In this interview, we hear from Jeff Spencer. Jeff is a Peace Corps volunteer working as a Community Development volunteer in North Macedonia. What Jeff shares gives us a better understanding of the work volunteers do. We learn about the challenges, rewards, and personal growth that happens from volunteering in a new place. Jeff talks about living in a different country, working with local people, and dealing with surprise situations. Join us as we learn about Jeff’s journey and see how volunteering with Peace Corps can change lives.
Table of Contents
- Volunteer Experience and Motivation
- Living Arrangements and Cultural Integration
- Surprises and Challenges
- Advice and Support
- Practical Tips and Language Learning
- Partner-Specific Questions
- Impact of Media and Final Thoughts
Volunteer Experience and Motivation
1. Can you tell us more about serving as an CD volunteer in North Macedonia?
Community Development has no real definition. I mean, the Peace Corps tries to define it. And I’m sure that they have an official written job description, but any relationship that definition has to the reality of doing work in any particular site is tenuous at best. The job is what you make of it, period. When I got here, I was assigned to two organizations, the Municipality and a Macedonian NGO that works with Romani young people.
I’ve got 50 years of work experience behind me with four college degrees, so I’m pretty efficient when it comes to getting work done. I spend probably 2-4 hours a day doing work and then I spend the rest of the time reading, writing, doing household stuff, or playing games on my phone honestly. I’m also on a Peace Corps committee, the Peer Support Network. We’re there to support volunteers who may be struggling, and we put out a monthly newsletter. It’s important work, and I spend a fair amount of time writing for that.
I work from home, which is not the norm. I have staff meetings with my counterpart and my NGO team on the Internet. But the best part of my work is the youth exchanges that I support. So far, I’ve traveled to Sofia, Bulgaria, and Berlin, Germany where young people from all over Europe come together for about a week to learn using innovative non-formal educational methods.
The topics vary, employment skills, citizenship, climate change, social justice, and history. They do topics on anything people under 30 are interested in and they can get funding for. Non-profit organizations fund all the travel, housing, and training costs. I’ve met people from Morocco, Spain, Romania, all over Europe really. I’m doing another one in Belgrade, Serbia next month about the Roma genocide.
2. What motivated you to join the Peace Corps and choose North Macedonia?
I’ve wanted to join the Peace Corps since the first time I heard about it in 4th grade. That was back in 1965, right after it was announced. I thought it was such a cool idea. But once I got to college, I fell in love and got married and dreams of the Peace Corps faded as life got in the way.
When I was preparing for retirement, I attended some seminars on how to manage Medicare, Social Security, and finances in general after the paychecks stop. But the presenter started the session with this provocative question, “What does your retirement look like? What are you doing every day? Because if you just want to stop going to a job that you hate, you’re going to hate retirement.”
That night while I was envisioning the possibilities, I remembered my dream of joining the Peace Corps. I researched opportunities in the Peace Corps and shared my dream with friends. Every time I shared the dream, it became more real. Three years later I was stepping off an airplane in Skopje, North Macedonia with 38 new friends ready to start an adventure.
Honestly, North Macedonia was not my first choice. I wanted to go to a Pacific island and applied to Timor-Leste. I was denied because of my age and type-2 diabetes. The nearest hospital was eight hours away if the roads were open and Peace Corps staff thought it was too great a risk, so they offered me North Macedonia which is more developed with better transportation and medical facilities. So, my partner, Ramona, and I decided to go for it. I’m glad we did.
Living Arrangements and Cultural Integration
3. Tell us more about your home situation:
Ramona and I live in a smallish city in the northwest of the country. It’s one of the oldest cities in North Macedonia in the mountains. Actually, it was built in the crater of an extinct volcano which is pretty cool. We have a couple grocery stores, a few bars and restaurants, a hotel, a small museum, and a city center where the community events are held. On Saturdays there is an open market where local vendors sell fresh fruit and vegetables, locally picked leaves for tea, eggs, beans, basically anything you need for your meals for the week except meat and milk products. There are also clothes and household items for sale there as well.
We rent a small, three-room basement apartment from our host family. They are an older couple (younger than us). Their daughters are grown, and married and they have two grandkids. They are always helpful in introducing us to people and encouraging us with the language. They seem to know everyone in town and the outlying villages. They explain all the holidays and rituals that are so important to Macedonian culture. Last winter wasn’t that cold, and there wasn’t much snow which we were happy about because the town is extremely hilly and nearly all the streets are cobblestone, many in bad repair. So far, this summer is looking like it will be a scorcher even though we’re up in the mountains.
There are several foods that are staples. Peppers of all varieties, tomatoes, and cucumbers are in all the salads. We eat a lot of cabbage, but not much lettuce. And they make this condiment called ayvar from sweet red peppers. In the fall, they roast the peppers, peel them, put them in a vat with some olive oil and salt, and cook them over an open fire for hours. Then they put it in jars and eat it all year round. The flavor is unbelievable. I sent jars to all my friends in America for Christmas. They also love this pungent white cheese that they call syranjay. There are multiple varieties made from cow milk, sheep milk, goat milk, and some mixtures of different milks. Each has a different texture and flavor. We put it on salads or simply use it as a side during any meal. It’s great with bread or ayvar.
People here grow their own fruits and vegetables. It seems like if there is a plot of spare land in someone’s yard, it’s got a garden growing in it. Most carports are shaded by grape or kiwi vines. Oh, and the locals are proud of their rakia. Many people have their own stills and a secret recipe. It’s a kind of brandy made from grapes or plums or other kinds of fruit. I had some that was pitch black made from walnuts. If we’re having dinner with locals, we always start it by toasting with rakia, “Na Stravia!”
4. Any memorable experiences or interactions you’ve had with community members?
The Macedonian people are incredibly friendly, and my town, in particular, is known for that. When we’re walking around, we always say “Hello” or “Good Day” to everyone, in the local language of course. People will invite you into their home for coffee after simply meeting you on the street. It’s happened several times to us. I struggle to understand people most of the time. The language is challenging. But people are typically patient, and we get by. It always cracks me up when I tell someone that I don’t understand what they’re saying, so they say it again, only louder.
One time this old guy, Bronco, was walking by while Mone, my host father, and I were doing something or other outside. So, of course, Mone invited him to stop and have a beer with us. We talked and laughed, and I didn’t understand much of what he said because he has no teeth, but we made a connection. Now every time I see him, we’re like old friends. We share a cigarette and I’m starting to understand about 20% of what he says. The other day he told me that he loved me. That just warmed my heart.
The other night, I stepped outside to smoke a cigarette before I washed the dishes and got ready for bed. Mone came down and struck up a conversation. Then Lile, his wife, came down as well and we chatted about my trip to Berlin. So, Mone got a liter of beer and Ramona came out as well. An hour later, the neighbor stopped by with a bowl of popcorn and joined us. Then another neighbor, walking to the grocery store, said hello. I offered her some beer, which she declined. But then Mone said, c’mon we offered you beer, it’s rude to decline. So, she joined us as well. I was just having a cigarette and a party broke out. It seems to happen all the time. People are just so friendly.
Surprises and Challenges
5. What has surprised you most about CD challenges in North Macedonia?
Transportation is a real challenge. The bus schedules seem to be only a suggestion. They’ll come, or not, whatever. Nobody thinks it’s a big deal. People say it was better before COVID-19, there were a lot more buses, but the frequency of buses has never really come back after the pandemic.
I was told about the laid-back attitude of the people here in advance. Still,that can be frustrating if you really need to get something done. There is a saying that is often repeated, it translates to “There is time. It will be.” It’s forced me to slow down and chill, which is a good thing, and easier for me than other volunteers because I’m retired. I appreciate a slower pace of life. It also kind of sums up what’s important here, which is relationships. Family and friends are the bedrock of the culture. Those relationships must be nurtured above all else. So, holidays, dinners, visiting with friends and family, just taking time to really know each other, takes precedence. There will be time to do whatever “seems” to be important right now. In the meantime, “there is time.”
6. What challenges did you face while working on CD projects with community members?
When I got to my permanent assignment after pre-service training, it was at the end of November. I was assigned to work with a Roma NGO and the municipality. Both were busy with end of year work and didn’t have time for me at all. Then January was the holidays, so nothing was happening in that month either. Basically, I sat on my hands for a couple of months. Not really a problem for me. I used the time to work on my language skills, learn about the culture and integrate into the community. From what I’ve heard from other volunteers, they had the same experience. They were eager to jump in and get to work and some got frustrated.
I overcame those frustrations by busying myself with personal writing projects and the like. It’s important for me to keep in mind that the Peace Corps has three goals to promote world peace and friendship:
- Help countries meet their needs for trained people
- Improve understanding between Americans and the people they serve
- Improve understanding between Americans and other peoples
I could work on the second two without ever working on a project. I’m here to help, not force things to happen. I can’t care about anyone’s organization more than they do. It’s a matter of changing my perspective. Everything moves more slowly here. Before I left when my friends in the States would ask me what I would be doing. I’d joke that I’ll probably spend about six months having coffee with people and then figure out what I’m supposed to do. I was mostly right.
7. Could you share some of the secondary projects you have been involved in?
The streets of my town are extremely hilly. Some of the grades are 40% or more. I’m trying to organize a 5-10K race in the city and maybe a trash pick-up day. It makes me sad to see how people don’t care about the environment here. Trash gets dropped on the street and in the river that runs through town. To be fair, there aren’t enough garbage cans around town and trash pickup seems rather lax.
Advice and Support
8. What advice would you give to someone considering serving as an CD volunteer in North Macedonia?
This is the most interesting and personally rewarding adventure that I’ve ever embarked on. Ignore your doubts and jump in with both feet. You don’t often get the chance to pack up your life and spend a couple of years in a different country with an unfamiliar culture and a new language. It’s challenging for sure. But I’ve seldom regretted the things I did. I’ve always regretted the things I never attempted.
Even at my age, I’ve learned things about myself that I never knew. This is not just a physical adventure, it’s a personal one as well.
9. What skills or qualities do you think are most important for a CD volunteer?
Flexibility and patience are the two personality traits that should be at the top of your list. You’ll have plenty of time to practice. If you’re not flexible and patient, you’ll be miserable. If you’ve been accepted into the Community Development program, you already have most of the professional skills required to be successful. The question is what does success look like? I found that I need to allow success to present itself rather than define it up front. The secret to a successful Peace Corps career is managing expectations.
10. How has the Peace Corps training helped you during your service?
The Peace Corps training was rigorous and thorough. The language was more difficult to learn than I expected particularly because of my age. That was frustrating. We had lessons on culture, health, sexuality, safety and security, sexual assault, local politics, you name it. I was impressed, and I’m a tough audience. Suffice it to say, that the Peace Corps wants you to succeed and will do everything in their power to help you do just that.
Practical Tips and Language Learning
11. Anything that you packed or didn’t pack that you’d like to tell future volunteers?
Get a luggage scale. You get two bags plus a carry-on and a personal bag. There’s a per-bag maximum and a total maximum. You will have to move things from one bag to the other based on volume, weight, and density. A handheld luggage scale makes that process a lot easier. You can get pretty much everything here that you can get in any European country. If a particular brand of some product makes you happy, bring it.
You can get almost every consumer product you need, but there are some brands you can’t get in North Macedonia:
- Glide dental floss
- Diet Coke (they have Coke Zero, but it’s not the same)
- Good knives are hard to find (if you like cooking)
- Some spices are unavailable, like cumin and cilantro
- It took us 8 months to find Sriracha
YOU CAN’T SHIP ANYTHING TO NORTH MACEDONIA!
Shipping from the States takes about six weeks. The customs process is insane and insanely expensive. A volunteer friend had a box shipped from home of personal stuff, and customs charged her $300 to pick it up. They said they based it on weight. I’m betting it was also based on from where it was shipped. Amazon doesn’t ship here. Nobody ships here because of the customs process. It’s convoluted.
12. How has learning the language been?
I learned Macedonian, but for such a small country there are a surprising number of dialects. If you can find the time, learn as much as you can upfront. Some volunteers learn Albanian as well. I’ve been using an app on my phone called Anki (Anki Web and Anki Droid) It’s also available in the Apple Store. It’s basically a flashcard app with algorithms that help you learn facts. Medical students use it a lot. There are tons of tutorials on YouTube about it. I’ve got all my decks online and shareable if you want to use them. I’m trying to clean them up, so they are more usable for new volunteers.
Talk to as many people as possible and use the language as much as possible as early as possible. People love to help you learn the language and they are more patient than you can imagine if you are trying to speak their language.
You can use Google Translate for simple words, but it sucks for more complicated sentence structures. Chat GPT is much better. It’s available for free on Microsoft’s app Copilot.
Don’t try to translate colloquial expressions literally. They are meaningless. For example, if you translate “I’m just winging it” literally, people will think you’re flying away.
Partner-Specific Questions
13. As a PC couple, how has your experience differed from that of individual volunteers?
I think serving as a couple has been easier for us than for the volunteers serving alone. We have each other for company and support, where the individual volunteers are alone and face a great deal of loneliness. For those in the smaller villages, they are the only Americans who live there. The feeling of isolation can be overwhelming. We’ve got each other to talk to and listen to. We can tell each other our frustrations or just converse about our days.
When one of us has a question about some odd Peace Corps requirement or procedure, we can immediately ask, “How did you handle this?” Some Peace Corps processes on their website are, to be polite, ‘interesting’. My initial response to the Volunteer Reporting and Grants website was WTF are they asking for?
When we’re traveling, it’s less scary. One or the other will notice a critical detail like, we’re standing on the wrong platform. The published bus schedules are merely a suggestion, so when we find out at the last minute that the bus won’t be leaving for another six hours, we have someone to hang out with.
When we’re socializing with Host Country Locals it’s less exhausting. Speaking in a foreign language is surprisingly tiring. Sometimes it’s nice to just check out and let your partner carry the conversation. I probably do that more than Ramona. Her language skills are better than mine, although she always disagrees with my assessment.
When scheduling a vacation, we have built-in companionship. We don’t have to look for someone. And we can split up the household duties. Ramona does most of the cooking, while I do most of the dishwashing. Sometimes we switch it up. And if one of us wants to sleep in on Saturday, the other can go to the open market for fruits and vegetables.
Overall, we work well as a team, making living here pretty easy, relatively speaking.
14. Has being a couple affected your integration into the community?
That’s probably the biggest downside to serving as a couple. Since it’s so easy to hang out together, we’re not forced to forge relationships with the locals or other volunteers. Of course, we do, but it’s not our only social outlet. I think that the individual volunteers have gotten closer to each other than we have to them simply because they have to. If they don’t, they’ll only have their host families for interaction.
As a result of that ‘forced integration’ I think their language skills have improved more than ours as well. They have more opportunities to practice than we have because they’ve created them. We try to speak in Macedonian with each other, but we inevitably slip back into English. It’s just easier. I can choose how much I want to speak Macedonian, and I’m pretty lazy. 😊
15. What advice would you give to other couples considering Peace Corps service?
We haven’t had any problems balancing work with our relationship. I think that is a canard, an illusion. Work is what you do. The relationship is the environment in which you do it. We just respect each others’ responsibilities, full stop. If Ramona has to prepare for her English classes, I let her work, or help in any way that I can. If I’m working on a project plan or writing something or on a conference call, Ramona leaves me be. We support each other’s work. That’s the nature of relationships. There’s time to work and time to play as they say.
And we complement each other’s strengths. I’m good at logistics and computers and stuff. Ramona is good at creating and maintaining outside relationships and empathy. We’re both pretty good at writing so we edit each other’s drafts.
This idea of work/life balance was created by people with unrealistic expectations, who are either bad at their jobs or bad at being in a relationship. Sometimes you have to be alone, you know. Sometimes you have to put your head down for as long as it takes and get the job done.
Strangely enough, Ramona and I started dating two years before we left for the Peace Corps. We had never ‘lived’ together before except for some extended road trips in the States. That may sound like we were taking a big risk, but this isn’t the first rodeo for either of us. We’ve both been married a couple of times before and know what’s important. Most importantly, we know what’s NOT important. The ratio is about 1% important to 99% unimportant. I think if couples can keep that in mind and let go of the unimportant things, they’ll be fine.
Other bits of advice: Know yourself, Make an effort to reach out to other volunteers, Make integration into the community a priority, Always be kind to each other, Say thank you a lot.
Impact of Media and Final Thoughts
Jeff Spencer, PC Volunteer https://jeffrey-spencer.medium.com
Exploring life in all its absurdity, finding connections in strangely divergent ideas.
16. How do you think your blog contributes to your overall mission as a Peace Corps volunteer?
I don’t know. I originally thought I might use my blog as the basis of a book, but writing a book is harder than I thought. I’ve decided to just stay with short form essays. I’ve detailed my thoughts and observations and if that helps people, great. But I’m mostly writing it because I like to write. I aspired to keep a diary every day, but I’ve been inconsistent with that. My most popular article is about how I wrote my motivation statement, so I guess it’s making an impact.
Nowadays, people like videos. The Peace Corps is trying to improve its presence in that space, so if that floats your boat, go for it.
17. Any last comments or observations you’d like to pass on to future North Macedonia volunteers?
I hope we get a good group of volunteers coming in over the years. There’s lots of work to do here. And this is a wonderful country to do it in. Feel the fear and do it anyway. You won’t regret it. It’ll be an experience that you cherish and talk about for the rest of your life.
