Aspiration

A. Three professional attributes that I believe will be indispensable to me during my service in Panama are patience, flexibility, and enthusiasm. Shifting to living and working in a foreign land is sure to bring drastic changes, from adapting to different customs to not hearing my native language. Dealing with the frustration of these changes and frustration with myself is going to take an immense amount of patience. It will also take patience to interact with the local people and push them to make changes relating to my mission of environmental improvement, conservation, and education. Working hand in hand with patience is a good sense of flexibility; it is indisputable that things will not always go according to plan, and I know the best way to deal with this is to change accordingly and from experience I know I am not one to blow up or shut down when something goes wrong. I try to always view things going wrong as a change in direction rather than a failure. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, is enthusiasm, for nothing is as successful and rewarding than when it is done enthusiastically. I know that I will be enthusiastic in my position, because I am passionate about the environment and using the education I was so fortunate to obtain to protect the earth and help its people. That enthusiasm I possess will help me to be patient and flexible. Ultimately it will allow me to get things done and get them done well, because it is something that I truly care about and am invested in. B. Working effectively with my partners in Panama is essential and I aim to establish an effective team by maintaining open communication and gaining respect by showing respect. Being upfront and deliberate while interacting with my partners will establish open communication. By following through with correspondences and always being timely and prepared, I will gain respect. Making necessary changes to my current appearance will also prove my respect for Panamanian customs and traditions. These combined strategies will help me develop the productive relationship essential to cooperating with my partners in Panama, by allowing me to be aware of and responsive to the needs of my community and partners and allowing them to do the same for me. C. One of the things I am most looking forward to during Peace Corp service is fully experiencing a new culture. I am excited to embrace the Panamanian lifestyle. I know that adapting to a new culture may be challenging, but I think I can accomplish it by staying open minded and positive when experiencing new things, like food, housing, or even just social norms. Remaining aware of my own culture and sharing it to those who wish to know about it is also important. This will help me compare the new culture I am adapting to with my own. I can maintain this awareness by staying in contact with home and by keeping a journal where I can write about the differences in culture I notice. D. I expect pre service training will be intense and in depth and I am looking forward to all the things I will learn to help me during service. I really hope that more details about my exact duties will be revealed during training. I also expect to learn ways in which to effectively communicate with community leaders and the people I directly work with and improve my Spanish skills to achieve good communication. I am very excited to learn all the details of where I will be living and what I will be doing, and I hope to learn things that will aid me in being successful in adapting to the Panamanian culture and way of life. E. I have no doubts that Peace Corps service will be one of the most life changing experiences I will ever be fortunate enough to experience. I am fresh out of college with a degree in Environmental Science and I believe that using this degree in a place like Panama will teach me exactly what I am truly capable of, in terms of finding strategies to promote community environmental conservation effectively. I ultimately hope to apply my lessons and successes in Panama as they are needed in the Unites States, where there is an overwhelming need for conservation but little public awareness of that need. On a personal level, I hope that through my service I will find new ways to interact with people different then myself. I hope to gain perspective on what it means to not only be a citizen of America but a citizen of the world. I hope that my values rooted in conservation and social involvement continue to grow. I know that after my 27 months in Panama I will be a different person, a better person, and a person more driven and passionate about environmental conservation than ever before.

Retail

I work at Kmart a lot almost as much as I complain about working at Kmart. Almost. And I do not really like it as much as I would like to like it and that is okay. I am working at a job I dislike and I am okay with it. It is temporary. I just need to get these bills out of the way. Im doing it and I do not feel bad about doing it. I do not feel like I am betraying my dreams. It is okay. I am okay with it. And honestly as much as I complain about it, I like that I get to be active and run all over the store carrying boxes. Going up and down the sixteen steps to where the layaways are kept over and over again. I like making my costumers smile, the simplest yet somehow most powerful indication of humanity. I do not mind the irrate and horrible costumers who yell and cuss, because getting those few to smile to be happy for just a second make up for it. And I can honestly say that I have learned a lot in the small amount of time that I have worked there so far. And not about the cash register or how to properly bag a purchase or do a price check. No, I have learned more than I ever imagined about how people live. How people who I do not like to think about live. The people who have to put back the one box of mac n' cheese they brought to the register because their bridge card was empty. The people who put diapers on layaway. Who put toys for their kids on layaway and have to cancel them because they lost their jobs. The man without a home who pays for a loaf of bread whenever he can collect enough change from the cars exiting 1-75 to go to the mall. These people that I have pretended do not struggle as much as they do. The woman who tears open a box and hides it in order to sneak out unnoticed with the pregnacy test that was once inside. These people whose lives are so different from mine while exsisting in the exact same environment. These people with their smiles have taught me what I have known all along, what I am forced to learn over and over and over again. My struggle is another persons stability. My life is beautiful and something to smile about. Their lives are beautiful. Life is beautiful and we must always do whatever possible to let one another know, smile, and give, and help one another whenever possible. And I am okay with working at Kmart, because there are a lot of ways to spend my time until Feburary that are a lot worse.