Archive for 13 October 2008
Impressions…
People always use toothpicks after meals…you don’t “get off” a bus or Matatu, you “alight” (I have actually never heard this word before)…people make “blunders” instead of “mistakes”…Kenya produces great coffee, but since the domestic demand is rather for tea, most places serving coffee here are surprisingly bad…people love eating meat…when I ask people for directions, they assume that I am utterly helpless and may not make it to where I am going…if my colleagues give me directions, they want me to send them an SMS once I arrive, so that they know that I made it safely…everyone carries little plastic bags with them wherever they go…the growing middle class is obvious, even just by looking around at the massive billboards, which are designed to be more vertical than horizontal, and the endless commercials hocking a consumer lifestyle to Nairobians…the word “gay” was censored out of the Ugly Betty episode I watched after dinner last night, as was the word “sex” on an episode of “Shark”, an awful American TV series I have never heard of…the Swahili news will show interviews with people in English without subtitles…the English news will show interviews in Swahili without subtitles…men walk down the street holding hands, because they are friends…my frequent “Thank you” or “Asante” (thank you in Swahili) to whoever has helped me are always met with “Welcome” or “Karibu” (welcome in Swahili)…people are proud of Kenya and are slightly ashamed about the post-election violence; they hope that is not all I know about their country…if I walk into any eating establishment that is not an almost exclusively white hangout, I will be watched by the other customers the whole time, from ordering to eating to paying: it seems to me that they are in total disbelief that I am sitting there, drinking coffee and eating a donut (good donuts here)…handshakes can be an extended affair, and vigorous…people speak English to me, but the accent can be impenetrable, the words unfamiliar and unexpected, and when coupled with the accent: impossible to understand…
NAIROBI: It’s a mad, mad world…
Nairobi is a mad, mad place for the unfamiliar visitor. Traffic, pollution, swarms of people…
The simplest, most convenient way to get around is on a Matatu. A Matatu is a little van, almost like a VW bus, except outfitted with seats for 14 people…and sometimes a flat screen TV and Pioneer speakers, which are always pumping some kind of reggae or American hip hop through the little van.
Matatus rule the road, or at least they think they do. The sliding door is almost always open, with the “Matatu Manager” hanging out of the van for the whole ride, shouting where the Matatu is headed, how much it costs, etc… once you are in the van, the open door policy provide a nice breeze as you weave your way through the other cars and around the brave individuals trying to cross the street. But once you are in, you barely notice the world whizzing by around you, or how close you come to smashing into another vehicle. Usually I am so consumed by the deafening music that there is nothing else to do except bob my head to the beat and leave it all up to some higher being…
The music, the chatter, the entire vibe of the Matatu wraps you up and dumps you out somewhere down the road – which really feels like the past few months of my life…
Being a white man here is interesting. Either no one bothers you, no one cares that you are there….or you become the center of attention in any situation. You can swarmed by people, all wanting to know where you from, your marital status (disbelief follows my answer of “27 and single, no children”) and how you should follow them to the nearest store, market stand, restaurant, etc…
Thankfully I do not have to deal with all of this on my own: I have the honor of living with David Kitusa, Kiva’s Partner Development Specialist for East and Southern Africa, and his family. This makes my experience extra special, as I come home every night to a family. Their warmth and hospitality cannot be overstated – in the past 7 days I have learned so much from them about life in Kenya and Nairobi. Staying with them has added an extra dimension to my visit, certainly, as well as that intangible feeling that comes with being part of a family. Living life here with them is something I will never forget.
Let’s start from the beginning…
My name is David Stewart and I am the Kiva Fellow in Nairobi, Kenya. I am working with Opportunity Kenya, part of Opportunity International. Opportunity just bought Sunlink, a small MFI here in Nairobi. I am here to help the transition and get all of the Sunlink staff on board with this thing from the US we know (and love) as Kiva….but before I got here….
It was virtually impossible to write anything before leaving the States for Nairobi. There was simply too much movement, too much momentum to stop and capture my thoughts.
For starters, I spent almost 5 months backpacking through the mountains of California, Oregon and Washington on the Pacific Crest Trail. Most people have heard of the Appalachian Trail: the PCT is its longer, slightly wilder cousin in the West.
It is a 2,600 mile long continuous footpath through the mountains, starting at the Mexican border east o San Diego and ending 8 miles inside of Canada. There are virtually no shelters to sleep in (bring your tent!) and one must go into town every 5-8 days in order to buy food and supplies for the next leg of the journey. It runs along the eastern edge of California, through the Mojave Desert, and then up into the majestic Sierra Nevada mountain range, where you live like a mountain goat for several weeks, climbing up and over and down 11, 12, even 13,000 foot mountain passes. It then winds back to the middle of California and takes you up through the center of Oregon and Washington along the crest of the Cascades. All told, the trail passes through 7 national parks and countless national forests and wilderness areas.
Along the way, I managed to apply for the Kiva Fellowship, conduct a phone interview (early on a Sunday morning in Ashland, Oregon) and get hired (which I found out by checking my e-mail on another hiker’s IPhone, high up on a ridge in Oregon, where he happened to have reception).
Originally, I thought I was headed to Azerbaijan; this was right around the time that Russia invaded Georgia. This lead to mock “Good luck out there” wishes from other hikers and suggestions that it might be safer to sleep with candy bars in my tent in bear country than to go anywhere near Azerbaijan. It was also discussed at length whether or not I should shave my beard before leaving…this, however, was all for naught, as I found out soon afterwards that I would be headed to Kenya, instead. I was pleasantly surprised…
My hike lasted from April 25th until September 11th. The timing worked out perfectly, as training for the Kiva Fellowship began on September 25th. I still had to get to San Francisco, though. How did this work?
At the northern end of the trail, in a provincial park in Canada, there are buses running into Vancouver. Vancouver was a beautiful city, a great way to come back into civilization…unless you take a wrong turn and go down East Hastings Street, on which you can find countless people shooting heroin and smoking crack in broad daylight. I am not exaggerating about this; my friends and I made the wrong turn and watched people shoot up on street corners. Less than 100 yards away, people were shopping at American Apparel and enjoying the finest raw oysters that the northern Pacific has to offer. This passes for normal in Vancouver.
I jumped into the northern Pacific, by the way. In a word: cold.
A few days later, upon arriving in San Francisco for my Kiva training, I witnessed a shooting. I called 911 and described to them everything I had seen, which was not all that much. I simply heard the shots, looked across the street, saw a hooded figure fall and another hooded figure run off with a gun in hand. It all happened so fast….tragic, sad, scary…
Such was my reintroduction to society.
At least Kiva was uplifting. Actually, it was downright inspiring. After one short week of training, I left San Francisco feeling that I was truly a part of Kiva and that I could actually contribute to the cause. It was not an abstraction; indeed, as a Kiva Fellow I am on the ground, in the country, seeing how loans are disbursed and how those loans affect people here. The positives, the negatives, and all the concerns and issues surrounding microfinance as it relates to real people who are simply trying to get a leg up in life.
I can say now that the effect of these loans is very real – for the Microfinance Institutes that grant the loans as well as for the borrowers who use them to grow their businesses.
Oh, wait: before leaving Boston for Nairobi I attended a wedding in Delaware, swam in the roiling Atlantic Ocean (thank you for the waves, Ike) and found some time to sleep somewhere in between all of this…
Have you ever wanted to ask a Kiva entrepreneur a specific question?
Well now is your chance!!!
I will be visiting the Siphat Yang Village Bank and the Chon Erm Village Bank Group this Thursday. If you want me to ask the members of the village bank a question, send me an email with your question: sanjaya.punyasena AT fellows.kiva.org
This is the first time I’m trying this, so I might run into some problems. I want to apologize in advance if I am unable to ask your question.
If you could send me your questions before October 15th, that would be great!
Also, if you haven’t voted for Kiva on the American Express Members Project, do so now!!! You only have 10 hours left and Kiva needs 400 more votes to reach second place!!
