So who am I
anyways?
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Well, aside
from being your typical Environmental Action Peace Corps Volunteer that loves
the smell of fresh compost in the morning, teaching children 10 different ways
they can re-use a plastic bag, and trying to stop an irrevocable forest fire,
I’m just a normal guy. I mean… I love
watching football and devouring pizza, jamming on the guitar, playing soccer
and going skateboarding, and hanging out with friends.
Not personal
enough? – I also secretly enjoy popping bubble-wrap, making Mint Oreo cheesecakes,
reading books that cause me to question the way I think about life, and going
on long hikes through uncharted territory.
I grew up in
the bustling metropolis of the Quad-Cities (can you name all four of them?) in
the vast state of Iowa, where I spent surprisingly little time walking through
corn fields. After graduating from
Davenport Central High School, I attended the University of Iowa and earned a
major in Civil & Environmental Engineering and a minor in French. While
in college, I spent much of my time outside of class playing competitive
Ultimate Frisbee and recreational soccer, undertaking environmentally oriented
projects through UI’s chapter of Engineers for a Sustainable World, designing and
welding model bridges for ASCE Steel Bridge Competitions, and building actual
footbridges for communities in Zambia and Nicaragua. I also held a variety of jobs, ranging from
landscaper extraordinaire to plant & wildlife research ranch work-hand to city
christmas-tree composting collector to bottled-water water quality researcher.
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| A group of engineering students from the University of Iowa that I worked with building footbridges in Zambia and Nicaragua. This bridge connects the villages of Linda and Libuya in Zambia |
Now, I’m a
Peace Corps Volunteer in Benin, West Africa.
For the past 15 months, I’ve been living in the rural village of Miniki,
in the Collines Department, nestled behind one of the largest mini-mountains in
the country. I live at the same level as
members within my community; meaning that I do not have electricity or running
water, cell-phone service is inconsistent and hard-to-find, and cooking interesting dishes
requires one to be pretty creative with the limited number of ingredients
available. Along with these challenges
come the advantages of living in the middle of a breathtaking forest, the
ability to practice and learn several new languages, getting used to a slower
and more relaxed pace of life, and becoming part of an entirely different
culture. When working, I spend most of
my time alongside farmers and agricultural groups. My main projects hinge around promoting
small-scale gardening, and my routine activities involve volunteering at the local health center during
baby vaccination days and holding English and environmental clubs at the nearby secondary school.
If you want to
read more about any of the specific projects I’m working on, click on the links below.
