The Beyond War award was given to Peace Corps over two decades ago and I found this video very fascinating and relevant for today. As dorky as the video style seemed at times, I tried to keep in mind that our fanciest stuff today will look just as dorky two decades from now. Yes you, with that 2010 hairdo...
I really enjoyed when former Peace Corps Director Loret Miller Ruppe said Peace Corps Volunteers are “thousands of the most individualistic, self-reliant, adventurous, motivated, dedicated, idealistic Americans on the face of the earth.” I agree completely. Also, former Director of the NPCA, Katy Hansen is right when she said, “They say if you get 3 RPCVs in a room at any one time there will be at least 4 different opinions on any one subject.” When you mixed individualism and energy together, they you go.
However, maybe my favorite comments came from the interview with Sargent Shriver:
"Volunteers go overseas not merely as willing and skilled workers, but as representatives, as living examples, of the most powerful idea of all: the idea that free and committed men and women can cross, even transcend, boundaries of culture and language, of alien tradition and great disparities of wealth, of old hostilities and new nationalisms, to meet with other men and women on the common ground of service to human welfare and human dignity."
I always really enjoy Sargent Shriver's words. You will probably see more and more of them here over the coming months. At the end of the video there was a very fitting comment: "Service to humanity is the highest possible service to one's nation and one's world," said Director Loret Miller Ruppe in closing, "To learn peace, to live peace and to labor for peace from the beginning of our service until the end of our lives." I encourage you to watch the full video below if you can.
