There and Back Again

A week and a half ago, we were all assured that Peace Corps Moldova had almost no chance at all of ever being evacuated, now I am sitting at home in Kansas.

-30 Hours: I am on a bus to Cahul, the farthest district from my home located in the Southwest of Moldova. I decide to capitalize on a three-day weekend to make my first visit to some friends in the south, who are so far away you can only visit on such a weekend. All the volunteers in Moldova receive an email from the country director saying that we were now on alert due to the coronavirus situation (we received word that week the first cases had arrived in Moldova), saying travel is discouraged and that we should be prepared for higher levels of our action plan. Having received the news last week that our chances of evacuating were zero to none and that I was almost halfway to my destination (a good four hours away from my village), I decide to continue on my journey.

-16 Hours: I arrive at my friend Maddie’s village down in the very South of Moldova. We take a walk, throw a football, eat supper with her host family, then go to chill in her room. It was there we received news from a volunteer who just had to leave the country for a funeral that there was a 99% chance we were going to be evacuated. Although Maddie was not shocked about this due to her experience with these kind of situations in other countries, it came as a complete shock to me. So, we did what most all of the other volunteers did at that point: we called friends, gave a preliminary heads up to family and partners, waited for official staff confirmation, took a walk, and tried to finish all the alcohol that was lying around which would not fit in the suitcase home.

-3 Hours: Maddie and I hop on the bus to the district center to meet up with Hannah and spend some time as we waited for the official news. It was still very surreal to me as we chatted and sat in an open-air pavilion with some drinks, olives, and a banana. We receive an email to remain at site and not leave.

0 Hours: We receive the official email from the country director confirming our evacuation. No details are given at this point and with the little information we had, we assumed we would probably leave our sites on Wednesday. Since I was already in the South and have no idea whether or not I will ever come back, I ask Hannah if I can spend the night with her host family and see her site before I go back to site. She calls them up, we tell them it is my birthday to increase the likelihood of me getting to come, and we get permission for me to stay with her host uncle for the night. I make calls to my family, host family, and partners to inform them of the news. We stay at the bar until the last bus back to our villages were heading out. We get on.

Hour 4: We make it to Hannah’s village and take a walk around as we try and process the news.

“I don’t want to leave.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“I just don’t want to go.”

“Yeah.”

There is not much else to say. Meanwhile, the timeline for evacuation is getting sped up at an alarming rate. Wednesday got pushed to Tuesday. Tuesday to Monday afternoon. Monday afternoon to Monday morning. Hannah had not yet told her family and we decided to go back and try and have one last normal evening.

Hour 7: Due to the rapid acceleration of events, Hannah goes ahead and tells her family. The rest of the evening held a lot of emotions and silence as we all process. We make mulled wine, eat supper, then engage in the nightly rituals of watching the news (featuring a news anchor from their commune) and eating sunflower seeds while sucking on a berry-flavored candy. Mild panic sets in for me as I have to travel nine hours in the morning back to my village and both transport in the capital (where I pass through) and the bus that normally leaves in the morning were shutting down. We decide the best course of action is for me to ride with Hannah’s host uncle in the morning to a village along the main road and try and flag down a bus coming from the district center if any are circulating.

Hour 15: I wake up at 4:45am to ride with Hannah and her uncle to where we will wait for the bus. Despite the recent lovely whether, it is freezing cold outside. Every time we see a vehicle approaching, we get out to see if it’s the bus, then when it is not, we run back in the car to stay warm. Luckily, I am able to catch a bus after only 20 minutes of waiting.

Hour 19: I arrive in the capital and am picked up by my Moldovan friend Dani who drives me from the South bus station to the North bus station. I cry as I get out of the car because I know I will not get a proper chance to say goodbye to him, his wife, or his parents, all of whom I am super close with and have taken such good care of me since I got to Moldova. Hop on a bus to my district center and leave within 30 minutes. I call to arrange transportation to our consolidation point from my partner.

Hour 24: After hopping off my bus and running to buy a new phone charger (which I left in the South) and pull money from the ATM, I rush to catch the bus to my village, which fortunately that day is being driven by my host sister-in-law’s father who I am rather fond of. I make it back to my house with 2% battery. I had been doing fine holding back the tears until I saw my host family at which point the tears just came rolling down. They looked at me and said, “Sean, don’t cry. You’re a big boy. Remember, there is nothing more beautiful in the world than going home.” They insisted it would be temporary and I would find my way back some day. If not, I would have beautiful memories that will last a lifetime. This came from the culture that has spent most of their life away from their family and friends, they understand, they have said more goodbyes than people should have to say in their lives. At this point, I am not handling the tears well and run back into my room because I only have the afternoon to pack.

Hour 26: The longest come-and-go meal I have ever attended begins. I had asked my mother if we could have an open house for people to come and say goodbye, which was fabulous, but left me scrambling to pack amidst the shots and guests. Our godfamily came who I am very fond of the entire afternoon/evening to help serve and clean, I cried when they arrived and left. My host dad brings the baby lamb into the house to show me, it had just been born on Friday when I left. Next my partner and his family come over. Next a group of volunteers from my center who give me a card and sing. Next a group of girls from my middle school English club. At this point we are breaking all social distancing guidelines and I think we have around 20 people around the table. We play a game where I ask them a question about me to see if they know it or not. My host mom is typical fashion demands a song, so one of the volunteers sings, and then they all head out the door. At this point I bunker down and pack my bags.

Hour 34: I thought no one else was coming until I my host dad comes in around 10pm and tells me I still had two visitors. My godfamily’s eldest kid comes with her husband and they give me this cute rabbit with really long ears that is holding a heart which says, “Ion and Maria.” They leave a little after 11 and I save the 10 minutes of packing I still have for the morning. Thank goodness I have drank some wine otherwise I would not have fallen asleep at all.

Hour 42: I can’t sleep much so I wake up quite early, finish my bags, and head on a walk to the top of the hill where I can see my entire village. I am going to miss this view and the fresh morning air. I get back, eat one last breakfast with my host family, and I wait for my partner to arrive with the van. My host dad packs a bottle of wine and my host mother some bread and chicken for the road.

Hour 44: My partner picks me up and I say goodbyes to my host parents. Although putting on happy faces, I know they are crying as I drive away. We head to my community center where I say goodbye to my coworkers, find out the charter plane is supposed to be picking us up at 11:30pm this evening, then we head to the district center to pick up Dylan (another volunteer) and exchange money. We then head to our consolidation point.

Hour 45: We reach our consolidation point to meet James, Seth, Katie, Paige, Emma, Harrison, and Marian. I say goodbye to my partner, and we wait to be picked up by our bus, throwing a football to pass the time. The bus arrives 30 minutes late and by the time it is all packed up it is an hour and a half pasted when we were supposed to take off. We head to the next consolidation site to pick up other volunteers.

Hour 48: We arrive in the village where the others are consolidated to find that we don’t actually know how to get to that house. We spend 15 minutes driving around the town before finding them. One of the frustrating things about this whole process is that everyone always underestimates how much luggage there will be, even though they know exactly how much we have. Each volunteer gets two checked bags, a carry on, a personal item, and a 15-gallon garbage bag’s worth of Peace Corps issued material. Multiply that by even the 14 of us in this bus and that is really a ridiculous amount of luggage. Emotions are already beginning to run high and we all pretty much don’t say much the entire ride back to the capital.

Hour 50: We arrive at the hotel as the last group to arrive and are told to go straight up stairs to eat because lunch closes in 10 minutes. There is not much left, and I am not really in the mood to eat, so I go get my suitcases, get them to my room, then get called down to head to the Peace Corps office.

Hour 52: The Peace Corps office is some kind of organized chaos. Each department has set up stations for volunteers to do abbreviated off-boarding procedures. Lines are long, stress is high, and everyone just wants to get out. They ensure my group that the full intention is for us to come back and complete our service. We attempt to have an abbreviated COS (close of service) ceremony and take pictures ringing the COS bell. I ring the bell with my training village cohort, and we put a sign over the bell so instead of COS it reads, “hallway there.” They had each of our partners write us a parting letter and hand them out when we are ringing the bell. After some miscommunication and taking an extra round trip to the hotel, I am the very last to leave the Peace Corps office and head to supper. The hotel staff are not quite sure at this point how much food to cook and so when I get to supper the food is pretty much gone.

Hour 60: The plane was supposed to be in at 11:30pm but got delayed. We are told that the current plan is to have a plane flying in from Jordan pick us up and take us back to Jordan, where then we would fly to California, then to DC, and then to our home of record. There is still a chance the plane will get in tonight, we were are sent to our rooms on-call, saying we need to be able to mobilize within an hour should we hear the plane has taken off. Needless to say, no one is getting any sleep as any buzz from the phone in the slightest had us jumping up to see if we were leaving. Finally, around 2:30 we get the official word that we can go to sleep because the plane is not coming tonight. Later we will find out this is because the Moldovan government was not prepared to reopen the airspace after it officially closed at midnight to all commercial flights.

Hour 66: We wake up to a message from our director of training and programming (DTP) who informed us that the flight would not be coming until 6pm tonight and we could enjoy a restful morning with breakfast. Of course, when we get to breakfast, they inform us that the flight is indeed about to takeoff and we need to get to the airport ASAP. Organized chaos then ensues as everyone rushes to pack their bags and get them loaded on the bus.

Hour 71: We get to the airport to get the buses stopped at the entrance. We hang tight for a few minutes before they release us onto the convenient park at the entrance to the airport. It is beautiful weather and we all enjoy our time out and about as we are not allowed to enter the airport. The plane is on the runway in Jordan and we are just waiting to get confirmation of takeoff. I had weekly calls to various people and wrote some appreciation notes and talked to various groups. We order 80 pizzas for a picnic (not eight as the person taking the order needed to clarify). We all flee to the buses when we found out the news station had arrived, and we did not want the bad press of 80 Americans openly breaking Moldovan law (which prohibited gatherings of 50 or more people at this point). We find out later they were just coming to do a story on the closed airport when they saw us there, and actually thought we were all Italians. After our country director (CD) tried to do an interview, we head back to the pub at the hotel to eat the pizza.

Hour 75: We devour the pizza because we have not eaten since breakfast. We are informed that the plane is still on the runway and the plan is to fly to Kosovo, change planes and pick up the volunteers there, and then fly to DC. We go back to our rooms for a little bit, then pretty much turn straight back around and get supper (which features leftover pizza for those who want it). We do not unload the bus because we are still planning on leaving tonight.

Hour 79: Stress and anxiety are running high as we still have no word on when/if the plane is coming. I have a rather unfortunate encounter and argument with a dear friend, mostly stemming from me not thinking through what I say and do. Situations like these should never be excuses to be a crappy friend. I hope time will heal what trust has been lost.

Hour 84: Go to lobby at appointed time for bus to leave, only to find out the plane is still on the runway and could take off in 5-45 minutes. We go back to our rooms until we finally get word around 2:30am that nothing will be happening tonight at all. We will find out later that the Jordanian Ministry of Health did not clear the flight crew to fly because they did not get the international required amount of sleep. I call a few friends and barely get any sleep at all.

Hour 92: We wake up to a message that so far nothing is planned for today as far as a plane leaving, so we can really take some time to relax. Everyone sleeps in and eats breakfast at their leisure, though no one is in a real mood to chat, including myself. People just wander to different rooms and try to find ways to manage stress and anxiety while filling the time.

Hour 97: We all gather for an update. There are no confirmed plans at this time, but we are all informed that everyone is doing everything possible to make sure we get home, which will 100% happen. They are considering routes by land, air, and sea. The other best option at this point is to charter a flight to Istanbul and then fly commercial from there. We are reminded to be grateful how taken care of we are as there are many Americans with no recourse for getting home and to be careful on posting any thing about the evacuation to social media. Moldova has also declared a state of emergency so we have special presidential permission to be in the hotel, the staff have the same permission to work, and gatherings of groups of more than three are prohibited. We leave the meeting feeling good and prepared to relax a little in the afternoon.

Hour 99: We get a message for all my cohort to get to the pub ASAP for a meeting with the medical officer (PCMO). The PCMO informs us that we are being COS’d, which normally means you are not coming back at all, and that we need to fill out this paperwork for her right now to ensure we will have all we need for medical exams back in the States. Someone calls the DPT and CD who both know nothing of this new development (the PCMO has a different, direct line of communication with HQ in DC). This was when, please excuse my lack of a better term, shit hit the fan. Emotions are running high, confusion and chaos ensue. I fill out my forms and go to my room and shut the door to wait out this storm. Some people start to drink heavily, others are crying, while others are running up and down the halls swearing profusely.

Hour 100: The CD and DPT arrive to the hotel and the CD gives us a fuller picture of the situation. Yes, we are being terminated as volunteers and given alumni status. This allows us to receive Peace Corps scholarships and is better on the resume. HQ did not have the support system to put 7,500 volunteers on an administrative hold. There is an option to be reinstated but when and how that will look is still undetermined. We all eat supper in somber spirits, feeling partially better after the clarification, but still not great. People are having mixed feelings about the idea of returning.

Hour 104: Despite all that has happened up to this point, we decide to proceed to our previously planned evening activities. Two married volunteers have a renewal of vows ceremony, with toilet paper streamers, condoms thrown on the ground instead of flower petals, and with all guests in their hotel issued bathrobes. It was a beautiful ceremony officiated by a volunteer who is a minister. We then have a reception with cake and dancing. The staff have also put together a small COS video and they say a few speeches. I then attend a karaoke night where I sing a little to much, loud, and offkey, but at least you cannot fault me for lack of energy. We receive the wonderful news that a plane from Dubai is actually in the air and on the way to Moldova, and we will be leaving tomorrow.

Hour 116: We sleep in and go down to breakfast where we find the flight crew from the plane eating with us (since we are the only hotel in the country open). We still do not know our exact flight time but everyone goes and hangs out in various rooms. Some people get tattoos, some do puzzles, and Piper, Richard, I end up hanging out with Linda who shared some of her amazing life stories and gave us some free chiropractic counseling.

Hour 124: Of course, for how long we have now been waiting the end will have to be rushed. We get the message at 4pm that the plane will be leaving at 7pm. We will be flying through Iceland because the Moldovan runway is too small for us to leave with a full tank of fuel. People rush back to their rooms to put their bags down in the hallway and get to the bus. We are given masks, gloves, and antibacterial wipes as we load the buses. We clap at every stage of the journey. We clap when we get on the bus. We clap when the bus left the hotel, we clap when we get to the airport. The airport is open specifically for us as the airport is closed but it still takes a lot of time to check all the bags and get through security. We get everyone through, do roll call, and are all ready to load the plane when we find out we will be delayed by over an hour as they prepare food for the trip. At this point, I just want to be on the plane, food or not. We all chill in the lounge until the plane is ready and then we load. The nice thing about a private plane is that no one cares where you sit, so that is nice.

Hour 130: The plane leaves Moldova for Iceland. We clap as it takes off. Supper is served and then we all doze off until we land in Iceland. Surprise, surprise, our 25 minutes refuel time turns into an hour and a half. We then get on the way and head to DC.

Hour 142: We arrive in DC. HQ had been making our flight itineraries all night and so many people do not know what time their flights are as we land in DC. We land at 4:30am and a majority of the flights are at 8am. We had read that sometimes health screening/customs is taking around 4-8 hours these days, so everyone is stressed about making their flights. Thankfully no one else is in the airport at 4:30am and we all get through customs and security easily in time for 8am flights. I meet a girl waiting for the plane to KC who is evacuating from Peace Corps Georgia. We share stories, I eat a pulled pork breakfast burrito and drink diet Pepsi to commemorate arriving in the States. We board the plane.

Hour 150: I arrive back in KC and am picked up my dad. My evacuation is over.

Thank you for all of your thoughts and prayers during this time. A huge shout our to Peace Corps Moldova staff who supported us like crazy throughout this time and slept even less than we did. God is good, and I am home.