Who is Lisa?

Oh, hey! I'm Lisa, and I'm currently serving as a Preventative Health Educator with Peace Corps Senegal. I arrived in Senegal in March 2011, and barring life-threatening scorpion stings, a spontaneous decision to move to New Mexico, or the world ending in 2012, I will be staying here until May 2013.

I graduated from the University of Notre Dame in 2009 with a degree from the Program of Liberal Studies, aka the campus cult of Great Books and home to some of the best people in the world. During college, I did summer service projects with a maternity home in California and a women's rights organization (WORI) in Uganda, and during the school year, I spent most of my time at our campus radio station and working on a sexual violence prevention project through our Gender Relations Center.

After graduating, I worked in my hometown at a youth empowerment program, interned with a children's theatre in Chicago (Chicago Children's Theatre), and eventually settled into a lovely city life existence that involved a lot of nannying for toddlers, teaching English to immigrants, and dancing, writing, and improv-ing throughout my favorite city: Chicago!

I decided to apply for the Peace Corps in March 2010. The Peace Corps had always been something I'd wanted to do, but I didn't know if it was going to be something I did when I was 28 or 65. I ended up leaving when I was 23 because... well, why not now!

Things I like include: cheese, traveling for long periods of time, Isabel Allende, the color pink, pastries, dancing as an expression of joy, and maintaining a high degree of contact with people I love.

Things I don't like include: when your jeans get wet on the bottom and then you can't sit with your feet folded under you, when I eat so much popcorn that I make myself sick, and automatically flushing toilets because you never know when they're going to strike.

I hope you now understand everything there is to know about me, as a person.

<3!

Postcards and Packages

Already, I have started to accumulate a few letters and postcards... they are cherished, and occasionally hung on my walls! I say occasionally because my duct tape doesn't seem strong enough for a lot of them. But they are loved no matter what! So if you have the hankering to write, please do!  I'm a far better penpal than email correspondent.  I'd love to hear from you. Just toss an international stamp on your letter and it's good to go.

Lisa Floran

B.P. 957

Thies, Senegal, West Africa

And for the extremely motivated... if you feel like sending a package, here are some items that would be especially appreciated:

- magazines! Old or new, I love them, and so do my empty walls, and so do the kids who wander into my room

- sunglasses! Senegalese sunglasses are beautiful and plentiful, but also have the dubious distinction of having no UV protection AND being made with mirrors that literally cause permanent eye damage. So any sunglasses from America are extremely exciting, because I want to be able to see for the rest of my life.

- food treats... Chocolate candy, like m&ms and fun-size candybars, and granola bars are especially hard to find here. POPTARTS. Also, powdered cheese or alfredo sauce is great!

- CHEETOS... Why is this one of my only cravings? Or just anything with cheese. Velveeta. Macaroni and cheese. Cheese.

- Macaroni and Cheese. It deserves its own shout out because apparently, my whole host family likes it just as much as me. Sponsor American night in Lisa's hut for her and her whole family!

- pens... Their quality here has trouble keeping up with how often I need them.

- coloring books, markers, and stickers... for projects done by me and my classes. Maps are also great, to grid and copy as murals, or just to keep as is!

- nail polish! There are few better ways to hide the fact that my hands and feet are constantly dirty.

- any decorations that could continue or challenge the burgeoning Lil Wayne theme in my little house

The element of surprise is always appreciated, but then again, it's not a bad idea to shoot me an email asking if I need anything in particular at the moment too.  

About My Assignment

My primary assignment is to work as Life Skills consultant for Plan's Youth Economic Empowerment project. Plan has been working with various groups of young adults, most of whom are between 15-25, female, and did not finish school, through savings and loans groups and providing support and trainings for independent businesses. Now, they are moving to the next phase of the project, which involves financial literacy, microcredit, and Life Skills – which is I come in.  After collaborating to make a Life Skills manual with a Peace Corps Response Volunteer and two volunteers with Niger, I now work with the facilitators who teach the material in the field, supporting them, taking suggestions for improvement from them and the beneficiaries, and ultimately leading more trainings for future facilitators.  

I’m pretty excited about its potential, especially for the opportunity to enrich the projects and businesses that the youth already built themselves. The line of thinking with the project is that with the addition of life skills, the young adults will be able to make healthier, stronger, and more beneficial decisions for themselves, their families, and their communities – not just impacting the economic structure of the community, but other areas as well. Plan has set up the project to allow for a lot of local autonomy too, which I can appreciate.

My other projects include:

• Teaching a weekly English class with two other PCVs, an IFESH volunteer, and a U.S. Embassy fellow at a local Cultural Center... always a highlight of my week!  
• Supervising my work region's 2012 Girls' Camp... always a highlight of my year!
• Selecting winners for a local middle school scholarship program, the Michele Sylvester Scholarship
• Serving as board member for two volunteer organizations close to my heart, SeneGAD for gender and development work and the Peer Support Network, a support system for volunteers
• And everything else that goes along with being a PCV... making spring rolls for my family, conversing with the coffee crowd on my local corner, and sharing my experiences with all of you back home :)

More Info...

Peace Corps

Peace Corps Senegal

Plan

Plan Senegal