Jackson Kellogg of Tashkent
by Julia Carr

Growing up in a Beyond War household taught twenty-five-year-old Jackson Kellogg about civic engagement at a young age. "Having my mom do Beyond War in the 1980's I felt very connected to what was going on and very aware of all the issues with nuclear arms proliferation and the threat of nuclear war."

Kellogg remembers in 1987 when Beyond War gave an award to returning Peace Corps volunteers. "Seeing the poster for that in my house made me want to join the Peace Corps and help people in other countries," he said. Kellogg was eight years old at the time. He upheld this vision until he completed a Bachelors degree and joined the Peace Corps in 2001.

As a volunteer, he spent two years in Kyrgyzstan, a small mountainous country in Central Asia with a population of five million. He taught English and worked on development projects. He was the only American in the village -- a place with no running water and poor electricity -- and had no prior training of their Turkic language, Kyrgyz. "I couldn't even count to ten when I stepped off the airplane," he recalled.
Although the Peace Corps supplied language training, he admitted, "I definitely learned most of it in the field. It was a pretty steep learning curve."

According to Kellogg, the people in Kyrgyzstan are struggling to make the transition from a communist system to a democracy. "It's proving to be very difficult for them because they don't have many natural resources or experience with a market economy," he said. Kellogg led a successful project to obtain grant money for a new roof on a local school. "I encouraged them (the locals) to do everything. I just advised," he said.

Toward the end of his stay, his mother visited Kyrgyzstan and brought some Beyond War pins. The following May, he returned to the village for a month long visit and was pleased to notice people still wearing the pins. "There's definitely a feeling from the people who live in Kyrgyzstan that Beyond War is a good idea and they want to continue it," Kellogg said with excited voice tones.

Kellogg has contributed in many ways to Beyond War including donating a computer and assisting in daily operations. One spontaneous contribution started with a sunny day in San Francisco and ended with photographs for the Beyond War website.

He had extra time before an evening flight and was walking through downtown. Kellogg remembered thinking, "San Francisco is such a beautiful city, and there were so many different people making up a beautiful tapestry of colors."

He said people in Central Asia had an impression of the United States as having only Caucasian people. In an effort to give a fair representation of the U.S. to his Central Asian friends, he explained his cause to some people of color on the street and asked to take their photo. "No one said no. Everyone was very keen to have their picture taken," he said. He donated some of the photos to the Beyond War website.
Kellogg believes firmly in Beyond War's guiding principle "We are One." He plans to dedicate his life to "work in ways that encourage understanding between different, diverse peoples that share this planet." Perhaps without his Beyond War upbringing, he may not have discovered his passion: "I love Central Asia and I just really want to be there."