Ah, what is Peace Corps without several dozen conferences… all of which can be referred to via a series of acronyms?
I recently traveled back to Irpin to attend a Project Design and Management (PDM) conference with my wonderful counterpart Tania!
OK, biting sarcasm aside, I really do love Peace Corps conferences. They give me an excuse to socialize with all the other PCVs (at least, the ones I like) and sometimes you can actually participate in some pretty cool stuff!
You also almost always get a branded canvas tote bag. Yunno. The important things.
The focus of this conference was pretty self-explanatory: how to design, coordinate, implement and manage projects.
We (the PCVs) also got to learn all about the grant writing process, and our Ukrainian counterparts got to learn about goal setting.
The conference culminated in a gallery of sorts where each PCV and their counterpart got to display their finished project idea.
A lot of teams came up with some really cool and elaborate plans for everything from opening up facilities like business centers and libraries to coordinating community beautification projects and infrastructure improvements.
(It helps that this is the first conference I’ve been to that wasn’t JUST English teaching volunteers. There were a lot of community and economic development volunteers and youth program management volunteers as well.)
Tania kept it small, and came up with a pen pal project. We may have cheated a bit because I’ve already started coordinating this with some teacher friends back in the U.S. Oops.
And, it wouldn’t be a Peace Corps training if there wasn’t a little bit of language learning thrown in there as well.
I got to work on some technical vocabulary during daily language lessons, which culminated in a presentation we created about climate change in Ukraine.
Outside of project work and language lessons, there were a lot of really cool side activities set up. One of the PCVs, Sugi, offered henna tattoos, which Tania and I got.
Ukrainian culture is very homogenous compared to U.S. culture. I mean, the U.S. has kind of branded itself as a melting pot of immigrants. A nation of nations.
So, it’s always really cool when volunteers like Sugi are able to share their culture-within-a-culture with Ukrainians.
And, in non-Peace-Corps sanctioned events…
I will say — one of the cool things about being this far into service is that I’ve made some pretty good friends… which means that Peace Corps trainings and conferences now involve more bar nights and other various shenanigans.
The first time we were all at this conference hall in Irpin, it was right after we landed in Ukraine. We were all jetlagged and exhausted, and none of us knew any language. I spent my nights in the hotel trying to get my phone to work and talking to friends back home.
So, it was cool this time around to a. have friends, and b. get out and explore Irpin.
During one night of the conference, a few of my closer friends from the TEFL program and I walked from the conference hall to a dive bar for beers.
A few nights later, a bunch of us — including some new-to-me friends — headed to Штопор (Shtopor, like “stopper,”), a cute little gastropub downtown.
We also got to choose roommates this time around, instead of having them assigned to us. Which was amazing.
I chose Erin.
…and wine.
A funny note. By the end of the conference, when we were all piling our trash outside our hotel rooms, just about every single PCV’s room had a stack of empty Domino’s pizza boxes right outside.
And, finally… I got to vote! I got to send my absentee ballot via diplomatic pouch (fancy!) back to the U.S. so I could vote in the presidential primaries.
So, that’s it! PDM was actually a really fun few days back in Irpin, and definitely surpassed my expectations. Conferences and trainings have historically been kind of sorted by sector (teaching, community and economic development, etc.) and not by region, so it was really cool to go to a conference and meet other volunteers that live somewhat close to me.
It was also cool to have the chance to bond with Tania a little more, and of course, to see some of my REALLY good American friends.
This post was originally published Jan. 22, 2022. Its timestamp has been updated to better reflect the timeline of my Peace Corps service.
