After three quick days of language and
culture training, we were shipped off to the host families we would
be staying with for the duration of our training. As the car pulled
up to my new house, I could feel the butterflies swirling in my
stomach. How was I supposed to talk to these people? I was used to
being a talkative, outgoing person, but I could only say two
sentences in Khmer. What would they be like? Would they like me?
I walked up to the house and was
introduced to my host mother, father and younger sister. Everyone's
eyes came to rest on me as I awkwardly pressed my hands together in
the traditional Khmer greeting and barely managed to stutter out my
name in Khmer. My Khmer Language and Cultural Facilitator (LCF) swept
me into the house and showed me the bathroom, the kitchen, and my
room in quick succession. After asking if I had any questions, he
rushed out of the house to deliver the next volunteer to her awaiting
family; I clearly remember the pause as he left the room. My family
and I stared at each other as we tried to figure out what to do next.
I had already exhausted all my Khmer and my family didn't know any
English, so more conversation was not an option.
Luckily, my family moved on to
practical matters and began to help me set up my mosquito net. Once
finished, my host mom and dad drifted out of the room, leaving my
younger sister to watch as I opened my suitcases that contained the
trappings of my life. From these suitcases, my books, clothes, and
toiletries tumbled out. I reached in and pulled out a photo album my
mom had made me to show my new Khmer family and friends. Opening it,
I showed it to my sister, explaining who everyone was and what my
life was like in America.
And all of a sudden... it hit me.
Like an unexpected rush of wind from a
passing semi-truck, like a mid-afternoon rainstorm during the wet
season, it struck with a suddenness and vengeance that surprised me.
I was crying... and I couldn't stop.
All of the emotion that had been bottled up since the moment I
accepted my invitation came pouring out. My host sister was
mortified. Only babies cry; as my host sister later told me, in
Cambodia that is how you differentiate between a baby and a toddler.
Needless to say, my host sister had no idea what to do. She
tentatively patted my back and tried to console me while yelling for
my host mom to come help. My host mom hurried in, thinking I had died
on my first night in her home. She took in the situation and did
something I never would have expected given my recently-acquired
Khmer cultural knowledge.
She hugged me. She wrapped me in her
arms and patted my back murmuring, “Stop, stop, stop.”
In my emotional state, the only thing I
could remember to say in my new language was mother. “Mom, my mom,
miss mom.”
“Stop crying, I am your mother now,”
she replied. Eventually, I stopped crying as she continued to calm
me. It was at that moment that I knew I was actually in the Peace
Corps, and things were about to change.
____________________________________________________________________________
Someone recently asked me if I felt my
time in Cambodia had been successful.
My first thought on hearing that was,
how do we determine success? In number of bathrooms built at the
local primary school? In students taught the ABCs? In number of new
mothers educated about breastfeeding? While doing my needs
assessments for my community where I would be working for the next
two years, I quickly realized I wouldn't be able to point to
something and say “That's what I did. That's what I built.” My
community had infrastructure covered; they didn't need a library or
bathrooms. So, I was faced with the question: without those typical
markers of success, how can I justify my feeling that I have in fact
been successful thus far?
Peace Corps and the concept of success
is a tricky thing. Any Peace Corps Volunteer, past or present, knows
the three goals of Peace Corps. One, to help the people of interested
countries in meeting their needs for trained men and women. Two, to
help promote a better understanding of Americans on the part of the
people served. And three, to help promote a better understand of
other peoples on the part of Americans. As Peace Corps Volunteers, we
don't arrive in country with the stated purpose of building some
physical structure; we may help in the construction of libraries,
bathrooms, or sports courts, but that isn't our mission. Our true job
is less tangible, but equally (if not more) important. Our true job
is to connect, communicate, understand, empower, support... and these
things cannot easily be measured.
Despite our American desire to measure
success, to quantify and logically justify our experience for
ourselves or for others, serving in the Peace Corps is an intensely
personal, unique, and non-quantifiable experience. In truth, no one
can decide if you succeeded but you. As this became clear to me, as
someone used to checklists, to clearly defined goals and objectives,
to “do A and B will follow”, the ideas was quite frankly
terrifying.
As I started to think about my
definition of success, I kept thinking about my emotional episode the
night I met my training host family. While it isn't a moment I would
have initially categorized as successful, it was. It was a moment
where I was vulnerable and a human connection between two people and
two cultures was formed. That is success. To paraphrase someone
famous, “I can't define it, but I know it when I see it.” I might
not be able to define what success in my service is, but I know it
when I see it.
I see success when I bond with my
students about missing my family, just like they do sometimes. I see
it when I share in the joy of a wedding or in the sorrow of a
relative passing. I see success when my sisters and cousins have a
living example of a strong woman working in the world, a woman more
concerned about her education and career than about her weight or
skin color. I see it when my students, who will be primary school
teachers when they graduate, have a teacher role model that doesn't
miss class and comes on time with a smile. I see it when my
counterparts feel encouraged to practice their English despite
pronunciation or grammar mistakes.
In my service thus far, the thing I am
most proud of is my courage in re-defining what success during my
service looks like. Before Peace Corps, I would have insisted on a
quantified, step-by-step definition of success. If I reached this
destination, I would be successful; there is something comforting in
this formulaic approach. For me, success during service is now a
little vague. Typically, the clearer goals and objectives are, the
better. However, my new definition of success lives and thrives in
this ambiguity. This new definition doesn't tie me to infrastructure,
number of people reached, or even knowledge passed on. It allows
things like crying in front of your host mom to be a success. It's
about messy, non-quantifiable things: people, connections, and
understanding.
So, what is success for me? When I am
on the plane home, how will I know if I succeeded? When people ask me
about my time in Cambodia, how will I justify my experience here?
I'm not sure yet, but I'll let you know
when I see it.
