Goals

I decided to start this blog to be a way to tell my story to a wider audience. I email friends and family with updates, but I felt large chunks of it would be fine for wider reading, and I feel like it’s a “next stage” to the volunteering I’ve been doing. I am seeking to do maximum good while I’m out there, and I think failing to be a part of the narrative- failing to add my own bit to the chorus- does a small disservice to the projects I’m doing. They’re amazing, interesting, and challenging, and should be talked about in case it helps someone else get the gumption to do similar. It can be life-changing.

Besides those lofty big-picture principles of writing, I’ll be happy enough if what I write stays a) truthful, b) informative, and c) interesting. An ambitious final goal is that it will d) inspire good actions in others. I’ve been a part of some cool things, and you can as well.

I’ll write this largely in the voice of someone introducing himself to strangers, though like most of my writings,I suspect its primary consumers will be blood relatives of mine and people already “on the hook,” friendship-speaking, with keeping up with my goings-on. May my friends and family forgive me as I speak in an aloof voice for the imaginary new folks I’m manifesting into readers!

In my first act of sticking with Goal A (truthfulness), I’ll say that I’ve also started this blog so I have a consistent point of information for people who may support me or my projects financially. I feel like some transparency, and updates, are only fair for people who’ve gone through the sacrifice of supporting me. Furthermore, I’d love it if my story inspires new people to support me. A friend and I kind of joked about it- that I am somewhat like an Avatar of the will of people who donate. Not everyone’s schedules or life stages allow for volunteering, but donated money allows me to enact peoples’ wills in their stead. I hope to use this blog to reach a wider audience of people who may wish to be a part of this “avatar” idea- which goes both ways. The blog may be your eyes and ears to see what’s going on in corners of the world as I record what I see.

Getting onto Goal B, being informative, this blog will be the story of me- the Wandering Farmer, as I’ll alias myself- as I volunteer around on my “gap year.” I’ll try to provide some illumination on the countries I’m in, but I’m no journalist and wouldn’t want to falsely present as one. I can largely just report what’s in front of my eyes. I’m widely read in history, psychology, and all the big-picture non-fiction I can gobble up, so I think I’ll have some interesting perspectives to share (Goal C), but again, I won’t be a journalist- I’ll just be me.

At 35, it’s not the usual timing for a gap year, and the details of how this came to pass will come out over time. I was farming as of 9 months ago. It was a bohemian rejection of the other path I’d laid out for myself, when I got my Bachelor’s a decade and a half ago, in teaching English to speakers of other languages.

A common thing (especially, it seems, in the American Northeast,) is to get yourself a Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in nearly anything- could be liberal arts or a hard science, doesn’t matter- and promptly start yourself a postage-stamp sized sustainable farm of some kind. You get to contemplate the big mysteries of life while whittling away at to-do lists that look exactly like one an ancient Sumerian could’ve had several millennia ago- “trim the goat hooves, hoe the beans, don’t forget to buy wheat seed at next market day.” It’s fun, stimulating in its own way.

I did that for about a decade and a half, as mentioned, before I had a resurgent case of the travel bug. I had WWOOFed (volunteered on farms for room and board) in Europe in 2012, and so I have travel in my DNA, but it had lain dormant a while.

Middle of last year, I weighed the opportunity costs of farming, with my other hobbies and interests, and decided it was time to explore other options that would allow the travel DNA to express itself. I also had closely followed the news in Ukraine for that whole year, and my itch for volunteerism was also weighing heavy on my mind.

So, the months whiled away last year, as I worked to wrap up each farm project one by one, and I frantically searched the internet for a way to help Ukrainians in Europe. I narrowed down my searches to “help Ukrainians in Poland” because I knew it was one of the busiest countries receiving refugees. As I went to page 2, 3, and beyond, of search results, I was frustrated, finding nothing for someone with my experience.

A handful of organizations advertised for highly specialized roles (bilingual/trilingual psychologists!) but I couldn’t find anything suitable for a passionate but entry-level volunteer. I tried this search on and off for several months, probably from May to August of 2022, but I gave up for a bit and focused on farming as the back pages of search results continued to result in nothing.

That’s when AI-driven targeted advertising did some good for the world. In October I got a targeted ad on Facebook for an organization called All Hands and Hearts. I’d never heard of them, but to be fair, I’d never looked for anything like them before. I clicked through on the ad and had a thrill in my spine as it looked exactly what I’d hoped for- an organization taking volunteers in Poland, to help Ukrainians. All Hands specializes in finding projects suitable for a mixed skill set of volunteers. By and large, it is in light and medium construction. You get on-the-job-training and while having some background in that is nice, it’s not mandatory to getting an invite from them.

Anyways, hopefully that should give some background to why I am where I am today. For two months (mid May to mid July 2023), I’m on a “rest and refit” trip back in the States. I’m returning to Turkiye in mid July after having spent 6 weeks there earlier. Before that, I’d been in Poland (minus a two week break) from mid November 2022 to the end of February.2023. Saying yes to that email over half a year ago propelled me onto a path of massive changes. That’s a bit of an understatement.

I believe what I’ll do, as part of my rest-and-refit phase, is release a somewhat-weekly blog (in chronological order) that summarizes a previous part of my journey up until this point. This will give an idea of the kind of work I’ve done and give a hint towards what I want to keep doing. I may also share some other writings about the philosophy or ideas that are going on in my mind.

That’s where the final goal comes in mind- Goal D, of inspiring actions in others. I have met lots and lots of ordinary people on these volunteer projects- professionals using their 2 to 4 weeks vacation, seasonal workers using their off-season, retirees living off savings, young folks in their gap year. It really is a transformative experience to get out of your comfort zone and do things for others, in challenging environments. I most certainly care about the two issues I’ve been a part of- the crisis in Ukraine caused by Russia’s invasion, and the horrific earthquake in Turkiye and Syria. Even if you can’t volunteer for them, I hope to inspire people to stay informed and engaged and support in other ways.