Thomas H. Boyd Oral History Interview
Interviewer(s): Ivan Browning
Interviewee(s): Thomas H. Boyd

Ivan Browning: Today is October 20th, 2015. My name is Ivan Browning and I'm interviewing Thomas H. Boyd, who was a Peace Corps volunteer in Ukraine from 2010 to 2012 in a teaching and youth development project. So you go by Tommy, right?

Thomas H. Boyd: Correct.

Ivan Browning: OK. Well, tell us what you were doing a year before you joined the Peace Corps.

Thomas H. Boyd: So I joined the Peace Corps originally in March 2010. One year before that, I was working in Kerry, North Carolina, at Immediate Communications, which is a company that works with proxy materials and delivers voting materials for companies when it comes to their annual meetings and delivering of prospectuses, annual reports. In an office setting on a computer all day. Having gotten my application in and waiting, waiting to hear from Peace Corps.

Ivan Browning: Very good. Well, let's go back a little bit. Tell us a little bit about where you grew up and your family background.

Thomas H. Boyd: Sure. I was born in Atlanta, Georgia, and grew up in Marietta, which is a suburb right outside of Atlanta, and lived there for the first five years of my life. Around in '91, we moved, my mom and my dad and I moved to Kerry, North Carolina, at that point, along with newly acquired little brother David. And from there, I grew up in North Carolina. I went to elementary school, middle school, high school in Kerry and then from there went on to Appalachian State University in Boone, North Carolina, where I received my Bachelor of Science in sociology with a concentration in social inequalities. So grew up in suburbia and playing lots of sports with a close-knit group of friends right on my street.

Ivan Browning: Very good. So you have one brother?

Thomas H. Boyd: Correct. Just one sibling. One. And he's younger. And he's currently now in Asheville.

Ivan Browning: Mm hmm. Your parents. Did they both work?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yes, they both worked the majority of their lives. My mom was a teacher, itinerant teacher, and her last job was in the Wake County Public School system. She's now retired. My dad has also retired, and his last job was as a technical editor for SAS.

Ivan Browning: I see. Did they have any international travel experience or interests?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yes, they've both, um. They've both had some travels around the world. My dad's been to Haiti on some mission trips. He's been to Finland for work. He served as an Army photographer back in the, I think, late sixties and was in Thailand for 18 months. So he's been around a little bit. As well as my mom, I think, has been to Europe for more of a vacation type activities as well as she did the Experiment in International Living back in the late sixties as well, which is a world learning program. And she was in Holland, I think, at that point.

Ivan Browning: Very good. When you were in high school, did you study a foreign language?

Thomas H. Boyd: In high school, I studied Latin and am embarrassed to say now that I little very remember, I remember very little from that, from those four years.

Ivan Browning: And in college, any language?

Thomas H. Boyd: In college I did not study language, no.

Ivan Browning: OK. And were you doing any volunteer work, either in high school or college?

Thomas H. Boyd: In high school, I did a little bit here and there, mostly sports and extracurricular honor society type activities took up most of my time. Throughout the summers of high school and undergrad, I went on the Appalachian Service Project, which is a mission trip that goes to the Appalachian Mountains during the summer and works on the homes with lower income families and families in need. That was a significant part of my summers the first decade of the century. And in college or at App State during my time there, I feel like I got more and more involved in the community as a, uh, working with the local food bank was one thing. There was another group called People Fighting Poverty, which was an on-campus group that worked to address homelessness through different initiatives as well as I was a logistics coordinator for a blood drive, which was a volunteer activity as well. And that actually ended up being the largest North Carolina blood drive in history at the time. In the state, I should say.

Ivan Browning: Very good. Very good. So your summers were spent volunteering for the most part while you were in high school and college or?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yeah, I guess I did not specify. That was only a week, a weeklong project, but I did it every summer for nine summers.

Ivan Browning: Oh, I see.

Thomas H. Boyd: So yeah, thanks for the good clarification.

Ivan Browning: Oh, well, OK. But and otherwise, what did you do in the summers?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yeah. So when I was App State, most of my summers were spent actually working at the Gregory Poole Equipment Company. I was a maintenance assistant and I did a lot of painting in the summer heat, especially those yellow poles that you see all over the place.

Ivan Browning: All right. Well, how did you become aware of the Peace Corps?

Thomas H. Boyd: I don't remember my first exact exposure to it. A couple of my friends when I was in either late high school or early college had done it, and so it was on my radar as soon as I entered college and just something I had always, always thought about it, about doing it. And but again, I don't remember my first specific moment hearing about it.

Ivan Browning: So it was pretty soon after you graduated from college that you applied?

Thomas H. Boyd: Correct. I think I applied within a few weeks after graduating. And it had always been kind of something on the, uh, I'd always thought about. But what really sealed it for me was when I went to Bolivia in 2008 with Appalachian State study abroad course, and we went down there for three weeks on a social change and leadership course. And that was my first time out of the United States. That was the, that just opened a lot of doors for me and exposed me to a lot of things and really showed me the value of. It changed my perspective on service completely. And that's what directly led me to apply for the Peace Corps.

Ivan Browning: When you applied to the Peace Corps, did you have to take any kind of entrance exam or just fill out paperwork?

Thomas H. Boyd: No exam, there was just paperwork and an interview I think were the most of the involvement in that process.

Ivan Browning: Where did the interview take place?

Thomas H. Boyd: I believe it took place on the NC State campus.

Ivan Browning: OK. Well, from the time of your application to the time you got your invitation, how long was that?

Thomas H. Boyd: So I think I got my application in January 2009 and got the invitation. It was either October, I want to say November 2009, so about ten months.

Ivan Browning: And after that, when did training start?

Thomas H. Boyd: So from there it was about 4 to 5 months later. Training began the very end of March 2010.

Ivan Browning: And where did the training take place?

Thomas H. Boyd: My training was in the small village of Semenivka in Ukraine, which was in the Kyiv Oblast, oblast being a word for kind of region. And that was about an hour or two from Kyiv, which is the capital.

Ivan Browning: Were you in a group of other trainees?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yeah. So there was about 75 of us that, or 77 I should say, that went over to Ukraine at the same time. And then in my training village of Semenivka, there was myself and four other volunteers.

Ivan Browning: I see. Now, does did Ukraine have a history of having Peace Corps volunteers work in the country?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yes. So we were the 38th group that, and groups had been coming about twice a year. So there was definitely, definitely previous volunteers.

Ivan Browning: So you did your training in country.

Thomas H. Boyd: Correct.

Ivan Browning: So what did you think when you first arrived and how did you get to your training site?

Thomas H. Boyd: I think when we first got to Ukraine, we spent I want to say two or three nights at an old Soviet facility for kind of orientation arrival. And it was dark and it was still cold in March, there was snow on the ground. And my first kind of thoughts were, you know, what have I gotten myself into? But in talking to other volunteers, I wasn't the only one. And from there, everything was happening so fast and we're being thrown tons of information. So those few days are still kind of a blur, but I still remember them very clear at the same time. But from there, we took busses with our cluster and to the various training sites from there.

Ivan Browning: So it was a mixed group of men and women?

Thomas H. Boyd: Correct. Yeah, men and women, all different ages. I think we had one gentleman who was 79 at the time.

Ivan Browning: Were there any married couples or was everybody single?

Thomas H. Boyd: Uh, yes, there were two, I want to say two or three married couples.

Ivan Browning: Was everybody destined to do teaching or had the trainees had teacher training experience or they had teacher education degrees?

Thomas H. Boyd: So I think everyone did not necessarily have a certain degree and we had different experiences and different backgrounds. Ukraine works in three different programs. They have youth development, which I was a part of, community development, and TEFL, teaching English as a foreign language. So in our Group 38 there was about 50 youth development volunteers and the rest were community development. So 27 approximately, give or take. And then the TEFL teachers come in the other group. So like Group 39, for example, Group 37, on the other ends of 38 were all TEFL teachers.

Ivan Browning: I see. And learning about the host country, was that done in orientation or did that continue through your training?

Thomas H. Boyd: That continued throughout my training and until the very last day I was in Ukraine, not as official, but there was definitely trainings about, intentional trainings throughout training about Ukrainian history, Ukrainian culture, and Ukrainian way of life.

Ivan Browning: And including language?

Thomas H. Boyd: Correct. We had 4 to 5 hours of language classes every day.

Ivan Browning: What language?

Thomas H. Boyd: I was in a group that learned Ukrainian. And again, it was probably 60% of the clusters learned Ukrainian and 40% of the clusters learned Russian.

Ivan Browning: Was there any particular reason for that? Is the country bilingual then, Ukrainian and Russian speakers?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yes, I think I would say the majority of Ukrainians understand and can speak both languages fluently. The Ukrainian, no matter what is spoken in the home, Ukrainian is taught and used in schools. But at the same time, there's lots of Russian on TV, for example. But we were assigned by Peace Corps a certain one of the languages to learn based off where they'd be sending us in the country. So in the western part generally speaks Ukrainian, the eastern part generally speaks Russian. And then through the middles is a mix of kind of both that has commonly been referred to as Surzhyk.

Ivan Browning: And who was doing your language training? Do you have native speakers that were your teachers?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yes. So all the teachers, language teachers, were Ukrainians who also were fluent in English and could explain things if need be in our native language.

Ivan Browning: Was there any expectation that you would reach a certain level of competence in the language to be able to function?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yes. So they have a different, they have a scale of how far you've gone in a particular language and the, uh, you needed to be intermediate mid is what they called it for the youth development project. And I think just intermediate low for the community development or for, sorry for the TEFL program, because they're likely just not going to be speaking as much Ukrainian and Russian. But for me it was intermediate mid and I came out of training with intermediate high. So I was, uh, I was all right in that boat.

Ivan Browning: So would you characterize yourself as motivated to learn the language? Enjoyed learning the language?

Thomas H. Boyd: I did. I went in really kind of fearful of it because I'd never really learned and then spoken a foreign language. So I actually spent a month before leaving for Ukraine, I spent an hour every day looking at the alphabet, looking at some of the basic phrases that Peace Corps had sent us ahead of time, to try to get a jump start on it. And I'm really glad I did, as I felt it paid off during training. And I quickly saw, especially in a village of 600 people in Semenivka, and then when once I got to my site as well, that you learn Ukrainian or not communicate for a couple of years. And as well as just the immense appreciation that Ukrainians had for us when trying to learn their language was a huge way just to build relationships and build trust and enabling us to work together more effectively.

Ivan Browning: Was the teaching done with conversation or written lessons, or was there a mix?

Thomas H. Boyd: There was a mix. I thought Peace Corps had done a great job with the design of their language classes. Like you said, there were conversations that we had to practice. There were role plays, there were written exercises, there were homework assignments where we had to find out something from our host family, for example, in Ukrainian. I feel like they, yeah, they covered kind of every tactic possible almost to learn a language and I thought that was really effective.

Ivan Browning: So you were living with a host family during your training and?

Thomas H. Boyd: Correct.

Ivan Browning: Tell us something about that. How was the host family and what was that experience like?

Thomas H. Boyd: I really enjoyed it. I lived with a father and a mother and then they had two children, a son and a daughter who were both, I would say, in their young twenties at the time I was there. Both knew some English. The brother particularly was really good, but they were both in Kyiv in university and so I didn't see them a whole lot. But it was a great way to, uh, it was part of really the language and the culture and history. It's you get a look into all of that and especially with the language of just being immersed in that environment and the TV has Ukrainian on or really forcing us to communicate needs in Ukrainian. And it was, uh, you know, by the end of training we were a family.

Ivan Browning: Very good. Did anyone from Peace Corps Washington come to your training either prior to going to your training city or at any time?

Thomas H. Boyd: I don't believe so. Anyone from Peace Corps? I don't remember seeing really anyone from Peace Corps Washington during training at all. There were a few U.S. staff based in Kyiv and at least one of them came to visit our particular training site.

Ivan Browning: So there was a Peace Corps staff in country?

Thomas H. Boyd: Correct. There are three of them.

Ivan Browning: At what point did you find out what area of the country you'd be going to?

Thomas H. Boyd: So we actually found out at the transition slash the swearing in conference. So after we had gone through the ten weeks or so of training, we made it to June, and all the volunteers gathered in Kyiv and we had two or three, maybe even four day conference. And it was there that we found out where we were going, and we'd all been anxiously waiting to hear for a long time at that point.

Ivan Browning: Now, did everybody make it through the training or were there some that did not?

Thomas H. Boyd: There were a few that did not. I want to say there were probably about three that did not make it through for various reasons.

Ivan Browning: Mm hmm. Was there are any kind of peer ratings of other trainees or was it all done by staff?

Thomas H. Boyd: In terms of, yeah, in terms of evaluation that was all from the staff.

Ivan Browning: Was there any knowledge among the group of trainees that there was a possibility you could not be sworn in or you might be sent back to the States?

Thomas H. Boyd: I don't think. That was not a feeling that I picked up on and or a conversation that I had with anyone, just from my experience. That was not something I came across.

Ivan Browning: So your feeling was during the training that it was just a process that you had to get through, and you were going to get through it and take your assignment and run with it, right?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yeah. Because I really feel people wanted to be there and people were, and especially with a close group of volunteers around you to support you and push you when needed, that just everyone was going to make it through. And, you know, that's what we were there to do was to, uh, we knew it wasn't going to be easy. And but yeah, there was no fear that I picked up on in that regard.

Ivan Browning: How did, uh, about your contact with home. What were you telling your family during the training time?

Thomas H. Boyd: I want to say I talked to them probably once a month during training. I was able to get them on phone one way or another, and a few emails here and there when we went into the larger cities. But I was just kind of, I was taking in things. There was so much to be processed, being in a new country and new language and new weather and everything was new. And so just trying to process it and cut that down to a way where they could understand and get a glimpse into what I was experiencing.

Ivan Browning: Did you develop any friendships with people in the training group?

Thomas H. Boyd: Absolutely. I am still in touch more or less with all four of them and saw one of them just the end of August, so a couple of months ago. So definitely. Definitely some lifelong friends from the training group and other Peace Corps volunteers as well.

Ivan Browning: Any other comments about training?

Thomas H. Boyd: I think one other thing that sticks out for my training experience was there was a group of children probably, uh, higher elementary school, lower middle school in that age group, that lived on the street that two of the host families were stationed. And we ended up playing a lot of games and a lot of soccer with them after the day's lessons were over. And that was just really incredible. And that it was youth development in its own way. It was a chance for us to just play sports and have fun and connect with these kids without that language barrier. And that was a favorite memory from training. And when every time we went back to Semenivka, I ended up playing with them and hanging out for the afternoon.

Ivan Browning: After training, was there any kind of break? You stayed in country or?

Thomas H. Boyd: Correct. Yeah. From so from training, the three or four day swearing in conference, and then right to our sites.

Ivan Browning: And so when you left the U.S., what was your route to get to Ukraine?

Thomas H. Boyd: The route to get to Ukraine. We all the volunteers in our group met in Washington, D.C., [coughs] excuse me. And then from there, I believe we flew to Frankfurt, Germany, and from Frankfurt on to Kyiv.

Ivan Browning: I see. So there was a pretty long flight. When you got to Kyiv, was there any ceremony or anything, anybody to greet you or at the airport?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yeah, there were a few Peace Corps staff there, and they had signs and there was one staff member collecting our passports. So that was kind of a test of trust, it was just, oh, here's our passport. But it worked out.

Ivan Browning: Do you remember who the country director was?

Thomas H. Boyd: Absolutely. It was Douglas Teschner.

Ivan Browning: What kind of guy was he?

Thomas H. Boyd: He was great. He's very energetic, well-spoken, very positive all the time. And I think he was a former state or local politician, but absolutely a big believer in the mission. Was very, very responsive to volunteers' needs and to emails. I can't imagine how many emails he got a day, but he'd always respond. And that was a great feeling for me being in a new place. And he is actually a country director in I want to say Sierra Leone now, but he's still, he's still doing it.

Ivan Browning: So after you, um. At what point did you feel comfortable speaking the language?

Thomas H. Boyd: I think I felt comfortable going, uh, going into after training into my site having tested at intermediate high. That was, I felt good about the language in general and that was a good kind of affirmation of OK, you've done some work, you've learned some things. So I felt comfortable. I think when I remember specifically this meeting I had with my school director in November of that first year at site, November 2010. And when we had a discussion, just my director and I, about an HIV AIDS project or some ideas for the HIV AIDS Awareness Week or Day, and I understood that whole conversation taking it through. And that's when I was like, OK, now I've really got this language thing down.

Ivan Browning: Did you get any ongoing language training or was the initial shot, was that it?

Thomas H. Boyd: So Peace Corps actually had some language refresher camps for us that took place twice a year. So we had those to go to and they would last three or four days in a particular area of the country. As well as I had an Ukrainian tutor for about, I can't remember how long I worked with her, but probably a year or so, maybe longer, once a week. And Peace Corps gave us an allowance that we could pay the tutor for his or her assistance. And then, and then again, yeah, just being in a small town called Rudky where there was a handful of English speakers, if even that. It really just forced me to learn the language and there was constantly language practice in other ways.

Ivan Browning: Were there any currently serving Peace Corps volunteers that came to visit during the orientation or the training?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yeah. So we had volunteers throughout the training process from the arrival retreat. Someone came in and spoke to us. I'm actually still good friends with her. And she's now out in Seattle. And then during the training, we had a couple of people, I guess one person had adopted a cluster program. So the volunteer who is currently at site would adopt a particular cluster of the trainings and go and visit them and talk to them and share experiences, answer questions, etc. And then as well, at the swearing in conference, several volunteers came to speak about different initiatives within the Peace Corps organization that volunteers could connect with.

Ivan Browning: So when you were on site, what provisions were there in case of emergency, what to do or who to contact?

Thomas H. Boyd: So with an emergency, we had a handbook of what, you know, what the process was. Numbers to call within Peace Corps and as well as. So, yeah, the handbook, the numbers to call, who to contact. As well as within the first week at site in Rudky and as well as the volunteers at their sites all across the country. We needed to get up with the local police and introduce ourself, get their contact information, draw a map of our town for our own benefit, understand the ways to get out of town to local districts or larger cities, and how to get to Kyiv, etc. So we were given some information on one hand and then also had a very strict assignment of finding out certain information on our own in case something did happen.

Ivan Browning: Mm hmm. During orientation, was there any mention of the political situation in the country?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yes, they did review current politics to some extent.

Ivan Browning: But at that time, things were pretty stable?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yeah. You know, in 2010, the president I think had just been, President Viktor Yanukovych had just been elected within the past couple months. And so everything was relatively stable and, yeah.

Ivan Browning: So in your talking about your assignment, was there any choice involved or preference for a particular assignment? Anybody on the staff ask you about that?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yeah. So I think during week six or so of the ten weeks of training, we had site interviews with some two or three members of the Peace Corps staff. So they'd ask us some questions, more about our background, what we're interested in doing here in Ukraine. How's training going? Because they have all the sites in their minds and then getting to know us better, they were able to piece together what would be good fits. And so they asked us certain preferences on what kind of work we'd be doing, what kind of the size of a city we might want to live in, host family or no host family. So they took that into mind while making their decisions. But we by no means could directly choose something. It was here are our general preferences. And then they made the final decisions.

Ivan Browning: So the place where you ended up. Tell us a little bit about it, its geography, how far it was from the big city.

Thomas H. Boyd: Sure. So again, I ended up in Rudky, which is a small town of about 5,000 people, an hour by bus southwest of the western city called Lviv. Lviv is kind of known as the almost the cultural capital of western Ukraine. A beautiful city in itself, but Rudky was an hour southwest, about 30 minutes east of the Polish border, bird's eye view. It takes a little longer to get there by bus. And there's a, there's just the one school there. But there's also a gymnasium, which is a specialized school in Ukraine. And they had Boy Scouts and a little nice city center with some shops and the post office and a museum and as well as a center for family and children, which served families in need, in addition to a cultural palace where they were able to hold local events and concerts and performances of that nature.

Ivan Browning: Well, what was the terrain like there? And how did the people of Rudky earn a living?

Thomas H. Boyd: Hmm. I would say the terrain. Generally it was kind of a forest area, I would say, is the best way to describe it. Relatively flat, although there were some almost rolls. Because in the western Ukraine is also where the Carpathian Mountains are. So it's relatively close to that area. So it wasn't completely flat. And then as far as what people did for a living, so the school. There's also a hospital. And now I'm thinking of these other aspects of the town, but a small college and the shops as well. So the educational institutions, the shops, and the hospital were all the major places of employment. And there was a significant number of people who would take the bus an hour to Lviv and back every day to go work in Lviv.

Ivan Browning: You mentioned the bus. That's the way you got to your assignment?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yes, absolutely. And we took, originally we took a train from Kyiv to Lviv and then from Lviv to took a bus to Rudky. And that's absolutely the main form of transportation I used, although if I had to go across the country or halfway across the country, it was train was the choice then.

Ivan Browning: When you got to Rudky, did somebody meet you and pick you up?

Thomas H. Boyd: Well, actually at the swearing in conference, we had what was called a counterpart or like a representative from the organization who would be our primary contact for the two years. And so this person, Oksana Valerivna, met me in Kyiv and then we traveled by train together to Lviv. In Lviv, my host organization, the secondary school, had sent the bus, their school bus, to Lviv to pick me up and Oksana. So we, Oksana and I and the bus driver, we all drove back to Rudky. And there was my host grandmother was waiting for me in her house.

Ivan Browning: So were you the only Peace Corps volunteer in the town?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yes. There had been another one previously who worked at the gymnasium, kind of the other school option that I mentioned. But she and she did not stay the entire time. She had gone home early.

Ivan Browning: And so how close was the nearest Peace Corps volunteer? Other Peace Corps volunteer?

Thomas H. Boyd: The closest one was about 20 minutes by bus. There was a bunch of us in the Lviv Oblast, the Lviv region.

Ivan Browning: OK. So after the time you'd spent in training, socializing with the group members, was it a little bit wrenching to be on your own and out in the boonies?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yes. After ten weeks in Semenivka, it was kind of at the point of I was feeling, starting to feel comfortable at that point, and as well as with being with a few volunteers to kind of have that connection to home every day. And then so when it came time to leave that after, it's like, OK, here we go to another transition. I thought we had just done this. And then getting to Rudky I remember I kind of asked myself the same question as I did at the arrival retreat of what have I gotten myself into? And I'm going to be here for two years. You know, I'm okay with the language, but I don't know anyone. I don't know what I'm going to do with work. What difference can I make? Type questions when I got there. So it was tough in some ways, but the overwhelming hospitality of Rudky made that transition a lot easier.

Ivan Browning: So there was telephone service to the town.

Thomas H. Boyd: Yes. Yeah.

Ivan Browning: OK. So tell us a little bit about your living conditions and settling into your home with your host family.

Thomas H. Boyd: So I lived with a host grandmother, Sophia, and she's in her seventies. She actually spent a few years in the United States. She came and worked in New Jersey, I believe it was, for about three or four years, but was with Ukrainian community and with Ukrainian families and actually learned very little English. Which was fine because, again, she was one of my main teachers of Ukrainian and just listening to her talk and tell stories. But she was, I still remember the first time, she just, ah. Despite being in her 70s, she's just so energetic and so warm and she's just standing out on her porch like I think she's started reciting a Ukrainian poem that she loves to do and welcomed me in and had this huge meal prepared, which was definitely a foreshadowing of things to come for the next two and a half years. But so I knew I was in good hands right away.

And I actually had two very comfortable rooms to myself. I still I think I still argue that I slept better in that bed than I have at any other location in my life. And so I had this kind of bedroom and then the dining room, and then Sophia had her two rooms and we shared a kitchen and shared a bathroom. And it was because of her work in the States, she was able to do some significant renovations on her house and it was very, very comfortable. And I would say very much what I grew up with. And so the living condition was, um, I'd say physically by no means a challenge.

Ivan Browning: OK. So you had the modern conveniences?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yeah, absolutely. We even had a laundry machine. And so it was, yeah, I was very blessed in that area.

Ivan Browning: How about access to radio or TV?

Thomas H. Boyd: So Sofia had a TV with probably ten channels on it that I would watch every now and then. She usually had the radio going, especially during the summer when she was out working in her garden. And then with internet, I bought a kind of like a travel modem that I used for the first probably half year at site. And then after just kind of becoming frustrated with it, I had a satellite installed and that actually was something that became available while I was there. So the satellite wasn't available when I first got to Rudky but I got that installed. And so internet was probably my main source of electronic connection.

Ivan Browning: Did Peace Corps provide you with a computer or did you have your own?

Thomas H. Boyd: They did not. And a lot of the prep materials for coming to Ukraine, they suggested bringing it, or at least most of the volunteers I talked to suggested bringing it. So I brought my own personal one. And it's, yeah, it's not something that they had provided.

Ivan Browning: Had your host grandmother hosted a Peace Corps volunteer previously?

Thomas H. Boyd: No, I was her first, her first guest in that regard.

Ivan Browning: Did you do your own shopping and cooking and cleaning?

Thomas H. Boyd: I did get to help out with a lot of the shopping. I would. As Sophia got older, she was able to send me like with a list of things to get in town and I was able to pick that up and did some shopping for myself as well. She was, um, I guess, very traditional in terms of cleaning and cooking and that as a man I was not supposed to do any of that. Which was, it was a mixture, I would say, almost of some frustration at times of not having that independence, but also just really being grateful for how good care she was taking of me. And it was always funny. If I went into the kitchen to maybe put a dish away or do something, if I was in the kitchen, it meant I was hungry. And so she would start either asking or just start cooking something anyway. So it was always a game.

Ivan Browning: What were the shopping facilities like?

Thomas H. Boyd: In Rudky, they didn't have any of, anything comparable to Food Lion or Harris Teeter or what we might know. They had, I would say, almost little shops that are comparable to maybe like a market or like a gas station convenience store. But they had meats and fruits and bread and chips and water and everything that you would need, and eggs, but just very small size. And they did have what they called a bazaar, almost like a farmers’ market, that ran pretty much every day where you could buy anything you need in terms of food or clothes and other items that you just might need to grab.

Ivan Browning: So your settling in period, at what point were you would you say you were settled, you were comfortable, adjusted to the climate?

Thomas H. Boyd: I would say probably about a month or two. So we got there, I think it was mid-June, so maybe late July or into early August. I felt, OK, this is my, this is my home.

Ivan Browning: So in June, is that the warm time of the year in Ukraine or are the seasons are different than they are here?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yeah, the seasons. The seasons match up right with what we experience here in the States.

Ivan Browning: Was your health OK at that time? Did you have any health issues?

Thomas H. Boyd: At this time, I had no health issues, this first summer, but I did severely sprain my ankle on a hill. And that was frustrating because it limited my mobility in a time where I had a lot of time because school was out and was, you know, it would have been nice to really get out and talk to people and have conversations. But so that was a test of patience, certainly.

Ivan Browning: Tell us a little about the school that you were working in conjunction with.

Thomas H. Boyd: So the school had about 500 students, about 75 or so teachers. I think that also included maintenance workers and other all staff of the school. At its peak actually had 1,200 students, but due to just lower in general of people moving out of Ukraine and out of Rudky as well as the opening of the gymnasium, that second school, it was down to 500 students. Oh yeah, a secondary school. So it was first grade through 11th grade is what they go through in Ukraine. And a school that had gotten a lot of, already a lot of recognition, I think, in the region for what they were doing, as well as possibly around Ukraine as a whole.

Ivan Browning: Did the students, were they all local from the town or did they come from the surrounding area as well?

Thomas H. Boyd: As far as I know, they're all from the town of Rudky.

Ivan Browning: And how many other teachers on the faculty?

Thomas H. Boyd: So teachers is probably 50 to 60 out of the 75 staff.

Ivan Browning: Were there any other non Ukrainian Europeans or? As teachers?

Thomas H. Boyd: No, no. They were all Ukrainian.

Ivan Browning: So the kind of work you were doing, was it straight teaching of a subject? Did you have more of a youth development spin to what you were doing?

Thomas H. Boyd: So I, yeah, I think I would say I had absolutely the youth development spin. I did not have any classes per se. My work during the day, I went around to a lot of different classes, whether it be to sit in on a Ukrainian class and learn some Ukrainian. I helped a lot of the English teachers with their classes. I sat with a psychologist and we would plan ideas and projects and activities together. So the majority of my work came after school for extracurricular clubs and extracurricular activities in which I held a leadership club, English clubs, both at the school and in town, and as well as some sporting clubs were kind of my primary weekly activities. Additionally, again, I mentioned the partnership with the psychologist. We put together a lot of interactive trainings on youth development topics such as leadership, HIV AIDS, human trafficking, understanding people with disabilities more efficiently and more effectively.

So all kinds of these trainings to give during special events and special days, or come in and teach and do a kind of a substitute or guest teaching experience. And also some of my work involved just meeting with these different organizations of the community and seeing where I might be able to get involved there and connecting people together who had similar goals. So it was something different every day. And I really loved that variety as well of just seeing the, of trying to give the youth more opportunities in a town where there wasn't a whole lot for them to do.

Ivan Browning: So the after school clubs and athletics, what would some of the typical activities of that type of club do besides play soccer?

Thomas H. Boyd: All right. So that was the sporting activities. And then for English Club I would, I'd use a lot of, because we didn't have any official English training or how to teach English or very limited I would say. That we, I used a lot of methods and ideas that I got from our Ukrainian classes and just turned them around and used it to teach English. And then we had a leadership club as well, as I mentioned, and we worked on several community projects. I think our most noticed and biggest success was a cigarette for candy exchange. So I had a lot of friends and family send me U.S. candy and the students set up a table and had posters of information about why smoking is harmful. And then if somebody traded in a cigarette then we'd give them a piece of U.S. candy. And it was a great way for them to act on something they believed in.

We did it at the school. We did it in the center of Rudky. We even went to Lviv and did it a time or two there. And it was, and there were times where the students were criticized of like, why are you doing this project? It doesn't make any sense. And they got to practice some of those leadership skills and defend themselves and defend the project and defend why they were out there. And some other projects we did. We tried a mentor program with the local family and children's center where pair up a student with a child in need there and they would spend time together. That particular one actually didn't being so successful in the end. But it was a try. And they also did some, like a forest cleanup one day and organized that, so just kind of all these different projects throughout the community. And I think that leadership club was where most of the success I had a hand in happened.

Ivan Browning: The students, were they kind of on different tracks? There were some that were headed for the university and some that were going to be in trades or services? How did that work out or did you notice any different tracks of the students in the school?

Thomas H. Boyd: I'd say yeah. There's probably a pretty good variety of what students are planning after the completion of secondary school. I think most of the ones I worked with in my clubs were planning to go to university. So that's what I remember the most of hearing.

Ivan Browning: How was discipline handled in the school?

Thomas H. Boyd: I think what I witnessed in my school and in most Ukrainian schools was that there weren't a whole lot of punishments for misbehavior or not doing an assignment per se. And as far as I know, I'm not sure if students can even really fail technically. And so I think the most frequent punishment was a good scolding or calling out in class. Calling them out in class.

Ivan Browning: Did the headmaster of the school, was he or she a participant in any of your activities or supportive of what you were doing?

Thomas H. Boyd: The director, principal, yeah. So she, Nadia, was very supportive of me being there and gave me a lot of freedom in my work and but also wasn't afraid to ask for certain things and request certain things of me. So I felt we had a great working relationship and she was so busy that she was tough to get a hold of sometimes and talk with and discuss some ideas, but always made the effort to talk with me. And we ended up doing, I guess, a couple events or classes together. But the majority of it was we didn't work directly together on a lot of things, but were always in communication about what we're up to respectively and ended up at a lot of events together, but just doing kind of separate things within that particular event.

Ivan Browning: So you got to your school after language training. And how long was it before you felt like you were accepted in being a part of the program?

Thomas H. Boyd: Uh, the program being?

Ivan Browning: The ongoing activities of the school.

Thomas H. Boyd: Oh, being accepted kind of at the school as a?

Ivan Browning: Yes.

Thomas H. Boyd: I feel like. Uh. I really feel for the most part, just right away. They had on my first day there. I had mentioned a little earlier about how my host grandmother Sophia greeted me that morning on the steps. I had time to get a shower and shave. And from there, we went to the school and I thought I was just going to kind of be a meeting with the principal and maybe a tour of the school. And at this point, I'm exhausted from the train ride. I didn't, I ended up sleeping eventually great on trains, but that first train I didn't sleep anything, you know, didn't sleep a wink. But we go to the school and the students have prepared this huge welcome concert and celebration that I've, you know, the U.S., the U.S. guy is here. And so they had PowerPoint presentations about their school and they recited poems and had dances and songs and there were multiple teachers and students in attendance. And it was just, it was overwhelming.

They asked me to get up and say a few words in Ukrainian. And so I felt, again, just immediately welcome for the most part. There were a couple of teachers who, you know, it was less than 5%, but they didn't just jump on that welcome wagon right away. And it took, um, it was a year and a half with some of them before I finally kind of had that connection and then those walls were broke down. And there was one particular I remember, Sirhi, who was more standoffish for the longest time, but then we ended up playing a volleyball game together. And that was the end of that, end of that barrier.

Ivan Browning: How did you get feedback on what you were doing in your assignment?

Thomas H. Boyd: Hmm. I think the director was very good at that, about, you know, of being more open with what's, you know, what's working, what's not working. I had a few, after some time, a couple teachers that I really consider, who are also have ended up lifelong friends. Just emailed one of them a couple of weeks ago. That I could really trust and about getting some honest feedback I think. Um. And Ukrainian culture, I think when you're having surface conversations there can be the tendency to just say everything's good, everything's great. When really maybe I could have benefited from some more feedback.

Ivan Browning: What kind of standards did you use to judge the effectiveness of what you were engaged in as a volunteer?

Thomas H. Boyd: Hmm. Uh, well, we had a reporting tool that we had to kind of fill out every six months on and report numbers on how many Ukrainians were coming to things. So I took note of that and where the numbers are. And then I guess just a little more informally, I really just observed students and picked up on their physical and verbal cues on what was clicking for them with my work and what was engaging them, and then trying to do more of of what those things were.

Ivan Browning: Did students ever complain or give you compliments?

Thomas H. Boyd: Um, again, I think I got a lot of compliments just because I was the U.S. volunteer, I was different. And so everything I did was cool, quote unquote. But definitely, definitely got some complaints when I'd come in to sub for an English class, for example, if the teacher couldn't make it. They're used to maybe more interactive activities with me and it ended up being I had to follow the lesson plan and couldn't do that. So there'd be complaints where being not having my formal class. For most students, I probably ended up more of a big brother or like a friend almost. So when it came time to teach and I had to be stricter, that was, oh Tom, come on, like be fun.

Ivan Browning: Did you have any opportunities to spend time with students outside of the class or club or activities that you'd organized?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yeah, so I did spend a lot of time I think with them, not necessarily in the school. Between they would invite me to like end of the year celebrations and we'd just be sitting and eating dinner together. I'd see them and it's a small town, again, so I'd see them in town and we'd chat, and how's life? And as well as I'd go and play soccer with them a bunch, even though I remain awful at soccer. But it was still just something that we could all do and have fun together with.

Ivan Browning: So did you feel like you got to know a good number of students when they got to know you?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yes. I feel like one of the biggest things that Ukrainians gave me, and I hope I gave them in return, was relationships. And so I feel very happy with what I was able to do there and remain in touch with a lot of people.

Ivan Browning: Did you ever have students come to your home?

Thomas H. Boyd: No. That was recommended by Peace Corps not to do. And I was able to follow that guide.

Ivan Browning: Probably good advice. Develop friendships with other people in town besides folks at school, the faculty?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yes. Yeah. So I met some people my age through basketball or I had a local kind of restaurant that a lot of people would go to on the weekends and met people there. And so ended up definitely with some good friends my age, older, younger as well, that weren't necessarily connected to the school.

Ivan Browning: So you had the ability to write emails, to stay in touch with friends and family back in the States?

Thomas H. Boyd: I did. And it was, I didn't have internet at the school. So if I had downtime during the day, I would write emails in a Word document. And then back at home in the evening, I could just send them off and be on the internet less time that way.

Ivan Browning: Did you take a lot of pictures or send photos back?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yes, I took lots and lots of pictures and posted them on, uh, Facebook was my primary way of sharing them. And was able to send links to those albums to people who weren't, who were not on Facebook.

Ivan Browning: The first Christmas that you were away from home, sometimes that's a little hard for people. Do you remember your first Christmas in Ukraine?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yeah. So actually my first Christmas in Ukraine, I did, or in 2010, I came back to the States for a week to be in the States for that. And then Ukrainians celebrate, I guess it's just Orthodox Christmas, so they celebrate January 7th. And but really, to turn it into the 6th, 7th, 8th, and sometimes 9th. So it's this massive three or four day celebration and I greatly enjoyed that. And then 2011, I spent with friends. In 2012, I was back in the States. So I think for me almost it was Thanksgiving of that first year of 2010 that I really was a moment where I missed being with family.

Ivan Browning: How was your diet?

Thomas H. Boyd: Is full an option of diet? No, I was constantly full in Ukraine. As I mentioned, the hospitality. You will not be cold and you will not be hungry in Ukraine. And my host grandmother Sophia was a phenomenal cook. She cooked all the traditional Ukrainian dishes. Meat and potatoes almost every meal, but in different ways. And bread was with everything. Hot soups and fresh fruits and vegetables during the summer. I just really, the food was simple but just delicious. And I still eat most things with bread to this day because of that experience.

Ivan Browning: So did you feel any sense, because you were there in town by yourself, the only American, did you feel isolated or out of touch or any kind of culture shock related issues?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yeah, there were definitely times where I just felt like I, uh, there were days where like I'm an outsider, like again, what am I? Who am I? Like, what am I doing here? And there were definitely days like that. And but and at that point, I could usually just call another Peace Corps volunteer, you know, just speaking English for a little while. And that was, I was back to my A-game. And but the majority of the time, I didn't feel that because I just felt this connection to Rudky and the people again after a very short time there and felt at home.

Ivan Browning: In your free time, what kinds of things did you do?

Thomas H. Boyd: Hmm. Um, actually I didn't. Looking back at it, I didn't. I kept myself really busy between the school and just intentionally trying to be with people and listen and talk. I think when there was downtime, I enjoyed sitting out with Sophia in her garden, especially during the summer in the evenings, and just listening again to her stories or just enjoying kind of the quiet of the small town. Peace Corps was probably the first time I read for pleasure in years. So that was wonderful. And got to watch, and usually my nightly tradition was to watch an episode or two of Seinfeld or The Office on DVD to just kind of turn the mind off and wind down for a night's rest.

Ivan Browning: Did you travel any?

Thomas H. Boyd: I did. I was very fortunate to be able to travel a lot within Ukraine and see many cities within Ukraine and parts of the country, as well as a good chunk of Europe through several trips.

Ivan Browning: And what types of transportation?

Thomas H. Boyd: So I think a couple of the trips, um. I know I went on a trip with my brother and I think I flew to Germany and met him there and we went around to several countries and, uh. And so most of these, most of these trips I ended up flying. A couple of them were by, a one was at least by train. We took a train down to Romania one day, took a bus over to Poland. So those border countries, we took trains and busses. But to get a little farther into Europe we're on the plane.

Ivan Browning: What about the local music and art scene in town?

Thomas H. Boyd: I would say with art, I don't have a lot of memories of that. There were, there was a small museum again in Rudky and some museums in the area that carried some art and historical information, I guess to say. And one of the teachers at the school was an artist and had some paintings, and I meant to get a painting of his and just now realizing I didn't. So hopefully one day. And then music, there were lots of concerts and dance performances of local students and local groups and singing events of choruses singing, as well as kind of just like this club European techno dance music that was very popular in clubs that grew on me throughout my time there.

Ivan Browning: So in your second year, were there any differences between the first and second year?

Thomas H. Boyd: Absolutely. I would say, I mean, I was more confident. My language was better. I knew more people. People, more people knew me. I had gotten a sense of what worked and what wasn't working in terms of my work with the youth. And I just felt, you know, it's like the first year I was figuring things out, trying to get adjusted and being stressed. And the second year is feeling confident and doing, putting, seeing some things come together in really great ways. And oh, like oh my gosh, I'm going home soon.

Ivan Browning: In that regard, did you have any goals that you wanted to achieve before leaving?

Thomas H. Boyd: Yeah, absolutely. I had kind of plans and ideas of projects and when I wanted to generally, you know, ideally get them done and who I wanted to involve with it and who to hand more off of it to and to get them in more of leadership roles. And so just kind of and realizing that my time was limited and thinking how much time I had left, I would just be intentional about having conversations with people and expressing my ideas and hearing theirs. And this is how much time I have left. What do you want me to do? Type things, especially with my director. School director, I should say.

Ivan Browning: So you went, you came back to the U.S. and you were in the States for what period? And then you got into Peace Corps Response.

Thomas H. Boyd: All right, so I actually my original for, just backtracking real quick to the traditional service, my original end date was June 2012. And I ended up extending that for six months and came home in December. And so I went home in December 2012, having completed my traditional service, was home mostly in North Carolina from the end of December, and was scheduled to go back with Peace Corps Response in February. But due to some visa issues that ended up being pushed to April. Mid April 2013, I returned to Ukraine.

Ivan Browning: To the same, to Rudky again?

Thomas H. Boyd: Oh, no, a good question. That was actually to Kyiv, the capital, and that was where my work was. I was stationed in Kyiv for the last ten months.

Ivan Browning: OK. Was it the same kind of work or different?

Thomas H. Boyd: It was different. And then I, um, one of my side projects during the traditional service was Operation Respect, which was something I kind of worked on with other volunteers and did a couple of small things with in Rudky but not a whole lot. But it's a social and emotional development program for youth that uses music, videos, and interactive activities to, you know, as you can guess, to increase respect and tolerance and understanding and decrease ridicule and bullying. So my work in Kyiv with Peace Corps Response was with a Ukrainian NGO called Alternative V, and they do a lot of volunteer exchanges between Ukraine and other European nations and run summer camps and trainings and seminars. They do all kinds of things.

And so with me working specifically on Operation Respect, which was something they were picking up and doing trainings on, so I helped coordinate a lot of these trainings happening all over Ukraine for teachers on how to use the materials. I did a lot of trainings myself for teachers, other Peace Corps volunteers, and students. I would go to summer camps all over Ukraine, which is also something I did in my traditional service, and work with Operation Respect Materials with youth there. I would reach out to other organizations in Kyiv and see if they were interested in using it or getting on board. And again, it ended up being a really diverse set of responsibilities and trying to promote the program and expand it in any way I could think of. And I actually wrote a few grants as well to try to raise money for it to produce materials and books and just have those funds ready for the program.

Ivan Browning: Did Ukrainians ever express feelings about American foreign policy to the American?

Thomas H. Boyd: Um. Hmm. Not a whole lot, that never really came up in the conversations that I had. I think there was some. Every now and then I'd get a question of like, why would the U.S. send volunteers to Ukraine, to have a general like seeking for understanding on that issue. I had a couple of friends in the east who ran into some almost like, you know, protest American imperialism type approaches. And as well as, I think, within these last few months as Ukraine continues in its political and social crisis now, I've heard, um. I haven't had any direct conversations, but other former volunteers have talked with Ukrainians of like, why isn't the U.S. doing more to intervene into the current conflict? So limited from my own experience, but I hear of it I guess more often.

Ivan Browning: So tell us a little bit about your ultimate exit from Ukraine at the end of your Peace Corps Response service. What was happening in at that time?

Thomas H. Boyd: Mm hmm. So, um, uh, I guess Viktor Yanukovych, the president that had just been elected right before I came in 2010, had been promising to sign a trade agreement with the European Union, a trade pact. And then a few days to a week before it was time to sign it, he backed out and that sparked some protests at the end of November 2013. And then there were clashes here and there with the police throughout the winter. And the protests ended up growing and becoming more violent at times and then resigning for a little while and then becoming violent again. And then it was in February 2014 when approximately 75 to 100 Ukrainians were sniped down unarmed in the center of Kyiv.

And at that point, that kind of event, along with a lot of the rumors that were going around about what might happen in terms of this growing conflict, that there was just, it was becoming chaotic. And at that point, Peace Corps made the decision to get us out. I had, because my Alternative V office is a block from Maidan, which is the center area where the protests were happening. I had worked a total of eight and a half days between December, January, and February at work, and was working from home, limited with what I could do at my apartment. But so I was not working and following all the events very closely and kind of had to escape from Maidan the day that the, a couple of days before the snipings happened and clashes were on the rise again. But Peace Corps called, I think it was a Friday night at 9 p.m. and said there would be a vehicle at 3 a.m. at your apartment and have all your bags packed. And we're going to be getting you out.

Ivan Browning: That was abrupt.

Thomas H. Boyd: That was a, that's a good word to use.

Ivan Browning: Well, it hasn't been that long since you completed your Peace Corps Response service. But overall, how did your Peace Corps experience impact your thinking after you returned home?

Thomas H. Boyd: Hmm. Um, yeah. It's probably cliché, but I would say I'm a different person than the one that left in 2010 to go to Ukraine. I think I've just learned a lot of skills in terms of leadership and community organizing and teaching and listening and staying cool in difficult situations. Just to name a few. I think I've become more vocal with my ideas and looking at the whatever the political reasons were behind it and looking at the Ukrainian people, the people I had come to love in three and a half years and at least understand on some level. I'll never fully understand as I'm not Ukrainian, but to see them standing up for what they believed in in Maidan and being shot down for it. It's like, why can't I speak up a little more and stand up for what I believe in?

So it's been, as tough as it was to watch and go through, I think it's ended up empowering me to be a more effective citizen. And what else? I think it's put things in perspective and more on what's important to me in life and what I hope to be working toward and how to live. And has shaped, it inspired me to do the current master's program I'm in and set me on what hopefully will be a life of service and trying to make the world a better place.

Ivan Browning: And tell us a bit about the master's program.

Thomas H. Boyd: So I'm currently a student at the SIT Graduate Institute, which stands for the School for International Training, going for a master's in Intercultural Service, Leadership and Management. I finished the on- campus phase last year and I'm now getting ready to head into the practicum phase where we practice some of the skills that we learned on campus in a work environment. And then I'll do that for at least six months and write about it in a capstone slash thesis presentation.

Ivan Browning: OK. And anything else about the Peace Corps experience you'd like to mention?

Thomas H. Boyd: I think we, I think we covered it, but I think, uh, again, I think it just did, as I was just mentioning, so many good things for me personally. And at least from what I hear from Peace Corps Ukraine and Ukrainians, that they received some good things in return. So I hope that was the case. And it's just given me an incredible perspective that has shaped the rest of my life.

Ivan Browning: OK. Tommy, thanks so much for doing the interview.

Thomas H. Boyd: Thank you.