Situation Update

As you have seen from our blog title, Martha and I have slowly drifted out of the limbo we have found ourselves in over the last few weeks here in Armenia, and have decided to transfer to Peace Corps Bolivia. This is a result of the hard work of the Bolivia, Georgia, and D.C. staff, and I’d like to thank all of them for making this work.

This is a very exciting but a rather sad time for us, as we feel as though we are leaving behind friends, family, and incomplete projects in Georgia, and do not know when we will be able to return. Though I did attempt to look for work in Tbilisi, to try to help the humanitarian and rebuilding effort that is going on there, I decided that the situation was just not stable enough to risk going back. Perhaps Martha or I will be lucky enough to find ourselves with the opportunity to return to Georgia in the future, but as for now, we had to look elsewhere.

Our previous Country Director, Kathleen Sifer, transferred to Bolivia a few months ago, and reached out to the Peace Corps Georgia family immediately when the situation began, expressing her concern for us and Georgia. Since then, she has opened a few spots in Bolivia for her old group (G7’s), and we gladly accepted to finish out our last year with her in Bolivia. While details remain to be fleshed out, it is looking like Martha will be working as an Integrated Education/Youth Development volunteer, working on a wide range of issues, and I will be working as a Natural Resource/Environmental Education volunteer, focusing on the dramatic environmental deterioration facing Bolivia. We will start in a few weeks time, as soon as we can get our vaccines and visas in D.C.

We will keep you posted on our plans as we get more information, and we will also be posting pictures from the last few months in Georgia, as soon as we get to a more reliable internet connection in the good old USA sometime next week.

Thank you again for all your support and concern for us over the last few weeks.