The Foreign Service Journal, July-August 2016

THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | JULY-AUGUST 2016 71 bladder cancer support group. The overseas group was a wonderful stress-reliever and provided a collegial forum to discuss international politics and happenings in the Foreign Service, and reminisce about past postings. We talked, for example, about the Foreign Service Insti- tute’s Job Search Program, an option most of the group had not pursued when retiring. As it happens, the Job Search Program had prepared me well. Room and board costs were offset by remaining longer on the payroll. Upon completion, I knew what I wanted to do with my Thrift Savings Plan and Social Security, had prepared a 10-year financial plan, and decided to set up a nonprofit foundation and keep my federal health insurance (a move that has saved me thousands of dollars in medical costs). Setting up the nonprofit foundation was tricky and time- consuming, but represented a welcome diversion from ongo- ing cancer treatments and surgeries. The foundation embraces international medical, educational and humanitarian causes. In Addis Ababa, my last posting, our family became involved with a youth tennis academy and decided to sponsor a student to study in the United States. Because Ethiopia is not exactly known for its tennis players, it was a hard sell. But we finally found a college in Lewiston, Idaho, that offers an excellent tennis program for international students. Yonas, the student we’re sponsoring, joins our family during holidays and school breaks, and we follow his tennis team. The foundation also sponsors a humanitarian award for a student frommy high school and helps support Missionaries of Charity in Bhagalpur, India, the birthplace of our two adopted children. Looking back, I wish I had known about the Foreign Service out of college. I joined State as a specialist at age 42, later moving to the FSOmanagement track. Overseas international schools provided a comprehensive college-preparatory education for our children and a stimulating professional environment for Jane, an elementary teacher. My close medical calls since retirement have made me appre- ciate life, particularly my overseas experiences with the Foreign Service, more than ever. I am grateful for my pension; excellent, affordable health insurance; and the flexibility to engage in the activities of my choice. Alan Roecks served in the State Department Foreign Service from 1989 through 2012, with postings in Kinshasa, New Delhi, Brasilia, Ankara, Dakar and Washington, D.C. His last tour was as management coun- selor in Addis Ababa. He has published stories in State Magazine and The Foreign Service Journal . Fulfillment in the Nonprofit World BY LAMBERT “ N I CK” HEYN I GER I joined the Foreign Service in 1956 and served first as a consular officer in Amman and, thereafter, as a political officer in a series of overseas postings and assignments in Washington, D.C. These included the Bureau of Intelligence and Research and the Office for Combating Terrorism, amon g others. After retiring, I moved with my Foreign Service wife to Montreal, Canada, and found a very pleasant and fulfilling life as an executive at a fam- ily foundation. Before joining the Foreign Service, I wish I had gone to the Georgetown School of Foreign Service. As a political officer I never was given any training whatever on how to perform in that posi- tion. Before retiring, I wish I had known more about the not-for- profit world. As it happened, I found my next job in Montreal, working for a family foundation, but that was more a matter of luck than design. Nick Heyniger served overseas in Amman, The Hague, Elisabethville (now Lubumbashi, a city in the Democratic Republic of the Congo), Dar es Salaam and Oran, and in Washington, D.C., in the Visa Office, at FSI (learning Swahili), as desk officer for Portuguese Africa in the Bu- reau of African Affairs, with the U.S. Army General Staff as an exchange officer during the VietnamWar, and in the bureaus of Intelligence and Research, Personnel and the Office for Combating Terrorism. COURTESYOFNICKHEYNIGER Nick Heyniger (left) in Katanga Province, Southeastern Congo, in 1965 at the investiture of a new tribal chief up- country. Heyniger gave the chief a set of USIA books, and the chief gave Nick a leopard skin.