talkin' 'bout my generation.

I’ve been thinking a lot about my generation. Sometimes when I’m with fellow Peace Corps Volunteers, I can feel the future politician oozing out of them. It’s not that it’s a bad thing, only that in certain people- the quality of “diplomacy” is evident and intentional. For the most part, they are not crass, they are easy to talk to, they are persuasive, they make you feel important, they get things done whether through luck, skill and/or manipulation, and they drink a little too much. This goes for both males and females, and I often wonder if 30- 40 years from now, when I go to the Presidential polls in America, will I be voting for someone who lived on this hot, hot island with me?

One of my best friends is serving in Afghanistan. She wrote me an email a few months ago and asked when my “contract” was up. I read that word over and over. Sometimes I forget we are both serving our country, and that we each signed a piece of paper saying we would go to a place our government thought best to help the “poor” people there. Help them in such dissimilar terms.

It’s much different for me. My contract is more like a marriage. Call the divorce lawyers if you don’t like it, and move on with your life. (Also there is this small detail, where I am not concerned for my life at any given moment). Her contract is non-negotiable- it’s two years to the day (which most of us know, turns out to be longer), no questions, no sympathy, and no second chances. She and I are serving our country in two very different ways, and when I think about how we are simultaneously going though this, literally on opposite sides of the earth, I feel like a shmuck.

When she announced, over a year-and-a-half ago that she was leaving for Afghanistan, my dad offered to move her to Canada. I really don’t think he was joking. I will always love him a little bit more for that.

This week she wrote me an email saying a soldier in her unit died. To my understanding, she works in an office and doesn’t see combat often (Gracias A Dios). He was a hard-working, young man who was on his way up, she wrote. He was a good husband and good father to his toddler son. He was the brightest in his field and he will be missed. I am not sure of the details of the soldier’s death, only that like all deaths in war, it was unplanned and with regret.

She said how she didn’t understand why they were still there. They say the war is over, but it’s a joke, and how she can’t wait to get back home and be with her husband and see her friends. She called me her dearest friend and when I read her words, I cried. I cried for her and for the soldier’s family. I cried for everyone who has ever given their life to their country for a “greater cause,” and mostly I cried for the hopelessness of it all.

It seems like every article I read says that the Taliban is rising again. Couples are being stoned to death. Stoned to death! Is everyone aware of what that means? It means the alleged criminal is buried in a hole up to their necks (shoulders for woman) with their hands tied behind their backs. They do this so they are given a “fair” chance to escape from the hole. Then a circle is formed around them and the people throw rocks directly at their head trying to kill them. If the person can manage to escape and unbury themselves from the hole and cross the circle where the people are, they are forgiven for their sins. Obviously, this never happens. How could it?

These practices are still happening today, as in August 23, 2010. And we’re supposed to believe the war is over? My friend is supposed to believe that what she’s doing in Afghanistan will change that country? Apparently with violence comes the people’s need and want for democracy.

I can feel this war changing my friend. Through her emails, her words, I can feel her becoming someone she never would have become had she gone to Canada with my father. In some ways, it is good. She has experienced things that most of us are lucky enough to never experience, and she has turned them into her own motivation to improve her life, to continue with education when she finishes and to live a happy life with her husband. And in other ways, I can feel the desperation. I can feel her wanting to scream at the President and past- Presidents and every person who got us to this point, and ask them to give up their lives for their country.

Giving your life for your country. My generation is a part of that now. From the greatest generation to the Vietnam and Korean War Vets, now there is also Iraq and Afghanistan. Peace Corps has been around since 1961 and it would be ignorant to think that people have not died while serving in the Peace Corps.

In the DR, there have been six or more (I am not sure of exact numbers, but I believe it is under 10) deaths since the start of Peace Corps. The majority of these deaths were from car and motorcycle accidents. And although these people did not die by gun shot during a battle or an insurgent uprising- they did nonetheless die serving their country.

It makes me wonder what my dear friend sees and feels when she looks around at other soldiers in Afghanistan, especially those her own age. Does she feel like I feel? Does she think about how much people around her have changed, for the good and the bad? Does she meet people her own age and think about them running our country in 40 years and using their experiences as a 20-something in extreme circumstances to make all those future decisions?

Does it scare her? Or does it give her hope?

People are dying. She sees that every day. I see people sweating too much and killing themselves slowly by eating too much sugar and fattening foods. There are people in my generation who will never see either of our sides. Mine of Peace, hers of war.

They will sit in their air conditioning, drive their cars with insurance that is still paid for by their parents and blink quickly over headlines about death, war, extreme poverty, development crises, etc.

These are the people who have college degrees and are unemployed. They are fighting their own battles, I suppose- complete with a Starbucks latte in hand. This is my generation and of all three of these groups- who will define us?

War.
Peace.
Apathy.

And when exactly do we get to decide how it’s all decided? Forty-years from now at the election polls, I guess.