America, Kenyan Style

So this post is a bit late, but I thought I'd share a bit about my weekend, and how amazing Saturday was. I woke up and met a friend of mine in my program for breakfast, and then we made our way downtown to meet up with some others before heading to Village Market.

Village Market is a westernized upscale mall that is toward the UN and US Embassy area of Nairobi. Upon walking in, we were greeted by a small waterfall/river thing that ran through the very nice food court area of the mall. We sat down for a few minutes and just took in what we were seeing, America in Kenya. It was a bit overwhelming.

After a soda, we made our way to the pool area. And when I say pool area, I mean the pool area with 5-6 decent waterslides, a kid's pool, a lap pool and a "lazy river" which I will explain why it's in quotes later. I felt like a little kid going to Noah's Ark for the first time. I went down some slides, and proceeded to almost ruin my friends' iPhone as they tried to take pictures of me sliding.

My sliding experience took a little stop when I went down a slide which was closer to the steps than the others were, so when I slipped on the bottom of the pool, I fell thinking I had more room. Unfortunately, I hit my shin pretty hard on the step, so I got to make a little visit to the first aid station. After getting my cut wrapped up pretty well, I made my way down to the lap/regular pool.

We swam for a little while there, and then my friend Maggie and I decided to go down the "lazy river". Ok, this thing was nothing like we're accustomed to in the U.S. We were confused why there was a sign telling us to keep our arms and legs inside the tube, but as soon as we went, we figured out why. The water pressure got us moving fairly quickly, and I had to cross my legs and pull them up to my chest so I wouldn't smash them on the wall. It was fun, but the second time we went, Maggie's tube got under mine and I flipped over, hitting my head on the bottom. Regardless, swimming was amazing!

After swimming, we continued our little day of America by getting some pizza. We had some problems here as we ordered a pizza with just cheese in the crust. Normally they put meat and cheese in the crust, but we specifically asked for just cheese. SO, when they brought out the pizza, what was in the crust? Just meat....think like a hotdog.

After finishing our pizza, we walked around for a little while and then wanted to get some ice cream, building off our American eating fest. Let's just say the ice cream I bought was my best food purchase in this country. I got this dish that went from the top down: whipped cream with chocolate sauce, chocolate ice cream, espresso ice cream, real espresso, whipped cream...THANK YOU!! It was AMAZING and after not having real ice cream for a long time, it was glorious.

Completing our day of American fun, three of us decided to go mini-golfing. The course was actually really nice and fairly challenging. I unfortunately did not win, but still had a great time, feeling a bit like I was on vacation in Florida at Goofy Golf or joking with my friends at Vitense in Madison.

All in all, it was a great day. I got to do a lot of fun stuff for actually really cheap. The slides cost 350 shillings (about $5-6) and the mini-golf cost 200 (about $3-4). Ahh the joy of childhood fun....

Appreciation

Hello everyone!! I hope you're all doing well and looking forward to the warm weather I hear you're about to get in Wisconsin. Actually, it's not that much warmer here than what it's supposed to be there, so hopefully the adjustment will just be continued warmth when yI come home in May.

I'm finishing up my second week of internship this week, and I'm excited about the stuff I'm working on. First of all, I'm continuing to work with the kids in Kibera, helping oversee them make ads and other video stories. Secondly, I'm doing some advertising and promotion activities for a couple groups. The first is for a guy who is from Kibera but sells these AWESOME sandals in the Prestige Market. He takes used tires and uses them as the soles for the sandals, and then covers them with nice leather. They actually look pretty good, are generally eco-friendly and supposed to last a long time. So for him, I will be making a video and print ad over the next few weeks.

In addition, I'm helping out with an art group in Kibera called Maasai Mbili. They're a group of guys who make varying kinds of art, and I will be helping them with promotional activities. In particular, I have a hard time thinking advertising is a useful way to promote pieces of art. So instead, I will be hopefully making an online video for them, teaching them the use of online social tools such as Facebook and other basic promotional activities they can do to get their name out to a larger audience.

Now a little update on me personally. I'm writing this post on a sunny afternoon in my favorite coffee shop/restaurant, Java. While I frequent Java, something about today's visit is different for me. As I sat waiting in the Prestige Market for the guy selling the sandals this morning, I got a few minutes (well 30 minutes. When they say a 10 minute wait, that's what they actually mean) where I could just sit and watch people. Some people were working and trying to sell their goods to customers in the market, while others were just making their way through.

Moments like these are incredibly simple and simultaneously amazing. These are the moments where I see true connection with my life here and my life back home. I see things like two men greet each other with a smile and a handshake, reminiscent of my Dad and his friend Bob when they go out for coffee. I see a woman with a small restaurant in the market joking with a lady who sells vegetables, reminding me of my sister Elise when she's grabbing Starbucks with her friend Nicole.

In those small moments, life offers you the opportunity to just slow down and look at the world around you. While I'm somewhere new, that doesn't mean life is really that different. There are definitely differences between living here and living at home, but I think you can just stop in those moments and notice the commonality in humanity. You see yourself and friends in those you don't know.

I really appreciate these moments as I think since I've adjusted to living here, I forget that I'm living in KENYA!! I do not always grasp the amazing opportunity God has placed before me, and how much I need to take advantage of that.

To be sure, this trip is not exactly what I expected. But maybe that's a good thing. Some things have been amazing, some things incredibly difficult. But just because something is difficult does not make it bad. I think I've truly learned a lot about who I am and how I need to grow as a person through this program. It is in the beauty of finding something good out of something bad that I truly appreciate the life and people I have here and back home. God has blessed me with these people and opportunities for a reason, and it is up to me to decide how to live in these moments. I do not always look for the best in every situation, but some times you've got to just stop and look at the beauty around you and truly appreciate the life you've been given.

Kenyanisms

So I figure that since I've picked up a Kenyan accent (which I have to turn on and off depending on who I talk to) and my parents commented on my how I speak a bit differently when Skyping earlier in the week, I thought I would share a bit about "Kenyanisms" or things Kenyans say and do that I probably will have when I come home and you won't know what to do with.

1). The inability to say yes or no: I've found many Kenyans who, rather than saying yes or no, will simply respond with an "mhmm" to mean yes or no. If it goes up, that means yes, and if it goes down it means no. So if you ask me a yes or no question when I come home and I respond with this, tell me to clarify if you don't understand.

2) Ehhhh?: Think about how we say that Canadians say "eh" at the end of sentences, elongate it and make the sound go up at the end, and you've got a Kenyan "ehh". This is how I respond to people when they call my name or when I don't hear someone say something. It's basically equivalent to "what?" without saying it.

3) Raising my eyebrows with a slight nod: The Kenyan way to say yes when you're too lazy to feel like making "mhmm" sound.

4) Tisking: Kenyans tisk a lot, but it can mean different things. First off, you can tisk at something to say that it's bad, and this is how it's usually used. For example, if a tout (conductor) on a bus calls you over to get on a bus and then tells you the bus is full, you can tisk. OR, tisking can be a good thing. If something is VERY nice and people don't comment, you can tisk to mean something is good. Logical, right....?

5) Hissing: This is actually a bit rude, but a way for people to get each others' attention. For example, I've been walking in a market and a guy behind me with a wheelbarrow has hissed at me to get my attention so I could get out of the way.

6) Clicking: This is a Kenyan habit that I'm not happy I've picked up on, and probably will be the most confusing for people when I come home. When someone does something you don't like, you can click at them. Think of the clicking noise you would make to call a horse, but only do it once. I don't like this one, but unfortunately have picked up on it. So if you do something I like back home, watch out for that click! It's happening!

7) Me, I....: This is the one that always cracks me up, and I have yet to pick up on. Kenyans like to say, "Me, I something...." For example, someone might say "Me, I didn't go to school yesterday." Or "Me, I'm thinking I'll leave at 5:00." My favorite response to this to ask if they can do or not do something twice. For example, if someone says "Me, I didn't like the food last night," I'll respond with "You didn't like the food twice? You, you didn't like the food? How does that work?" I hope to not pick up on this saying.

So yea, these are a few of the things that I've noticed and picked up on in the past few months. So if you hear me say or do something and don't get it, let me know. It's probably just Kenyan.

Coffee Drinking Culture in Kenya

If you know my family, you know that we love to drink coffee, a lot! Some of my best family memories revolve around us sitting and talking over a cup of nice coffee. When we have guests over, we've been known to put down a few pots of coffee in one morning. So when I realized Kenya's drink of choice was chai (tea made with whole milk), I was not sure how I would handle the transition.

In all honesty, I'm not sure I've made much of a transition at all. When my mom asked me if I've been drinking a lot of tea here, I told her no as the whole milk has kind of turned me off. Kenyans, however, drink a lot of chai. I know people who drink it more than four times per day. But there's something about chai that just doesn't do me right.

So, instead I've resorted to the Kenyan coffee world. My two main hubs of coffee are at Java and Dorman's. Both are not what we would consider "coffee shops" as they offer more of a restaurant feel with coffee as a key aspect of the menu. But as I'm in Kenya, they are my best option.

My first visit to Java, I got laughed at by my previous host sisters as I starting walking toward the register to get my coffee. I didn't realize that Kenyan coffee shops are like restaurants, so you sit down and coffee is brought to you instead of ordering, waiting at the bar and then finding a place to sit.

While I love my coffee, and have found a couple places to go, finding coffee is actually a bit hard to find outside of tourist centers. Coffee is too expensive for the average Kenyan to drink, so I've only seen it in affluent areas of Nairobi. A cup of coffee can run from 90 shillings to 130 (about $1.20 to about $1.75), but those costs are too high for many Kenyans. So often times going to a coffee shop surrounds you with the middle to upper classes in Nairobi and other tourists or business people.The other option for some Kenyans is instant coffee. When I'm at home, this is what I drink, but ugh...instant coffee...

Because there are few coffee shops, those that exist are often crowded and too loud for me to get a lot of work done. I love doing homework in coffee shops back home. It's a good place for me to have enough peace to focus but also enough distraction to not zone out. So unfortunately, coffee shops here are not as useful for getting work done as they are back home.

However, I've also noticed the coffee here in Kenya is AWESOME! Again, like chai, places will make the coffee with milk instead of water unless you request it. It's actually pretty good, and at Java, they make it dark! So good!

While I've found my coffee fix at Java here in Kenya, let's just say I'm ready for some good American coffee!

Internship Day 3

So I'm now three days into my internship. After a couple of talks with Ken, we have my plan for the next few weeks more finalized.

As I said before, I will be doing advertising in Kibera as well as teaching youth in the slum. This week, we are doing the basics of advertising and strategic communication. After my introductory class on Monday, we discussed the basics of background research in reporting and advertising yesterday, and then I sent them out on assignment to go interview a local business as if they were to go advertise for them.

This morning they came back and presented on their findings. We then went into strategy of planning for advertising. I had them create mental webs about the companies they interviewed and come up with ideas. I then had them go back into their groups and answer some questions on strategy like who are they trying to reach, why, how will they reach them, what are the one to two key points their audience needs to know, etc.

The rest of this week, we'll talk about ad placements and also about how to write a lead. Even though we're doing advertising this week, I want them to be able to come up with ideas on how to engage an audience. Then on Monday we'll do creative work.

While this is going on, Ken will be teaching them about video shooting and editing. So next week after they've learned about these aspects of advertising, they will go out to a business in Kibera and create an advertisement for them. I'm excited to see where this goes.

After the next couple weeks, I'm going to transition from advertising into story writing. We want to give the kids some skills to maybe get a job, so I want to help them with their ability to tell a story and their writing ability. So that whole week we'll learn different aspects of writing a story.

The fourth and fifth weeks of my internship, we will be overseeing them making multiple projects. At this point, they should know more about video work from Ken and the basics of writing a story and advertising for me, so we'll have them do a couple stories and advertisements as projects over these two weeks. My final week, we hope to teach them how to do basic web work and to upload their videos to a web site.

While doing this teaching work, I hope to also make a couple advertisements of my own. I'd like to have some for my portfolio and be able to have them for when I go home.

All in all, I think this could be a great few weeks. I'm excited and simultaneously a little overwhelmed with what we're going to do. I've had to frantically go back through my journalism notes to remember topics to address with the kids and how to properly address them. In fact, I've spent half of my work hours this week doing lesson plans...not exactly what I was expecting from a communications internship. But I'm excited to see what these next few weeks bring and hope you're all doing well!

My Internship

Today I started my internship, meaning I'm over halfway done for the semester. I am working for a film group in Kibera called Filamu Juani that teaches youth how to use film equipment to tell their story and gain skills to get out of the slum. I actually met the head of the program, Ken, last year when he worked in Madison.

When I met with Ken to set up my internship here in Nairobi, I told him that in the journalism school I specialize in strategic communications. He was excited about this as he said he wanted some advertising and strat comm work done with his program. I was really excited to get started and do advertising work for businesses and individuals based out of Kibera. I was excited to do something that is entirely new, and would look really good on an application.

This morning, however, added a large unexpected twist to the equation. I found out from Ken as we were walking from the bus stage that I was going to lead a class on advertising today!! So we got there and I basically made up an hour and a half long lecture on the basics of advertising and strategic communications! I was more than mildly overwhelmed! Luckily, I've coached before and have handled kids, so the class actually went ok.

After class, Ken and I went to get some advertisements for the kids to see as examples, and I learned over the course of the day that I basically will be leading and teaching these kids over the next six weeks. So I guess we will be working on advertising projects while I teach them the basics of advertising. I'm not entirely sure how this will go as I don't have too much experience with strategic communication myself...

I have talked to one of my former journalism TAs who is working here in Nairobi and have e-mailed a couple of my former journalism professors asking for some help. So we'll see where this goes. I'm excited about working with the kids and to do advertising in a slum, both of which are unique and amazing experiences. However, this whole teaching thing will be interesting and a way to push me for sure. Let's just say it's another growing experience in Kenya.

Changing Homestays

Just a heads up to all of you following my blog, I changed homestays today. There were some security issues at my previous place, so I talked to staff from our program, and I moved this afternoon.

Now, I'm living with a family in an area of Nairobi called Kilimani. I'm excited about my new place, especially that there's a tree outside my window with flowers on it. A nice break from Wisconsin winters.

I have a host mom, who is a nurse, and three host brothers, of who I've met two. The two brothers are both great and we get along very well. I was excited about the fact that they both swim, so we could talk swimming and we're planning on going later in the week.

I think it will be interesting to stay here to also get another perspective on Kenyan life. While still in Nairobi, I think there are things that will be both similar and different that I will hopefully be able to see from my new home. My time in Kenya has been a growing and learning experience, and I think that will add to that.

I hope you're doing well, and to hear from you all soon. I also hear the snow is melting, so enjoy the green!

Markets and Bargaining

Open-air markets are the key shopping source for many Kenyans. The markets can have such things as clothes, food, jewelry, bedding, bags and potentially furniture. This is a great place to go buy things at a fairly cheap price.

There are two main markets that I've been to, Toi and Adams. Both primarily sell clothes and food, and are close together. The clothes that most stands have is actually donated from the western world. The clothes come into a center in Nairobi, people buy the clothes in bundles and then take them to their stands to sell. There are markets literally all over the city.

As I said, markets are a great place to guy buy clothes. But part of going to a market in Kenya involves bargaining. My main experience with a market prior to traveling to Kenya is the Farmer's Market in Madison. There, if someone gives you a price, you generally pay that price. In Kenya, it's a different story.

In Kenyan markets, bargaining happens with almost every purchase. The sellers expect you to bargain, and you have to get good at bargaining to get the price you want. I have been able to bargain for a couple items in some broken Kiswahili, but most people speak English fine. The Kiswahili gives the impression that you know what you're doing.

But bargaining also takes some practice. I've learned the general method of taking the first offer and going under half of that price. For example, I bought a pair of almost new Abercrombie and Fitch jeans at the market today. When I first asked the price, he wanted me to pay 1450 shillings. So I started at 600. We worked our way back and forth until I got him to 1100 shillings.

At this point I used my favorite bargaining move that also worked with the bracelet I bought today. You just walk away. At this point they realize that either you can buy it and they can make a profit or they can make nothing. So the guy came out of his stand after me, we continued bargaining and I finally bought the jeans at 950 shillings. It was a bit more than the 750 that I actually wanted to pay, but $12-13 for an almost brand new pair of brand name jeans is not too bad.

I've learned to like bargaining. While I get a bit mad that I often get initially offered the mzungu price, I like the game of trying to figure out who's actually willing to give more. And no matter what, someone won't sell you something if they won't make a profit. The problem is that I'll have to remember to keep my new bargaining to a minimum when I come home.

My Classes

I figure that since this is my last week of classes, I should probably do a little post on what I've taken so far this semester.

First off, I've taken first semester of Kiswahili. Ninapenda Kiswahili kwa sababu lugha ni rahisi (I like Swahili because the language is easy). We know it as Swahili in the States, but it's called Kiswahili as the "Ki" denotes a language. For example, Kiswahili, Kikamba, Kingereza (English), etc. Luckily, there is little you have to change between verb tenses, making the language pretty easy to pick up. On the other hand, using it in the city is a little different. For one, Sheng. Sheng is the slang language of Kenya with a mix of English and Swahili, hence its name. Despite this, I've been able to put together sentences pretty well and can do basic things like bargain, order, etc. in Kiswahili with a little Sheng thrown in so I can pretend like I know what I'm doing.

For example, the normal Nairobi greeting involves either "Mambo", to which you respond "Poa" or "Habari gani/leo/etc." to which you respond "Mzuri". However, Sheng is "Sasa", to which you respond "Fit" (pronounced feet). That and using the word "bao" which means 20 shillings is helpful when using the matatus.

In addition to Kiswahili, I've taken a class on development and another on country analysis. For development, we've looked at how Kenya has developed since colonialism, and how modes of development have played a role in Kenya. For country analysis, we've studied the country of Kenya as a whole, learning about the people, politics and history of the country. For this class, we have a professor named Dr. Jonyo who is one of the funniest people I've ever met. He has his name monogrammed on all his shirts, and he also loves to tell outrageous stories.

Another aspect of our class time has been having guest lecturers. We've had guests come and talk on such varying topics as women in Islam, community development and my personal favorite who we had today, a ethnomusicologist. He talked to us about the basics of Kenya singing, dancing and instrument playing. We learned about the basic instruments of traditional Kenya music, as well as a few songs and even got to get up and learn how to dance a few moves. It was fun!

I hope that you are all doing well, and enjoying a Wisconsin March day!

Masai Mara, aka Most Amazing Weekend Ever!

This weekend can simply be put as the most amazing experience of my life. Myself and seven other students from my program went to Masai Mara National Reserve, one of the best places to go on safari in the world. The reserve is in the southwest corner of Kenya, and this weekend, it lived up to its expectations.

Friday morning, we left Nairobi in a private matatu and left for “the Mara”. We drove for about an hour, and made a stop to oversee the Great Rift Valley and Mount Longonot. We then drove another couple hours to the last actual town before Masai Mara, Narok. Along the way, we saw zebras, gazelles, giraffes and had to stop because of goats and cows crossing the road.

After eating at a buffet in Narok for lunch, we kept driving, eventually hitting an extremely bumpy road about 30 minutes outside of Narok. Luckily we had 4-wheel drive because after 45 minutes on that road, we had to drive another 45 minutes on another “road” that was the bumpiest road/track of dirt I’ve ever been on in my life. But as we kept driving, we made our way closer to the Mara and got to also see wildebeest!

We stopped at our campsite right outside the reserve to put our things down. We stayed in tents that were raised a couple feet off the ground with an outer roof and two big beds in each. It was nice to have a decent sized bed on safari.
We left our camp and went out for our first safari. We got into the park, and unfortunately, it was raining. We could kind of make out zebras, Thompson’s Gazelles and wildebeests. After a bit of a drive further, we got to see our first lions! We sat and watched two females for a while, and eventually the rain stopped, so we could pop the top off our matatu and take better photos. The females walked literally two or three feet in front of our vehicle!! We watched them for about 20 or 30 minutes.

We drove off and got to see our first of many elephants over the weekend. A group of 16 was walking in the valley we were in, so we got to get about 30 yards from them. After watching them, we drove back to the lions we saw before and a male joined them! We again got very close to all three.

On our way out of the park, we got to see a female cheetah and her baby! They walked through the bush, right in front of our vehicle and stopped about 30 yards from our car. We then made our way back to camp, had some dinner and went to bed.

I woke up early the next morning, at around 6:15 am. I went to go take a shower, and was a bit sketched out by the shower’s cleanliness. Looking past the outside appearances, it was probably the best shower I’ve had since I left home. It was a hot water shower, probably my third since I’ve come to Kenya, and there was actual water pressure! The window in my shower also let me see the sun gradually rising.
We got back into the matatu and went out for our second day. We again got to see wildebeests, zebras, gazelles and a giraffe as we got into the first part of the park. We drove a little ways, and got to see two male lions sleeping in the morning sun. They seemed to not mind too much that we were so close to them while they napped.

We drove a further into the park, saw a lone male elephant, and then a group of ostriches. Our guide then drove us to go see a female lion nursing her baby cubs! It was cool to see, but we left a little sooner than we were expecting.
We were not sure why we left the lions so early, but in the long run, it paid off. Our guide informed us that we could go see a couple cheetahs. We drove over to them, and got to watch them clean themselves and play with each other from about five to ten feet away. They then went to the other side of our vehicle, and what happened next made me feel like my life was “Planet Earth”.

One of the cheetahs had their ears back like they were ready to hunt. Further out in the valley we were in, there was a herd of topi and Thompson’s Gazelle. We hoped that we could watch something happen, and something definitely did. The cheetahs gradually closed ground between themselves and the gazelles, and we moved along with them. After a couple minutes of following them, we saw the first one take off!! We got to see a cheetah run at full speed and go after prey!! We unfortunately did not actually see the first cheetah kill the gazelle as we drove next to the second one, but we did see the first one walk later with the gazelle it killed. Overall, it was amazing. To first off, see a cheetah take off at full speed, have our guide race us to go see the kill, and then see the cheetah carrying the gazelle later was probably the most amazing thing I have seen in nature!

After the cheetahs, we drove back and saw the mother lion with her cubs for a few minutes, and then made the long drive to the Mara River. We stopped at a very nice hotel to use the bathroom quickly and kept driving. We got to see a couple giraffes and then our guide drove us to the border of Kenya and Tanzania. Serengeti National Park in Tanzania and Masai Mara run up to each other, so we got to see Tanzania.

We then made our way down to the river to see some more animals. We got out of the vehicle and met a park guide who took us down to the water. We got to see a crocodile and hippos lounging on the banks of the river. In addition, the Mara River is the famous location of where the wildebeest cross into Masai Mara from Serengeti during their migration.

After stopping for lunch on the river, we started making our way back to the gate. On our drive, I stood up in our vehicle as we drove across the savannah. Masai Mara is absolutely beautiful in an entirely unique sense. By the gate, there are large hills and there are more trees on the savannah. This part of the reserve, though, is a mass expanse of plains with the occasional rolling hill. There is a tree or small group of bushes every once in a while, but mostly it is green and golden grass as far as the eye can see. It is land untouched by humans where animals can roam free. It’s absolutely beautiful.

On our way back, we ran into a group baboons, and later elephants. We stayed on the road and watched the elephants eat in tall grass about 15 to 20 feet from our car. They are amazing to see in the wild. They gently move across the earth with their HUGE bodies, picking up chunks of grass and dirt on their way. We even got to see a baby elephant! We stayed and watched them for about 15 minutes.

We kept driving and saw a couple more solitary elephants before running into another group. This was a scary little moment in our safari. We saw some elephants in a tree/bushy area, and so our guide drove us up to go see them. We drove up next to them, and then got surrounded on three sides with a watering hole on the other. One elephant got in front of the vehicle on the road and another got behind. Both stood up like they were going to charge. The one in the front of the vehicle stuck out its ears and started trumpeting. Our guide had to turn his lights on and off and then drive at the elephant so it would not charge us! It was scary, but a fun story either way. We pulled around and watched the group, including a MASSIVE male elephant. We drove back to the road, saw a herd of about over 100 cape buffalo, and then kept driving.

We went back to the two male lions we saw earlier, and this time got about three feet away. They were both napping, so we got some great photos. I did get a bit scared when one of them stood up, but it laid back down, and we were ok. Our guide drove us out of the park, some people in my program went to a local Maasai Village, we went back to the camp, ate and went to bed.

We had an early rise this morning at 5:30 am. We got ready, got in the matatu, and made our way into the park right before the sun rise. We got some great shots and then drove for a while. We saw some similar animals, but closed out our safari experience with a bang. We drove up over this hill and watched a cheetah drink water from a watering hole. It was a peaceful way to end our trip.

Basically, this weekend was amazing. I apologize for the length of my post, but I don’t even feel these descriptions do this weekend justice. I hope you’re all doing well, and to hear from you soon.