Just a few days before the stunning U.S. election, I received a message out of the blue that confirmed something Peace Corps told us during our training: You never know whose life you may touch, no matter what happens in the wider world.
The message came from Signor Rana, one of my students when I taught English at a school near Kathmandu as a Peace Corps volunteer four decades ago, long before I began serving again in Moldova.
It came to me on Facebook: “Hi, are you the same David Jarmul who was peace corp volunteer back in late 70 in Nepal? Remember Lab times in lab school? I was one of your student? I was looking for you since 1988.”
Of course I remembered the Lab Times, the wall newspaper I started at the school, but I didn’t remember Signor — one of several hundred students I had there and in Champa’s village, Ilam. Still, I wrote him back, and he responded quickly.
“Wow, I was looking for you since I came to US as a student back in 1989,” he replied, describing how he is now married, living in Maryland and working as a software engineer for the federal government.
“You used to tell a story of America and show us moon landing documentary and made me participate in play Snow White. That made me dream of America and came here. You do plant a seed on a boy who was 10 years old. Thanks for helping me. Please let me know when you visiting back to US.”
Coincidentally, I’d responded just a few days earlier to another unexpected message, this one from Australia. It was from the son of a friend of mine from Ilam.
Perhaps there were others, too. I don’t really know. Neither do most other Peace Corps volunteers who completed their service years ago.
Signor’s timing could hardly have been more auspicious. His was like a message in a bottle, washing ashore just when I needed to discover it.
It reminded me that no matter what happens in politics, we all have the power to make a difference in some lives, even if our impact is not revealed until years later, if ever. That remains true today for the nearly 7,000 other Peace Corps volunteers and trainees serving around the world, in more than 60 countries. As it has for more than 50 years, the Peace Corps touches lives every day, with strong bipartisan support from Republicans and Democrats alike.
That’s a fact worth treasuring at a moment when our country is struggling to heal after a bitter presidential campaign. Indeed, perhaps some of the lives that need touching right now are Americans who feel uncertain about the future.
I don’t mean the election’s results don’t matter. They do, profoundly, and I will be watching what happens along with everyone else. But as someone who is old enough to have lived through presidents from both parties who did both good and bad things, I choose to take the counsel of our current leader: The sun will still rise tomorrow. We can still find meaning in our own lives. We can still make the world a better place.
No matter whether we are abroad or back home, in the Peace Corps or among our neighbors, regardless of politics, we can all try to touch lives or, as Signor put it, to plant seeds.
Sometimes they will bloom. You never know.
(That’s him in the photo.) Beside him was another friend, filming the event. Ludmila remained backstage until her collection, “Autumn Dream,” was finished, then appeared with one of the models to receive a bouquet of flowers and walk the runway to applause.
That’s a message more young people, especially girls, need to hear in our own country, Moldova and around the world. Coding is an increasingly essential skill. Especially in poorer countries, it can open the door to participating in the global economy. Here in Moldova, older girls can also take part in 
I’ve never been to the Met in New York but I’m guessing it costs slightly more.
Here in Moldova, though, people are still using bulletin boards, often located near bus stops. Those looking to sell or rent their property post advertisements in Romanian or Russian, Moldova’s two main languages. Most of the signs are printed simply in black and white, with no photos or graphics. Some are scrawled by hand. Within a few days or after a storm, they start drooping.
Champa and I have learned about all of this over the past few days as we’ve begun searching for an apartment ourselves. We’ve loved staying with our host family in Ialoveni, where we’ve been renting the second floor of their house. This past Saturday, we hosted our first dinner party, with several other Peace Corps volunteers who came from neighboring towns. Unfortunately, the family needs to reclaim the second floor, so we’re now actively looking for a new home.
Dumitru Guzun and his partner opened the factory last year above a market in the town of Criuleni. My Peace Corps group stopped by for a look on Monday afternoon.
As Dumitru showed us around, his eight employees barely looked up from their sewing machines and other duties. They were racing to fill an order. The company is doing well but, as Moldova’s first jeans brand, it faces intense global competition. It recently turned to a new Moldovan
One woman we know is raising two energetic kids while her husband works abroad. In another family, the daughter and her husband are working abroad part-time, with two school-age girls at home. When Champa and I were sitting outside at a cafe, a guy sat beside us, said he was on a break from his job in England and asked whether we could help him get a green card to America. Lots of people want green cards. A work colleague told me he applied but didn’t get one. Someone I know through Peace Corps told me he wants one, too. One reason many adults are keen to learn English is to help them find employment abroad.
I’ve illustrated this blog post with some of the signs you see across Moldova. They’re from employment companies promoting legal jobs abroad. Every piece of paper torn from the bottom of a poster represents another person who may be leaving Moldova.
