We lowered our right hands after taking the oath from the U.S. Ambassador. Mine readjusted a silk blue tie before dropping heavily into the right pocket of my pleated pants. Eight months ago there were no pockets, at least readily accessible ones. Perhaps one of the seventeen of us was ingenious enough to have requested a hidden pocket tailored somewhere into our boubous or compléts. It wouldn’t have mattered. We were busy embracing, marveling in the standing embassy representative’s perfect French. One of the most heartfelt speeches we had ever heard had just been directed at us.
Today’s speech could have been plucked from a manual. The Peace Corps country director perched next to the podium translating each of the ambassador’s automatic phrases while we shuffled in our foldout chairs. toying with our ties and our dresses, ready to step down one of landings of the Ambassador’s lawn and into some imaginary wedding rehearsal. The most memorable line in those five minutes came from behind me, a fellow CYF volunteer pointing to the back of his newly-issued Peace Corps ID, “There’s a 2-for-1 bloomin’ onions coupon for TGIFridays on the back.” The speech ended. We filed one-by-one to the front for a handshake and a quick photo in front of the Peace Corp emblem. How did most take the manufactured pomp? Probably as another step in this novel process of becoming a volunteer, maybe even an exciting punctuation. For them, after all, there’s really nothing to compare.
I kept my seat as the audience slid into disorder. Three years of patient frustration were over; and all I could do was sit there trying to shake the sudden melancholy. After a few minutes the new volunteers were summoned for group photos. I sprang up and began walking toward the lawn, happy for a reason to step back out of the past.
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