Peace Corp Isolation

How sad that your impression of African men, Peace Corps Volunteers and counseling are so negative. Had I known that, I could have offered you free counseling on the spot. It seems as if you said you had spent 2 years as a PCV but it must have been a very sad and bitter experience for you. I have not encountered PC Volunteers with the kinds of problems you spoke of, but I did encounter you.
We are each entitled to our opinion but I was told to inform myself before launching into a diatribe about something. Also, maybe you do not utilise courtesy as a part of your personality repertoire, but the next time you decide to dissect a conversation with someone online, perhaps letting them know that you are listening to their every word, as in an interview for inclusion in a blog, would give that person a "heads up".
By the way, Peace Corps ends with "s". Even PCVs who are spelling impaired without a computer know how to spell the name of this illustrious organization.
As you said in your parting words to me today, before I read your blog, Have a good life.

I agree with happylady... You are gravely missing the point. You are so wrapped up in your own existence that you can't see what is going on and what really matters. Are we supposed to be impressed that you have traveled and can 'feel out a new city' and you're a self proclaimed 'citizen of nowhere'? Sounds like you take yourself too seriously. Maybe if you got out of the hostel bar and stopped being a judgemental 'dirty american' you might see that these 'kids' (although the average age for a PCV is 27) spend 2 years doing something for someone else, even if they change one persons life in those 2 years it is still significantly more than your contributions to the world. As happylady proved, people aren't impressed by you and your mediocre blogging gig. So grow up, grow a pair, stop running away and do something worthwhile while traveling.

You obviously think very highly of yourself, and it is quite evident that is about all you think about, is yourself. What a superficial view you have of the world. You have not spent over two years living in a hut with no running water and no electricity. You have not had to worry about purifying your drinking water every day for fear of guinea worms and malaria. You haven't had a child die in your arms from AIDS, a preventable and treatable disease. You haven't had young girls, barely teenagers, leave your village for months on end only to return with a deadly disease from having to sell themselves to support their family, unable to do anything about it. I don't think you could do it. You couldn't live for two years in a hut, isolated from your family and friends, so don't put down those that do. You didn't live in Togo when their President died and 40,000 people literally walked out to neighboring countries for fear of another Rwanda. How dare you judge those that did. Vacationing in Lome for two weeks is hardly getting to know the country and the people. It is a superficial view, just as you are superficial. You try to teach sex education when Bush has cut funding for anything but abstinence in a country with 50% AIDS. You think you wouldn't need someone to talk to? Shame on you. You disgust me.