Week 58: Monday September 30, 2024 – October 6, 2024

Good afternoon, my dedicated readers,

As some of you may have already picked up on in my last couple of newsletters—and for those of you whom I have spoken to directly—this has been a difficult period of time for me in my service. If I'm being honest, it's been so challenging that I've even been considering leaving service early and finding a job in the U.S.

It's not that anything bad has happened, per se. But I've found myself feeling like my service no longer has meaning and that I'm no longer making an impact on my community. I think a lot of that has to do with my own personal feelings of burnout and the general culture of the community of not participating in activities outside of the home, which have made for a challenging combination. That, and being physically and socially isolated a lot of the time. 

Well, after speaking with a number of you—and I am so so grateful for all of the advice I have received—I have decided to stay in the Peace Corps and try to make the best of things. 

I know I still have the option to leave if I really am struggling and there's clearly nothing else I can do in my community, but I'm going to put in the effort and re-build my service from scratch. I'm going to think of this time as a reset—a time to feel renewed and give service another go. 

Don't get me wrong, service is hard. And I think a lot of volunteers struggle with service. I honestly think it's an inherent a flaw in the Peace Corps method. To take a group of fresh-out-of-college individuals and throw them into the deep end. Well, I guess the only thing to do then is to learn how to swim, which is what I believe I am trying to do.

I have one year to go! Just one year. I know I can do it. 

I am confident that I will accomplish my first cistern project by the end of this year. Things are finally moving along with the process and I'm hoping to be able to start building by the week of the 21st of October (fingers crossed). 

I am going to be innovative and start up some new initiatives in the community like a biodiversity monitoring club to continue the work I have done on species identification. The hope is to get a solid group of individuals (youth and adults) interested in the rich biodiversity of the land they live on.

I'm considering starting a music group to foster more of a culture around the traditional music of the region, which relies heavily on the violin, and to put to use more of my skills that I have spent so much of my life cultivating. As of right now, there is no formal music class here in the community and I believe this could be something incredibly beneficial to the people and the preservation of their culture. 

I'm also going to go back to teaching in the elementary school as well as the high school, which I have already begun teaching in. I was looking last night, and there are so many environmental holidays celebrated throughout the year. Instead of trying to sequence my classes in the elementary school in a particular order, I'm going to base my classes off of the theme of each holiday or celebration. I think that will make things interesting for both me and my students. 

And after finishing my cistern project, I hope to start applying for another grant to finish out my second year with.

This is the official beginning of my second year of service. By next October, I will have completed my two years of service and I will be ready to come home to all of you and spend a good few months figuring out what I want to do next.

So that's my update for this week. Nothing too fancy to share with you all, but something to hold myself accountable to.

Now, I have an ask of all of you: if you have any photos of me with you in your camera roll, will you please send them to me via email or mail? I want to decorate my room with pictures of the people I love so I can keep myself motivated this next year. 

If you want to send the physical photos, you can send them to this address:

Ilana Hirschfeld
Av. Universidad No. 202 Ote
Col. San Javier CP 76020
Querétaro, Quéretaro, México

I can't wait to see all of the wonderful pictures you have of us through the years. 

Thank you for reading! As always, I am so grateful for your support. 

Love,
Ilana

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