The Foreign Service Journal, December 2020

26 DECEMBER 2020 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL When I asked again sometime later, she suggested that we elope and then tell her parents that we were married. I didn’t think it was a good idea; but after her parents declined my proposal and locked her in her room in the house where she grew up, we ended up eloping after Lucy’s dramatic escape. Her parents finally came around after meeting our children when they visited Thailand. They came and stayed with us in Bangkok and presented me with a gift of two scrolls as a symbol of peace and reconciliation. My daughters were born overseas: Katherine in Japan, when I was working for the U.S. military, and Sarah inThailand, when I was working with USAID. FSJ: When did you join the Foreign Service? What was the application process like? EJP: I joined in 1972. When I was working for USAID in Bang- kok, I decided to take the Foreign Service examination. Nicholas Thorne, who was the administrative coordinator for Southeast Asia at U.S. Embassy Bangkok and a former Marine, was key to my success. He was able to arrange for me to take the written exam inThailand. After I passed, I had to travel to Washington, D.C., to take the oral exam. Thorne assisted in arranging my travel by military air. He gave me advice on how to prepare and told me to read the back issues of Newsweek and newspapers, particularly the international sections. I had five days to further prepare after I arrived in D.C., and a friend pressed me on everything from art to quantitative analysis and world politics. I went to the bookstore and picked up a book about French artists that included Pablo Picasso. One of the photos was of a sculpture by Picasso, which I had previously seen during a visit to Paris. During the oral exam, I was asked whether I liked art; I told them about my love of Picasso and that particular sculpture. They questioned me about this sculpture, appearing doubtful of my knowledge, and were shocked when I was able to tell themmore than they had expected. Some 10 years later I was about to embark on an ambassado- rial assignment to Liberia and met one of the examiners, who told me they had asked random questions during my oral exam because they didn’t believe I knew anything about the world. While I had surprised him 10 years earlier, he was even more shocked to hear that I was going to Liberia as ambassador. But my desire and dream to be a Foreign Service officer and my life experiences had prepared me. I am grateful that the few people who believed in my dream were there to provide the support and guidance I needed to make it a reality, and one of them was Nicholas Thorne. FSJ: You joined the Foreign Service not long after the civil rights movement gathered momentum. Did you find the State Department to be welcoming? EJP: There were no other Black diplomats in my orientation class. There were only 20 or so around the world, and most of them were posted to Africa. The department was not welcoming at the time, and Blacks in the Foreign Service faced prejudice. When I was looking for an assignment in one of the geo- graphic bureaus, none of the bureaus wanted me. There were no “vacancies,” even with the support of then Executive Secretary (and later Secretary of State) Larry Eagleburger. I was selected to be deputy chief of mission in Mozambique, but the ambassador there opposed me, saying he needed someone who had experi- ence as a reporting officer, which I did not have at the time. So I was sent to Accra as political officer. OVERSEAS ASSIGNMENTS FSJ: What was that first overseas posting like? EJP: When I arrived in Accra in 1978, I was the only one in the political section except for a few CIA operatives. However, I did not let that stop me from striving to be the best political officer the post had ever seen. As a result of my efforts, I received the annual global reporting award. Despite my family and I living through a bloody coup, I enjoyed my time in Ghana. It was a beautiful country, rich in culture and scenery, and I could not have asked for a better first assignment. The Ghanaians are an interesting, open and wel- coming people. I developed networks in all areas of Ghanaian society. Pretty soon, it seemed that everywhere I went in Ghana, I was known. I took the job as a political reporting officer seri- ously, following the advice Mao Tse-tung gave to his army: “Be a fish in the sea. Swim among the people. Get to know them.” That was also the great Sun Tzu’s philosophy. One of the highlights of my time in Ghana was when another Black FSO, James Washington, and I found the grave of W.E.B. DuBois, the father of the civil rights movement in America. DuBois was also the first Black man to earn a Ph.D. from Har- vard and was one of the founders of the NAACP. He had left the United States at the age of 92 and moved to Ghana, where he died. Nobody remembered where he was buried. We found the plaque that marked his grave, cleared the overgrown site and sent a photograph to the NAACP publication where it was featured in the issue commemorating the magazine’s 100th anniversary.