Youth in Ukraine light candles to remember victims of HIV/AIDS. They are among those who are aware of HIV/AIDS and how to avoid it, thanks to the Peace Corps and its Volunteers who teach youth to adopt healthy lifestyles.
Aicha Boulmahuahib was the midwife at the local hospital at Ouled Berhill, Taroudant, Morocco where I lived for 2 years. The day I met her, we automatically started developing health workshops for women in the community. Also, I assisted her on...
These girls were my students at the Dar Chebeb (Youth House) in Ouled Berhill, Taroudant, Morocco. I would teach them Spanish and English and help them on their french. We established weekend hours to play, learn about health and talk about what...
Kids would always love how I invented and translated songs from Spanish (my native language) to different languages. That would make them build better vocabulary. Also, they will also greet me around town in as many as 4 languages. So proud! Photo...
My counterpart decided on a whim one day to have an "English party." For two weeks, our students, who barely knew any English, rehearsed "Sleeping Beauty." They made all their own props and costumes and memorized their lines from a book my aunt...
This is the first time our English classroom in Darkhan Village, Kyrygzstan, has had good textbooks. They came our way through a private donation from the U.S. Here is a group of 3rd graders, proudly showing off their colorful new books.
In the school where I worked in Darkhan Village, Kyrgyzstan, students like these two 3rd-grade girls use the cyrillic alphabet in all their classes. They can speak Kyrgyz and Russian, but learning English is difficult, because they have to learn a...
The day my host sister, Begaim, announced that she was getting married, a summer afternoon rain shower gave way to a dramatic double rainbow in my small village in eastern Kyrgyzstan. We rushed outside to take pictures. Here, my youngest host...
Here is Azamat, hiking back up the hill with my snowboard for another run. Azamat was helping us collect firewood for a winter tourism project deep in the Terskey Ala-Too range of the Tien Shan mountains of Kyrgyzstan. At the end of the day, our...
Peace Corps takes you to some far-out places. This is me, posing in front of a yurt during a blizzard. The yurt was about four miles above a small village in eastern Kyrgyzstan called Ichkey-Jergez, nestled in the foothills of the Terskey Ala-Too...
A lone sunbather rests on the southern shore of Lake Issyk-Kul, Kyrgyzstan, while a throng of sheep search for grass in the sand. While the north shore of the lake is quite developed and popular with tourists, the south shore still offers serenity...
This photo was taken on September 1st, 2012 in Chornomorka, Ukraine at Chornomorka Comprehensive School. It is tradition for a male in the soon-to-be-graduating class to carry a girl from the year's incoming 1st form class on his shoulder as she...
I took this photo on October 5, 2012 in Chornomorka, Ukraine at Chornomorka Comprehensive School. October 5th marked the celebration on Teacher's Day at my school. On this day, students in the most senior class take over teaching duties and...
This photo was taken outside of Sozopol, Bulgaria in July of 2012. A Ukrainian English Language summer camp with 5 PCV counselors held a baseball game after lessons were given about how to play. This is a student playing the game as pitcher for his...
This photo was taken at Madiba Clinic in Mahalapye, Botswana in December, 2010. I worked with the clinic staff to teach a series of 8 weekly infant care classes to expectant mothers, and this photo was taken on the final day of the course, when...
Enjoying my first winter with my host family in Panagyurishte, Bulgaria. This photo was taken outside their flat by my host brother in the winter of 2003.
After visiting my host family for Christmas 2004, my now-husband and I were thinking about what to do for New Year's Eve. He remembered his grandfather was from a village nearby, deep in the Balkan mountains, and we decided to catch the bus there...
This photo was taken during my best friend's baby naming ceremony in a local church in a fishing village in the Western Region of Ghana. The photo shows a line of women bringing the newborn child to the front to be dedicated and officially named....
This photo was taken in the village of Dihovo where all of PC Macedonia teamed up to help with a trash cleanup. We cleaned for 2 days and picked up over 30 tons of trash from the river and its banks! We pulled everything imaginable out of this...
I took this picture in January 2008 in Kazakhstan. The Moroz (Frost) in Kazakhstan could get down to deathly temperatures, but at the same time it could be one of the most amazing and beautiful scenery to encounter. When the Moroz would set in on...