Americans to underdeveloped areas to
provile American skills and to demonstrate America’s compassion for the less
favored peoples af the earth, Micronesta is the only place in the world rez
by
Americans
to
which
the
Pence
Corps has been dispatched. “The Corpsmen, then, are part of the government
by background and
culture, but at
the same time they are detached from
it and-—in keeping with the present
attitude of young Americans toward
vested authority—often disenchanted
with it. When a Micronesian highschool student wrote, “We find that
the United States leads us in the right
way,” lus Peace Corps teacher serb-
bled on the margin, “fAre you sure?”
When another student wrote, “Palau
has beautiful things and big trucks and
cars,” Ais Peace Corps teacher queried,
“Why are trucks and cars beaunfulf”
Before the Peace Corps arrived, most
Micronesian youngsters attending a
Western movie tended to root for the
cowboys; Corpsinen have been trying
to convince them that their sympathies
should more logically belong with the
Indians. The majority of the volunteers have had a decidedly beneficial
effect on the region. Some of ‘them,
perhaps slightly misled by rec ruitin g
literature, thought they were going
toa trangail, palmy paradise and
brought surfboards alang, “They have
all had one indisputable edge on the
other Americans in the region: itis part
of their traming to acquire a working
knowledge of the language of the area
to which they are assigned, so each of
them speaks Palauan, Yapese, or whatever, More of them have been stationed on remote outer ishiuids—where
provisions and mail may arrive only
every few months—-than any ether
Americans have ever been, Wherever
the volunteers have stayed, they have
hived—far fromidyliically, by Western
standards—as the
Micranesians live,
often sharing native homes and subsisting largely on rice and fish; among
many of the Corpsmen it is considered
a badge of honor to have intestinal parasites. Several volunteers have married
Micronesians and have gone native to
an extent undreamed of by much of
the local popwation. With the combined advent of the Peace Corps and
the Congress of Micronesia, there has
come
to
the
Pan
wilt
oe
merical
who dics been chere a done time calls
“the era of eriueism and challenge.”
This may be the greatest recent change
in Micronesia.
itevervwhere.
ralers of the
INSGINeE, Ve
One finds indications of
Phe traditional mative
Marshall [shinds, for
highborn chiefs called
5013
irot}. The Trust Terntory administration has alwavs courted the good will 03
the soz, wha can be stubborn but can
also serve as useful middlemen between
the government and the people. The
Peace Corpsmen, though, have been
openly questioning whether an autocratic
leadership system can coexist with
democracy, and the effect of their
skepticism was evident ina Majuro bar
one night recently when a young Marshallese said something that would have
been publicly unutterable ive years ago.
Hesaid, “The hell with the wor!”
Some of the most diligent Peace
Corpsmen find their own success unsettling. “The trouble with our being
here under an American adninistration
is that the more we're accepted the
more palatable aff Americans become,”
one of them told ine. ‘So the better
a volunteer one is the more one does
to lay the groundwork for a less ad-
mirable American presenee.” The virtual vow of poverty that the volunteers
take when they sign up doesn’t bother
them much in most countries where
the Corps has operated. In Micronesia,
though, Corpsmen sometimes find
themselves working alongside Americans who are doing the same jobs for
comparatively princely pay. Moreover,
the “Trust Territory admuinistracon,
which ts constantly squeezed for funds,
has on a few occasions simply used
Peace Carps volunteers co All job apen-
Ings
that
were
budgeted ar a
high
salary, and spent the savings clsewhere.
It is a shtuation that puts altruism to 32
severe cost,
There have been Peace Corpsmen
of all sorts in Micronesia: lawyers, doc-
tors, architects, business specialists, hota-
nists-—one of the last aaking a survey
of medicinal plants, another studying
the ecology of mangrove swamps. In
the Afarshatls, where many of che
women are stout, especially thase who
have had seven or eight children, wemen volunteers have conducted reducing
classes; the shy natives insise that these
be held
behind
drawn curtains, lest
the men scoff at them while they grunt
and strains in pursuit of the svelte
American dream. In 1969, on the
initiative of Peace Corpsmen, the first
MicrOlympic Games were held, on
Saipan. Tt was an event that did as
much to bind the diffuse area together
as auything since the inception of the
Coneress nf A foe ronenint. “Vhe individual
star was a Ponapean distance runner,
who won four 2gold medals, includingvy
one for the 6.2-mile race, despite casual
pauses between laps for puffs en spec-
tarors’ clearetres. Elis proud compatriots
sent him to a winter martha in