Tuesday, November 1, 2011

Early Termination

Last week, the other PCV who had been living here in my town decided to ET (early terminate), that is, he decided to stop being a PCV early, and return to the USA. During the few days between when he decided on early termination of service and when he left town, when speaking with me and also with others, he most frequently cited his relatively poor language skills as why he decided to ET. I suppose that I will admit that his Darija, that is, his Moroccan Arabic, wasn't the best I've encountered in other PCVs.

However, there are a variety of ways in which one can be effective as a PCV. Here in Morocco, enough kids, teachers and other community members know enough English that one can help a good number of Moroccans using English. One can also do work in the community which involves little or no speaking. Given these options, in combination with what he told me about himself, I was reminded of the maxim that to be capable of attaining things, one must believe that one is capable of attaining them. One must have hope, faith and confidence. Without those qualities, whatever one tries to do becomes that much more difficult.

Having said all of this, I must say that I am not in a position to judge his decision. While I would have preferred that he stay here, I'm just simply not positioned to assess even whether his decision was the correct one. He makes his own decisions. Furthermore, I don't know what God has in mind for him. He may be back in the USA now to help fulfill an important purpose there.

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