The First Days – Juvey Wrangler Country Director

If you are ever in a situation where your potential boss tells you that he used to be in charge of a juvenile detention facility, run. No need for pleasantries. Run like you’re chasing pantyless Britney with a camera. 

 

Adult prison wardens hope to rehabilitate. Juvenile offenders expect to rehabilitate with all of tough-love, glass half-full half-empty, you get out of it what you put into it crap. If they don’t turn a gangland youngster into a model citizen, they’ve failed.  And, once a juvey wrangler, always a juvy wrangler.  You can take the man out of the detention center, but you can’t…you know the rest.

 

 

 

 

Unfortunately, you don’t meet the country director until you are actually in the country.  Nelson looked like someone from the Brady Bunch reunion show with his 70s manfro and genuine bushy sideburns, but he had an agenda. Powerless in the US

, he was a man who would be king as a Peace Corps country director. Like a very small dictatorship, it was Nelson’s way or you would be sent home.

 

 

Now, the threat of being sent home to a non Peace Corps person is meaningless.  Having just arrived after selling your belongings, giving away your cat, assuming the weirdo Peace Corps persona, having goodbye sex with your ex, and deferring your student loans is another matter.  So, no one wants to go home yet.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nelson started his first state of his union in the nation of Nelsonland with the glass is half full or half empty speech, earning him the name of half-Nelson. Humorless but not odorless, Nelson built his empire in Slovakia with adoring Slovak natives who served as language teachers, medical help and office staff.

 

 

 

 

In addition to the natives, he recruited a couple of former Peace Corps volunteers who really went native and had been in country for more than 6 years.  Gregor fancied himself as the suave guitar-playing ex-pat hottie, but he had been out of the US

so long that only non-American women were interested.  Too weird, too full of himself and too scrawny to exist in any cool circles. He would simply be a target for all bullies, sand-kickers, softball pitchers and gym rats.  He literally could never go home again. Paul, on the other hand was adorable but had a Slovak girlfriend and that was the obvious impetus for remaining in the country.

 

 

 

 

 

Surrounded by yes women and men, Half Nelson had his own little despotic acreage with no beachfront real estate. If you’re going to be a despot, you’d think a cool beachy place like Belize or Fiji would be better.  No.  Choose land-locked Slovakia.  At least it is located in the heart of Europe and you can fly really cool places like Turkey and Mallorca on the cheap.

 

 

 

 

The first day in the country was not unlike a middle school spring play. Language teachers in local costumes acting out the history of the country. Communism makes me think of the Kremlin, not crinoline.  For a bunch of adults, 42 to be exact, from ages 21 to 72, it was all very disturbing. 

 

 

 

 

Then came the rules.  You are on duty all of the time.  Weekends are not your own.  Any travel on weekends counts toward your annual allotment of 20 vacation days. You will be assigned your host family and you will speak only Slovak. You will do exactly as Half-Nelson says.  Now, it is a government institution, so you do expect some of the nonsense.  But being told that you would be checked on and monitored, examined and rated was a bit much. And, it did evolve that I was called every Friday with some inane question from a lower-level staff member around 5pm.

 

 

 

 

Half-Nelson’s second in command was named Phil.  Naturally, to continue with the absurdity of the glass-half-full-half-empty analogy, we called him Phil the Glass.  It evolved to Philly-G, which sounded like a cool rapper name but it was all about that stupid analogy.

 

 

Phil was very gay in a country where very gay wasn’t acceptable in the mainstream and he never actually came out.  He had a mullet and porn mustache, but he was actually a nice guy who was under the juvenile-delinquent-wrangler’s thumb.  On many a drunk night, when posed the question if we would sleep with Nelson or Phil, I always chose Phil because I suspected he would always just want to cuddle and he would make me a stunning omelet with a latte come morning.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Throughout our time in the PC, it turned out that all of the country directors in Europe were nutso. We met other volunteers and their biggest beef was always how nuts their country director was.  We didn’t meet many volunteers from other continents, so the African volunteers may have been living large without all of the hassles.  I worked with a former country director from Benin

and the man was really off his rocker.  Had a serious case of the crazies.  Very dysfunctional in the workplace, prone to tantrums, power hungry and poor communication skills.  In other words, the perfect country director!