1. Azerbaijan Azerbaijani Bride

    During my traditional Azerbaijani wedding my husband and I broke the rules and smiled American style! Traditionally, no one smiles in wedding photos in this post soviet country, but we couldn't help but just combine our styles!

  2. Azerbaijan Azerbaijani Meal

    In Azerbaijan us PCV's use the word 'guest' as a verb, and 'going guesting' usually involves visiting an HCN's house, bringing them a small gift, having many cups of tea, and being greeted with a LOT of delicious food! Pictured here are: fresh cucumbers and tomatoes, an assortment of pickled items, stoliçni (an Azerbaijan potato salad), uç bacı dolması (three sister dolma, which is stuffed eggplant, tomato, and pepper), and a fresh pasta & chicken dish whose name I forget.

  3. Azerbaijan A PCV Christmas

    One of the volunteers had a birthday a few days before Christmas, and a bunch of his HCN friends threw him a party at a local restaurant, complete with a Christmas tree! We gathered in front of the tree with the local Şaxta Baba (Azerbaijan's version of Santa Claus) for a PCV family photo. (Please Note that Santa Claus is smoking hookah, haha.)

  4. Bulgaria Merry Christmas!

    Getting ready to celebrate with their annual Christmas program, 5 kindergarteners at the Roma kindergarten in Samokov Bulgaria stop for a photo op while sporting their new Santa hats! 

  5. The Gambia Joankunda

    Joankunda was the head wife of my host family. She was the one who understood me before anyone else did. After twenty-five years away from each other, we still had a strong bond.

  6. Morocco Christmas Cake!!

    My back was acting up and it was bone chilling cold, both, outside and in my Moroccan host family’s home on Christmas day in 2006.  I hadn’t planned on doing anything to celebrate Christmas.  My host family was not home.  I was just hanging out with a hot water bottle and a book when a fellow PCV phoned to say that he was outside in the street---he had something for me.  Andrew (who created thirdgoal.org) lived an hour or two from me and had been in country a year longer than I.  I went outsi...

  7. Georgia a merry christmas, or something like it

    This was my second Christmas in a foreign land, a land where Christmas is on an entirely different day, so the locals make nothing of it.  But to be honest, I never get into a holiday spirit anyway.  Holidays are something that I like to believe don’t really affect me, though they might affect my relations with other people and the going-ons around me.  They make for themes to parties, but they don’t give me any sense of meaning or reality, no stability of philosophy or character.  Character...

  8. Bulgaria The Joy of Life

    Me with a group of kids from the village where I live.

  9. Bulgaria HIV/AIDS Poster

    Two peer educators making an HIV/AIDS awareness and prevention poster for World AIDS Day.

  10. Bulgaria AIDS Is Not A Game

    Two peer educators conducting an HIV/AIDS Jeopardy game during a World AIDS Day celebration.

Countdown to Weekly Contest Deadline!

“Sunset at the Railroad” by PCV Nicholas Baylor Hall. Namibia, 2011.