Some Guy Named Peter, (by Steve)

I’m borrowing Martina’s account as mine is not set up yet. My colleagues have shared a lot about Kenya already, so in an effort to avoid telling a similar tale, I’ll just recount a relatively inconsequential story that might give you a bit of the flavour of life in Nairobi.

I arrived on a Sunday night and the next morning I walked downtown with Martina as a tour guide. We went to a popular fast-food joint called Kenchic which serves deep-fried chicken. I’m not much of a fan of fast-food, least of all of fried-chicken, but I must admit that this was the best fried chicken I’ve ever eaten. The portions were generous and the bird was healthy and plump. I ordered a half-chicken with chips (yes, more oil). After cooking, they cut the chicken into pieces with a menacing looking pair of scissors; they don’t disarticulate the bones as we do, rather they cut them mid-bone so it often takes a few seconds to recognize which part of the chicken you’re eating. They also shake a large quantity of salt onto the pieces before handing it to the customer. At each place along the counter there is a salt shaker and Kenyans tend to add more salt for each bite. A Kenchic salt shaker is not like ours with fine holes that allow a gentle sprinkle to come out; theirs is a small bottle with a single large diameter hole in the lid that shoots out salt like a small avalanche. With the high sodium content of the Kenyan diet, high blood pressure must be a significant concern. An even larger concern must be diabetes as their consumption of sugar is phenomenal. Kenyans take their tea seriously (they are a large exporter). They brew it with milk which of course already contains lactose, a sugar. To a single cup (not a mug!), they will add three teaspoons of sugar! Some will claim “oh, I don’t take much sugar, only two teaspoons!”. But none of this has anything to do with Peter … let me tell you about him.

After lunch, as we sauntered down the sidewalk, from out of nowhere a man appeared, matching us step for step and addressing us like he was the official Nairobi welcome wagon. “How are you?!” “Oh, Canada …. wonderful!”. His name was Peter and he was one of many would-be sales representatives that eke out a living by dragging unsuspecting tourists to a safari tour office in the hopes of getting a commission. These guys are like ninjas or stealth fighter planes or something (maybe Mr. Harper should cancel the F35 Phantom order and hire few of these guys??); you never see them until it’s too late. He had cards from every tour company imaginable, though most had a name other than “Peter”. He was pleasant enough and his tactics were not aggressive like the Moroccans or Egyptians would use. After a few minutes – using as much vigour as a Kenchic customer with a salt shaker - I managed to shake him off. But I had a feeling I would run into my phantom menace again, and I was kind of looking forward to it. About three weeks later, while walking several metres in front of Ben and Julie, I felt a presence “uncloak” (think Star Trek Klingon vessels … not some guy exposing his, well, “peter”) beside me and prepared myself for the safari sales pitch. “How are you!?” “Where are you from!?”. He had launched into his full spiel when I cried out “Peter! How are you?!” He was flabbergasted; gobsmacked; pick your adjective. I thoroughly enjoyed his discomfort as I reminded him that we’d already met three weeks prior. He recovered quickly and closed his gaping mouth, suggesting I might have friends that were interested in a safari. No, but I had a good laugh stopping him in his tracks like that. For the past two weeks I’ve kept my eyes open for him, wondering if I’d see him again before my departure tomorrow. So Peter, if you’re reading: third time lucky?

Farewell Kenya

As I have just hopped on a bus from Nakuru to the Ugandan town of Jinja, I thought I would take a minute to compose a blog post on my phone while I still have access to the fantastic wireless data service offered by Safaricom. I believe Nancy has previously mentioned Safaricom, but just for frame of referwnce, it costs me around 3 cents per minute to call Canada and about 20 cents a day for 25mb of data per day, with fantastic coverage around the country.

I have found that having a data enabled smartphone has developed into an almost indispensable travel tool. For example, while waiting for the bus to Jinja, I was able to Google hostels to stay upon arrival, phone them, and book accommodation in about ten minutes. In previous travels, this sort of thing meant a trip to an internet cafe, a tenuous internet connection, possibly a successful Skype call, but more likely an email that would only tenuously solicit a response.

Also, having accurate maps with my position plotted by GPS has been very useful for navigating highways, parks, and towns. When you are traveling in unknown territory, knowledge is power, and for example, exactly how many kilometers away the next town is is very useful for fare-bargaining purposes and general safety and awareness.

I was at first apprehensive about traveling with a fairly fancy phone. However, especially in Nairobi, I found that practically everyone was toting an android phone, and that mine was only slightly better. Then again, I bought my phone from the US just before departure and it was at the time better than what was available in Canada. Also, walking down the street looking at one's phone for directions is much less conspicuous that thumbing through the lonely planet or unfolding a tourist map and attracts less unwanted attention.

While I will certainly miss the wireless service in Kenya, it certainly won't be my most unforgettable experience from the country. Experiencing Kibera was definitely what will stick with me most (that and sharing a room with Steve for a month straight). Having a bunch of kids from the slum utter the term "cash flow positive" when describing a company with a pretty good idea of what that meant was something I will always remember. One or two of the personal mission statements that the students composed and recited for the whole group was moving. One of the students, 'Nice' Nazri, displayed the essence of his nickname and made for Phoebe, martina, and myself customized, name-inscribed, Kenya bracelets. Nazri proudly declared that they were "authentic original, not photocopy!" Mine was a struggle to get on and I think it will remain with me for quite a while. It really was eperiences like this that made the trip so memorable and meaningful. I feel as though the average tourist on safari is getting very poor bang for his buck relative to us.

That being said, I have just come from Naivasha and Nakuru, where I spent a day cycling with giraffes and gorge-exploring with Steve, and a morning spotting game at lake Nakuru. In Jinja, I will go whitewater rafting on the Nile, and then proceed to Kampala where I will depart on a gorilla viewing trek in southern Uganda. All that in the next two weeks before flying straight to Rotterdam for the final fall term of my MBA on exchange.

The road is now too bumpy to type on my phone so I must bid adieu. Many thanks to Nancy, Martina, Steve, Julie, Phoebe, for such an amazing experience. Also a special thanks to everyone who contributed financially to the program. I think in all the hustle and bustle we don't emphasize how much of a learning experience the sauder students receive in the pursuit of passing knowledge to those less fortunate than ourselves.

So long,

Ben

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Experience the Wilderness - Masai Mara

Interested in experiencing the most "genuine" wilderness of the world, Ben, Julie, Steve and I spent the last weekend on a safari at the Masai Mara (Mara) National Reserve, which is around 185km away from Nairobi. We departed right after teaching, and after a 5-hour drive, we arrived at our camping site, which was very close to Mara. Although sitting in a car for 5 hours was tiring, we were all so excited to see animals such as lions, leopards, cheetah, etc. We woke up very early in the morning and were all ready for the visit to Mara.






This is the van tourists sit in while visiting the park, and the roof of the van can be lifted up so people can actually stand in the car and take photos of animals.









After entering the gate of the park, the first thing we saw were a group of gazelles peacefully having their breakfast. We were hoping to see gazelles running, given the fact that they are such swift animals, who can run at a speed of 80km/hour.









The second thing that caught my attention was several vultures eating a already dead wildebeest. This thing made me think about the food chain system in the wild. Some animals are just meant to be enemies, such as lions vs. zebras.







On the other hand, there are also animals who live together to defend themselves in case of attack by other animals. As our driver told us, zebras and wildebeests are very good friends, because zebras have a very good sense of hearing and vision whereas wildebeests are good at smelling enemies. As a result, it's very often to see these two kinds of animals staying closely together almost everywhere at Mara.



Talking about enemies, here is a photo of a wildebeest and a female lion facing off each other. The story was that when were were driving back to the gate of the park, our driver noticed a lion secret waiting for something along the road. Then we found there was actually a group of wildebeest around, so we assumed the lion was waiting to hunt. Suddenly, the wildebeests all started running, and we discovered that there was actually another lion on the other side of the road chasing a wildebeest, then this "waiting lion" joined and the two lions were together chasing a wildebeest. However, the wildebeest ran really fast, and turned his head facing the two lions. Having a very sharp horns on his head, the wildebeest used its horns as weapon to defend himself. After all, the two lions gave up, because it was very difficult to get a wildebeest when it's facing you, because the wildebeests can use its horn to protect himself.




Here comes the another surprise we received at Mara - we saw many vans parked in front of us, so we thought some van got stuck in the mud. All of a sudden, a male lion slowly walked by our van, and we all rushed to take out our camera to take a shot of the King of Jungle. I think lions must be very confident animals, because they never seemed to be scared of anything. Although there were many vans parked beside him, he was still taking his own pace, and slowly walked by.





We also saw a lonely but very elegant ostrich slowly moving on the grass and a group of elephants. Although elephants are ginormous animals, I think they are really cute when they use their long noses to grab tree branch and then send it to their mouths. When I was enjoying looking at elephants eat, a baby elephant appeared. I quickly took out my camera and started taking picture of him/her. Then an interesting thing happened, the baby elephant walked behind his/her mom, and the mother elephant was protecting him/her. I think mother nature is just something universal, doesn't matter if it's human or animals.



Continue on this "mother nature" topic. On the second day of the safari, we also watched a mother lion teaching her four kids how to hunt. The five of them were slowly approaching a group of wildebeest. We first thought the mother was hunting food for the four kids, but it turned out that the mother let the kids go in front of her and approach the wildebeests first. The driver introduced to us that there is actually strategy involved in almost every single hunt, and sometimes the hunt can take hours. Unsurprisingly, the four kids did not even get the chance to touch a wildebeest, but they must have learned something this time.






This is also a very cute picture of the baby lions playing with each other, while their mother is leading them at the front.







Although there was a disappointment that we didn't see any cheetah nor leopards, we saw another very very rare animals - a black rhino!!! The driver said rhinos often hide behind bushes, and almost no visitor ever had the opportunity to see them. Luckily, we found a rhino very close to our car, and we drove to a closer place and took photos of him. The driver joked with us that we should never mess with a rhino, and we should take the photo quickly and leave, because a rhino can easily flip a van haha..





The trip to Mara is definitely something I would never forget in my life. If any of you ever have a chance to visit Africa, remember to personally check out the wilderness, because it's absolutely worth it to see them in your life time! Lastly, here's a picture of our team except me, because I was the camera lady!

Bringing Everyone Together

Last Thursday we brought the students from Kibera and Mathare together for a day of activities, discussions, networking, and food! The day, of course, started later than planned, as students arrived at the site on 'Kenyan time', many commenting on the horrific morning traffic.

For those of you who have never experienced rush hour traffic in Nairobi, allow me to paint a bit of a picture for you. Many roads do not have separate lanes (there are cars EVERYWHERE - often on the wrong side of the road), nobody pays any attention to the stoplights, and everyone is always fighting for an extra inch of space. In addition, there is a lot of roadwork happening throughout the city, which means sometimes 8 lanes of traffic need to fit into 1. Put all of this together and more often than not, you get complete gridlock!


Once everyone had arrived safely at the Mathare site, we started our first activity - a networking game which encouraged the students from both sites to interact and learn about each others business proposals. Students were given worksheets with spaces to write the names of the people they met, their proposed business idea, and one reason why their business was unique. It turned out to be quite a successful mixer. Eva, a young woman from the Mathare site who is planning to start a wholesale food business, was crowned the best networker and given a prize for her efforts.


We then moved on to 'the human knot' activity - a game which encouraged students to communicate effectively and to work together to untangle themselves and their group.

Finally we got into our small discussion groups, which were organized primarily by proposed business idea - hair salons, food, clothing, entertainment, etc. This year we also invited a number of mentors to participate, including previous students of SE:101 who now have their own businesses here in Nairobi. The discussions revolved around the many different challenges students faced as entrepreneurs.

In my group students talked about their fear of approaching microfinance centers and being turned away, the possibility that they will be unable to raise enough capital to open their business, the difficulty of legally registering their business, the problem of security and electricity shortages within Mathare and Kibera, and ultimately, the fear of failure. We discussed each challenge/fear separately and together we came up with a series of ways to address and deal with the challenges. The mentors shared their personal experiences and offered practical wisdom and great advice to our students.

One of the most interesting discussion topics arose when Freddie, a previous student of SE:101 who now owns two successful businesses, asked the students to consider who were the 'biggest enemies' of small business ventures in Kenya. Immediately a couple of students answered family and friends. Why is that? Kenyan people are very generous and they tend to share what little they have with their family and friends. In fact, sharing seems to be expected. Freddie emphasized to students that 'business is business' and that they should not offer additional discounts or loans to their family and friends. He told students to remember that the money was not theirs to loan and that it belonged to their business. An important lesson that the students will hopefully take to heart.

I closed the discussion by asking the three mentors in our group to discuss the most important lessons they had learned when starting their own businesses.

1. Make sure you have a well thought-out business plan, but be flexible and treat it as a working document.

2. Do your market research and make sure you understand your customer.

3. Be patient, dedicated, and passionate. Never give up!

Finally we brought everyone back together for lunch and juice! The lunch was prepared by Francis, a 2010 graduate of the SE:101 program who has started a catering business. And the triple-layer mango, avocado and beet-root smoothies were prepared by Dennis, one of the current students from the Kibera site who owns a juice business. Delicious!

So overall, the day was a success!

Playtime in Nairobi

Play time in North America can often be so structured (and so expensive) that it starts to lose its "fun." Or we forget what fun means. Three quick stories on play in Nairobi might give you a different perspective on what's needed for fun.

1) Last week, the UBC team took our Strathmore University team ice skating, to show them something Canadian. (Or at least that’s what they said. I figured it was so that the UBC team could be better at something sport-wise, since they can’t even attempt to compete with Kenyans at soccer.) We arrived at the rink to find bureaucracy in action. Skating costs $5 an hour, and you can only enter the rink on the hour. So despite the fact that it was 2:15, and no one was on the ice, we had to wait around until 3 (or pay $5 and skate for the remaining time until 3). So we opted to wait, while trying to convince those in charge to let us in early. The best we could do was get them to rent the skates out early so that everyone would be ready to hit the ice right at 3. The ice skates were more like ski boots with dull edges than ice skates as you might know them, but, after some brief trepidation, the Canadian team easily rose to the equipment challenge. After they got confident on the skates, they started working with the Kenyan students to teach them how to skate (a first for all of them). Lots of nervousness, but I will give it to the Kenyans. They all stuck with it, and some within a half hour were doing a decent job of navigating the rink. I watched from the sidelines, by the way. Never could master ice skates, and decided that I didn’t need to do so in Nairobi.

2) On Sunday I was passing through Uhuru Park, which is down the street from where we're staying. The park was full of people out enjoying the day (one of the few warm, sunny days we’ve had since we arrived.) I had never noticed before that the park contained a ferris wheel and swings, but the daughter of a friend of mine (both in town to do their own volunteer work with Agano with Kenya) noticed them right away. She wanted to try them out. These were like no amusement ride you’ve ever seen in North American (pictures attached). Both the ferris wheel and the flying swings are operated through manual labour, not motors. You can see in the ferris wheel shot the guy pushing it to go round. It actually could go quite fast once they got going. Rides lasted a long time too, about 15 minutes.

The flying swings were also operated by someone spinning a crank—this is not so visible in the picture, but you can see someone at the center of the structure working. Again, the swings got pretty far out, and were going pretty fast.

3) Today I visited our Mathare site, and there were a number of children playing in the courtyard. They were making clay figures by digging up clay from the ground, adding water, and then pounding and kneading it to make it pliable before forming their creations. In the picture, you can see some clay people, and some other “toys” if you look carefully at the wall. I have a better picture of the creations, but these kids were so cute that I thought you’d enjoy the picture of them more. There were four slightly older boys, not in the picture, who were also working with the clay—they were making vehicles with it, and adding wheels. All of the children were having a great time, there were no parents hovering around telling them how to do it better, and it was really fun to see them use the raw materials at hand to create things. It reminded me of a scene in Kibera the other day: a little boy pulling a “car” made out of a juicebox, with bottle caps for wheels, all attached to a string.

Watching these different play activities made me think that we sometimes lose sight of simple pleasures: skates don’t need to be perfect, we don’t need the newest technology to run a ferris wheel, and we don’t need to go to Toys "R" Us to buy clay. It’s part of the ground we walk on. And everyone can still have fun.

The Kenyan Medical Experience/The World's Worst Tooth

For my first post in Africa, I have decided to relay a slightly different experience which, unfortunately, occupied my entire first week in Nairobi.

Some may know of my upper left molar which developed an abscess a year ago and cause me to have to fly by helicopter from Mount Everest Base Camp to Kathmandu. Well wouldn't you know it, the next time that the silly thing gave me trouble was the Sunday prior to the start of class in Kibera. I woke up with it aching a little but by the afternoon I was munching over-the-counter codeine at a pretty good clip. By midway through Monday, after introductions and some preliminary exercises in the classroom, I was also experiencing a pretty severe adverse reaction to an anti-inflammatory I was also taking and realized that I needed to get some help. One of our drivers, Fred, arranged for me to be taken to the nearest medical clinic which was the Aga Khan University Hospital Health Clinic in a nearby shopping center.

I was able to see the doctor right away, owing in part, I assumed, to the fact that I was a Muzungu with a Visa card. I described my symptoms, severe stomach and tooth pain. The doctor took a look in my mouth and to my dismay announced that I had gingivitis! Considering I was doubled over in pain, I did not feel as though this was the pinnacle of diagnostic achievements. Nonetheless, the doctor prescribed me an immediate IV dose of antacid for the stomach and a blood test to gauge the severity of a possible tooth infection. My trepidation at receiving injections in Africa was mitigated by the possibility of relief from the pain I was in. After receiving my injections and giving a blood sample, I laid down to rest and waited for the medications to take effect. A short while later, the doctor came in with the blood test results. Turned out the tooth infection was actually fairly serious, and had come up in the blood test. Thus, more needles! This time, some potent antibiotics. After the second round of shots was completed I was sent on my way with an array of medications to counter the infection and others to counter the side effects of the medications. All told, I paid around 50 CAD for all the services and medications, all of which will be covered by my travel medical insurance. After a few days of shivering away a fever and recuperating, I visited a dentist who took an xray and confirmed that the infection was well into submission (without any mention of gingivitis!). A few days more and I was back on my feet in the classroom teaching positive and negative cashflows.

I must admit to a slight bit of nervousness at the prospect of receiving medical treatment in Africa. I do have to say, though, that on the whole I was fairly impressed. I was seen and treated promptly, and I received thorough explanations. The conditions were relatively clean and sanitary at all times.

What struck me, however, was how much superior treatment I received than many Kenyans themselves do. I wondered if many of the people in Kibera didn't have to cope with the same sort of tooth pain I had on a regular basis. It really got me thinking.

Anyways, I suppose the moral of the story is that one can survive medical treatment in Nairobi, so feel free to come down and get sick at your leisure!

Planned Parenthood, Kenya Style

Numerous US states have been rushing to defund Planned Parenthood at an alarming pace, arguing that no tax dollars should be spent on anything that the organization does.

Compare this to a recent event in Kenya. Members of Parliament approved a motion to establish a new department that would source and distribute sanitary napkins to school-aged girls. The MP (a male!) who proposed the motion noted that many girls miss four or five days of school a month because they lack sanitary pads. The government allocated about $3 million dollars this year to provide sanitary napkins. The Assistant Minister of Education noted that about $13 million more was needed. One could only imagine how this would have been handled during last week's US debt ceiling debacle, should there have even been a fund for this.

Many girls use pieces of "old blankets, mattresses and rags as sanitary napkins," said MP Rachael Shebesh, one of the supporters of the motion. She suggested that panties be distributed with the sanitary napkins. "You can give out all the sanitary towels you want but if you don't give panties you are losing the war because many girls cannot afford them," she said. Another MP noted that providing sanitary napkins was an important component of the Free education system because without them, girls could not participate fully in education.

This brings me, indirectly, to the subject of birth control. At our teaching site in Kibera there are many posters on the walls, with themes on safe sex, much like the one shown here. We were curious about the training that was given to young people regarding sex. Apparently training is quite explicit at the youth centres (for instance showing films of what the various STDs actually look like), so we wondered at what age discussion on “safe sex” started. Age 10. My team was a bit stunned at how young the training started, and we mentioned that this direct, blunt education at age 10 would be highly unusual in Canada and the US. (A 2009 article in the journal Reproductive Health suggested that the prohibitions on sex education in “religious” states was partially responsible for the higher rates of teen pregnancies.) So what do youth centers do in Nairobi? They place free condoms in the washrooms (both genders) so that there is easy access to them. As one of the instructors noted, it was difficult, even for him, to go to the pharmacy and ask for condoms (too embarrassing!), but free condoms in the privacy of the washroom guaranteed access to anyone who needed them.

Has the availability of free condoms made a difference? Kenya has one of the highest rates of AIDS and HIV in the world. But the epidemic peaked in 2000, and the numbers are starting to come down. Which means that sex education, particularly for the youth, is having a positive impact on outcomes.

Kenya is clearly more advanced than the US on the sex education front. It is an interesting contrast.

How the "Kenyan time" made my day

I cannot believe that we have completed 2 weeks of our teaching already. The time goes by so fast and I think even the weather is crying that we are almost done as it has been pouring down with rain since the late afternoon.

Most of the UBC team has gone to a very well deserved safari trip to Masai Mara. Professor Nancy and I stayed behind to help run the workshop for Agano with Kenya, another very interesting project in Nairobi run by Jene Meece from US and Father Henry Simaro from Kenya.

But one thing that I was looking forward to the most was this afternoon and the dance performance of our students at the part of Nairobi named California or Calif as the locals call it. The show was supossed to start at 12.30 pm but things took the usual course and the start of the event was delayed. And I have to say, lucky me. Getting from one part of Nairobi to another took us over an hour and I would have not seen our students perform if the famous "Kenya time" did not exist. When I arrived students seemed to be a bit surprised but also pleased that I kept my promise to come.


The dance crew consisted of 10 people from the Foundation of Hope and not all of them are in our class (even though some of them were meant to be but never showed up which makes me a bit sad as they seem as lovely and bright individuals).
They were the first ones to perform, excited and ready to show their talent. Mich played the drums, Michael took the responsibility of video recording and Augustine enjoyed himself on the stage.

At the beginning, I took my camera out and intended to take lots of pictures but after few minutes I felt that I would miss a lot if I did not just watch. Their traditional dance was vibrant and lively and I enjoyed every minute of it. After the dance, everyone surrounded Michael to see how they have done. It was interesting to watch the facial expressions as they commented on their performance. I thought they were amazing and cannot wait to see another show - I just might ask them to do a little replay during the tea time at school. Well, they all deserved a little bonus and I think they enjoyed the baked fish for late lunch.

Lesson Tried: Low Price

In teaching our business plan course, one of the lessons we try to instill over and over is: what is the uniqueness of the product or service you will offer? Inevitably, the answer is "low price." Though we try to explain over and over that low price in the Kenyan environment (particularly in the slums) is not an effective strategy, the lesson falls on deaf ears. Somehow it’s hard to convince our students that a “low price” strategy is most likely to lead to price wars, as everyone will follow suit.

A story in last week's Daily Standard (a local Kenyan newspaper) reminded me of the futility of continuously focusing on being the lowest price provider. Cellphone penetration in Kenya is currently at 63%, and it’s estimated by Business Monitor International that penetration will be at 100% by 2013. There are four major cell providers in Kenya: Safaricom has 70% of the market share; Airtel has 15.2%; Telkom Kenya (also known as Orange) has 8.5% and Yu has 6.4% (all of these numbers were as of end of December 2010).

Text messaging is big in Kenya--it's rare to find someone, even from the slums, who does not have a cellphone. Most cell services are “prepay” where the customer buys an amount of credit (generally between 100 KES (Kenyan Shillings) and 500 KES at a time), and then draws down that credit with usage. In order to compete and grow their customer bases, some cell companies in 2009 and 2010 introduced an even smaller "prepay" credit in the amount of 20 KES. This made cell usage affordable for people who had very little money, allowing credit for a couple of text messages and/or brief phone calls to be purchased at a time. This was a way of increasing the customer base for cell providers by tapping into a whole new category of users (those who are very poor).

The first week … meet the Kibera students

When I enter the classroom for the first time, there is always so much expectation and excitement. How many students are going to show up? What will be the dynamics in the class? Are they going to be lively? Will they show up the next day (if they do not, I cannot help myself but wonder whether we have done a good job)?

But then a week passes by and I suddenly find myself attached to all of my students. I know their names and nicknames; I know that they are all extremely smart and courageous to be willing to start their own business at such a young age (student age range is 18 – 25). I know who is the class comedian (Edwin), who is the mathematician (Dennis – he also runs his own business already) and who is the cool DJ kid (Mich). I watch the girls in the class: Sellah, Gertrude, Catherine and Eunice argue their point with the boys and firmly stand their ground. There is also more serious David and Aloys, a very boyish looking Nazri (his real name is Stephen and he wants to be a stand-up comedian), quieter Michael and Felix. And I can not forget Augustine and Josphat who always manage to surprise me with their bright insights and comments.

There are some things that will never change. Their unconditional love for sweets and games. The creative excuses why they did not do their homework. The dancing and lively chatter during the tea break. And their wide smiles. But what I love the most about being in class is, that it is not only about teaching.

It is also about getting to know my students. Last Friday I learnt so much about their active community. Number of them are members and volunteers with the Foundation of Hope (the Foundation operates from the site where we teach). They write their own poetry and plays and then choreograph them. They dance and act and have an all day festival next week and I cannot wait to see them perform. If what they can do in the class is just a taste of it, it should be a world class show.

Education apparently is not enough

Yesterday was our first day of teaching. We have two sites, one in Kibera (which has often been referred to as the largest slum in East Africa, though apparently more recently, they’ve estimated that its size is perhaps one-third of earlier claims. It’s hard to do a census in a slum.) We’ve worked in Kibera before and we understand its rhythms, to the extent that a mizunga (white person) can do so.

Our second site is in a different slum at a different edge of Nairobi. This slum is called Mathare. Mathare may have recently overtaken Kibera in terms of size, from what I’ve been told. I accompanied the two UBC team members (both MBA students) who are working at Mathare so that I could get a sense of the conditions first hand, with class in session. It was interesting, and disheartening, at once. But it might also give a sense, for those of you who have made donations to the programs, of how money can be spent in these types of programs.

Our program provides three weeks of free education, with all the mentoring a student could want, all for the asking. We have sometimes been criticized for not charging a nominal fee for the program (say around $10-15), to add a level of seriousness and commitment to the program. We have resisted that suggestion to date.

Our program generally runs from 8:30-2:30, give or take. One of the first issues that arose at the Mathare site was “what language would be we using?” We had greeted each student as they arrived, watched as they kicked a soccer ball around, and played some ice-breaker games outside. Everything was comfortably communicated in English. We’ve always taught in English (Kenya, like Canada, is a “two official language country” with Kenya’s two languages being Kiswahili and English). This has never been an issue in the five previous years that we have been here.

In Mathare, it became an issue. There was a class ringleader who was clearly trying to stir everyone up. To what end, it was not clear, but it made for a rocky start. At first I thought perhaps his English was weaker than he’d like. Later, though, I was given an alternative hypothesis by one of our drivers. He noted that in Mathare, unlike in Kibera, there is far more peer pressure. Part of that peer pressure means that speaking in English is not appropriate (even if you can do so fluently, which, it turned out, most of the class can, so they must be practicing somewhere). If you are speaking in English (as a resident of Mathare) it means that you are showing off, and trying to let everyone know that you are better than everyone else.

Next question: how much were they going to be paid for taking our free three-week class? We told them “nothing,” but this did not set well. (We simply have never been able to raise enough money to consider this as a possibility.) We explained that we are here to teach, we are educators, not bankers or financers, and that education was what we provided. Not a stellar answer from their perspective, to be sure. Many NGOs do pay people here to go to training sessions. I think that is a bad model overall. Because then the focus is on showing up to get paid, not on learning. If people really don’t want the education, but bribery gets them into the classroom, is that really a good thing? I have yet to see a student learn when they didn’t want to learn, and I have a lot of experience in the classroom.

Next question: were we feeding them lunch? No. (Again, our fundraising simply does not support that kind of activity.) Without lunch, some said they didn’t want to stay beyond 12:30, even though for many of them there was nowhere else to go (unemployment among youth is a staggering 60%). In fact, with no lunch, they suggested that we just run a two-hour class, but they wanted the certificates that came with the program, even if they were only doing 20% of the work. We didn’t go for that either.

Next question: If they didn’t drink the tea and eat the mendazis (similar to donuts) we provided (something our fundraising does provide for, and for which we’re grateful to our donors), could they be given the equivalent in money instead? One student in particular had an issue with this because he’s Muslim, and yesterday was the start of Ramadan, the month of fasting (and fasting goes from sun-up to sun-down, which is why he couldn’t partake of our tea break). This would be about the equivalent of me going to your house for dinner, and after dinner you offered me dessert, and I wasn’t hungry, so I asked you if you could pay me, instead, the amount of money my dessert cost you to provide. We said we didn’t give “rebates.

It will be interesting to see how this site develops, who stays, and who goes. Particularly the ringleader.

The photos help illustrate the Mathare scene. The first is an aerial view of a section of Mathare (note the tin roofs, and tin buildings). The second is a view from our classroom door, looking out (soccer/football is big here, and we brought a soccer ball for recreational breaks). Finally, here is Julie, working with her breakout group.