Close to the End...

I’m sorry I haven’t posted on here in a while. My days have been filled with exciting…typing. I sit in my apartment typing up forty-one interviews worth of notes and attempt to send them to the right companies for review. You would be surprised how many of the email addresses bounce! So, I don’t really have a lot to report on.

On Monday I had a really successful day at a government agency (name withheld). After shuffling through several offices, I ended up at the Director’s office. He spent many years as a diplomat for Kenya in Saudi Arabia and was a very interesting person. Impressed with our work so far, he introduced me to the head of investigation and prosecution (of the ministry). They took a look at our physical map (complete with post-its on all the Chinese company headquarters) and said “Looks like you’re beating us at our own job!” Haha! They agreed to provide any data they had (which I learned is extremely limited as they digitized only last year) if we agree to share our findings with them. Deal.

One thing that struck me was the amount of unfiled paperwork that contained so much data! I’m thinking a lot about thesis topics, and the one I am most excited about requires a lot of data that is not digitized. I wonder if the Kenyan government will pay for me to come back and digitize their information so I can use the data in a thesis? I plan on asking the Director when we touch base tomorrow.

Yesterday, to break through the typing, I baked an apple pie. I am currently renting a room in an apartment with several other people (a Nigerian man, Cameroonian man, two girls from Somalia but work in Dubai, and the Kenyan cleaning staff of three). The first response of almost everyone was, “What is pie?” After I baked it, they asked “Why doesn’t it rise?”And after they tried it, all of them said, “Tooooo sweet!”

Today, I made a banana cake. Actually, I taught my 13-year old friend Charlton (nephew of the owner) how to make a cake. I’m glad to report it received far better reviews than the pie J

Television is the fireplace of the Kenyan home. In every Kenyan household I’ve been to, the TV is always on in the background. My apartment is no exception. Since the communal computer (which I have taken as my own as no one else uses it) is located in the living room, I listen to the TV all day long.  The stations are always limited to: Nigerian soap operas, Hispanic soap operas, Hannah Montana, and Evangelical American preaching. I never thought Hannah Montana would be my show of choice!

Thank you to everyone that has followed me through this two month journey. It is a bit surreal for it to be ending, but I am looking forward to returning to London and regaining a schedule. I'll post at least one more before I leave, and don't forget to check on the research blog for updates once we stat typing the full report!

Other funny things of the week:

-On the street I saw a bus that said “Missionary” down the side and then “Winning” on the front and back windshields. They certainly had faith J

-When purchasing apples, baking powder, and eggs for my baking experiments, I was asked multiple times if I wanted a machete to cut my apples. A knife sufficed.

-In multiple interviews, people asked us what the information would be used for AFTER they completed the entire interview.

-Kyla asked if the burning trash on the side of the road was an offering. Haha. Unfortunately, it is just burning piles of trash, making offerings to the environmental and air pollution gods.

-One of the 5-star hotels we interviewed had clocks representing the time in different cities around the world. One of the places was Nework, which we are guessing was supposed to be Newark.

-After numerous marriage proposals, Kyla calculated based on the current price of cows in Kenya, it would take a minimum of 1 million cows to even take a proposal seriously!

Bomas!

August 19, 2012

Today Kyla and I went to Bomas of Kenya, a cultural heritage museum in the suburbs of Nairobi. After a two-hour bus ride that should have taken 40 minutes, we arrived to a nugget of paradise (in terms of museums). The facility is mostly outdoors and when you first enter, there is a gigantic playground with kids running all over and families picnicking. The grounds are only 25KSH for the entire day (around 30 cents) , so it is a great deal for parents.

One of the main attractions is a series of traditional villages from across all of Kenya. As you wind through a forest path, you come across about 20 different villages (just huts, no people). Though I'd lived in a village before and seen many on the roads, it is interesting to see them next to each other because you can recognize the subtle differences between them. For example, the roofs were almost always made out of straw, but the way that the villages applied the straw was vary. Some layered them in particular patterns, some covered all the way down the walls, some had overhangs, some mixed in more dirt, etc. The huts themselves were also quite diverse. The Kisiis, for example, had extensive walls and separate rooms within the hut. The Taita, on the other hand, had really small open huts with no division of space. We took many pictures but unfortunately I cannot transfer them onto the computer until I get back to London (you can look here for a link to their website, though!).

Seeing the variation across tribes made me wonder how often the similarities were due to pure evolution or knowledge transfer among the different people. There were clearly commonalities that all tribes included, such as granaries, boys huts (but not girls huts), and the fact that ALL of them were round (except the Maasai, though the ones in Bomas were unlike any I've ever seen in Kenya).

The admission price also included a 2-hour traditional drum and dance show. My favorite!!!! The first thing that struck me was how similar some of the movements are to West African dance.Unsurprising, but still interesting since they are across the continent from each other. I also noticed how smart the missionaries were in Kenya, because the Christian gospel music that blasts from most public transport and plays incessantly on the TV in our apartment was almost exactly the same as the traditional music, just with Christian and English words attached. They definitely did their homework on that one and came out on top.

The dances were great and it reinforced my awe at African women's ability to disconnect their torso from their hips and rapidly move the lower half of their body while the top stays perfectly still.  I do not know how they do it!

Overall we had a fun day. Afterward, we ate dinner at a sports bar across the street and caught the final game of the Kenyan Premier League. Not quite as riveting as the British Premier League, still entertaining. Within the first seven minutes one team had five fouls and the other had three. Nice job :)

Fun Things:

-When the others in our apartment watch television, they will pass up cartoons, movies, Nigerian dramas, and the news to put on FamilyTV: Keeping Jesus on the Airwaves. Though I'm ok with Jesus, sometimes the Christian music videos get a little much for me.

-MagicAroni, the Kenyan mac and cheese, is actually from Miami, FL! I think I've found more "Made in USA" products in Kenya than I can find in America!

-Saturday, Kyla and I went to see the movie Brave in the theater. I loved the music and the storyline was pretty girl-empowering for a Disney movie.

-A fence company in Kenya: Elefence. Hahaha! I want to make one!

Door Dragon

Sorry for my lack of posts on this blog...we've been so busy with interviews I haven't had time!

We've been trying to contact this one company for six weeks but they have a particularly adept door dragon whose job is to make sure no one gets any information. We called, sent her an email with our questionnaire, and called some more. On our last phone call, we suggested that maybe we could drop by and she told us the building was located in ACS Plaza.

Lo and behold, ACS Plaza does not exist. However, there is a CPS Plaza that we decided to check out and we discovered the company is actually located in the building next door to that, in Labioni Plaza. So, lying is not her strongest skill.

We went to the office, told her who we were and her face immediately became animated. She apologized and explained that unfortunately the person she sent our form to is out of the office. We told her we would be back later in the day. Several hours later, we returned and she explained to us that the staff was all at a Corporate Social Responsibility event and out of the office. First, CSR in Kenya??? Really? Not a likely scenario. In fact, I almost laughed right there. Second, we could see people walking around, so it is clear that they are not at a CSR function. But, good effort, Door Dragon. We accepted her answers but decided to come back another day in the morning.

**Note, the reason we were so intrigued by this company is that they are a French-American telecommunications company with no listing of ANY work in Africa, let alone an office in Kenya. But, they were listed on a document from the Chinese Embassy in Kenya of Chinese firms working here. And the parent company has a subsidiary in China that is half-owned by the parent and half-owned by the Chinese government. So, we wanted more information!

Fast-forward to Thursday. We arrive back at the office in the morning and the first thing out of Door Dragon's mouth is, "You're back. So, when are you leaving Kenya?" Haha. We say not for a few more weeks. She apologizes again that the person is very busy and cannot see us. So we tell her that it is quite alright and we are able to speak with anyone and can wait all day until someone sees us. After some phone-calls to different departments, she tells us that everyone is busy. We tell her again that we will wait. She makes a few more phone calls and informs us that unfortunately the information we want is not available. We explain to her the reason we would like to talk to someone, as we are a bit confused by they were listed as a Chinese company. We show her the list from the Embassy and she quickly takes it to her boss.

After a few more minutes of waiting, she ushers us into a conference room and sits us down. She quickly states that she is speaking on behalf of her boss and they are not at liberty to disclose any information about their company and that they do not know why the Embassy listed them. She says they have no connection to the Chinese and in fact, compete with other Chinese companies. We smile, explain that we understand, and note that we will inquire back at the Chinese Embassy why they were listed, because perhaps it was a mistake.  Immediately she responds that we should not do that because it will look like we are investigating.

My first reaction was "they are definitely hiding something." My second reaction was "why would it matter if we were investigating something?" The entire experience was a bit surreal. Kyla and I politely took our leave, though we both desired to give the Door Dragon the middle finger as we got in the elevator.

We went to an internet cafe immediately afterward to see what else we could find about the company. Hysterically, the CEO of the Kenyan branch has an open LinkedIn profile that lists almost all the information we wanted about the company anyway, including profits and staff numbers.

Though the Door Dragon was one of the hardest nuts to crack, we ended up finding most of the information without her help anyway. Sometimes I feel like I am harassing people when we become persistent in our pursuit of information. But, if she would have told us from the beginning that they do not provide information to the public, we would have noted it and dropped it. I think it would be very difficult and slightly immoral to be an investigative journalist. Some of the information we have found in this project does not necessarily paint the brightest picture of the situation, but we did not intend that from the outset. I don't know if that makes it any better, but the experience is definitely revealing many new skills I did not know I possessed :)

Once again, we got up close and personal with Chinese construction companies. As we sat in a matatu on our way to Village Market (the mall near the UN) for a meeting, we suddenly jolted forward. A huge dump truck with “China Wu Yi” was blocking the road.

We were in the middle of a crowded informal market and the truck decided it was going to dump an entire load of dirt and sand onto the sidewalk where people had their stands. The locals that worked the stands covered their goods in plastic but refused to move their businesses (rightfully so). Unfortunately fo rhtem, the dump truck did not mind the market-goers and continued to pour dirt all over the walkway. The matatu waited and when the truck was finished, attempted to weave around the truck. Now, the road is very narrow in this market and the truck is sideways across the road, taking up the entire space. So, the matatu tempts fate and tries to bypass the truck. Not a smart move.

The truck lurches forward and swipes the side-mirror off the matatu. Now all hell breaks loose and the matatu driver gets out of the car and begins to scream at the truck driver. Kyla and I contemplate getting out of the car and catching a different vehicle, but the crowd grows quickly and it becomes clear that it is safer to stay in the matatu than get out. After about seven minutes, they come to some type of agreement, the matatu driver gets back in and we continue our journey as if nothing happened.

Just another day in Nairobi, researching Chinese companies first-hand.

Kyla working hard in our new apartment :)

  

A Bit of Reflection

I used to think that I could never work for a big western company in a developing country. When I was here in 2007, I saw first hand how the policies and work environments of these “Western” style institutions are often misaligned. It is like putting a square peg in a round hole...sometimes it might fit but there will always be gaps. These gaps might be in the form of local knowledge, language, cultural practices, mentality, efficiency, regulations, or a plethora of other things. But there are always gaps.

Though I still think that organizations such as the World Bank and UN are more ineffective because of these gaps and their extremely “western” style approaches to management and work ethic, I am becoming more and more attracted to the stability and security of that type of work environment, as opposed to the local mentality. And this is scaring me!!! Working for a local company is exciting and energetic but also exhausting and lonely. I'm realizing that both paths lead to a type of isolationism that is hard to get out of. The UN compound in Nairobi, for example, is far out of town—maybe 10 kilometers. The people that work there have virtually no incentive to go into the city center unless they need to meet with a government official. There is only one public transit line to the compound and the roads are not made for people to walk along. Everyone drives. Nearby is a huge western-style mall with mini-golf and a movie theatre that when we visited, felt like we were in the twilight zone. So, there is an isolation one experiences within this ex-pat community that is comfortable but doesn't drop you into the nitty-gritty of the situation on the ground.

On the other hand, the local organizations that hire foreigners are generally focused on a particular issue or topic. They are in the trenches day in and day out, also isolating them away from the broader picture of development and potentially limiting their ability to establish sustainable changes. I am realizing that neither approach is particularly effective and both must co-exist in order to survive in this global era.

I've seen so much “development” in the past five years in Kenya. The middle class is booming. People can afford cars. There are Africans in restaurants that were exclusively catering to foreigners five years ago. Many many many more women have their hair done, another sign of an emerging middle class. Construction is booming and there is massive deforestation, superhighways being built, and people generally seem to have more disposable income. There are all the signs of development happening here. But I'm having a hard time being able to tell if this is a good thing. What are people trying to achieve with this development? Better standards of living? Economic development only? They are definitely leaving environmental and cultural development to the wayside.

I've always thought a “better” type of development was needed but never doubted actual development itself. Now, I'm seeing the rapid-growth here and wondering what it is all for. I am definitely in favor of decreasing poverty and mortality rates, increasing literacy rates, and ensuring that people are able to live a decent life. But my anthro-brain keeps nagging me with questions like “what does a decent life look like?” and “why do we assume economic growth is the answer to everything?”

I realize I've written about much of this before and it is probably quite boring to read about, but it is something I've been thinking a lot about during my time here. I have no answers to these questions and I don't think there are answers per-say. I guess I'm just figuring out what I'm comfortable accepting about the “development” world and if it is something I can feel good about participating in for a career. Scarily (to me), the more I spend time here, the more I am accepting and even desiring the idea of working for a “western” style corporation. What is happening? It is almost like when a professor told me that everyone turns republican when they get older and start making money. More to come on this before my time is up here. :)

Fun things (finally!):

-The kids that live in our apartment (owner's kids...unclear where they actually live) watch Hercules the Disney movie several times a day. Love it!

-Between the Chin-glish, Swahi-lish, English accents, tribal languages, and various Chinese dialects, PLUS the lack of street names in Nairobi, it is a wonder we ever are able to locate ANY companies let alone interview them effectively. See the post on the other blog about Siemen Po for an example :)

-Kyla is a master-mosquito killer. She has a gift.

-One of the only brands of spaghetti sauce here is “American Garden” and is made in New York, USA. If you pair it with Iranian-made pasta it all ends up tasting like spaghetti-o's. Yum :)

-They show the Olympics at the restaurant across the street, and we've had the pleasure of watching the Men's Single Trap Shooting Final (which was a nail-biter...a shootout for bronze as well as gold/silver) and the Rhythmic Gymnastic Semifinals. Surprisingly, none of the running events where the Kenyans actually compete and win.

Kyla and I at the top of the International Conference Center
overlooking Uhuru Park and Upperhill

-It was sunny a few days ago and we went to the top of the Kenyatta International Conference Center. Though the inside looks like a giant funeral parlor, when you get to the top, you can walk on the helicopter landing and see the entire city. The breadth is magnificent.

-At Westgate mall there is a movie theatre. However to get to it you have to go THROUGH a toy store. Genius!  

MAGIC-ARONI!!!!

-The regular grocery stores here have more types of boxed cakes than I can find in the UK (including funfetti). Remember that the majority of the population here doesn't even have ovens! Also, best find ever....MagicAroni, the Kenyan equivalent of Kraft Macaroni and Cheese!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Rebuttal and Mombasa

First, a rebuttal.

Kenya has a tropical climate and relatively small population for it's land mass. As such they never developed food preservation techniques. Why is this important, you may ask? In areas such as Europe, with changing climates and high population density, preservation techniques equated to survival skills. Without preserving your food, you would die. Institutions were created to deal with monitoring and rationing of food, as well as the diverse factions of people.

In Kenya, this was never the case. People generally have enough food all year round. Historically, the cattle herders spent all their days walking their cattle to water and watching their herds. The farming communities spent most of their days planting, weeding, harvesting, etc. Since food grows all year round, there was never a sense of urgency for events to occur. Life was “simple.” This lifestyle was maintained until the British colonialists and even after, not because the people were lazy but rather there was no incentive for people to develop such institutions. Kenya was not undeveloped, it just evolved in a different way.

Today, this mentality of pole-pole (slowly slowly) penetrates modern life. Jacob noticed the slow-pace of life and it is true. Nothing here moves very quickly. Not the people, the traffic, or the mosquitoes. But it is not because they “like” to take their time or they understand the realities of unreliability. Rather, the people come from a background that is the antithesis of Weber's Protestant work ethic. Hard work is admired, but is not defined by it's speed or efficiency. Efficiency has virtually nothing to do with it.

To understand Kenya, one must first understand it's history. Culture is often a forgotten link in the study of Economics (much to my dismay) but is so essential in maintaining an open mind to the functioning of a society. Sometimes taking a step back and figuring out the cultural background helps to inform one's observations and make them less foreign and strange.

Ok, now onto Mombasa!

We are actually back in Nairobi after an eventful trip to Mombasa for a few days. I loved Mombasa the first time I was there and that admiration remains today. First, it is HOT. People said it was the cold season because it was winter, but it was in the 80s and 90s every day. Second, the history is so strong. Between the Arab, Portuguese, African, Indian, and English influences, you can feel the vibrancy of the historical roots everywhere you go. VERY different from Nairobi! We visited Old Town, Fort Jesus, and the markets. I get such a high from the claustrophobic nature of the markets, because the streets are pedestrian only, extremely narrow, and crammed with vendors, tailors, and people. I love the energy of the place! Third, there is less a culture of cat calling, and as such it is a much more pleasant place to walk around in. As Jacob noticed about Kisumu and Nairobi, we stand out and people make sure we know it. In Mombasa, people notice but rarely make a comment about it.

Our visit occurred during Ramadan and a high percentage of the population is Muslim. Therefore, everything is open late, people are generally in a gleeful mood, and it is safe to walk around at night. Also a welcome change from Nairobi :) Our hotel had a nice open-air terrace and we even took a tuk-tuk (three wheeled transport vehicle) to a beach resort one day to play in the water! Overall it was a nice trip!

When we returned to Nairobi, we said our farewells to Jacob and got back down to business. Kyla and I moved into an apartment near Adams Arcade and are settling in nicely. We found a great cheap place across the street for food, drinks, and free Olympic TV! Overall everything is going well :)

Fun things:

-Hillary Clinton visited Kenya a few days ago and the news was abuzz with the “ridiculousness” of the FBI security because they required journalists to submit their names the day before for entry and then arrive an hour before the meeting. The newspaper called it a “nightmare” for journalists. Haha!

-Treading onto the beach from the hotel in Mombasa, one got mobbed by people trying to sell you camel rides, boat rides, and every type of touristy-thing you can imagine. Boats would literally turn around in the water when they saw you approach the sand.

-Kyla has been called “Helen” on two different occasions. Once even after giving the person her business card. When in doubt, change all the letters but one and you'll have the same name. My name is often heard as “Maureen,” though that seems closer than Helen.

Alright. Enough for tonight. Thanks for reading!