In a matter of days, the world turned upside-down.
Jessica Schwarz was just finally feeling comfortable in Ukraine. As a Peace Corps volunteer, she had been working in community relations for the past six months, and felt she had found her fit. She grasped the language and social customs, had met countless people who endeared themselves to her and impacted the lives of young people she worked with. She had a home, and had adopted a cat named Indy.
Then the COVID-19 pandemic cascaded across the world.
"All that was left was skid marks when they pulled us out," she said.
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Schwarz went from watching the crisis from afar to preparing for a gradual end to her Ukraine experience to having just a few hours to rush to the airport before borders closed. Somewhere along the way, she contracted the virus herself, which forced her to spend two weeks in quarantine in her parents’ Center Grove area home.
She’s back home now, and fully recovered from the disease. Though her time in Ukraine was cut short, Schwarz cherishes the work and people she experienced during the abbreviated stay. The Peace Corps opened up a new career path moving forward, and she plans to make the most of it.
"As hard as this had been, I recognize that this is a gift, because there are not many women at 30 without a husband or children, and I get to have this pause in my life," she said. "I can learn to be at peace that this has happened for a reason, but also recognize the pieces that are important, and figuring out what I want to do next."
‘Started to feel like home’
Schwarz applied to the Peace Corps in 2018, following a love of new cultures and driven by a feeling of restlessness. The Peace Corps is a government service organization that encourages peace and cooperation between countries around the world.
For Schwarz, her role as a community development volunteer involved increasing capacity, efficiency and effectiveness in a local community foundation.
She left the U.S. in August of 2019, arriving in Kiev, Ukraine for training before being assigned a host family. The first months of her assignment were spent learning — customs, social norms, the language. She also had her first opportunities to work with the community and help in its development.
Though it was difficult at times, she fell in love with Ukraine and its people.
By the end of 2019, Schwarz was feeling much more comfortable. She had a firm grasp on the Ukrainian language—she was able to speak conversationally—and was working with a tutor to learn Russian so she could communicate better in different parts of the country.
Situated in Voznesensk, a city in southern Ukraine, she was working on projects such as advising a community foundation on funding, engaging people and team development. She was invited to speak on a panel about gender equality rights in Kiev, and attended a conference on community building. At a local school, she was part of its Science Olympiad, helping them with the English reading, speaking and writing portion.
All of these assignments helped Schwarz integrate into Ukrainian society. She also hosted community-building activities in the town she was assigned to. On Christmas Eve, she and the English club she worked with organized a screening of "Home Alone," a movie that is immensely popular in Ukraine, at a local cafe.
Another cafe with a microwave provided popcorn. That night, a packed crowd gathered to enjoy the movie, with Russian subtitles, together.
"It was a huge hit. People dressed up for it; it was kind of like a night out," she said. "I remember sitting by myself to the side of everyone, and to hear this communal laughter, I loved it."
Schwarz also moved out of her host family’s home and into her own apartment. After a challenging search, she found a small house in the center of Voznesensk, giving her a personal space that allowed her to feel further rooted in Ukraine.
Her first night in the house was interesting, to say the least. After dark, she awoke to a pounding on the door. The next day, a man approached her, wondering why she was there.
He was her neighbor, and he questioned her. When he learned that she was from the U.S. living in Ukraine, he immediately became suspicious.
"He thought I was a spy. In his mind, what he told me, was there was no reason someone would leave a golden place like America to come to a place like Ukraine. There had to be ulterior motives," Schwarz said.
Over time, she reached out to the man multiple times, offering food, first brownies then a plate of cheesy chicken and rice casserole.
A few days later, someone knocked on Schwarz’s door. She opened it to find the man and his wife—the first time Schwarz had met her—had a platter of fish to give her for dinner.
"Fish is biblical for them, because it goes back to Jesus and the fish and the loaves. So when they give somebody a fish, it’s a way they can give the best nutrition they know how. It’s a big deal," she said. "So that was the point where I felt this started to feel like home."
‘This wasn’t what I wanted’
But all of that momentum was about to skid to a stop. By mid-March, Ukraine started imposing restrictions to prevent against COVID-19. Each day seemed to exacerbate the situation. As a safety and security warden for the Peace Corps, Schwarz began to realize there was a real possibility that she and her fellow volunteers would be sent home.
"I had a video conversation with my mom and dad late that day, and it was not a conversation. It was me bawling my eyes out because I’m having a meltdown that evacuation would really happen," she said. "I wasn’t ready for that; I’d only been there eight months. This wasn’t what I wanted."
Schwarz started preparing to leave, even though the evacuation order had not been given. She made her director at the community foundation aware of what was happening, and phoned her host family to assure them that if she had to leave, it was not because she wanted to or didn’t appreciate them. She expressed how grateful she was for them, she said.
"They absorbed me into their family. I was so deeply ingrained in people’s lives there. I wanted her to know that if I had to go, it was out of duty, not to hurt her," Schwarz said.
Her host family responded by planning an impromptu party—a "just in case" party, she explained. That way, if evacuation happened quickly, there would be a sense of closure.
She showed up to the party at 5:30 p.m. on March 21. At 7:30 p.m., she received the notice from the Peace Corps that they were evacuating. She didn’t know when she’d be back, if ever.
"As COVID-19 continues to spread and international travel becomes more and more challenging by the day, we are acting now to safeguard your well-being and prevent a situation where Volunteers are unable to leave their host countries," read a letter to Peace Corps volunteers from Jody Olsen, the organization’s director.
Schwarz received the news surrounded by her friends.
"It was a blessing, but at the same time, it hurt so much," she said. "The room just swarmed me at night."
Under the evacuation order, Schwarz and the other Peace Corps volunteers had to be in Kiev by midnight the next night. The following day, a charter plane was supposed to leave from Kiev. The airport and Ukrainian borders would be closing that night. Unfortunately, a problem with the airplane put the entire evacuation in peril.
"Peace Corps did an amazing job of putting 291 of us up in two different hotels that had restaurants, when the whole city was shutting down," she said. "There was no transportation … The trains had stopped. The world stopped."
‘We were so lucky’
Finally, on March 27, they were able to leave Kiev on another charter. The volunteers passed through Madrid, Spain, where they had a four-hour layover. Schwarz’s doctor suspects this is where she contracted COVID-19, even though Peace Corps gave them masks, gloves, hand sanitizer and other precautionary measures.
After flying to Washington D.C., Schwarz finally arrived in Indianapolis, with her parents, the only ones in the airport waiting for her. She self-quarantined at her parents house for 14 days, following precautions for travelers returning to the country from overseas.
Schwarz didn’t have any symptoms of illness for most of that time. But on the 13th day, she felt incredibly tired. Her assumption was that she was still adjusting from Ukrainian time and the breakneck pace of evacuation. She went to bed early that night. A few hours later, she woke up shivering.
She was downstairs making tea, pale and shivering, when her mother came down.
"She didn’t have to say anything. I knew she felt the same way I did," she said.
Schwarz’s brother, Grant, is a paramedic, and has been dealing with COVID-19 since it started. He knew what to look for, and was walking Schwarz and her mother through what they may be facing.
The main concern was for her mom, who had a history with respiratory disease, Schwarz said.
"I remember laying in bed, with a 103-degree fever, and this wave of emotion came over me that I was going to kill my mom," she said. "I did my best to hold myself together. I tried to do everything I was supposed to, and here I had it."
They were able to video-conference with their family doctor, who told them they could not get tested, but were presumed positive for the disease. Schwarz’s mother was given drugs to prevent pneumonia from setting in, since she had just overcome the condition in February. Schwarz had a serious temperature, but no other symptoms other than small exertions, such as walking to the kitchen, left her out of breath.
Both were officially quarantined for 2 1/2 weeks, meaning Schwarz spent more than 30 days isolated.
Thankfully, both Schwarz and her mother had only mild cases of the disease. They both recovered.
"We were so lucky," she said.
With recovery past her, Schwarz is looking toward her future. Peace Corps has said there will be no possible reinstatement of volunteers before Oct. 1, though Schwarz has been on the phone, consulting the community foundation in Voznesensk from the U.S.
"I’ll always find ways to be involved in the community and give back. But not many people have the ability to give back on an international level. God gave me that opportunity to speak into people’s live in a small pin dot across the world. As long as they still welcome it, I’ll continue to do that," she said.
