JOHN YOUNG, a 2011 graduate of The Dalles Wahtonka High School, will head June 8 for the Comoros Islands off the southeast coast of Africa to use the history degree he earned at Reed College in Portland in a Peace Corps mission to improve the nation’s economy by helping citizens learn English to pursue opportunities in eco-tourism.
JOHN YOUNG, a 2011 graduate of The Dalles Wahtonka High School, will head June 8 for the Comoros Islands off the southeast coast of Africa to use the history degree he earned at Reed College in Portland in a Peace Corps mission to improve the nation’s economy by helping citizens learn English to pursue opportunities in eco-tourism.
In a little more than two weeks, John Young, a 2011 graduate of The Dalles Wahtonka High School, will head to the Comoros Islands to teach English.
“This is an opportunity for me to do something radically different,” said Young, 22, who recently graduated from Reed College with a bachelor’s degree in history.
“Other than three weeks of research in London, I haven’t been abroad.”
He has joined the Peace Corps and heads out June 8 to spend 27 months on the archipelago of four volcanic islands and several inlets that are located off the southeast coast of Africa, to the east of Mozambique and northwest of Madagascar.
The islands are politically divided between the sovereign state of the Comoros and the French overseas department of Mayotte.
Although the islands once had a thriving vanilla trade, Young said that export market has collapsed, so there is a high rate of poverty.
He said government leaders are seeking to revive the economy with eco-tourism and Peace Corps volunteers are helping people learn English so they can better accommodate visitors.
Prior to getting started in his mission, Young will spend three months learning about the Comoros culture and how to speak the Swahili dialect of the villagers.
Islam is the official state religion of Comoros and Young will arrive shortly before the start of Ramadan, the annual holy month of fasting.
“Islam is the world’s second largest religion and I think, with the tensions with the West, learning how to communicate across cultural boundaries is especially important now,” he said. “The world is becoming increasingly connected and we are going to have to learn to get along.”
Young said, unlike some Muslim nations where females are repressed, half the government cabinet in Comoros is made up of women.
“It seems more progressive than many other nations,” he said. “I’m excited to have my assumptions about daily life and my world view challenged.”
Although the Comoros had about 20 coups between 1990 and 2005, Young said the government is now stable so he doesn’t anticipate any safety problems.
He will be living in a concrete home without utilities and a latrine toilet.
“I like camping out so it’ll be fun,” he said.
Unlike other countries in the region, Comoros does not have searing temperatures in the summer. Young has been told to expect weather that is 80 degrees and humid when he arrives.
He grew up The Dalles and left high school with an associate’s degree. He attended Reed on a scholarship and graduated with honors.
His father, Mike Young, is the meat manager at Fred Meyer and his mother, Mary Beth, is a homemaker. He has three sisters: Lettie, assistant director of The Dalles Art Center, Dorothy, who is a student, and Jamaica, a social worker in Pendleton.
Young spent his college years as a classroom assistant and provided after-school mentorship to middle schoolers in the Portland area.
“I’ve had some experience tutoring so that will help,” he said.
Once a month or so Young will travel to Peace Corps headquarters in the capital city of Moroni from wherever he is placed and be able to access the Internet.
At that time, he plans to report to The Chronicle on his activities and send along a picture or two for publication.
“I want to bring the lessons I learn back home,” he said.
When he returns to the U.S., Young plans to either go to law school or earn his doctorate.
He is interested in getting into international aid work as a career.
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