In this interview, you’ll hear from Jake Sarver-Verhey, a Peace Corps Education volunteer in Indonesia. Jake shares what daily life looks like, the work being done, and how service has shaped their personal and professional growth. You’ll learn about housing, cultural differences, project work, language learning, and what it’s like to live and work in a new country. This interview offers a real look into Peace Corps service and what future volunteers can expect.
Table of Contents
- Volunteer Experience and Motivation
- Living Arrangements and Cultural Integration
- Surprises and Challenges
- Advice and Support
- Practical Tips and Language Learning
- Social Identity
- Impact of Media and Final Thoughts
Volunteer Experience and Motivation
1. What do you do as a Peace Corps Education volunteer in Indonesia?
Each day, I teach at SMKN 1 Subang, a vocational high school in the center of Subang city. I work with 3-5 counterpart teachers to make fun and (hopefully) educational English lessons for the students in grades 10-12.
Though my schedule varies by the day, I usually arrive at school in the morning in time for the English Club for Teachers, where a rotating cast of other teachers learn some conversational English together in the teacher’s room. After that, it’s off to class until lunch, which I often eat at the cafe on campus run by the Culinary students. I finish off any afternoon classes and walk home with my host brother, who attends the school as well.
Every week I try to get some exercise 3-4 times; be it joining the Boxing club for practice, running in the city park, doing yoga at home, or hitting up the local gym. On my off days, I’ll put some time in working on my language skills, or hang out with my local friends or host brothers.
2. Why did you decide to join the Peace Corps and serve in Indonesia?
I had always been curious about working as a teacher in my later years of university. I graduated with a Master’s in Mechanical Engineering from the Rochester Institute of Technology, and worked with the teaching staff there as an upperclassman doing curriculum design for the program. My professors encouraged me to try my hand at teaching professionally, but it always seemed a second-place priority compared to making use of my fancy new (and expensive) degree.
Though I asked a few questions to a Peace Corps recruiter and shared my email with them in college, it ended up not quite seeming right for me. I worked in the field for a few years, but during COVID, I was forced back home with my parents and spent quarantine feeling rather lonely working by myself. It was one particularly solitary day when I suddenly received an email from the Corps reminding me they were back open for business.
It was something of a moment of synchronicity – here was a chance to try my hand at teaching and to get out of the house and indeed the country all at the same time! I signed up right away, ready to work wherever there was a need, and the rest is history.
Living Arrangements and Cultural Integration
3. What is your housing like in Indonesia?
I live with a wonderful host family here in Subang city. I’ve got a mom, dad, four brothers, and one little cat named Ucup. The area is an odd mix of rural and urban, farm and shopping strips. It’s hard to quite describe the make-up of Subang in American terms, I’m quite certain I’ve never seen a place quite like it state-side.
We’ve got a McDonalds and a grocery store, but both are bordered by rice fields in the back. In a 3 mile radius of me there are upwards of 80+ different schools at all levels, but many students live out of town in the surrounding areas. The result is a plenitude of options for food and entertainment compared to some of my more rural Indonesian Peace Corps peers, without all the hustle and bustle that makes big cities like Bandung or Jakarta feel suffocating at times.
My favorite things to do to de-stress in Subang are taking a long bike ride through the rice fields around town, or heading to the second floor of the Grand Yogya superstore and relaxing by the cafe with the air conditioning and some ice cream from a nearby parlor.
4. What moments or interactions stand out during your service?
It’s difficult to pin down a particular moment that defines my service – every day seems either full of incredible firsts or yet more classes struggling to explain the past tense to students whose native language lacks tenses entirely.
If I were to pick one, I’d say my favorite memory as a teacher was traveling with my students to the provincial high school English competition. We’d been working hard at work, practicing together for a month prior, and all the kids were stressed and nervous as we walked into the campus of one of the area’s biggest universities. I tried my best to help them prepare and chill a bit, but more than a few of them were shaking in their boots as they took their respective stages.
After much ado, our school emerged the victor! Celebrating with all the students as we rode back to school as champions really made me feel fulfilled as a teacher and proud of what they had accomplished.
Surprises and Challenges
5. What has surprised you most about living or working in Indonesia?
I would say the biggest surprise to living and working in Indonesia is also the thing I’ve realized I value most about America – the ability to be normal. In the states, especially in the city of Cleveland, where I’m from, it’s not odd to see people with ancestry from all over the world, all living together as Americans.
In Indonesia, however, I’m the only foreigner in my entire city, and the number of times I’ve introduced myself and explained where I’m from to strangers who can’t help but ask has got to number in the thousands. I’m proud to have achieved a solid level of proficiency in Indonesian and made lots of great friends in the area, but no matter how long I live here and no matter how fluent I might become, I will never really become Indonesian in the eyes of others.
To be strange, to be another is a feeling that I’ve been privileged not to experience before, though feeling it each day during my time here has been a powerful educator into the struggles of others and has taught me the incredible value of a multicultural and multiethnic society like the one we enjoy in America. The states are far from perfect, home to their fair share of racism, discrimination, and inequality, but it is still a place where someone from anywhere can go and become American. And that is an awesome thing.
6. What challenges have you faced in your Education work, and how did you respond?
A Classroom Divided by Language Ability
By far the biggest struggle teaching in Indonesia has been the huge range of language ability amongst students in any given class. In my 12th-grade classes in particular, I’ll have quite a few students who are almost fluent, able to chat with me and joke around in English with laudable fluency. At the same time, over half of many classes are unable to say ‘My name is . . . ‘
The gap between these two groups is populated by many students with solid skills but unequal distribution, and the entire phenomena is the result of a complete lack of standardization in the Indonesian education system, and the inability of students to ever fail a class. There is no standardized testing or curriculum amongst schools here, and many teachers within a single grade might teach wildly different lesson plans.
Challenges of a Non-Standardized Education System
If I, in one of my 11th grade classes have students from multiple different 10th grade teachers; some of who were taught more conversational skills, and others who were taught more reading skills, and then attempt to make a lesson about conversation, of course those who learned it last year will do well and the others will struggle, by no real fault of their own.
Furthermore, in order to appear more effective to the government education office, the grades of all students are raised to at least 80% at the end of the year, meaning all students always pass all classes regardless of performance. A 12th-grade student may well have slept through 99% of their classes, or they might have studied hard and participated in language exchanges in their free time. Regardless, both students will be sorted into the same class, and I will have to try to design a class plan that satisfies them both.
7. What secondary projects have you worked on during your service?
I’ve had the privilege of working with a ton of awesome people from schools all over Subang to set up English Days and school collaborations, though the project I’m most proud of has been a Digital Literacy program aimed at increasing the technical capabilities of both teachers and students at my school. I partnered with a number of staff and teachers to acquire a grant for the purchase of digital equipment, as well as the establishment of a yearly digital literacy training program that will continue long after I depart from the school.
Beyond that, I’ve worked with the Peace Corps on a number of environmentally and digitally-focused workshops and participated in a variety of clubs at my school.
Advice and Support
8. What advice would you give to future Education volunteers in Indonesia?
Indonesia is a nation of strong communal bonds, for both good and ill. I’ve never felt more a part of a community in any place in the world compared to my life with my host family in Subang. At the same time, social cliques and inter-school politics have a greater sway over the goings on in my work than any other place I’ve ever been.
Here, there is a tremendous need for growth that is at times stymied by governmental corruption, institutionalized negligence, and an educational culture that does not prioritize results, only advancement.
At the same time, I’ve met a host of passionate and brave teachers, a ton of incredibly smart students who humble me each and every day, and seen wonder and beauty in the natural world of Indonesia beyond anything I’ve ever witnessed. And yet, even in the most remote of jungles I’ve hiked through, trash litters the ground. Nothing in my experience here has ever been what I’d assumed, that is, in many ways, the joys of it.
Prepare for the unexpected. Try not to let your American preconceptions of social and work life color the actions of others, look deeper, and never be afraid to look stupid in the pursuit of learning more.
9. How did Peace Corps training prepare you for service?
Training was tough, though not in the ways I expected. In many ways, I feel lucky being placed in Indonesia as its language is one of the simplest of the major world languages – no tenses, plurals, or particles (sorta-kinda). For the most part, though training days could be long, I enjoyed getting better at learning each day, and my host family was endlessly supportive and fun.
On the other hand, bickering and pettiness amongst the Americans who came along proved to be the biggest struggle of not just my training, but my entire service. I had thought before joining the Peace Corps that my fellow volunteers would not be the sort to prioritize drama and rumors over learning the culture of the new nation we were all a part of, but that proved not to be the case.
If I could give one piece of advice for training, it would be this: focus on the reasons you joined the corps, and don’t let others drag you down because of their own insecurities. Success in something we create for ourselves.
Practical Tips and Language Learning
10. What would you tell future volunteers to pack—or leave behind?
I packed rather light, a decision I haven’t regretted, as I will soon face the daunting task of trying to cram all the cool stuff I’ve acquired over 2 years of adventure back into my poor suitcases at departure time. The most valuable things I can’t recommend enough for Indonesia are the following:
- 2-3 quick-dry towels: Indonesia is hot, but it’s a wet heat. You’ll be happy to try off properly after frequent showers.
- Quick-dry clothing: I brought around 4 quick-dry shirts for workouts, and they quickly became my primary clothing. Cotton t-shirts and anything heavy will get soaked in sweat quite quickly.
- Portable Fan: Always good to have on the go, and even around the house.
- Crocs: The perfect shoe for all occasions. Indonesia is a shoes-off-before-entering-places sort of culture, and the ever dependable Croc is waterproof, easy to don and doff, and if you get the fancy leather ones, they even look nice for teaching.
And finally, a special note for the big-footed people out there: bring an extra pair of shoes/sandals. It is impossible to find shoes beyond US Men’s 13 in this country, both in-person and online.
11. How has language learning been for you in Indonesia?
Finding My Voice in Indonesian
It’s been awesome! Honestly, learning Indonesian has been my absolute favorite part of the entire Peace Corps experience. Language is vast, complex, and wild. The formal Indonesian I learned in training often had little to do with the slang spoken by the average student, so arriving at site felt as though I stepped right off the plane all over again.
Nonetheless, I worked hard every day chatting with my host family, students, fellow teachers, and the many random folks on the streets who are always wanting to know where I’m headed (get ready to hear a lot of ‘mau ke mana?’ if you’re Indonesia bound) to get to my current level of like, being pretty good actually. (a hard-won accomplishment)
Navigating Indonesia’s Linguistic Salad
The unique challenge of Indonesia that sets it apart from many countries is the sheer linguistic diversity on offer here. Every Indonesian learns Indonesian, but it’s almost no one’s first language. In all places beyond Jakarta, Indonesians learn their regional language first, which serves as the primary means of communication at home and with friends, and then Indonesian later, the language of schooling, advertisement, government, and everything else. Rather than switch between the two, however, many Indo folks speak ‘Gado-gado’ (the name of a popular mixed salad), which is to say, they blend the two together depending on locality and preference.
This is a really cool and interesting linguistic environment, my enjoyment of which is slightly undercut by the fact that I don’t know Sundanese (the regional language of my area) and thus am forever left asking the question “Is that a Sunda word I don’t know, or I still dumb in Indonesian?”
A few recommendations
Even so, I have persevered, and have discovered a passion for language and language learning that I’m excited to follow on my next great adventure after the Peace Corps. I wouldn’t say I’m very good at the process of language learning, only that I have the drive to learn hard every day, and am extroverted enough to try and hold a conversation with the nice lady down the street who speaks so fast it makes me question how she can fit so many syllables in so few seconds. Of the various techniques I’ve employed over the years, here are my big recommendations:
- Chatting with people is the first and best way to put your learning to practice, and pick up on the rhythms and verbal peculiarities that you won’t find in any textbooks or learning programs.
- Real learning comes from real language. Online guides and Peace Corps training will get you started, but the best way to talk like a native is to engage in media meant for natives. Read books! Watch movies! Check out some Indonesian memes! The best way to learn a language is to use it. And have some fun with it! Do you like horror movies? Then try out an Indo horror flick! (I swear like 75% of Indonesian movies are horror films, so you have no lack of options) Do you like romance novels? Every bookstore I’ve ever seen in-country is packed full of them. If you’re having fun with something you like and already have background knowledge on the general format of, picking up new things becomes a lot easier.
- Find a local teacher at your site! The Peace Corps pays for language learning costs in service, and my classes with Miss Tanti, a brilliant English teacher at a nearby academy advanced my Indonesian by leaps and bounds.
- Never be afraid to ask questions! Most Indo people couldn’t be more excited to help out a foreigner who’s trying to learn Indonesian, and the amount of times I’ve thought I picked up a cool new word from a book or movie only to try it out in real life and have been met by blank stares is a few too many.
Social Identity
12. How has your personal identity shaped your service experience?
From Curiosity to Conversation
I’m a tall white dude with brown hair and blue eyes from the Midwest. I could not fit the Indonesian stereotype more if I tried. Though the attention that being a foreigner in Indonesia brings has, in some ways, been helpful, as there’s never a lack of folks to chat with, it also means that I can never truly just chill out. Everywhere I go, people point, people stare, and the inevitable “Dari mana?” (Where are you from?) is only moments away.
It’s been my own privilege in the US to never feel out of place, and it’s one I recognize now more than ever, having lived abroad these past two years. That America is home to a vast diversity of people from different backgrounds, national origins, cultures, religions, and more is by far the thing I miss most about home, and the thing that is the hardest to explain to my fellow teachers and students. As much as I’ve learned about Indonesia in my time here, I’ve learned a lot about the US as well.
When Safety Means Staying Quiet
Though my identity has never harmed me during my service, it is something that I can never feel too comfortable about sharing. Indonesian culture is very discriminatory towards LGBTQ+ folks, those of different religions, and has very strict gender norms. I can adapt well enough and simply stay quiet about the parts of my identity that I know wouldn’t be well accepted here, but hiding one’s true self is an everyday struggle that drains the soul after many years.
I’ve known a lot of kind and accepting Indonesians, but even with them, I’ve been reticent to talk too deeply about my background, as you never know whom they might talk to, and rumors spread quicker than fire in a community as close-knit as rural Indonesia.
13. Did your identity lead to specific challenges or situations?
Of the parts of my identity that I keep hidden, I haven’t had any struggles besides keeping my distance from any potential controversies, and making the hard choice not to help out some students who have come to me with questions that they worry to ask fellow Indonesians.
By far the most shocking fact about me that I will speak on from the perspective of the average Indonesian is my still being unmarried, despite reaching the decrepit age of 27! Many, many times I’ve had people offer me a meeting with their likewise-unmarried female acquaintances (but they’re still quite nice, they promise), and it has never failed to make me uncomfortable and put-upon in a culture that values marriage above most everything else. This struggle is not new to many people, but it was never one I faced back in the states, and has been a persistent topic of conversation amongst the other teachers in my school that never quite fades away.
14. What advice do you have for volunteers who share your identity?
Find connections where you can. I’m lucky enough to have an awesome group of close friends from back home that I chat with all the time and who share many parts of my identity. Talking with them and feeling normal for a little while can really help to de-stress from always being ‘on’ when I step out of my door.
Impact of Media and Final Thoughts
15. If you share content online, how has that shaped your service?
At the insistence of my grandma, as I set out for Indonesia, I created an Instagram on which I semi-often post pics of my various adventures as a sort of journal and a way to share my experiences with everyone back home. At some point, I shared my account with a student who wanted to check out some of my vacation photos, and by the next day, I had gained 400 followers and returned to school to become bombarded by students eager to get a selfie with me to post their story.
16. What final advice would you share with future volunteers?
This has been the journey of a lifetime, and it has given me the courage to set out on a brand new one when my service comes to an end. I joined the Peace Corps for many reasons, the greatest of which was a simple feeling that perhaps the thing I most want to do in this world is something I had yet to encounter, and perhaps never would work a mundane job in the States. It was an incredible leap of faith to step out from home and into the world, and it’s been one I’ve never regretted.
I’ve yet to find that perfect thing. Perhaps I never will. But along the way, I’ve adventured to places I never thought I’d ever be, learned a few languages, made new friends, tried new foods, climbed a few mountains, and gained a wanderlust and excitement for the future, and it will keep me going for years to come. So what are you waiting for? Get out here!
Are you thinking about joining the Peace Corps? If you’re curious about service and ready for something new, apply today. Like Jake, you can live abroad, work with communities, and grow in ways you didn’t expect. Apply to the Peace Corps and take the next step.
The content of this post does not necessarily reflect the views of the U.S. Government, the Peace Corps, or Indonesia Government.
