’est-ce pas?”

The bus driver called to us; the tire was fixed. Everyone shook hands

with Mohammed and we climbed back into the bus, setting off again

into the night. Mohammed’s miracle echoed in my ears, not yet understood, but I would remember it countless times during the coming

years until I too learned to share my bread, my space, my strength with

people who had less.Where I was coming from, that would be a miracle in itself.

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152 Uncommon Journeys

T H E S ENEGALESE M IRACLE ( CONTINUED )

N est-ce pas? [ness PAH?] French expression for “Isn’t that so?” Many Senegalese

speak French because Senegal was a French

colony.
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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 153

R EADING AND R ESPONDING TO

‘ T H E S ENEGALESE M IRACLE ’

O VERVIEW

A BOUT THE A UTHOR

Leita Kaldi joined the Peace Corps at the age of 55 and served as a

Volunteer from 1993 to 1996 in the village of Fimela, in Senegal.

Fimela is on the coast of Senegal, where the Sahara meets the Atlantic

Ocean. Assigned to the small-enterprise development program, Kaldi

helped start many projects, including small tourist markets in seven

villages and a warehouse for storing harvested shellfish and grain.

In an unpublished manuscript,“Adventures of an Aging Coquette in the

Peace Corps,” Kaldi writes: “I lived like most Senegalese villagers, in a

small cement-block house with a corrugated asbestos roof, no electricity, no water ... no problem.When it was very hot at night, I slept outdoors on a bamboo bed under a mosquito net. In the end, Peace Corps

was not the toughest job I ever had, but it is the one I loved the most.”

After her Peace Corps service, Kaldi (whose first name is pronounced

LEE-tuh) lived in Haiti, working as the administrator of Albert

Schweitzer Hospital. She was awarded the New Century Writers First

Prize in 2001 for her story “Fear of Falling.”

A BOUT THE S TORY

“The Senegalese Miracle” describes Kaldi’s arrival in Senegal and her

first encounter with the local population. After deplaning and boarding a bus, the new Peace Corps Volunteers have occasion to encounter

a Senegalese man and his family who offer them oranges and explain

the “Senegalese miracle,” a phenomenon entailing hospitality and genS TANDARDS

English Standards: 2, 3, 6 (see page 187)

Social Studies Standards: I,IV (see page 188)

National Geography Standards: 10, 11, 13 

(see pages 189–190)

Enduring Understandings 

• Attitudes toward sharing vary among 

different cultures.

• People offer hospitality in many ways,

depending on the culture.

Essential Questions

• What value does our culture place on

sharing? (Consider money, food, shelter,

material goods.)

• How do we know when we’ve shared enough?

• How does our school or community treat

new arrivals? What kind of hospitality do

we show? 

• How can I help to make new people in

my school or community feel at home?

• How can I revise my writing to make my

imagery more vivid? 

Materials

Photocopies of story

Assessment Tools

Class discussions, journal entries, descriptive

sentences, written responses to the text 
Giving and Receiving

erosity. The story gives students another view of

themes raised by Mike Tidwell in “Sharing in Africa”

(page 128), and makes an excellent companion piece.

A BOUT THE S ETTING

Because Senegal was a French colony, French is the

official language in the country, but many local languages are also spoken. Like many of its West African

neighbors, Senegal, which has a population of 9.2

million, ranks among the least developed countries

in the world. Under its new industrial policy, the

government is attempting to stimulate the economy

through the reduction of bureaucracy and the privatization of state industries. Progress is being made,

but many factors still hinder the country’s development. Desertification continues to affect agricultural

production. Roughly 70 percent of the population is

engaged in agriculture, but agriculture contributes

less than 25 percent of the country’s gross domestic

product. At present, many Senegalese do not have

access to basic health care. To address these needs,

Peace Corps Volunteers, more than 2,500 of whom

have served in Senegal since 1963, focus their efforts

in the areas of agriculture, business development,

environment, and health.

For further information about Senegal, visit the

country-information section of the Peace Corps

website at www.peacecorps.gov.

L ESSON 1

P URPOSE

To reflect on the enduring understanding,

“Attitudes toward sharing differ among different

cultures.”

1. Show students a map of Senegal and, using information from the introduction above, provide

information about the author and the setting.

Point out that Americans can join the Peace

Corps at any stage in their lives, not only in the

early stages of their careers.

2. Have students read the story. Ask them to note

the sentences or lines they liked the most while

reading.When students have finished reading, ask

them to describe in their journals the lines they

highlighted, and why. Then have students

respond in their journals to the following

prompts:

• What do you think the author wanted her

readers to be thinking about?

• What is Kaldi’s most important point?

3. Have students share their journal responses with

a partner. Then conduct a class discussion on

their responses, and also on the more literal questions that follow. Remind students to cite evidence from the text to support their answers:

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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 155

• What are Kaldi’s first impressions of Africa?

How does she feel about being there?

• What opportunity does the tire blowout give

her?

• Describe the people she meets while her group

is waiting for the flat tire to be fixed. How do

they greet her?

• What thoughts does this story bring to mind

about generosity? About hospitality?

4. If students have read “Sharing in Africa” (p. 128),

ask them what connections they find between

Kaldi’s description of her first day in Senegal and

Tidwell’s description of life in the chiefdom of

Kalambayi.

• Refer students to Tidwell’s statement in

“Sharing in Africa”: “It was truly overwhelming, all this giving.The Kalambayans were some

of the poorest people anywhere in the world,

and yet they were by far the most generous I

had ever met. Indeed, each time I thought I had

been offered everything they had to share,

something new was laid at my feet.”

• Have students compare the customs Tidwell

describes in what was then Zaire with Kaldi’s

description of the customs in Senegal: “Like

most Africans,” Kaldi’s brief host explained in

elegant French,“we are poor, but we believe in

sharing. Whatever I have never belongs to me

alone, but to my family and all my brothers and

sisters who have less.”

Then ask the class

• Why the poorest of people might be among the

most generous.

• How American culture compares with the cultures in the author’s region of Senegal and in

Kalambayi, in regard to sharing.

• Why people in different cultures might have

different attitudes toward sharing.

5. Read aloud the last paragraph of the story. Ask

students to describe “the Senegalese miracle.”

What is the nature of that miracle? 

6. Point out to students that, since this was Kaldi’s

story, she could have ended it any way she wanted.Ask them why they think she made the decision to end the story with the phrase: “Where I

was coming from, that would be a miracle in

itself.”

7. Journal Activity. For homework, ask students

to respond in their journals to the following

questions:

• In general, how would you describe the attitude in the United States toward strangers? 

• Describe a time when you were a stranger in a

place or situation. How were you treated?
Giving and Receiving

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156 Uncommon Journeys

T H E S ENEGALESE M IRACLE ( CONTINUED )

• Describe a time when you observed someone

else who was a stranger in a new place or situation. How was that person treated?

• In what ways does your school welcome

strangers and make them feel at home? What

more could students do to help? What could

you do to help?

Optional Activity. Have students write a brief

narrative, about the length of Kaldi’s story, titled

“The American Miracle.” In it, students should

focus on an aspect of their own culture that

seems, on careful reflection, to be remarkable. If

students have difficulty getting started, suggest

they think about some of the organizations they

know about in their culture; or some of the basic

necessities of life, such as fresh water, they can

almost count on being available; or remarkable

individuals they know or know about.

L ESSON 2

P URPOSE

• To practice modeling writing after exemplary

prose

• To practice writing complex descriptive sentences

1. Explain to students that one trait of evocative

writing is the appeal to our senses of sight,

sound, smell, taste, and touch. Ask students to reread “The Senegalese Miracle” and underline as

many sensory images as they can find in each of

the five categories. Discuss students’ findings as a

class. Lead students to see that Kaldi’s writing is

vivid because it is filled with complex descriptive

sentences, and that they can use these sentences

as models for their own writing.

2. Read aloud the sentence that begins the fourth

paragraph of the story: “As we milled around by

the roadside, sticking close to each other, a full

moon parted the curtain of clouds and flooded

the sky with light.” Explain to the students how

they can “chunk” this sentence so they can imitate it. Chunking simply means dividing a sentence into grammatical or meaningful sections

(e.g., prepositional phrases, subject clauses).

Divide the sentence into chunks on the chalkboard: “As we milled around / by the roadside /

sticking close to each other / a full moon / parted the curtain of clouds / and flooded the sky

with light.” Discuss with students what differences in effect they see between that sentence

and this one: “As we stood by the roadside, the

moon came out.”

3. Now put together a complex descriptive sentence with the class, modeled after Kaldi’s sentence. Focus the new sentence on an entirely different topic: a mother and her small child waiting under a bridge for the rain to stop and the
U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 157

sun to come out. Begin modeling by giving several starter phrases. For example, “While they

lingered / under the stone bridge / holding their

coats close around them /.... Ask students to

look at Kaldi’s sentence and provide ideas for

each subsequent phrase in the new sentence until

the sentence is completed. One example for

completing the sentence: “While they lingered /

under the stone bridge / holding their coats

close around them / a sudden deluge / poured

from the sky / and covered the ground with tiny

rivulets.”

4. Ask students to work with a partner to create yet

another variation of the same sentence.Ask for volunteers to share their new sentences with the class.

5. Have students take out a piece of writing they

are working on.Ask them to select two sentences

that are rather short and not easy to visualize and

turn them into complex descriptive sentences,

based on Kaldi’s model.Tell them that the details

they add to their sentences should relate to the

reader’s senses, with the goal of giving the reader the feeling of “being there.”

6. Option for Younger Students. Once younger

readers have found examples of vivid images

relating to the five senses in Kaldi’s story, give

them art materials and ask them to sketch one of

the scenes in Kaldi’s story. Remind students to be

sure they use specific information from the text

for their sketch, so that their drawing is accurate

(e.g., the oranges are green, not orange).

When the students are finished, ask them to

compare their sketches with those of a partner—

and to explain to their partners which details

from the text they used for their drawings. Ask

students to look for accuracy in their partners’

drawings. Ask how drawing the scenes helped

them understand what took place.
Resilience Above All

M USIC IN THE F IELDS

by Carrie Young

Peace Corps Volunteer, Mali (2001–2002) 

Mali, in West Africa, one of the world’s poorest countries, has riches

that remain a secret to many people of the Western world.These riches are the kind that we all seek, but few are lucky enough to find.They

are the secrets to happiness, the keys to laughter and music. And these

riches can be found on the most difficult of days, among those who

live some of the most difficult lives on our planet.

It is May in Mali, and the rains have not yet come. It is over 115

degrees Fahrenheit and my friend looks up at the sky.We have all been

watching the sky for weeks. The spreading desert and the receding

grasses in Mali are causing the rains to arrive later and later every year.

My friend looks up once again and says to me with utter acceptance:

“We think that it may be Allah’s will that we die now.”

The next day we watch and wait. Nothing matters at this point except

that the rains come. Everyone is ready to begin plowing the fields, but

nothing can be done until it rains.We continue to watch and wait.

The sun is a third of the way across the arc of the sky. The air is parched.

The dusty, dry red earth of the fields is quiet.

A faint wind slips by me. I look up yet again

toward the hills in the direction of the wind

and I see a few clouds beginning to blow over

them.There is a huge break in the tension of

the village as the clouds move in.

The wind begins to blow strong. Bright fabrics blow out from the bodies of the women,

dancing and slapping in the air. We all lean

against the winds and head for cover, except

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

Uncommon Journeys
V OCABULAR Y

Parched: Dry, arid

Frantically: With great agitation and 

frenzy; madly; crazily

Antiquated: Extremely old; out of date

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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 159

for the children, who run frantically toward the giant mango trees.

Small mangoes fall from the upper branches and the kids race to collect them in their shirts.

Soon darkness covers us and the rain begins to fall, frantic from the

wait. It feels as if the energy of the weeks before has built up in these

clouds—as if they had been forced to hold their breath for weeks and

now it has all broken loose.The wind blows branches out of the trees

and the rain falls with the fury of a hurricane.

After about an hour, the rain calms and continues falling throughout

the night.

The village will live.

The next day the men begin working acres of fields with steer and an

antiquated plow. The women wake early to prepare lunch. It is made

from the corn of the year before.They put the lunch in bowls and balance the bowls on their heads; most have a baby tied with a cloth to

their back.They head for the fields.They will do this nearly every day

for the next four to five months.Wake early, prepare lunch over a fire,

and walk barefoot or in flip-flops to the fields with a child on their

back.

When the fields are ready to plant, the men and women of the village

will take a tool made of a wooden handle with a flattened piece of

metal attached to the end and they will bend over the earth using only

this simple tool for hours and hours every day.

Within this daily work to sustain life itself, there is a peace, a connection, and a tradition of laughter and music that makes the Malian culture one of happiness and richness.

There are five main family groups that make up my village. Mine is the

Wattara family. Each Sunday all of the men in the family work in the

same field together. They line up and work side by side, efficiently

moving down the rows. The women prepare lunch, care for the chil-
Resilience Above All

dren, and also labor in the fields on these days.

These Sundays are unique, however, for more than just the joint work

effort. These are the days of the music in the fields. The music comes

from the hands of those women who have helped to raise this village.

The grandmothers, little old women who are as tough as diamonds,

come out to the fields on these days; in their hands they hold instruments made of gourds and beans, leather and wood.With these simple

instruments they create music that contains their souls. Music that feels

of their laughter and their losses, the years of hard labor they have

done in these same fields.Years of bending, years of calluses, pounding

grains and corn, carrying babies, cooking over a fire, carrying water

and wood. Years of being a little girl, a woman, and a now a grandmother.

These are the women who send out the laughter and the music in the

fields. These are the women who hold the secrets of the village, the

secrets that the world is desperately in search of.The secret of how to

make music out of toil and how to laugh in the face of hardship and

death.

These are the rich people of our world.

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160 Uncommon Journeys

M USIC IN THE F IELDS ( CONTINUED )
S TANDARDS

English Standards: 2, 3, 6 (see page 187)

Social Studies Standards: I, IV, IX

(see page 188)

National Geography Standards: 4, 7,

10, 12, 14 (see pages 189–190)

Enduring Understandings

• Obtaining food and maintaining health is

a constant challenge for some people.

• Richness can exist among those with few

material goods.

Essential Questions

• What is hardship?

• In what ways can those with few “riches”

also be rich? 

• What role does music play in my culture?

Materials

Photocopies of story, Resource Sheet 1

Assessment Tools

Class discussions, journal entries, extended

written responses to the text

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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 161

R EADING AND R ESPONDING TO

‘ M USIC IN THE F IELDS ’

O VERVIEW

A BOUT THE A UTHOR

Carrie Young served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Mali, West Africa,

in 2001 and 2002. As the only American in a small, rural farming village of 2,000 people, she initiated a number of projects to help the villagers lead healthier and more prosperous lives.

Teaching the villagers about health and the environment occupied

much of Young’s time. She introduced soybeans to the village and

taught the people how to make soymilk—while also teaching them

about nutrition.Young taught the village gardeners how to make use

of the surplus supply of mangoes—by drying them and by making

mango jam.With more than 400 students from her village, she collected plastic for recycling, and then taught a women’s group how to

weave the recycled plastic into coin purses they could sell at the local

market.With a group of friends,Young made a music video about soybeans that aired on Mali’s only television station.

After her service,Young recalled: “When I left my village, I felt like I

was leaving family. And even though I tried to teach the villagers

things that they didn’t know about, they taught me so much more 

than I could have taught them—like how to care for one another,

work as a community, and be happy with what I have no matter how

great or small.”

Young is a researcher in the art department of National Geographic

magazine.
Resilience Above All

A BOUT THE S TORY

The author reflects on life in rural Mali as a Peace

Corps Volunteer among hardscrabble farmers. She

writes of the resilience of the Malian people in the

face of a harsh and often arid environment, the role

that music plays in Malian culture, and the richness

she experienced in a culture without the material

wealth of her own country. And she records her

admiration for Malian women who, she believes,

hold the secrets to happiness in our world.

A BOUT THE S ETTING

The Republic of Mali, in West Africa, has a population of more than 11 million. Almost twice the size

of Texas, Mali stretches from the Sahara in the north

to Guinea and Côte d’Ivoire in the south.The capital, Bamako, lies along the Niger River in the southwestern part of the country.

A country dominated by ancient tribal cultures, Mali

has three major ethnic groups—the Bambara, the

Fulani, and the Berbers.Although French is the official language (a carry-over from when Mali was part

of colonial French West Africa), several tribal languages are spoken locally, including Bambara, Fulani,

Songhay, and Dogon.The majority of the population

speaks Bambara.

In the 1300s, Mali encompassed an even vaster territory—much of West Africa—and dominated the gold

trade across the Sahara. The city of Timbuktu, famous

today for its remoteness, grew into a major cultural center at that time.The French colonized Mali at the end

of the 1800s. In 1960, Mali gained its independence

from France and, today is an independent republic.

One of the poorest countries in the world, Mali has

an annual per capita income of $245 (U.S. equivalent). Only a tiny fraction of Mali’s land is arable.The

challenges of agriculture under these circumstances

are exacerbated by frequent droughts.The country is

not self-sufficient in food production, and hunger

and malnutrition are widespread. Life expectancy is

46 years. Almost 90 percent of Mali’s people are

Muslim, and the culture of Islam permeates all

aspects of daily life.

Unlike the United States, which generally experiences four seasons, Mali has two seasons—the dry

and the rainy. As people have cut down trees for 

firewood and timber, and as livestock has grazed the

withering grasses, the sands of the Sahara have 

spread farther and farther across land once fertile 

and vegetated, in a process called desertification.

Desertification has affected not only the vegetation,

but also the climate, creating shorter and shorter

periods of rainfall.

Since 1971, almost 2,000 Peace Corps Volunteers

have served in Mali, working to improve food production, water availability, environmental conservation, small-business development, and health care.

For further information on the work of the Peace

Corps in Mali, visit the country-information section

of the Peace Corps website at www.peacecorps.gov.

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M USIC IN THE F IELDS ( CONTINUED )
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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 163

L ESSON 1

P URPOSE

• To examine the concepts of wealth in Mali and in

the United States

• To consider the role of music in culture

1. Prior to the lesson, collect a sampling of magazine

advertisements for men’s and women’s fashions,

automobiles, gourmet food, health products, travel, exercise machines, jewelry, and real estate.

Photocopy the ads for distribution among the students, or project them to the class after scanning

them or photocopying them onto transparencies.

Initiate a class discussion about what these ads

represent.Try to direct the class to a discussion of

values, and then, specifically wealth. Ask the class

to define wealth: Is it the accumulation of money?

Of goods? Can wealth be the accumulation of

something non-material? [Students might suggest

health, friends, food.] Is wealth defined by sufficiency, or does it require excess? 

2. Read aloud the first paragraph of “Music in the

Fields.”Ask the students whether they think wealth

in the United States is necessarily the same as

wealth in another country. Have them defend their

answers with explanations as to why or why not.

What kinds of riches is the author referring to?

3. Review with the class the background information provided on pages 161 and 162 about

author Carrie Young and the history and geography of Mali.

4. Have the class read “Music in the Fields.” It

would be helpful for students to have individual

copies of the manuscript so they can refer in

detail to the text.

5. Have students break into groups of five to discuss

and answer the following questions. List the

questions on the board; make a handout for each

group; or read them one by one, at intervals of a

few minutes.

a. What are riches in the area of Mali where the

author lived? [There may be several kinds.

Students might answer: food; the ability to

laugh and to make music in the face of hardship and toil and death.]

b. What are the riches that the author says

“remain a secret to many people of the

Western world”? [The secrets to happiness;

the keys to laughter and music.] Who is the

guardian of the riches? [The grandmothers.]

c. Does the author reveal the secrets of the

Malian people? If so, what are the secrets? If

not, why do you think she would not reveal

the secrets? [Young never really reveals exactly how the grandmothers master the skill of

achieving happiness in the face of hardship.

Whereas she clearly admires the Malians’ pursuit of happiness and music, she does not make

explicit how they achieve these goals. It’s

arguable that the special ability of the Malians

to achieve happiness under duress remains a

secret to the author as well.]
Resilience Above All

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164 Uncommon Journeys

M USIC IN THE F IELDS ( CONTINUED )

R ESOURCE S HEET 1

3-2-1 R EFLECTION

THREE things I learned about life in Mali from this story:

1.

2.

3.

TWO ways people can be rich besides having material wealth:

1.

2.

ONE main point the author was trying to make:

1.
U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 165

d. What effect does music have on the Malians

in the field? 

Ask the class to reconvene and discuss as a group

their answers to these questions.

6. Point out to the class that as different as the

author is from her host villagers in terms of language, art, music, schooling, and many other

aspects of culture, there are also many similarities. Students might want to suggest a list of ways

in which the cultures share characteristics.

Ask students to name the purposes music serves

in their lives as you list them on the board.

[Answers might include entertainment, religious

services, patriotic observances, dancing, background “noise” such as in elevators and department stores, work rhythms (mining, historical

chain gangs), marching.] Of these purposes,

which do the students think apply to the Malians

in the fields? 

7. End the lesson by asking students to complete

the “3-2-1 Activity” on Resource Sheet 1, at left.

L ESSON 2

P URPOSE

To analyze the author’s style and use it as a model

for writing

1. Remind students that a good way to improve

their own writing is to model it after the writing

of an author they admire. Suggest that Young’s

story contains several elements of effective writing that they can use as models for their writing.

2. Writing Strategy #1: Show, Don’t Tell. Point

out that Young’s descriptions are vivid because

she uses a golden rule of writing: “Show, don’t

tell.” Provide several examples of “Show, don’t

tell” in Young’s work. Then ask students to find

several additional examples. (Using a “Thinkaloud” process is one way for you to highlight

the “Show, don’t tell” skill, as in the example that

follows:

I’d like to take a close look at how Young describes

the coming rain by showing, not telling. If I were

telling about the rain coming, I could simply write

“The rain was coming.” But this sounds flat and

boring. Young’s description of the rain’s arrival is

much more interesting. She shows her readers by

painting a vivid picture. She writes: “A faint wind

slips by me. I look up, yet again, toward the hills in

the direction of the wind and I see a few clouds

beginning to blow over them.... Soon darkness covers us and the rain begins to fall, frantic from the

wait.... It feels as if [the clouds] had been forced to
Resilience Above All

hold their breath for weeks and now it has all broken loose.” As I read these words, I feel I am right

there with Carrie Young. I think I will try this

technique in a piece of writing I am working on to

see if I can make the writing vivid and interesting.

I want my readers to feel they can actually see what

I’m describing—like a movie in their minds.

Ask students to re-read “Music in the Fields” and

highlight images that create vivid pictures in

their minds—places where Young “shows, not

tells.” Have students in small groups compare the

images they’ve highlighted. Some examples:

• To describe wind: “Bright fabrics blow out

from the bodies of the women, dancing and

slapping in the air.”

• To describe heat and dryness: “The sun is a

third of the way across the arc of the sky. The

air is parched. The dusty, dry red earth of the

fields is quiet.”

2. Writing Strategy #2: Personification. One

way to make inanimate things come alive is to

attribute human characteristics to them. Young

has employed this strategy, called personification,

liberally in her descriptions of nature. Ask the

students to examine the text in their hands and

underline any nouns, adjectives, verbs, or phrases

that assign human characteristics to aspects of

nature. [“Fabrics ... dancing”; “rain ... (is) frantic”;

“clouds ... hold their breath”; “rain falls with a

fury.”] In a class discussion, have the students

report their findings, then ask them to make up

a nonpersonified substitute for each example and

read it aloud to see how different the effect is.

3. Writing Strategy #3: Using Present Tense.

Another means of making the story more immediate is the use of the present tense. Help students discover that the author has employed the

present tense and ask them what effect that has

upon the writing.

4. Once students understand the way Young makes

her writing dynamic using these strategies, have

the students practice writing a paragraph of their

own, emulating Young. For students who have

trouble starting, you may suggest titles for the

paragraphs, such as “The Hottest Day of the

Summer,” “My Pet’s Close Call,” “There’s

Nothing Better Than Chocolate,” “The Day the

Hurricane Came Through.”

5. Have students compare their writing with that of

a partner. Ask partners to underline the phrases

or sentences that create an especially vivid picture in their minds.

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M USIC IN THE F IELDS ( CONTINUED )
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Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 167

E XTENSION A CTIVITIES

Options for Older Students 

or More Advanced Writers

1. Have students research life in Mali and then

write a short essay about how they would adapt

to living there.What would be easy? What would

be difficult? What attitudes and personality traits

would help them adapt?

2. Have students think about how the story would

be different had it been written by one of the

Malian women. If you have not yet taught the

concept of point of view in literature, help students understand this concept by drawing on

examples from the story.Ask students to compare

Young’s point of view with what they would

imagine might be the point of view of the

Malian women. Ask students whether they think

the Malian women would characterize themselves as rich, and whether the Malian women

would agree with Young that they hold the

secrets to happiness. Then have students rewrite

the story from the point of view of a Malian

grandmother.

3. Have students brainstorm in small groups what

they believe to be the secrets to happiness.Then,

have them write an essay, working individually,

titled: “The Secrets to Happiness I Wish All

Americans Would Remember.”

4. Have students research and report on one of the

following topics:

• Desertification in Africa and its effects on populations (Sudan and Mali are good examples)

• Cultural respect—even veneration—for the

elderly in some cultures

• Concepts of wealth in various societies

(including dowries)

Options for Younger Students 

or Less Accomplished Writers

1. Ask students to write and illustrate a poem based

on “Music in the Fields.”

2. Have students ponder how music helped fieldworkers where Young worked in Mali.Then have

them write a short composition on “How Music

Might Help Workers in the United States,” or

“How Music Might Help Workers in Our

School,” or “The Role Music Plays in My

Family.”
Resilience Above All

M R . J OHN AND THE D AY OF K NOWLEDGE

by John Deever

Peace Corps Volunteer, Ukraine (1993–1995)

(Excerpted from Chapter One in Singing on the Heavy Side of the World)

I can imagine how a high diver must feel standing at the tip of the

board, poised on the balls of his feet. His toes hanging over the edge,

he is finally in place, pausing to take one last breath before leaving

solid certainty to twist off into the sky and fall, tumbling downward

with as much grace and style as he can muster.That’s how it feels: the

first day of school. Even as a student, but more so as a teacher, at the

beginning of a school year I have always been obsessed with the sensation that I’m about to fall and everyone is watching.

I had arrived, just two days before, in the central Ukrainian city of

Zhitomir, following only a quick get-organized visit a month earlier

and with little preparation for the first week of teaching. It would be

my first morning at School 23 with students whom I would spend the

next two years teaching English. I tried to squelch my quiet but nagging fear of failure.

Outside the front doors at least a hundred children milled around,

waiting. The boys wore uniforms—brown or navy suits, some with a

patch on the arm, all looking faded and worn.

Many of them had outgrown the trousers of

their school uniforms since the year before;

spindly legs poked out beneath their cuffs to

reveal white socks. The girls wore brown

skirts, brown long-sleeve blouses, and lacy

pinafores, some with bows or puffs of lace

atop their heads. The youngest looked like

Shirley Temple dolls, but teenagers in the

same garb looked like hotel maids in movies.

In clumps these young women huddled,

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

Uncommon Journeys
V OCABULAR Y

Squelch: To suppress; push down

Spindly: Long or tall and thin

Pinafore: Sleeveless clothing, like an

apron, that young girls wear over a dress

Amerikanets: Ukrainian for “an American”

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 169

chattered, and welcomed each other after a summer apart. Playful

younger boys ran screaming through the crowd, chasing each other

and bumping into other children, who screamed back.

Everywhere moved the blur of rustling flowers. Most children, who

customarily brought teachers great bunches of bouquets to show their

gratitude for being taught, held droopy yellow daffodils or stiff pink

carnations. A few gripped white tulips or a trio of red roses in a cloud

of baby’s breath and fern, while others held heavy lavender camellias

or the occasional dahlia. The solemn drabness of the children’s uniforms was hidden in the splash of bright flower colors.

A teacher, visible only as a head and shoulders floating in a mass of

children, herded the mob to the schoolyard out back. I slipped into the

stream, hoping to see someone I knew. Many of them had heard about

me, it seemed—little girls pointed and giggled, covering their smiles

with their hands. I heard one boy whisper,“Amerikanets!” before scurrying into the crowd.

Then a mop-headed boy of maybe eight, bolder than the rest, stopped

in front of me and planted his feet apart like a cowboy ready to draw.

He held up his hand, waved it wildly, and shouted, “Khhhello!”

I smiled back and said, “Hello.”

The children around him squealed with laughter, their eyes as wide as

if a man from Mars had spoken. Frozen with panic, the boy stared me

in the face a second—then hooted loon-like and dashed off.

September First, the Day of Knowledge, was a national holiday in the

former Soviet Union. Now, beginning the second school year since

Ukraine’s declaration of independence, Soviet rituals had changed little.They had, however, taken on a new tint:The blue-and-yellow bars

of the Ukrainian flag waved from the building of this highly regarded

downtown school, which for decades had trained the province’s communist officials and later their children.
Resilience Above All

The principal, a small, stern woman named Nina Volodimirivna, whose

whole top row of teeth was pure gold, approached the podium. The

mike whistled. In a bold, very loud voice, Nina Volodimirivna proudly welcomed parents, teachers, and children in sentences mostly

incomprehensible to me, with my 10 weeks of rudimentary language

training. I did recognize the Ukrainian words for “glory,” “studious,”

and the “Great Nation of Ukraine.”

At the end of the speech the crowd applauded. “Kolya! Annya!” the

principal ordered. “Come here.” It was time for the annual ritual

Ringing of the First Bell, and from the crowd emerged a senior boy

holding the hand of a first grader, a tiny girl of six. After a few more

ceremonial words, Nina Volodimirivna handed the girl a large hand

bell.The young man lifted her onto his shoulder and began to parade

around in a space the crowd had made for them. From the loudspeaker above blared a Slavic-sounding march. Held atop the boy’s shoulder, the girl used both hands to ring her heavy bell while the crowd

cheered.

I looked around for Svetlana Adamovna, my counterpart teacher.

According to the official Peace Corps plan, we were to assess the

school’s development needs together and come up with strategies for

improving English education at School 23. On the first day of school,

Svetlana Adamovna had told me, I would simply watch.

In the crowd I spotted her tall, white beehive of a hairdo. She carried

a bundle of flowers bigger than most and was busy welcoming the 

parents and children. The children congratulated her by shouting,

“Z Prazdnikom”—“greetings on the holiday”—before handing over

more big bundles of flowers and dashing off. I greeted her likewise,

and her clear blue eyes widened happily when she saw me.“I wish you

Happy First Bell,” she pronounced in her high, birdlike voice. She was

dressed neatly, the pleats in her long skirt carefully pressed, her tanned

cheeks streaked with bright rouge. I was glad I had worn a suit and tie.

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170 Uncommon Journeys

MR . J OHN AND THE D AY OF KNOWLEDGE ( CONTINUED )
V OCABULARY

Rudimentary: Basic

Idolatry: Worship, usually of a false god

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 171

The ceremony was breaking up, and the children, a few still carrying

flowers, pushed and shoved roughly, charging to their first class.When

we got inside and out of the crush of small bodies, Svetlana Adamovna

invited me to join her for the First Lesson.

The First Lesson had become something of a headache for teachers at

this school, she explained. In the past, she said, the lesson covered a few

school procedures, but focused mainly on the life of Vladimir Ilyich

Ulyanov—Comrade Lenin, or “Grandpa Lenin,” as people now joked.

The “Lenin lesson,” as Svetlana Adamovna called it, began the school

year on a patriotic note: It gave students pride in their motherland. I

didn’t interrupt, although I wondered which motherland she meant—

the U.S.S.R. or Ukraine. I got the impression she felt somewhat lost

without the traditional lesson she had taught on this day for more than

20 years. The way Svetlana Adamovna spoke of the Lenin lesson as

promoting love of country, a sense of duty, and a commitment to work

reminded me of the U.S. Pledge of Allegiance. She still had phonograph records dramatizing legendary episodes in the youth of Lenin,

who, like George Washington chopping down the cherry tree, could

not tell a lie. Now, Lenin would no longer do: In Moscow, St.

Petersburg, and Kiev, his statues had been toppled (although his grim

statue still stood tall in Zhitomir’s central square).

For Ukrainian teachers, not only Lenin but many other Russian

images, symbols, and patriotic ideas were now off-limits.The state law

that mandated a political First Lesson had not been discarded with

Ukrainian independence; only the object of idolatry had changed.

Teachers were instructed to glorify the blue-and-yellow flag, the

“Tryzub” or trident, and the “Greatness of the Ukrainian People”—

nationalist symbols and ideas that, ironically, might have earned jail

time 10 years earlier. In a revolution from below, such a moment might

have been glorious, as the old power got what it deserved and new

leaders were installed on the throne. But not many Zhitomirans had

agitated for independence, which had brought them economic disaster.
Resilience Above All

Svetlana Adamovna, at least, said as much.With a scowl of disgust she

winced in scorn at the blue-and-yellow flag. “What greatness of the

Ukrainian people?” she snorted. “I don’t see this anywhere around

me.” She found it unbelievably strange and sad that the October

Revolution of 1917, Red Square in Moscow, and Cosmonaut Yuri

Gagarin (the first man in space) now belonged to the history of a foreign country. So much she had been proud of was Russian. I asked her

naively what she planned to teach for the First Lesson instead.

“Oh, I’ll teach what I must,” she sighed. “What else can I do? I’ll play

a record.”

I followed her to a room on the first floor, where her students were

already in their seats. As we entered, they abruptly stood up at their

desks.There must have been at least 40, all between the ages of eight

and 10. I took an empty seat at the back, hoping to observe quietly,

but the children’s eyes were on me.

When Svetlana Adamovna said “Good morning!” in precise Queen’s

English, the children turned in their desks to face her. In the collective bark of a long-drilled army platoon, they answered loud and clear:

“Good morning, Dear Teacher!” If she meant to startle me, it worked.

Svetlana Adamovna welcomed her class of fourth graders to the new

school year. She already knew everyone, having taught them English

the previous two years. In a sunny, energetic voice, she began asking

questions about Ukraine, quizzing the children to see what facts they

knew. Our capital is Kiev, they told her.The Dnieper River “washes its

banks” someone added.The sarcophagus of Yaroslav the Wise is in St.

Sophia’s cathedral, a boy volunteered. “Raise your hand,” Svetlana

Adamovna reminded. The children sat up very straight, with arms

crossed on their desks; when one wanted to speak, his or her right arm

popped up perpendicular like a semaphore’s, trembling in eagerness to

answer. Our country has 52 million people, a girl noted. The area of

Ukraine is larger than France, said another. A boy said: Zhitomir is

eleven hundred years old.

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

172 Uncommon Journeys

MR . J OHN AND THE D AY OF KNOWLEDGE ( CONTINUED )
V OCABULARY

Queen’s English: Spoken English of the

upper class in Great Britain

Yaroslav the Wise: Grand Prince of

Kiev in the 11th century; a Ukrainian 

historical hero who strengthened the 

borders of his kingdom and made Kiev 

a center of culture and learning

Semaphore: A flag used for signaling

Disdain: To look down upon

Sanitize: To clean up or remove undesirable things

Patronymic: A Russian or Ukrainian person’s name, based on the name of that person’s father. For example, Svetlana

Adamovna’s father’s name was Adam.

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 173

Svetlana Adamovna was an excellent teacher. On the first day of

school, she subtly shepherded her class back to habits they had lost

over the summer, giving reminders of how the game of school is

played. Without any notes whatsoever, she let the children supply the

material, then combined the knowledge in a few heads to add up to a

lesson’s worth for all.Without any explicitly scripted lecture—disdaining the subject even!—she directed discussion, generated questions,

and conveyed information. I vowed to remember her method.

I also noted how obedient the children were. Maybe it was first-day

excitement, I thought, hoping I was wrong. If they were used to that

level of discipline, my life would be much easier.

When Svetlana Adamovna put on an old and well-used phonograph

record,another Ukrainian march pranced happily along. It occurred to

me that this music must have been officially approved in Soviet times

(and therefore sanitized of real nationalism) or a teacher like Svetlana

Adamovna would never have possessed it. The children listened with

some interest at first, but their attention began to wander, and they

started whispering, then talking, pointing toward me. Svetlana

Adamovna noted the lapse and stopped the record. The period was

only half over.

“Now, children,” she said in Ukrainian, “you have the special chance

to practice your English. You are going to meet and talk to a real

American.” Then she waved at me to come to the front of the room,

switching to English to say, “This is our new teacher of English, Mr.

John.”

Mr. John was to be my formal title. In Ukraine (and Russia) teachers

must be addressed by first name and the patronymic form based on

one’s father’s name: Svetlana Adamovna, Galena Vasilievna, Nina

Volodimirivna. As elders and figures of authority, teachers were to be

respected; both names had to be used at all times.When I told the staff

that my patronymic would be “Davidovich” there were howls of
Resilience Above All

laughter. Too odd-sounding ... the name would seem funny to the

children, they said. “John” would be too informal, and “Mr. Deever”

was difficult for them to say.Thus we settled on “Mr. John.”At first my

new name sounded silly to me, especially when ninth graders said it,

but later even my Ukrainian friends (who normally called me John)

addressed me formally in front of my students by saying, “Mr. John,

may I speak to you?” “Mr. John” lost its connotations of day care and

became a title I held with pride. It conveyed some of my specialness

there, and I liked that. Eventually I caught myself using it in class to

refer to myself in the third person: “Mr. John doesn’t like when you

talk while he’s talking,”“Mr. John likes to hear all of you sing,” or “Mr.

John has a headache today.”

On that first day of school, the pupils were thrilled to try out their

English, never mind what my name was. Svetlana Adamovna encouraged them to ask me questions, reminding me to answer slowly and

clearly.The first brave boy stood up by his desk and said,“What is your

father?”

I momentarily thought this was a philosophical riddle before recognizing it as a question about professions. “A professor of mathematics

at the university,” I answered. He squinted in confusion, nodded, and

sat down. Svetlana Adamovna translated, and then he smiled. “What is

your mother?” another asked. “A teacher,” I said. They all understood

that.

A girl raised her hand and said, “What are you?” I told her I was a

teacher, too, and it seemed such a playful question that I asked her

back: “And what are you?”

She had already sat down.When she realized my question was directed to her, she stood back up and went pale with fright. She looked to

Svetlana Adamovna in helpless panic.

“Irichka, you know this!” her teacher chided. “What ... are ... you? I

am a ...”

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

174 Uncommon Journeys

MR . J OHN AND THE D AY OF KNOWLEDGE ( CONTINUED )
V OCABULARY

Connotations: Associations, additional

meanings, or overtones connected with a

word

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 175

“Pupil!” shouted a triumphant boy in the back. “Pupil,” Svetlana

Adamovna repeated. Irichka stood back up and said, “I am a pupil.”

Many others raised their hands frantically; I called on another boy. He

stood up and said loudly, “I am a pupil!” One after another, children

stood up and pronounced this phrase, continually repeating that statement of identity for what seemed like 10 minutes. I kept pointing to

outstretched, waving hands until Svetlana Adamovna cut off one last

child who’d been waiting to say,“I am a pupil.” She urged the children

to ask Mr. John questions.

Another boy, whose face had been squinched in concentration all this

time, stood up. He said, “Do ... you ... have ... car?”

“A car,” Svetlana Adamovna reprimanded. “Do you have a car.” (She

pronounced it “caahh” with no audible r.) The boy nodded and looked

to me eagerly.

“I did have a car. I sold it before I came here.” Everyone (including

Svetlana Adamovna) looked puzzled. I realized that, after my few

weeks of language training, I knew enough words to form that sentence into Ukrainian. I repeated “I sold my car,” in Ukrainian. At the

sound of my flat, American accent—but speaking their language—the

children’s eyes grew even wider.

A boy in the back shouted out in Ukrainian, “What kind of car?”

I told him a pickup truck, forgetting to make him speak English.The

room bubbled with excitement now. I understood a little of their language. What they really wanted was to ask me genuine questions in

Ukrainian. But Svetlana Adamovna scolded them and reminded me as

well that we were to speak only English.

A child asked,“Do you have a mother?” I smiled and said yes. Perhaps

they’d forgotten our discussion of professions already. I called on a pale

girl who’d been silent until then, who asked, “Do you have a father?”

Yes, I said again, a little impatiently. Thanks to the car question, the
V OCABULARY

Borsch (or borscht): Beet soup

Resilience Above All

class had remembered a new sentence structure: “Do you have a sister?” “Do you have a grandmother?” “Do you have a cat?” “Do you

have a dog?” I smiled like a candidate for mayor and answered each

question as sweetly as I could. Until the boy who asked about my car

said, “Do ... you ... have ... girl?” Mischievously I formulated an

untactful answer in my head. If I speak quickly, I thought, not a soul

in the room will catch what I’m saying.

Fortunately, Svetlana Adamovna interrupted and changed the theme,

suggesting they try “Do you like ... ?” Hands went up everywhere

again, and I called on each in turn, giving everyone a chance to speak.

The children, as if practicing a substitution drill, asked about every

animal, food, and place they could think of. When I answered yes to

“Do you like borsch?” they cackled with laughter. Irichka then asked,

“Do you like Zhitomir?”

Yes, I answered, yes. I did like Zhitomir.

They hardly cared what I said, so long as Mr. John looked them in the

eye and responded. They liked to be called on and to speak English

words, and hearing me answer yes or no was enough.The act of speaking to and understanding a foreigner in a foreign language was a magical experience. By the time the bell rang (a whole 20 minutes later),

I was exhausted but happy.

For that group of children that year, the First Lesson was not about

Lenin, and not even much about Ukraine. Instead, they saw what independence had brought to their school: a person from America who

could talk with them. A person who had come to stay for a while.

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

176 Uncommon Journeys

MR . J OHN AND THE D AY OF KNOWLEDGE ( CONTINUED )
U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools

READING AND RESPONDING TO

‘MR. J OHN AND THE DAY

O F KNOWLEDGE ’

O VER VIEW

A BOUT THE A UTHOR

John Deever served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in

Zhitomir, Ukraine, from 1993 to 1995. “Mr. John

and the Day of Knowledge” is excerpted from the

first chapter of his memoir, Singing on the Heavy Side

of the World, in which he describes his two years as a

Volunteer teaching English as a foreign language in

a Ukrainian elementary and secondary school.

Deever received a B.A. from Otterbein College and

an M.A. from Ohio State University. His story “To

Peel Potatoes” won the 1996 Peace Corps

Experience Award given by RPCV Writers and

Readers (the story is available at www.peacecorps

.gov/wws/stories).You can find many additional stories by other Peace Corps Volunteers online at

www.peacecorpswriters.org.

S TANDARDS

English Standards: 1, 2, 3, 6 (see page 187)

Social Studies Standards: I, IV, IX (see page 188)

National Geography Standards: 6, 10 (see page 189)

Enduring Understandings

• Serving in another culture challenges one to understand the

world from that culture’s point of view.

• People of different cultures differ in their approaches to teaching

and their attitudes toward learning.

• Political changes can have a profound effect on a country and 

its cultures.

• Language can bridge cultural differences, connecting individuals

of different cultures.

Essential Questions

• How do our cultural values shape our attitudes toward teaching

and learning?

• How does a change in political systems affect the life of a country

and its people?

• Is it important to learn a foreign language? Why or why not?

When might it be important? For whom?

• What are the challenges and rewards of serving in another culture?

Materials

Photocopies of story

Assessment Tools

Journal writing, class discussion,Venn diagram comparison, written

responses to the text

177
Resilience Above All

A BOUT THE S TORY

In the prologue to his memoir, Deever explains why

he characterizes Ukraine in his title as the heavy

side of the world—for its diet, its industry, its weather, its economic and social conditions, even its

humor. He ends with a paean to the resiliency of

Ukrainians, who, despite all their burdens, keep on

singing and surviving.

“Mr. John and the Day of Knowledge” details the

author’s first day on the job at a school in newly

independent Ukraine. His initial anxieties, the kinds

of jitters shared by most new teachers, were complicated by his limited language proficiency (he had 10

weeks of language training before arriving at his

Peace Corps posting) and the cultural differences to

which he had to adapt. He gives the reader a description of September First, the “Day of Knowledge” in

Ukraine, when students and teachers join to celebrate the re-opening of school. The second part of

the story details his observations of a master teacher,

Svetlana Adamovna, as she struggles to revise her

annual pro-Lenin First Lesson in the wake of the

new Ukrainian politics. To learn more about Peace

Corps Volunteers in Ukraine, visit the countryinformation section of the Peace Corps website at

www.peacecorps.gov.

Students will find more meaning in this story if they

understand the geographical, social, and political

context of Ukraine. They should be able to locate

Ukraine on a world map and understand Lenin’s role

in the establishment of Russian communism and the

former Soviet Union. They should also be familiar

with events surrounding the dissolution of the Soviet

Union in 1991. Finally, they should understand the

mission of the Peace Corps and the role of a Peace

Corps Volunteer (see Introduction, pages 8 and 9,

and the Peace Corps website: www. peacecorps.gov).

A BOUT THE S ETTING

Ukraine, a country of 233,000 square miles (somewhat smaller than Texas) with a population of almost

50 million, lies between Russia and Poland, just

north of the Black Sea. Although its diverse ethnic

population—Ukrainians, Russians, Belarusians,

Moldovans, Bulgarians, Poles, Hungarians,

Romanians, Crimean Tatars—speak many languages,

Ukrainian and Russian are the most common. The

government has made the teaching of English a priority so that Ukraine may be better able to participate in the global economy.

Ukraine’s long history has been turbulent. In 1240

the Mongols, led by the grandson of Genghis Khan,

attacked Kiev—today’s capital of Ukraine—and controlled the region for nearly two centuries. In the

wake of Mongol domination, Ukraine was invaded

and ruled by Poland, Lithuania, Russia, and others.A

Cossack uprising in Ukraine led to the country’s liberation in 1648. Ukraine signed a treaty with Russia

in 1654, which led to subjugation by the Russian

Empire and ultimately by the Soviet Union. Stalin

tried to stamp out Ukrainian nationalism in 1932

and 1933 by collecting grain and starving nearly 10

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178 Uncommon Journeys

MR . J OHN AND THE D AY OF KNOWLEDGE ( CONTINUED )
U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 179

million Ukrainians, in what is known as the Great

Famine. In 1991, following the dissolution of the

Soviet Union, Ukraine achieved independence.

Not all Ukrainians welcomed their independence

from Russia. And at a time when the entire educational system was trying to implement Ukrainian as

the language of instruction, there was also a growing

demand from parents and students for increased

instruction in English. Taken together, these factors

placed incredible strain upon an already stretched

educational system.

In response to Ukraine’s educational initiatives, the

Peace Corps launched its TEFL project (Teaching

English as a Foreign Language) in Ukraine in

September 1993. Deever belonged to one of the first

groups of Peace Corps Volunteers assigned to teach

English in Ukraine.Today, about 80 Volunteers work

in the TEFL project to expand and improve the quality of English instruction in schools and at teacher

training institutions—and to assist in developing new

English teaching materials for primary and secondary schools.Volunteers also work in the areas of small

business development and environmental protection.

L ESSON 1

P URPOSE

• To compare the first day of school in Ukraine

with the first day of school in the United States 

• To identify what challenges the author faced as a

Peace Corps Volunteer

1. Using information from the overview, introduce

students to the author, the story, and the setting.

2. Journal Activity. Ask students to respond in

class, in their journals, to the following prompts:

• How did you feel on the first day of school

back in August (or September)?

• Were you worried about anything? What were

your positive feelings? Your negative feelings? 

• Did you feel this same way as a young child—

on the first day of the first grade, for example?

What did you look forward to then? What did

you fear? What do you look forward to now?

3. As a class, discuss what the most common reactions

to the first day of school are for students.What do

students think the feelings are or would be for a

brand-new teacher walking into their class? 

4. Have students read the story—possibly for

homework—and ask them to highlight phrases

that make a strong impression on them, sentences

they find confusing or that raise questions in

their minds, and anything that surprises them.

5. Ask students to report and discuss what they

highlighted.Then conduct a class discussion using

the following prompts, while also addressing any

questions the students had in their reading:
Resilience Above All

• Did you find anything surprising? What questions did it raise for you?

• What cultural traditions stand out on the first

day of school in Ukraine? Why is the “First

Day” capitalized? What is the students’ mood?

• What do these details suggest about attitudes

toward education in Ukraine? What might

account for these attitudes?

• Why was Svetlana Adamovna unenthusiastic

about the First Lesson? What had changed compared with the First Lesson in previous years?

• Who was Lenin? What did he do? Why had the

lesson about him changed?

• Svetlana Adamovna is required to use the First

Lesson to inspire patriotism. Do U.S. schools have

similar rituals? If so, what are some examples?

• How can a change in political systems affect

the life of a country and its people?

6. Have students work with a partner, using a Venn

diagram (like the one illustrated here) or another

graphic organizer, to compare the first day of school

in Ukraine with their own first day of school.What

are the similarities? The differences? Conduct a class

discussion on students’ comparisons.Then ask them

how Ukrainian students reacted to seeing Deever.

What accounts for their reactions? How do your

students think Deever feels about being there? 

7. Journal Activity. For homework, ask students

to respond in writing to one or more of the following prompts:

• Serving in another culture challenges a Peace

Corps Volunteer to understand the world from

that culture’s point of view. What challenges is

Deever beginning to face in Ukraine? 

• How difficult do you think it was for Deever to

see the world from the perspective of

Ukrainian teachers and students? 

• After reading this selection, do you think

Deever might have had second thoughts about

his decision to volunteer to teach in Ukraine,

or do you think he welcomed the challenge?

Remind students to support their opinions with

evidence from the text.

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180 Uncommon Journeys

MR . J OHN AND THE D AY OF KNOWLEDGE ( CONTINUED )
U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 181

L ESSON 2

P URPOSE

• To evaluate the author’s lead metaphor as an

opening to the story

• To identify vivid images and analyze why they are

effective

1. Have students share their journal entries in a

class discussion. Ask the class to address why seeing the world from another culture’s point of

view can be important.

2. Read aloud the first paragraph of “Mr. John and

the Day of Knowledge.” Discuss with students

why Deever thinks the first day of school is like

a high dive. Examine further the comparison

between the diver and the teacher or student on

the first day of school:

• What does the pool represent?

• What would be the equivalent of a perfect 10

dive? 

• What would be the equivalent of a belly flop?

A cannonball?

• Who is the audience?

Encourage students to think of additional ways

to extend the comparison.

Ask students to comment on how effective they

think Deever’s metaphor is for opening his story.

Does it help Deever capture the reader’s attention? If so, how? How would the story be different without it?

3. Remind students that enticing imagery appeals

to the senses. Suggest that if an author is successful in his or her use of imagery, readers can close

their eyes and form a strong mental image of

what the author has described. Ask the students

whether the diving image functions that way for

them.

• Ask students to review the first part of the story

to look for images Deever has created (e.g., the

older boy carrying the tiny first-grade girl on

his shoulders as she rings the “First Bell”;

Svetlana Adamovna’s “tall, white beehive of a

hairdo”;“the blur of rustling flowers ... droopy

yellow daffodils or stiff pink carnations”).

• Now ask the class what makes these images

vivid. [Answers might include: Some images use

strong, concrete nouns; others vivid, active

verbs; others richly descriptive adjectives; and

still others, striking comparisons—similes or

metaphors.] Ask students in a brief activity to

write a few rich images for their classmates to

imagine. To help them get started, suggest they

think about scenes or experiences that they

found exciting, surprising, alarming, magnificent, sad, or funny—or something in which
Resilience Above All

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

182 Uncommon Journeys

MR . J OHN AND THE D AY OF KNOWLEDGE ( CONTINUED )

they have been triumphant (e.g., the first time

they rode a two-wheeler successfully; a time

they overcame fright to accomplish something).

Encourage them to be original, avoiding common or overused imagery.When everyone has a

few images written, ask individuals to share

some of their images with the rest of the class.

L ESSON 3

P URPOSE

• To analyze the role language plays in bridging

cultural differences 

1. Before class, make large signs that say: “Strongly

Agree,” “Agree,” “Disagree,” and “Strongly

Disagree.” Post each sign in a different corner of

the room. Write the statement “Learning a foreign language is very important” on the chalkboard.

In class, ask students to move to the corner of the

room that best expresses their opinion about this

statement.

Students should discuss their reasons with the

rest of their group. Give the students five minutes

for discussion.

Hold a class discussion among the different

groups to compare their reasons and see if the

class can reach a consensus on the question of

whether learning another language is important.

[Students might well conclude that the answer

depends on circumstances, e.g., where one is living or what one’s occupation is. For someone

who never travels out of the United States and is

involved in strictly local employment, knowledge

of a foreign language could make little difference. Even so, if an employer’s labor force is

made up of immigrants who don’t speak English,

it would be helpful for the employer to be able

to speak the language of the employees. For anyone who travels, studies, or is involved in commerce beyond the borders of the United States,

knowledge of one or more foreign languages can

be extremely advantageous for many practical

reasons that students should enumerate. Students

might identify watching films in another language, communicating directly with people in

other countries, being able to translate or interpret for others, reading signs while traveling, and

simply having the courtesy of knowing the language of one’s hosts are just a few of the many

advantages of knowing another language.]

2. In his second-to-last paragraph (page 176),

Deever writes: “The act of speaking to and

understanding a foreigner in a foreign language

was a magical experience.” Discuss with the class:

• Why did the Ukrainian students get such pleasure from hearing Mr. John speak their language?

Did it affect their relationship with him? Did it

affect their opinion of him? If so, why? How?
U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 183

• Why did the Ukrainian students so enjoy speaking in English to Mr. John?

• Why is English taught widely in Ukraine? What

particular advantage might English have over

other foreign languages for a Ukrainian student? [Ask students if they know or can guess

what language airline pilots use worldwide for

communicating with control towers at airports.

(English.) Most Internet pages and computer

manuals are written in English. A great many

academic papers at international conferences

are prepared and read in English. Peace Corps

Volunteers teach English or help local teachers

teach English when requested to do so by host

countries. This request is made across a wide

spectrum of countries in which the Peace

Corps serves today.]

E XTENSION A CTIVITIES

Ask students to select from the following:

• Describe in writing what you think Deever

should do with his classes to help them learn

about American culture. Construct a lesson plan

that Deever might use for one of his classes.

Include a warm-up activity, instruction, and

practice.Try to balance instruction and fun.

• Students might enjoy reading the rest of Deever’s

book—Singing on the Heavy Side of the World—to

learn more about his teaching experience with

children in Ukraine.

• Write a journal entry about your own experiences in learning a foreign language. Why did

you choose to study this language? How have

you used it so far? How has it helped you so far?

How do you think you might use it someday? 
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P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

186 Uncommon Journeys
Standards

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 187

E NGLISH L ANGUAGE A RTS S TANDARDS *

National Council of Teachers of English/International Reading Association

Standard 1. Students read a wide range of print and nonprint texts

to build an understanding of texts, of themselves, and of the cultures

of the United States and the world; to acquire new information; to

respond to the needs and demands of society and the workplace; and

for personal fulfillment. Among these texts are fiction and nonfiction,

classic and contemporary works.

Standard 2. Students read a wide range of literature from many periods in many genres to build an understanding of the many dimensions

of human experience.

Standard 3. Students apply a wide range of strategies to comprehend,

interpret, evaluate, and appreciate texts. They draw on their prior

experience, their interactions with other readers and writers, their

knowledge of word meaning and of other texts, their word identification strategies, and their understanding of textual features (e.g.,

sound–letter correspondence, sentence structure, context, graphics).

Standard 6. Students apply knowledge of language structure, language conventions (e.g., spelling and punctuation), media techniques,

figurative language, and genre to create, critique, and discuss print and

nonprint texts.

*Only the standards relevant to this volume are listed.
Standards

S OCIAL S TUDIES S TANDARDS *

National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS) 

NCSS T HEME I: C ULTURE

Social studies programs should include experiences that provide for

the study of culture and cultural diversity so that the learner can 

• Compare similarities and differences in the ways groups, societies,

and cultures meet human needs and concerns.

• Explain how information and experiences may be interpreted by

people from diverse cultural perspectives and frames of reference.

NCSS THEME IV: INDIVIDUAL DEVELOPMENT AND IDENTITY

Social studies programs should include experiences that provide for

the study of individual development and identity so that the learner can

• Identify and describe ways in which regional, ethnic, and national

cultures influence individuals’ daily lives.

• Identify and describe the influence of perception, attitudes, values,

and beliefs on personal identity.

NCSS T HEME IX: G LOB A L C ONNECTIONS

Social studies programs should include experiences that provide for the

study of global connections and interdependence so that the learner can 

• Explain how language, art, music, belief systems, and other cultural

elements can facilitate global understanding or cause misunderstanding.

*Only the standards relevant to this volume are listed.

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

188 Uncommon Journeys
Standards

U SING P EACE C ORPS L ITERATURE IN THE C LASSROOM

Paul D. Coverdell World Wise Schools 189

N ATIONAL G EOGRAPHY S TANDARDS *

Amer ican Geographical Society, Association of Amer ican

Geographers, National Geographic Society, National

Council for Geographic Education

E SSENTIAL E LEMENT II: P LACES AND R EGIONS

The geographically informed person knows and understands

• Standard 4: The physical and human characteristics of places

• Standard 6: How culture and experience influence people’s 

perception of places and regions

E SSENTIAL E LEMENT III: P HYSICAL S YSTEMS

The geographically informed person knows and understands

• Standard 7: The physical processes that shape the patterns of 

Earth’s surface

• Standard 8: The characteristics and spatial distribution 

of ecosystems on Earth’s surface

E SSENTIAL E LEMENT I V: HUMAN S YSTEMS

The geographically informed person knows and understands 

• Standard 9: The characteristics, distribution, and migration of

human populations on Earth’s surface

• Standard 10: The characteristics, distribution, and complexity of

Earth’s cultural mosaics

*Only the standards relevant to this volume are listed.
Standards

• Standard 11: The patterns and networks of economic 

interdependence on Earth’s surface

• Standard 12: The processes, patterns, and functions of human 

settlement

• Standard 13: How the forces of cooperation and conflict among

people influence the division and control of Earth’s surface

E SSENTIAL E LEMENT V: E NVIRONMENT AND S OCIETY

The geographically informed person knows and understands 

• Standard 14: How human actions modify the physical environment

A CKNOWLEDGMENTS

A special thank you to Mark Brazaitis, Kimberly Ross Camara, John

Deever, Jordan Earl, Peter Hessler, Leita Kaldi, Robin Solomon, Craig

Storti, Mike Tidwell, Jim Toner, Michael Varga, and Carrie Young—the

Peace Corps writers who contributed their passages to Uncommon

Journeys—to returned Peace Corps Volunteer Kerry Zahn for the cover

photograph, and to returned Peace Corps Volunteer John Coyne, of

peacecorpswriters.org, for helping to identify writers for this book.

The Peace Corps acknowledges with gratitude the following educators in

Anne Arundel County, Maryland, for their review of the lessons in

Uncommon Journeys: Aubrey Baden III, Gail Dabbs, Jeanine Perry, Sheila

Postlethwaite, and Matt Shagogue, Archbishop Spalding High School,

Severn; Elaine Boothby and Barbara Rader, South River High School,

Edgewater; Scott Forbes, North County High School, Glen Burnie; Mary

Kasper, Northeast High School, Pasadena; Bengt Johnson and Matthew

McCormick, Indian Creek School, Crownsville; Marilyn Morris-Revelle,

Southern High School, Harwood; and Sean Swanson, Old Mill High

School, Millersville.

P EACE C ORPS A DVENTURES A CROSS C ULTURES

190 Uncommon Journeys
worldwise Paul D. Coverdell

schools