SAI Celebration 2012

We just finished up our three-week Sauder Africa Initiative class last week.  For those of you who don’t know about it, this was a course to help youth and adults in Kibera and Mathare learn about entrepreneurship and also how to write basic business plans.  There were three classes – one in Mathare and two in Kibera.  Each class had a team of UBC students and local Kenyans.  I was lucky enough to be one of the teachers at Kibera.

Friday was a day to celebrate the completion of the program for the students.  The day was filled with emotion from both the teachers and the students.  In just a short time, I felt such a strong connection to the Kibera students.  After three weeks, I gained a serious respect for the way they live their lives.  The students were so warm and welcoming to our team.  There is also a strong sense of community.  Many of the youth in both Kibera and Mathare are involved in community-building activities.  It is really common for people to help their family, friends and neighbors, if they can.  You could also see this in class because so many students were always willing to help out a student in need.  This is something that I wish were more prevalent in North America.

The day started with introductions and welcome speeches from Martina and Nancy.  Then each student from all three classes went in the front of the group to present their personal mission statements.  During practice the day before, most of the students were really nervous.  On Friday, despite nerves, all of the students did a fabulous job!  Some of them spoke in Swahili so I could not understand it, but I can say that they spoke with confidence.  It made me really proud because they made such amazing progress in such a short time.

It was also touching to hear everyone’s personal mission statements because most of the students shared very troubling aspects from their upbringing.  However they seemed to all have a strong confidence in their ability to be successful for the future. 

The rest of the day was filled with motivational speeches, lots of pictures, food and celebrations.  It was bittersweet because we were celebrating the successful achievement of our students, but we were also saying goodbye to our new friends in Nairobi.

I hope the students have a tiny bit more knowledge and a few more tools and resources they need in order to get onto the road to success.  Frankly in three weeks, it is difficult to make a dramatic change, but all change starts with a small step.  That is all I can hope for is that we helped them make a small step…

Much love to the students and the teachers and everyone else who made the past three weeks possible.  I hope to see you all again next year! 

Asha

7 Years of Teaching: The Networking Event

(by Anoushka Patel)

During the three weeks that we were in Nairobi, we set a day aside for the largely anticipated networking day event. It was meant to be a fun filled day in which students can get a break from the classroom and topics such as cash flows, which is unbelievably hard to make fun. It is also held so that the students from the two different sites get to interact with other students in their industries with the aim possibly making feasible partnerships or just to share ideas. We also invited students who participated in the previous years to come share their experiences, inspire the new class and give them a few words of encouragement. Now, for those of you who have ever planned an event, be it frosh or camp, the first thing on the agenda is always ICEBREAKERS. Then again, those of you who actually have Kenyan friends would know that’s there is absolutely no point in doing that. All you need is a beat. It doesn’t have to be music, it can be a drum roll on a table or even the likes of my terrible singing but that will be enough to bring them together to bust a move on the dance floor. We tried the human knot game, but that quickly turned onto one big dance session! And boy can Kenyans dance!

We then sat down and heard a very inspirational speech from a graduate in the 2007 class who managed, against all odds to start her  bakery. Winifred is the symbol of courage and hard work and has inspired everyone one of us in that room to never give up and to dream big.

Then came the fun part - the activities! We first divided all the students into groups depending on the industry they were in and made them rotate through different stations. The first station was the marshmallow game in which students were asked to build a tower with 20 spaghetti strands and had to fasten a marshmallow on the top of it. The team with the tallest freestanding tower won. The idea behind the game was to facilitate team work and to encourage prototyping. It was also used as a symbol to never give up, and to get back up when you fall. The students really worked well together and a few even came up with great structures.

Another game we played was more along the lines of a design thinking workshop. We gave the students 5 completely random and somewhat useless items such as a hockey stick(Canadian pride), and asked them to think of 5 different businesses we could start with those items. It was a hard one, but after discussing and building on each others ideas, the students really started to tap into their creative zones and came up with some phenomenal ideas.

In the next workshop we played the word game. The students were split into groups of three and were each given a word that they had to illustrate on sheets of drawing paper. There were no restrictions when it came to the illustrations and students could use markers and post it notes, some even used mud and grass to get their point across. For instance, one of the words that were given to them was ‘hope’ and the illustrations they came up with were outstanding. One team used a small plant and drew rain to symbolize hope, strength and growth.

Another game we used to reinforce some of the concepts we learned in class was the target market game. Each group had to come up one business and figure out the target market for that business. While doing target market in class, all of us really tried to reinforce the idea of analyzing your target customers by telling a story about their typical day. We even went as far as creating a character and naming it to make it seem more life like. This workshop really tried to reinforce this type of thinking and all the groups did great.

All in all, it was a fabulous day filed with laughter, new friendships, renewed business ideas and a box full of pili pili rice J

Food in Nairobi

Unfortunately three weeks have gone by incredibly fast and the 2012 program has officially finished.  One of the many things I will miss about Nairobi is the food!  If you ever get a chance to travel to Nairobi, here are a few places that we've gone to that I would recommend trying:

1. Dorman's Coffee (8/10)

I must say, this coffee chain store was definitely not what I expected.  Although this coffee chain is everywhere in Nairobi, it had a much more local, diner-almost feeling to it.  The service is friendly and the ambience is very homey as well.  Coffee is definitely a go-to and I would also highly recommend the steak sandwich (Apparently, they used to have steak on their menu that was supposingly superb but was recently taken down). The steak sandwich however is definitely no let-down. Their egg-in-a-hole (toast with an egg centre) as well as their pancakes are quite good as well.  If you're a donut fan, one of the girls on the team this year is especially obsessed with Dorman's nutmeg donut!

2. Oarkley's Base (8.5/10)

This place has amazing Nyama Choma.  If you ever go to Nairobi, you should definitely try it.  Nyama choma is a common dish which is basically barbecued meat.  It compliments well with the African's prized Ugali (equivalent to Chinese people and their rice I suppose).  I highly recommend ordering the lamb leg as they grill and season it to perfection.  And also remember to order their chips (which would be considered fries in Canada) as they are very tasty!  The only thing about this place is that the wait time can be very long, ranging from 45minutes-1 hour to get your food.  However, they try to ease the pain by having good music or a band playing at all times.

3. Mystique Gardens (8.5/10)

Another cuisine that we tried during our time at Nairobi was an Indian-style barbecue at Mystique Gardens.  It was a very nice location where we were able to take part in cooking some of our food yet was also served by the staff at the same time.  The appetizers, deep fried fish sticks and the deep fried vegetables, were good especially with the tartar sauce and the brown chutney sauce.  The barbecue chicken was amazingly tasty and the chapattis prepared for us was very delicious as well.  Afterwards we had a dessert which was cooked carrot shreds mixed with condensed milk I believe and some ice cream.  It was a very lovely meal indeed.

4. Kenchic (7/10)

Kenchic's slogan is "We're kuku for chicken" (which technically translates to we're chicken for chicken in Swahili).  Although KFC can be found around Nairobi, this fried chicken chain restaurant is ubiquitous and very affordable as well!  360 KES which is about $4.50 can buy you an entire deep fried chicken.  To be honest, I do not find the chicken at Kenchic particularly amazing but for the price, it's definitely worth it.  I also got a chance to try the Bhajia (potatoes deep fried with a meat paste) which was delicious and the Masala chips were great as well if you're not afraid of spice!

5. Creamy Inn and Pizza Inn (8/10)

Creamy Inn is basically the Dairy Queen of Nairobi.  The ice cream itself is quite good, definitely reminds me of the soft serve ice cream at Mcdonalds.  Pizza Inn, on the other hand, has some really tasty pizza but beware!  The pizza is soaking in oil so if you're not used to greasy food, I would not suggest indulging too much.  The pizza dough is very soft and fresh and I would say is comparable to the Canadian Freshslice pizza.  They also have a 2 for 1 pizza special every Tuesday so for around $30 something, we were able to order 6 big pizzas and drinks for all!

6. Habesha (8/10)

Another common favourite in Nairobi I noticed is ethiopian food.  It is delicious and can also be adapted to for the non-meat-eaters!  For those who have never tried ethiopian food before (it was my first time and I am in love with it now!), what you do is you can order a large plate like us and some extra pots on the side and you take these rolled-up, napkin-like "bread" and use it to wrap the sauce/dish.  It's really a great way to share!

Overall, it was a great experience and I would definitely love to go back if I could (and not only just for the food)! 

M-Pesa and Safaricom

From the first day I arrived in Nairobi, I’ve been hearing about this nifty little service called M-Pesa that’s run by the telecom company Safaricom.

Pesa means ‘money’ in Swahili, and M stands for mobile in this case, so M-Pesa is all about mobile money. It’s a service where you can load money to an account and transfer it around using your cell phone! You can transfer money to anyone who has an M-Pesa account – friends, family, shop owners – as long as you have their number. Pretty much every shop has their M-Pesa number posted above their desk.

It’s an ingenious sort of system for a society that lives on cash. No one has a credit card here, though places that cater to foreigners generally accept credit. Debit cards are for people with enough money to have an actual bank account, and they’re generally only used to take cash out of a bank machine.

M-Pesa, on the other hand, works with people who would never think to set foot in a bank, who could never open a bank account even if they wanted to. At the same time, they don’t always want to keep everything in cash all the time. M-Pesa gives them an opportunity to deposit money and use their phone as their bank account.

Of course, the system isn’t perfect. There are accounts of people abusing the system, transferring around money sneakily and creating all kinds of fraudulent schemes, and there’s a lot of room for human error when you type in the 7-digit account number. Overall though, it’s a pretty good system. I’m not sure why North America hasn’t caught on to this whole ‘pay by cell phone’ thing yet, but I’m sure it will come…eventually.

Safaricom is also a pretty cool company. The cell phone and (amazingly cheap) phone service I’ve got are with Safaricom. For some weird reason, it costs 3 shillings per minute (just under 4 cents) to call Canada, but it costs 4 shillings per minute to call within Kenya. Also, you can sign up for all sorts of packages just by texting Safaricom. (You know those ‘text 5555’ to enter into such-and-such a contest in Canada? Think of that, but legitimate!) It’s incredibly simple, especially when you consider the immense hassle it takes to set up and manage a cell phone plan in Canada.

Overall, I think there’s a pretty good reason that Safaricom has such market dominance over here. They saw opportunity where no one else saw it, and have managed to make quite a bit of money through it too! More importantly, though, they have really managed to change the way that people in Kenya do business. 

Winfred Realizes Her Dream

Winfred was a student in our 2007 class. She attended the sessions we held at Kenya Assembly of God, in Bahati. I remember Winfred, because she sought me out each morning she was on site, to look over her homework from the night before. She wanted to open a bakery. At the time the task seemed daunting, but we all encouraged her to follow up on what she'd learned from her marketing survey, and to keep working on her plan.

Fast forward to 2012. Yesterday I had the opportunity to see Winfred's bakery. It opened a year ago. Between 2007 and 2011 she'd suffered a number of setbacks, including losing her mother, and suffering paralysis (which has left her with a slight tremor in her hands.) Afer her mother passed away, she struggled for awhile, but then told herself that she had to get back on her feet. She started saving money slowly, and mapped out the strategy for getting the bakery opened.

When we visited yesterday, three of her employees were busily at work: one decorating cakes, one baking, and the other cleaning measuring cups. The young woman cleaning the cups, pictured here, is an orphan. Besides opening the bakery, Winfred has dedicated herself to giving back to the community, and thus she helps some of the young people in her community by employing them.

When I first heard from Winfred earlier this year that she had started her bakery, of course I imagined a shop displaying cakes, cookies, and the like. As you can see from the picture, however, the bakery is the actual baking facility. People order cakes and cookies, and the bakery delivers (or you can pick up your order). Winfred proudly showed up her order book, her sales book, her receipts, and her expense books. We were happy to see these, as we spend some time in class trying to help our students understand cash flow, and the importance of keeping good records.

Winfred spoke very positively of the many things she learned in SE101, from her UBC student-teachers (Brent McFerran (Ph.D., Marketing, 2009), Jim Atamba (B.Comm 2008), and Jessie Yeung (B. Comm 2008). She was much more modest about all the hard work she had put into making her dream come true.

Winfred gave us samples of cookies and chocolate cake to take back with us to town. The treats would be competitive in Canada. We are planning to have her bake the cakes for our celebration ceremony at the end of this year's program in two weeks. We want our current participants to hear about Winfred's success, so that they can start to see how opening a business is possible with a lot of hard work, a dedicated approach to savings, and some business knowledge.