Goodbye...sort of.

Oh, decisions are tough.

We have been doing some thinking about our blog, and its purpose and audience, and have decided to move our little old selves to a private blog.

There is no mystery or scandal in our decision. We have had no exchanges with the powers that be about our blog at all…

The third goal of Peace Corps is "helping promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of Americans," and we have enjoyed using our blog as a format for sharing about our experiences here.

However, I forget the specifics of the story, there was once a PCV having a difficult day, as a person is bound to have in life, PCV or not, and, understandably wanted to turn to someone for support, and wrote home…. Unfortunately, on a postcard, that, during its journey out of the country, was seen by someone who took offense to the message. The incident nearly jeopardized the whole Peace Corps program in the country.

We did some pondering and soul-searching (yes, being a bit dramatic here) :) and thought about who we were writing for and why, and realized our most important goal is to keep in touch with family and friends, and share our lives here with them.

We have been doing that publicly, and it has been a lot of fun. Peace Corps is, understandably, though responding to the greater risks to the programs that the expansion of things like blogs and myspace and facebook accounts present, and requiring greater oversight by staff of what goes on in cyberspace. I mean, there has always been risks from frustrated letters falling into the wrong hands, or rogue postcards, but anyone can find and read what we post on the web!

It is not that we have negative things we need to say. Michael and I are grateful to this country for its hospitality, and all we’ve learned here. We are also grateful to Peace Corps for allowing us to be here. So many programs similar in purpose require the participant to pay for the privilege to serve. Not only do we not do that, we are supplied with medical care and safety support, as well as numerous other supports. We are finding though that being careful to write in a way that cannot offend anyone is compromising our original purpose, to share our lives with friends and family. It’s not that what we have posted here is not true or genuine… just….reserved.

So, we've created a blog that is “invite only.” I know, so exclusive. :) It will add an extra step to those of you who’d like to continue reading…you’ll have to set up a name and password, and sign into our blog to read it, so I hope we are worth the trouble. To find us, we’ll have to send you an e-mail, so, if you would like to continue, mail me ( supergirlmpls at yahoo dot com). Don’t be shy, okay? We don’t want to lose those who stop by just now and then…

Thanks for reading, and understanding our decision about this move. Farewell from Blogger!