Paul Milo Oral History Interview
Interviewer(s): Julius Sztuk
Interviewee(s): Paul Milo

Julius Sztuk: Today is November 26th, 2018. My name is Jay Sztuk and I'm interviewing Paul Milo, who was a Peace Corps volunteer in Fiji from 1975 through 1977, working for the Ministry of Education. Paul, thanks for agreeing to be interviewed today. Tell me a little bit about how you first heard about Peace Corps and why you joined.

Paul Milo: Well, I think in those days, Peace Corps was fairly well known, talked about, the volunteer service aspect, and it sounded like something that would be real interesting to be a part of. Nobody really talked to me about it specifically. I researched it on my own and found out a lot of interesting facts that made me more intrigued.

Julius Sztuk: What were you doing before that? Were you a student or had you been working for a while or what?

Paul Milo: I had just graduated, finished a mathematics degree, and it was always my intention to take two years, coincidentally, between undergraduate and graduate school. I had vague ideas about graduate school, and what I did know for sure is I didn't want to go straight through school, straight into a working type environment. I wanted to see the world. And really the competition for Peace Corps was being a yachty. That's a term popular in those days. I don't even know if they still use it. But you crewed on people's boats and traveled around the world. And started thinking about that and the lack of structure it offered and then thought about a Peace Corps and there was a real job there to do and it eventually won out.

Julius Sztuk: So where did you go to school, here in California or?

Paul Milo: My undergraduate was at the University of the Pacific. It's located in Stockton, California, in the Big Valley, if you remember that story.

Julius Sztuk: Yeah. So you're from this area, then?

Paul Milo: I was born and raised in San Francisco. My family's all from San Francisco pretty much.

Julius Sztuk: So now when you told your family and friends that you were going to join the Peace Corps, what did they think about it?

Paul Milo: Well, they were very encouraging, I would say, generally. My parents were pretty much encouraging in general. As you will remember, this was quite a tumultuous time. The war in Vietnam had ended. And there was a lot of changes in society going on. And so there was a great sense of exploration in general. So my parents were not ones to restrict that. They wanted me to try new things. Seeing the world certainly was not something they were against in any way. Friends thought it was, I guess, cool. Or maybe they said groovy in those days.

Julius Sztuk: Yeah. So you didn't get any kind of negative pushback from anybody?

Paul Milo: None at all. None at all. In fact, my, well, I did have a girlfriend at the time that wasn't so thrilled about my heading away. That was my only negative feedback.

Julius Sztuk: Understandably. And did you choose to go to Fiji or did you have, were you open to going anywhere? Or what was your first choice?

Paul Milo: At the time I was given, it might have been similar for you. There was three lines on the form and the first line, for pretty much no reason, I put Malta. And I realized that to be more specific, you had less chance of getting that. The second choice was Micronesia, because I thought, well, being in an American trust area, maybe I'd want to stay there. Maybe there'd be opportunities for Americans there. And then the third was just, gee, any South Pacific. And they came back, through great fortune and no real deserving of my own, with this offer of Fiji. And I really didn't debate on it long at all. I thought it sounded better than my choices.

Julius Sztuk: So you did have a predetermination to kind of go to the South Pacific. That was something you thought about.

Paul Milo: I've always been, well, again, imagine the yachty thing. You know, I grew up in a fishing family and being out on the ocean has always been very, very desirable. So, you know, being yachty or being in the Peace Corps, you're next to the water. I'm still very much that way, oriented towards the ocean, water, fishing, and that type of lifestyle.

Julius Sztuk: Yeah. Yeah. So after applying, then you got this invitation to go to Fiji. And did you know much about Fiji before that?

Paul Milo: You know, they had things like the Encyclopedia Britannica in those days. You didn't just pull up your iPhone and Google, tell me all about Fiji. So the information was fairly hard to come by. So really when I first set foot on Fiji, it was all new and all learning from the beginning, you know, vague concepts, and of course Peace Corps gave you some information about the country and which shots to get. I remember, what did we have, what they call WHO cards that had your vaccinations on there. And those were the types of things that they talked about.

Julius Sztuk: Did they have any kind of orientation before you left the States, to kind of brief you about the country or?

Paul Milo: We did have a few days in San Francisco. So we did, for me no travel. I was already here. But the rest of the volunteers from my group, Fiji 24, came from across the country. And we spent several days in San Francisco in some hotel learning about what the job might entail and how really it wasn't a generalist. You know, they referred to the previous Peace Corps groups as more generalist kind of things. And they said, really the goal of your group is to replace mid-level skills and supplement the need for hiring of those skills for the government that we were serving.

Julius Sztuk: Was the whole group education, all teachers?

Paul Milo: Every one of my group was education.

Julius Sztuk: Education. Hmm. So then you have this orientation and you get on the plane and take off to this new place. Do you remember your initial reaction when you landed in Fiji? How you felt about it?

Paul Milo: Yeah, it was just.

Julius Sztuk: Did anything impress you in particular?

Paul Milo: Well, what I remember most is that I was feeling great, because a lot of the folks stayed up all night on the airplane, and I slept all the flight and woke up feeling really refreshed and seeing this beautiful kind of environment. It was just really nothing but positive from the beginning there where it was. And, you know, it's just part of my nature is to be a traveler anyway. I mean, my career later in life was doing international business and I went to an international business school. So I already had an orientation towards being multicultural. And that was just, oh great, here's the next chapter. And that was more of the way I was thinking of it.

Julius Sztuk: Yeah. So it must have been pretty exciting for you when you landed there.

Paul Milo: Yeah, it really was. Because the intake, if you will, they, uh. I may be leaving out some parts, but basically they whisked us as fast as you could whisk something in Fiji off to the inside of Viti Levu and we went to the welcoming ceremony. So next thing I know, I'm sitting inside of a bure and the whole group is there.

Julius Sztuk: In a Fijian village? You went straight to a village?

Paul Milo: In the interior.

Julius Sztuk: Wow.

Paul Milo: So this isn't, you know, just a village. This is a full-on in the interior type of village.

Julius Sztuk: Yeah.

Paul Milo: And that was quite remarkable. Nothing had ever been. And then something you probably experienced, they say, oh, you're going to be the chief. And I go, what the heck is that? They said, it'll mean you'll have the first imbelo. And I didn't know what an imbelo was. And next thing I knew, there was this milky substance sitting out in front of me and everyone staring rather intently at me. And thankfully the Fijian gentleman who was part of the Peace Corps, who was sitting next to me, leaned over and quietly said, drink it.

Julius Sztuk: So they didn't tell you anything about that in orientation?

Paul Milo: It was all real time learning.

Julius Sztuk: Wow. Yeah. So how long a drive outside of Nadi was it, do you remember, from the airport to that village? You said it was right in the interior.

Paul Milo: Yeah. I certainly couldn't remember what road we took. I know that the roads were dirt. There was no such thing as a paved road. So when I say whisked us, it was compared to walking.

Julius Sztuk: Was it a couple of hours?

Paul Milo: It was fast. It had to be, I would guess 3 or 4 hours.

Julius Sztuk: Right. Yeah. And then after that, how long did you spend in training, do you remember, before you started on your job?

Paul Milo: Well, there were several weeks where we were in Labasa area. We were at a school and the school was in a break period. And there were students that were brought in, as I call it, the equivalent of summer school. And we were their teachers, so we were basically getting training on the job. So the training really consisted of some cultural education, some practice teaching, and then language training. In my case, Hindi language training.

Julius Sztuk: Because they expected you to teach at a Hindi school or a school that served mostly Indians?

Paul Milo: I suppose that was. I suppose that was the case. Right. Right. I ended up teaching at schools where, you know, English was the primary language. So bad for me for not learning really either Hindi well or Fijian, since it really was never required for my job, other than it would have been nice to have because you open up culture with language.

Julius Sztuk: Right. And so what else was memorable about your training? I know you did a home stay with a family.

Paul Milo: I did, yeah. Lovely family. And they had quite a few kids. And at the time, you know, I was dabbling with the idea of being a vegetarian and of course, an Indian family. The majority were vegetarian. So I was excited about that. And what I do specifically remember was that I told the lady of the house that I'd quite happily be a vegetarian for them. And she said, oh no, you're going to eat bones. And apparently what they wanted was for me to demonstrate that you could actually eat lamb and chicken and survive the experience in front of their children. I think they thought their children would be better off to have meat in their diet.

Julius Sztuk: Oh, so they didn't eat meat, but they wanted you to eat meat as an example?

Paul Milo: Demonstrate it for their children. Exactly. Exactly.

Julius Sztuk: That's interesting.

Paul Milo: I really didn't want to, because, as I said at the time, I was thinking about becoming a vegetarian and the vegetable dishes were just outstanding. I mean, they, you know, cook eight, ten, 12 dishes every meal. So it wasn't just you got vegetables and rice and that was your meal. There would be this great table setting at every meal, even including breakfast. There was quite a few things to choose from.

Julius Sztuk: Wow. And did you stay there by yourself or were there other volunteers staying with the same family?

Paul Milo: Yeah, that was just me at that house.

Julius Sztuk: And so each volunteer was farmed out to a different family.

Paul Milo: Correct. In our case, that was true. Yeah. It was a very interesting area in Labasa.

Julius Sztuk: Yeah.

Paul Milo: I could certainly tell you about the story of three sisters and the mosquito net. The mosquito net was very quick. I remember it as I had literally layers of mosquito bites. I had probably, if I were to venture a guess, 200 on each ankle. And I didn't know how to deal with that at all. It was pretty disturbing. And then they came and said, oh, there's a mosquito net and this will help you. So sure enough, first night I got my trusty mosquito net out feeling protected. And they didn't tell me or nor was I smart enough to think of that you had to tuck it in. So I woke up to a den of mosquitoes that I had trapped.

Julius Sztuk: Inside the net.

Paul Milo: Who were inside, right. So night number two, I was good. I learned the trick of the mosquito net. Tuck it in. And that was a lifesaver for me. You know, like a lot of volunteers, I was a little ill for maybe a week and a half or so. I think that was probably the lower end. We had one guy, Ralph Sukurski. I recall he got down from 160 to 98 pounds and they were just about to ship him to Hawaii.

Julius Sztuk: Wow, sounds serious.

Paul Milo: That was, he was on his way out and he just, his health kicked in. But that was several, several months. So, you know, you have to adapt to all the bacterias and have to adapt to this very different kind of environment chemically than your body is used to. But yeah, I always have to tell the big adventure, which was Three Sisters Mountain, because there is a mountain in the Labasa area called Three Sisters. It's rather famous because it's supposedly haunted. And the family said to me, yeah, you don't want to go there. And that really didn't deter me. So my friend and I decided to take a hike up there, and we encountered a junction between one mountain and the next to the Three Sisters Mountain. And, well, the short version is he was quite able to cross. I was not. I got stung by bees once. I moved hundreds of yards down the hill, got stung again. He passed through twice without ever seeing or being harassed.

Julius Sztuk: And this is because of some superstition about the mountain?

Paul Milo: Well, I'm giving you the facts of what happened to me. Whether or not the superstition led the bees to me or not? You know, I really can't answer that. It literally changed my perception of the spirit world from one of.

Julius Sztuk: Well, what was it that you did that he didn't, to make the bees come after you?

Paul Milo: Well, you know, on the way up the mountain, you know, there are rumors that there are bones from the cannibal days there way up the mountain. I said, Glen, are you planning to touch the bones? And he said, no. And I was thinking to myself, I didn't really verbalize it, I was thinking to myself, well, I probably would. And that's the only difference that I'm aware of between us.

Julius Sztuk: You didn't actually find any bones or touching them?

Paul Milo: I never got that close. There was no problem. But the aftermath of the whole thing, which was even more freaky, was after all those bee stings, the next day when I woke up there was, across from my chest to my leg, swelling. And you want to guess how many of them were swollen? Three.

Julius Sztuk: Three.

Paul Milo: Yeah.

Julius Sztuk: Wow.

Paul Milo: And yeah, there's lots of, I mean, you can Google the legend behind the Three Sisters Mountain and, you know, you'll see that I'm not making this all up. And there are stories of people who touch the bones or take the bones, and they, women grow beards. And people have had to repatriate the bones because their lives were ruined afterwards. That type of lore.

Julius Sztuk: That's a lucky thing you didn't find any then.

Paul Milo: Absolutely. Yeah, I really did change my attitude, though, because now spiritually I don't doubt things at the same. You know, I always say there's a lot going on in the spiritual world. I call it a mystery. It actually connects directly to my current Episcopalian faith. Episcopalians love to say things are a mystery.

Julius Sztuk: All right. So after training, you made it through successfully. Did you guys lose anybody in training? Did you have anybody go home or couldn't cut it or?

Paul Milo: Yeah, none that I recall. I might be forgetting that aspect of it, but there wasn't, it wasn't a big washout. We did through the entire period lose some folks. But I don't recall anybody washing out actually during the training period.

Julius Sztuk: Well, that's good. Then you guys went off and started your jobs. Where were you assigned to teach initially?

Paul Milo: Yeah, we all interviewed with the Ministry of Education and they told me that I would be going to Suva Grammar School, which is one of the three main government schools, Suva Grammar School. As well as for boys, that was Queen Victoria School and RKS. And then the girls school where I eventually taught at Adi Cakobau School. But I spent a semester at Suva Grammar School.

Julius Sztuk: So and Suva's the capital city.

Paul Milo: Suva is the capital city and it's right in the area they call the Domain. In fact, our school and our housing was right across the street from the prime minister residence.

Julius Sztuk: So that was pretty upscale compared to most volunteers probably.

Paul Milo: This was not an imbore.

Julius Sztuk: Yeah.

Paul Milo: Yeah, I was actually embarrassed by the whole thing. I was thinking I was going away for this helping others type experience and, you know, seeing this housing and how nice everything was, I was feeling a little guilty about that. Which, you know, didn't last long because I was after one semester out in the bush.

Julius Sztuk: Sure. Why did you get transferred?

Paul Milo: Well, the Ministry of Education.

Julius Sztuk: Was that a choice?

Paul Milo: No, it was a, well, yes, it was a choice. The Ministry of Education called me in and said, we have this immediate vacancy. There's no mathematics teacher at this all girls school out in the Sawani area. And would I help out? I'm a volunteer to begin with, right? And the first thing that crossed my mind is absolutely, yeah, I would do that.

Julius Sztuk: So when you were back in Suva, how did you like living in the big city there?

Paul Milo: You know, coming from San Francisco, it really didn't seem like a big city to me. It seemed like an island that had, you know, the odd bit of building on it. But for the feeling of it at all was not at all like what I considered a big city.

Julius Sztuk: Was it what you expected when you signed up for the Peace Corps?

Paul Milo: I don't know what I expected, not really. I was looking for really an adventure of learning and cultural exploration and giving back to some degree. I would say the giving back part got stronger as I was actually there. May have been more self interest in the beginning, but when you start seeing the effect you have on folks' lives and particularly your students' lives. And you realize, well, you know, if they pass six form math, which is not that common in Fiji, pretty much get a job at a bank or some relatively good job by local standards. So you were offering something that really did matter in their lives. That's what convinces you to believe in the vision, if you will, and embrace it. At least that was, in my case, the facts.

Julius Sztuk: So then you went from living in Suva to Adi Cakobau school, which you said was out in the bush.

Paul Milo: Sawani. Yeah, it was about 12 miles.

Julius Sztuk: Was there a village nearby where you stayed or what was your living situation like out there?

Paul Milo: They were quarters. They were nothing near as nice as the teachers’ quarters at Suva Grammar School. But there were teacher's quarters we had, I believe there were three in one building. And then you had a shared kitchen, living room, cooking area, that type of thing. None of us actually cooked.

Julius Sztuk: Was it all Peace Corps volunteers staying in the quarters?

Paul Milo: No.

Julius Sztuk: Or were there local teachers?

Paul Milo: I was at an all girls school. I was the only man at the school. I was the only male teacher at the school at the time. And everybody else was a Fijian teacher.

Julius Sztuk: And you shared the quarters with these Fijian, other Fijian teachers?

Paul Milo: Correct. Yeah. And they also had other arrangements. I don't remember anybody cooking. I ate pretty much every night at the dining hall with girls. So I would sit at the matron's table. The girls have a matron that's in charge of running the kitchen area and many of the activities for the girls. And so I used to call her my wife and I'd sit there and have dinner with my wife.

Julius Sztuk: How'd that go over? Probably a big joke around the school.

Paul Milo: Well, she was about, I was in my twenties and she was in her sixties, so yeah, we were quite the pair. But she had, as many folks there do, a wonderful laugh and it was just plain fun to be with all the time.

Julius Sztuk: So then your whole life pretty much revolved around the school since you weren't in a village with the local community.

Paul Milo: Yes. So you'd watch the Adi Cakobau School sports activities. I've got pictures of the girls sitting on the sides of the building and watching field hockey. Adi Cakobau School is pretty much an undefeated champion of field hockey. And you watch the girls sports. We would also do some activities together like math club and those type of activities, some academic. And if you had time off, you know, you went into town. That was certainly an option for the weekends.

Julius Sztuk: What was it, a couple of hours into town from there?

Paul Milo: Yeah, it's 12 miles so. As you know, the speed of the busses in those days, so it could be a couple of hours.

Julius Sztuk: Yeah, probably more like an hour. So just tell me what a typical day might be like there at the school.

Paul Milo: Yeah. I think like most teachers you head off to your class. I had pretty much the same. I taught forms four, five, and six, which is equivalent in the U.S. to grades 10, 11 and 12. So most of my sixth form class was in the same building. So I would head off to that building and I'd prepared the lesson and, you know, would start the conversation with the girls and live a teacher's life. It's actually pretty programed because they have breaks. I found out what a biscuit is in a nice way. You know, they had asked me if I wanted a biscuit and didn't realize it was a homemade, delicious cookie that I was going to get with this wonderful tea.

So after the bit of teaching, you'd get your first break and you'd sit and talk to other teachers, and then there'd be a break for lunch and then into the afternoon. I suppose you finished roughly the same time as U.S. schedules, you know, early afternoon, 3:00 or 4:00. And then you're back to your quarters to do paper grading and preparing for the next day lessons.

Julius Sztuk: Yeah, so teachers had a lot of work to do outside of school, just as they do here with grading papers and.

Paul Milo: Sure.

Julius Sztuk: That would probably eat up your evening.

Paul Milo: Yeah. Yeah. And then, as I say, I did start a math club at one time that. You know, you look back at these things and say, boy, I would do so much more if I was there now, and I would do things more intensely and better. But you know, at the time, they'd never heard of a math club, so it was a good project to also be involved with. And, you know, there are a lot of school functions as well on days they would put on mecces and various events, welcome people from the outside who are visiting, have assemblies. Typical things you'd have at a boarding school. You know, the majority of all the students at Adi Cakobau School were boarders and, you know, you're talking about several hundred girls that are living there from all over Fiji really.

As you probably know, Adi Cakobau School is the pride of Fijian womanhood. And brilliant women are there, most notably my former boss, who later became the Deputy Prime Minister, Miss Vakatale. So, you know, she is, uh, and also the vice principal, Ethalini. Thankfully I was able to connect with them. I've talked with them through the years as well. In fact, I was intending to see both of them at the recent 50th anniversary.

Julius Sztuk: Did you meet up with them?

Paul Milo: Well, unfortunately, there was a reguregu for Ethalini and her family, a funeral. And Miss Vakatale is in her eighties, and so she has her good days and bad days. And frankly, I was pleased at this particular event. The 50th celebration was very loud and noisy. And I really don't think she would have been comfortable had she met up there. She confirmed to go, but then sent her regrets that she wasn't feeling up to it. And it was a pretty noisy event.

Julius Sztuk: So what did you do in your leisure time out there while you're out at the school?

Paul Milo: Well, one of my favorite activities was scuba diving. You know, when I went there, I was a licensed scuba diver with NAUI. And then I joined the local dive organization there, the British Sub-Aqua Club, and I was an assistant instructor. So I got to do quite a bit of diving, went to places like the Astrolabe Reef that's typically rated in the top five by U.S. divers. So all throughout the time, particularly when I was in Suva area, I did a lot of scuba diving. So other favorite activities were meeting up with friends and going hiking, exploring around, going to places like Levuka. We'd take trips on, I think they call them copra boats.

Julius Sztuk: Yeah.

Paul Milo: I think there's one, I recall the name Ace Akula, that was able to be a transport boat. So exploring was probably the thing I would talk about next. And then I spent quite a bit of time socializing with other Fijians and just going to their houses, cooking chicken curry.

Julius Sztuk: You mean around the school?

Paul Milo: Other teachers, other friends around the school. Pretty much every night.

Julius Sztuk: Because the other teachers would have had their families out there, the married ones anyway, they would have been there with their families. So you did have some good community there, huh?

Paul Milo: Yeah. Pretty much. Well, when I was in Suva, pretty much every night we would be in the circle with somebody having a guitar and a tanoah and we would sit there singing songs, talking about the day, and going over problem areas that we had with students, discussing that type of thing. And of course drinking grog.

Julius Sztuk: Any memorable experiences or episodes while you were at, during your teaching time out there in the school?

Paul Milo: Well, yeah. I mean there's, gosh, lots of things happened. Memorable. It was one thing in particular that I enjoyed. There was a bit of a battle. There's a position similar to valedictorian at schools in Fiji they call dux, D-U-X, and that particular role is a high honor. And we had quite a debate over who would actually get that particular role. The student I wanted was Telaite Biu, and she was one of my top math students. So I and the other teachers all debated and Telaite was in fact selected. And I was so pleased.

When I went back to Fiji a few years ago, I put on a little party and invited people and she showed up. She's now a doctor, Telaite Biu, and she became an eye surgeon and runs the Pacific, she's now the director of the Pacific Eye Institute, so in a very prestigious role.

Julius Sztuk: Wow.

Paul Milo: And so that was, you know, quite memorable to me that I promoted this person and to see their life where it went and how super successful that she became.

Julius Sztuk: Right. Right. It's rewarding to see somebody that you taught become such a success, huh?

Paul Milo: Absolutely. Yes.

Julius Sztuk: All right. So looking back at your service, what do you think were your main accomplishments?

Paul Milo: You know, as a teacher in Fiji, getting folks to pass exams is very important. In fact, it's critical. They take different examinations to move to the next level. So me being a math teacher, I would say that answer's pretty simple. Getting the maximum number of people to pass. I was a completely untrained teacher and at the end of the year, the boss, Miss Vakatale, told me that my pass rate was higher than the previous year, when they had a trained teacher from, I believe it was Australia or New Zealand, that they would have had to pay a lot more money than the $0 they paid me.

Julius Sztuk: That's impressive.

Paul Milo: That was our benchmark, is how many of your students pass the exams?

Julius Sztuk: Any regrets about your service there or anything that happened?

Paul Milo: You know, I can't remember anything at all other than what I talked about earlier that, you know, when you get older and hopefully wiser, you think, oh, I would have worked harder from the get-go. I would have been more serious about certain aspects of the job, more dedicated to accomplishing more. So if there were any regrets, it would have just been to do more and more seriously what that job was. But, you know, you're in your twenties. You're there for an experience for yourself. And it really doesn't evolve completely until you've actually felt the results of your work. And that's when really service, I think, begins. And its contribution begins, when you see some results of your work.

Julius Sztuk: So you completed the initial first year tour and decided not to extend it. Did you have an opportunity to extend if you had, if you'd wanted to?

Paul Milo: Yeah. At one point, I guess coming from a business background for my dad, I went to the Ministry of Education and I asked them for a raise and their answer was, sure, we have no problem to give you a raise. We'll offer you a job here and you can quit the Peace Corps and work for us.

Julius Sztuk: Yeah?

Paul Milo: So that was always in the cards.

Julius Sztuk: But you decided not to do that?

Paul Milo: Yeah. You know, I thought a lot about that decision because why would you leave paradise and this absolutely beautiful experience? But, you know, when you're programed to move at a certain pace, it was clear to me that my programing was to run at a faster speed that I was running at there. And I felt there was some dissonance between that and the pace of life there. Now, I possibly could have returned to Fiji, but I also did meet some expatriates that told me a similar, similar story. You know, one guy I used to play tennis with at times was a judge. And he told me that, uh, we started talking about the beer actually. I said, oh, I like the beer here. What do you think? And he says, oh, I quite like it. I said. He said, I drink three bottles of it every night before bed. And I said, wait a minute, it only comes in quarts. That's a tremendous amount of drinking every night.

And at the same time, he was telling me the story about how his life in England had progressed and how he learned the law. And it pretty much went static at a point. So he didn't really feel like there was anything in terms of his profession that was really motivating him. And there again, I think he was programed in a way that you're supposed to keep learning and doing different things with your profession that he didn't feel he had the opportunity to do. And that kind of impressed me as well. I thought I might have that same kind of thing.

Julius Sztuk: Hmm. OK. So after two years, you decided to come home. And how did that Peace Corps experience, how do you think it influenced the rest of your future plans or your post Fiji career?

Paul Milo: Well, so like many Peace Corps, I was planning to go to graduate school. I think I was planning, if I remember this correctly, to go to law school. I decided that was probably not a great choice at some point. And I shifted to international business. So there was a fairly unknown school called Thunderbird, which was actually the number one rated international business school, but outside of its own sphere, not so well known. And that was what I decided to do, was take my interest in travel, my interest in culture, and to make a career out of it, which is what I did after Peace Corps. I went to Thunderbird and then proceeded with a career in international business.

Julius Sztuk: OK. Did you work in other countries?

Paul Milo: I did, yeah. My family was transferred to Canada. I spent three years in Canada, but I managed many organizations globally, set up joint ventures in China. I opened subsidiary offices in Mexico and Hong Kong. All over most parts of the world. And, yeah, we could have moved again. My wife is a little partial to this area, though, so that wasn't such an easy thing to do. She was okay with Canada, but you know, she wanted to really ensure that if we were to move somewhere, you know, it was going to be better for all the family. And I couldn't argue with that.

Julius Sztuk: So you think the Peace Corps service had something to do with pushing you into that international?

Paul Milo: No doubt. No doubt. It convinced me that I liked other cultures. I could say I was equally if not more comfortable with other cultures and certainly with what I experienced in Fiji, to make me want to spend time away from my own country. That I saw many, many things about Fijians that I felt were quite superior to what I perceived of my own fellow Americans. And their loving warmth was. Certainly one of my most memorable experiences was a very simple thing of getting on a bus. And there were some ladies in the back of the bus and then the bus would stop and another lady would get on. And they literally would run across the bus, hug each other, this great warm feeling, like a long-lost friend they hadn't seen. And they did that every day.

Julius Sztuk: Yeah.

Paul Milo: Every single day. And I'd never really seen anybody embracing, loving, warm like that pretty much in my entire growth. And, you know, I came from a loving family, relatively speaking, a super happy family, but we didn't do anything like that.

Julius Sztuk: And you've been back to Fiji a time or two since then?

Paul Milo: Yes. Yeah. Well, there was the Habitat for Humanity trip. Went back in conjunction with that trip, did some work, some projects and visited the people who I had worked with previously. And then of course the 50th anniversary. So I've been back twice.

Julius Sztuk: The Habitat trip was 2011. So was that the first time since 1977 that you had been back?

Paul Milo: It was.

Julius Sztuk: OK. And did you notice a lot of changes in that time?

Paul Milo: You know, I would say I noticed more similarities than the changes, really. I mean, sure, Suva was different and people had grown up. But the warmth, the friendliness, the cultural aspects that I described earlier were pretty much identical. I didn't notice any change in that whatsoever. They didn't suddenly become less warm, less loving, and less friendly.

Julius Sztuk: And you're still, now you're involved with Friends of Fiji. So you're still giving back to, uh, to the country in some way.

Paul Milo: Yeah, it's really part of something that I like doing, especially now that I'm, I guess I could call it semi-retired, that it's one of the projects of interest to me. Because you just don't have that good of an experience and sort of a special relationship with the country and then turn down an opportunity to continue to be engaged. And of course, I was really pleased that many of us from Friends of Fiji were able to travel there. I liked that we all just, just like before. You know, I hung out with some Peace Corps people in the beginning. And then once I was integrated into the culture, most all of my friends were Fijians. I still had a few Peace Corps friends, you know, and that's what I noticed, that everybody has their own affinity group we all go back to. We all meet up with the locals who we were associated with, which I think is great.

Julius Sztuk: Yeah. So it must have been good to see some of those people after so many years.

Paul Milo: It's tremendously undescribably rewarding. I don't even think I could tell people how cool that is.

Julius Sztuk: Yeah. So would you say that maybe the best part of the whole Peace Corps experience is those relationships, those connections that you make with the local people that last so long?

Paul Milo: It's absolutely, absolutely that, and feeling that, you know, within this complicated world made some kind of a positive impact and that they recognize that you did make some kind of a positive impact. And, you know, because a lot of times you'd go to a place and really try to do your best, but it might not be what they really appreciated. But, you know, they let you know that they did appreciate what you did.

Julius Sztuk: Yeah. Any plans to go back in the future?

Paul Milo: I'd like to go back as often as possible. You know, I live here in the Bay Area. All my family's here in the Bay Area. So it's not a simple task for me to go. I've got to convince others that it's in their interests as well. So, yeah, that's if I have a bit of an issue there, it's that this is my project. It's not something that we all in the family do together. So that means I have limited amount of time I can spend with it because it's individual to me. I was the only one who was a Peace Corps volunteer in Fiji.

Julius Sztuk: Yeah. So is there anything else you want to share? I think we're kind of wrapping up the questions here. Bu any last thoughts or things that you might have remembered while we've been talking that you want to get in here?

Paul Milo: You know, I think it's pretty remarkable that somebody who's 66 years old thinks about a place and when I meet new people, I find that the topic comes up relatively soon in conversations. You know, we'll talk about my interest in fishing, my interest in golfing, maybe some work if there happens to be a connection to that person. But invariably, at some point not too long into the conversation, I go, oh no, by the way, I was in Fiji. And suddenly you look at them and they say, oh, well, tell me more about that.

Julius Sztuk: OK. All right. Well, thanks a lot, Paul. I think it was a great interview and this is a conclusion.

Paul Milo: Thank you. Vinaka vaka levu.