I can’t help but feel a little sorry for my dad who is serving in the Peace Corps in Azerbaijan currently.

When I served in the Peace Corps, only 8 years ago, I didn’t have access to a telephone, electricity, running water or sanitation systems. While having many of those things wouldn’t have changed my experience much, they are what make my experience unique. While visiting my father in Azerbaijan last year, I realized that cell phones would have changed my experience drastically, negatively.

During our visit (my wife went as well), my father was perpetually calling or texting other PCVs or Azeri friends. He was always in the process of contacting someone or being contacted. From my perspective, the ease of communication kept him too close to other PCVs in his area. It did help him stay contacted with his Azeri friends but I’m sure they would have found him without a phone.

Dad always complains about other PCVs missing text-scheduled rendezvous. Makes sense, you disconnect yourself from others through text. It’s not as if you stood face to face with someone and made plans to get together. While I was in Haiti, we made plans in person months in advance. We made sure we arrived at the occasion unless some Haiti-esque problem struck us down. Often, we would arrive and sit and wait around for hours at the rendezvous point. We would sit and talk with whoever was around, usually Haitian friends of your friend. We did this contently because, after all, we had only set a date for the rendezvous, not a date and an hour.

I can’t help but feel some of the PC experience has been lost by handing out phones to volunteers. Don’t get me started on allowing them to have televisions and DVD players. It’s my understanding that PCVs in Azerbaijan watched DVDs until all hours of the night and woke up every afternoon. In my humble opinion, if you’re going to do that, stay home in the U.S. and waste your own money on worthless movies. I regress.

I think I would recommend to volunteers going into the Peace Corps now to ditch the cell phones except in emergency situations or during working hours. Outside of that, spend your time getting to know the people and try living like they do. That is what Peace Corps is about.