Photos of Kibera

Here is the small classroom in which we taught. In this tiny room we have about 20 plus/minus 5 people. Because we don't have enough space, we have to take out the tables and put the chairs into rows, while we taught up front with flipchart papers. We don't have enough chairs and we have to stand a lot or share chairs with 1 or 2 other people.






























Here are our students and us teaching. I don't have a photo of Sarah, Alia and Nancy's teaching in my camera... I know someone else does though. These are also some action photos of our business simulation exercise.



















Here are some photos around the area in which we teach. The children like to stop and chant to us, "How are you? How are you? How are you?" We scared them away by chanting "We are fine, We are fine, We are fine." The yellow matatu (mini bus) is hired by us to take us to Kibera everyday.
































Here are the students singing to us on the last day as well as graduation ceremony for them, when we presented to them a certificate, a pen, a keychain, and a cap.

































More photos of the Kibera community below. Slums are not legal settlements and there are times when the government just comes in and shut things down. Garbage just gets dumped everywhere and burned.

An End for a New Beginning

I cannot believe this project is done - well, at least the on site part.

We woke up for our last breakfast yesterday morning, thinking that this day will never come, but here we are.

I just wanted to say thank you to our sponsors for their support, Nancy for her guidance, and our entire team for such great synergy and team work.

As this project comes to a close, we really hope that it has brought impact and a new beginning to the lives of the many youths we have worked with.


Please do come back to this site as we eventually get back into town we will upload photos of what we have done and a more detailed debrief.

When Our Passions Meet

Eiston and I did our last workshop today. The topic was Teamwork and Management of Employees. We had only 8 students today because there was a community performance and many of the youths were in the performance or went to watch it. But the small group unfolded quite well as we turned the workshop into a discussion format and it really helped me so that I don't have to speak on top of my throat, as I was totally losing my voice after an entire day of teaching. Sarah and Alia will take on the last two workshops next week.

This afternoon Sarah and I had a long talk about business vs. development. I have always been skeptical about mega MNCs making billions of dollars and just dishing a percentage out to aid developing countries because the aid money often almost never make it down the system to people who need it the most. As an IR student, I should really embrace globalization as the formula to solve development problems, but as we talk about power and privilege in our own country in social justice issues (racism, sexism, heterosexism, classism etc.), globalization just extends the power dichotomy to a global basis. The developed countries being the privileged and always controlling the world system to keep the developing countries underdeveloped.

Well, anyway, that's just my personal take on development and world issues.

Sarah was telling me how she wants to study medicine and use that as a tool to come back to Africa and do development work. I think that is very admirable, because the majority of medical students want to become a doctor for the prestige, social status and money. Our entire team is full of passion and I am very proud of that. I have met many friends/students when I first entered university who did have a lot of passion about changing the world and helping the less privileged, although recognizing that it may take baby steps at a time. But after two years of university, I find the passion of the same people changed, because we are so consumed with the materalisitic lifestyle we pursue. University education often suffocates and blinds us instead of enlighten us because of the consumerist and materialist world we live in.

In here, I can wear the same t-shirt everyday (of course washed and cleaned) and when I have a bad day, I don't have to look in the mirror for 60 minutes before I am confident enough to step out of my house. I can care about things that really matter and I feel like I can be confident in who I am without spending a ridiculous amount of time to make myself look presentable. As much as we all want to live a comfortable and confident lifestyle modestly, it is almost impossible to extricate ourselves from the materialist system in the West.

I am so glad to have worked with such a tight and passionate team because it reminds me of where my own passion lies and that it can be sustained. I really need to meet more people like them for me to appreciate and reaffirm my own values.

Business in Action

We have been a bit behind on the blog because there has been so much action happening in so little time.

So, we have completed the introduction, marketing and financial workshops. Yesterday it was Eiston and my turn to teach about the Operational Plan. In the morning, we had an unexpected speaker and that threw us off schedule slightly. We were flying through the Production Techniques, Quality Control, Customer Service, Supplier Selection and Operation Location and Hours section as we really made it into a combination review of the previous workshops. It was really funny because… Well, Eiston is a very action-action-action go-go-go type of person, so he speaks really fast. In the workshop, especially because we were pressed for time, he was speaking faster and faster and faster like how speed accelerates as one rolls down the hill. I was quite stressed out by that time because I cannot quite keep up with him so I finally told him to slow down in front of the class, and we had a good laugh. Sorry to have to build the humour upon you, Eiston.

Anyway, it took us a lot of time and effort to explain the significance of inventory control and cash flow, and how to keep track of it. The youths really understood the concept, but to put it into a standard North American accounting spreadsheet - the layout was quite foreign and confusing to them. Anyway, by the end of the morning session, I was totally losing my voice and my throat was going to crack. I feel like I’ve never talked so much in such a couple hours of my life.

In the afternoon, we did a business simulation exercise, and I’m very glad that the youths enjoyed it so much and had so much to take out of the exercise. How the exercise was organized is that we have two competing companies who are to make greeting cards (e.g. Hallmark vs. Carlton Cards) and the youths played the role of employer and employees in those two companies. The UBC Team played the customers, banker (to give out a $500 loan and to collect $60 interest at the end of each production round), equipment supplier (to sell equipment and materials e.g. scissors and papers to produce the cards). Like in real life, the companies always think the customers are too picky. What happened was that they just produced cards at really poor quality and sold it to us at huge discounts - which is worse than not selling because they are losing money with each card. It was really interesting to watch how the team behaves and how the CEO of each team behaves so differently and everybody was so into the situation - it was not just a game to the youths. I was one of the customers and someone started to yell at me, and obviously, I did not give them any business. Although one team had an organizational structure advantage over the other, they still lost by a huge margin because of poor leadership. This not only brought business to reality for the youths, but watching them brought a lot of reality to my own life and helped me reflect on how I work with my team members in different organizations. We did debrief this morning and they really had a lot to take out of this simulation, and I am very happy that all the work we’ve put into this workshop and simulation paid off. I really have to thank the entire team to help us run this because we could not have done this on our own and without the feedback of this exercise before we did this.

We have been facing some problems though. The business plan is really long and difficult to write in such a short time, and we really have to push to get things done… We are quite exhausted with the one-on-one sessions too. For next year, I think it is important that we just shorten the amount of homework that we hand out and just simplify the business plan template in general to make things more effective.

Some fun stuff… Two nights ago a couple of us went to a Slam Poetry performance. What this was is that there is an open mike where people read out their poems in very creative ways, including singing, dancing, and slow motion Kung Fu. It was quite an eye opener because the quality of poems is on par with students at UBC. I am not even half as creative or my language is half as good as the performers there. Last night, we went to an authentic Ethiopian dinner. Well, I don’t eat spicy food at all, but since I came to Africa, I just have to deal with the spicy food, and I think I am getting quite good at it. Ethiopian dinner was fun because there are these mega plates with injera (a type of sour bread) on which you eat your meat/vegetables with. Nancy also got her 2nd proposal today…

Other fun stuff… Well, all of us except for Nancy and Brittany decided to go visit Tanzania after our program is over. We will enjoy the weekend at Zanzibar together, and Eiston and I will go on safari and see the crater. This is all so exciting, but African time is quite the challenge for us to get organized and just get our chores done… on top of our super tight schedule.

So, this has been what’s happening so far… I’m really enjoying my stay here. It’s really nice to wake up and just throw on a t-shirt whereas in Vancouver, I spend a significant amount of time deciding what to wear everyday I wake up. I love Africa.

Endless Marriage Proposals

Okay, so much has happened for the past couple of days.

Let's start with the Finance Workshop. To demonstrate the concept of supply and demand, Brit and Kathy brought in a cake and handed out different amounts of monopoly money to the class, and asked what price the students are willing to pay for the cake. Obviously, the more expensive it was, the less students are willing or able to afford the cake. Afterwards, we shared the cake and had a very happy break. It's also funny how the students loved the monopoly money and wouldn't give it back to us.

While we were waiting for the Matatu (minibus) to take us home, a busload full of kids in uniform stopped in front of us and started to chant, "How are you? How are you? How are you? How are you? How are you?" We chanted back, "We are fine. We are fine. We are fine." Dead silence. I wonder if the kids know what they are saying.

Yesterday, we had our Marketing tutorial. Nancy Brit and Kathy went to meet with Microfinance firms while Eiston Alia Sarah and I went to the tutorial. We were expecting the four students of the intensive group to show up, but 15 ended up coming. Obviously, demand exceeds supply. We jumped from student to student and talked endless for 4 hours. I'm surprised none of us came back out with a sore throat. On that note, the youths' eagerness to learn really touches me. They do their homework with great attention and effort, while I'm sure none of us would have attended to our homework with such great detail. Their efforts and positive learning attitude really shines through.

On that note, I had some colourful Post-Its sticking out of my Resource book and the kids kept on pointing to them. I gave it to them and they started to stick it around the walls and around their foreheads and just smiled and laughed and chuckled. You should really see how they huddled around Eiston's camera to look at their own silly faces. They are such happy children. Materialism does corrupt people, eh?

So, after the morning session, Eiston Alia and I went to the Saturday market in the City Centre to look for souvenirs. Alia could totally pass for a local, and when the vendors approached her, she told them to talk to us because she has everything in her house. Well, the vendors definitely attacked us, telling us that, "She gave permission to talk to you." Eiston and I were, speechless. Haha, I mean, come talk to us, no permission needed. Anyway, as all that was happening, this man started to talk to Alia and totally ignored his business when two customers desparately tried to gain his attention. Well, Alia suddenly became hot in Africa. Throughout these 7 days, you have no idea how many guys tried to get her attention and offering to buy her drinks. The big story came when we were grocery shopping at Nakumatt today. The bagger (people who put our groceries in the bag) offered to pay her dowry. The conversation went like this:

Bagger: I want to steal her away from you.
Kathy: You can't steal her away. She's mine.
Bagger: I will pay for her dowry.
Kathy: You can't afford it.

Well, haha, we had an interesting conversation about how beauty standards here are so different from Canada's. But nonetheless, Alia is beautiful and hot everywhere.

Well, Nancy had a marriage proposal already. Alia seems to be getting lots. I wonder if all of us are willing to leave this special place after our program is over.

Today... is Sunday. Well, currently we are in our Guesthouse with no running water. Apparently there is water shortage in the entire city.

We slept in for a bit, while Brit went for her animal counting connection building safari (I have ho idea what that is... but she refers to it as the counting trip) and Sarah is off visiting her family friend, the rest of us with Nancy went to Bomas of Kenya to see the different huts of the tribes. To be honest, none of us can really tell the difference. Then we enjoyed almost two hours of African music and dance. I also wanted to say that Eiston and Brit are the best roommate because we are laughing in their room but they are both sleeping and oblivious to what's happening to the rest of the world.

Anyway, I think that's enough update for now. "Back to school" tomorrow eh?

The Massai Experience

So, today is our marketing survey day. We split into two groups with the intensive-four - the first group is made up of Canto (African youth), Steve (African youth), Alia and Me, and the other is made up of Quin (African youth), Frank (African youth), Patrick (African youth), Eiston, Sarah and Nancy.

As we walked around Kibera slum, many people were staring at us and the children kept on calling us "Mazungu", meaning white people. I find it very funny because neither Alia nor I are anywhere near being "white". The children kept on wanting to touch me and gave me their hands, and they were so happy when I shook hands with them. Their genuine smiles always touch my heart.

The slum is hot and there is no running water. The trenches are filled with muddy water in which people wash their food with. I saw people boiling beef intestines, selling fish heads and bones, flies everywhere, and goats eating garbage. There were many dogs lying around too. Yesterday I saw a dog being surrounded by garbage and flies and I asked James, this African youth if it was dead. He said it was not, but Brit told me today that he was just being nice and the dog was actually dead. Interestingly, we saw some bathroom stalls and a water tank that's painted "Donated by Constant Gardener".

Now comes the real experience. As Canto and Steve went around to interview people, Alia and I were just standing around the corner. This old man, around 60 years old dressed in Massai costume, came to me and Alia and started shaking our hands. This was not unusual as I felt like the entire community is shaking our hands, especially with Canto around, since he is a football player everybody knows him. Anyway, this old man took my hand and asked me to wrap my hand around his walking stick, so did Alia and three other people. He then chanted and put the tip of his tongue on his walking stick. I think one of the people saw that I was quite frightened and told me that this is a spiritual ceremony and that settled my mind a little.

And then, he would not let me and Alia go. He then proceeded to kiss Alia on each side of her neck. I saw Alia cringe and I got really scared because Alia is always so calm and poised and know exactly what's happening. She being scared really freaked me out. And guess what, obviously the man came and kiss me too and I got really scared.

And then, he took his ID card out and asked me to hold it and bless him telling him that God will give him everything. I did as he wanted me to, but I felt really sour at that moment because I did not feel right to tell someone that God will bless him. This is not only because I am not religious in the first place, but I feel very weird that people here look upon me so highly because I have paler skin, but nowhere near what a real "Mazungu" looks like, not like I feel that real Mazungu should have any privilege just being the race that he/she may be.

By this time, there were more than a dozen people who surrounded us. At this time Steve and Canto were still oblivious as to what is happening. When Canto finally finished and came to our rescue and told the man to go away, I was really quite shaken, although with a smile on my face. He let me know that the man was a little crazy.

I feel that although people in Kibera live in poverty, there is a great sense of community. I do not even know the names of my neighbours, what a shame. In the stuffy classroom packed with 20 and more people, the youths never show any signs of slight discomfort, sponging up every single detail that we say. I feel ashamed that we complain about 8:30am classes and fall asleep to blame that our professors are too boring. There is no excuse to do bad in anything having the privilege to live in the developed world.

Gotta love the do-ers

Our group of participants keeps growing. The general trend with classes at UBC is that after the first day of classes a handful of people will dropout. This is possibly because the lecturer bores them, the syllabus is too demanding or the class just wasn’t what that individual was hoping for.

In our tiny room appropriate for 10, youth continue to flock to our workshops and we continue to welcome them - to the extent that people are standing outside the door and peering through the window.

Free education is a rarity in Kenya, let alone the slums of Kibera and therefore seems to be much appreciated.


Outside of the confines of our conference room is a trendy young woman named Laura who works with beads to create jewelry, Kenyan style. With the assistance of Meredan, a Dutch women, probably in her mid to late 20’s, they work together to create a successful business to support Laura’s livelihood, Fair Trade style. The beads and other supplies for Laura’s creations are bought from the Massai Market, Laura then spends hours making her finished products (bracelets, necklaces, earrings), and they are exported to Meredan’s contacts in the Netherlands, Sweden and France who own African themed shops. This small scale exporting business may be an example of a microbusiness that will help the Kiberan people alleviate the poverty they live in.

Yesterday we attempted to play football with the extremely fit Kenyans. Although our football skills were kind of lacking, it was pretty fun. The tables turned a little bit when we brought out the Frisbee.

Tonight we’re partying it up at the canadian embassy, should be fun times.

Kung Fu Fighting

I think Eiston really summed up my feelings about the cultural stereotypes. As an extension of that post... want to share a short interesting note:

Frank, one of the Kenyan youths, asked me if I knew anything about HK. I told him I was born there and he started to ask me about Jackie Chan. He said if I walk around the slum with my wallet flashy around my wrist I will be the safest person of the group because people here will think that I know kung-fu.

I wonder how true that is, but I don't think I will risk trying that out. Just in case. I really don't know how to fight, haha.

On a side note, we played soccer (called football here) and ultimate with the Kenyan youths. I did not play soccer because my sprained ankle is still very weak and I did not want to have to start limping around Kibera if I get hurt again. But anyway, the people here are so nice and encouraging. When I played team sports in Canada, people get angry very easily if you cannot do things properly, but people here are so encouraging and supportive - and appreciative that you have tried. It is true teamwork and not vying to win.

I am falling in love with this place. Without lavish clothes, shampoo, conditioner... they are the happiest people I have ever seen. In the West there are depression and numerous anxiety disorders despite the fact that we are so rich (we really are). The smiles of the children here gathering around our digital cameras are the most genuine I have ever seen.

Cultural Stereotypes

So the 2nd day went by as quickly as the sleep i've been getting in Nairobi (endless works had kept me up late at night unfortunately.)

We arrived early at 9am and we preped until classes started at 10am.

It's interesting in our concept of stereotyping cultures. The few days that we had spent here have taught us what "African time" means-- if you want someone to arrive promptly at, for say, 9am, you'd tell them to arrive at 8:30am. To combat this concept, we had purposefully start off our morning with a Q+A (uninstructured), in hope to combat this cultural norm.

But interestingly, perhaps as results of setting group norms, expectations, or even as simple as respect, the youths surprisingly arrived at ten to 10am. Anothersurprise came when Patrick, one of the four youths with the winning proposal, came into the door and showed us his homework-- 4 assigned pages fully completed. We really didn't expect much of these youths will actually do their homework (perhaps we are thinking of ourselves in Canada). Are stereotypes always true? Of course not.


We had a finance workshop today with Dr Waema-- a finance professor/ banker from the Catholic University of Eastern Africa in Nairobi. He commented of how pleased he was with our choice of location-- somewhere convenient to our participants, and somewhere which reflected the current hardships-- not anywhere fancy, intimidating, which further exaggerated the class differences. He talked on for about two and a half hours, and surprising the youths were listening sincerely, taking notes, and fully participating. This is so unlike any university lectures that I've ever sat on. To sum up Dr. Waema's charismatic speech, "opportunites is all that are needed, and poverty is in our hands to eliminate."

On a side note, we hope to quantify our education succeess. We gave the youths a test today and we are going to give the same test by the end of our project, in hope for some significant improvements. The results were not bad: mean-- 63%; median-- 57%. But of course, we hope that in about two weeks time, everyone will be in the 90's range-- or at least that's what all teachers hope in every class that they teach.

And for myself, Dr. Waema discussed his interest in researching about cultural management practices-- and spefically in African Management characteristics (I'm sure we've heard of the Japanese Management, North American management etc.) And suddenly I'm thinking: that will be SOOOO interesting! Perhaps I'll look into it, and see if I can find myself another excuse to come to this amazing continent! (And plus, it's management research; something I'm truly excited about!)

Empowerment

So, as Sarah and Eiston posted, our project finally started. I was teaching our first workshop with Eiston yesterday and we were truly amazed by the students' willingness to learn, participation, language skills, and their appreciation of us being there. Even though life is tough, they are the happiest people I've ever seen, way happier than in Vancouver.

I saw students looking out of the school bus in their uniforms, which reminds me of myself when I went to elementary school in HK. But instead of weary faces, they are all smiling and waving to us, shouting to us, "How are you?"

Word of the day: Condiments

I think I was not thinking when I was typing some of the paragraphs up in our "textbook" and I just put that word down. It was funny trying to explain this to them. I'm glad that people are willing to share with us what they know and what they not know without being shy. When I asked if anyone wanted to read out the paragraphs in the book so many people were willing to volunteer, something that I have not encountered in my 15 years of education both in Vancouver and HK. I remember when I was little (and still do) when my mom gives me Chinese lessons she will make me read out the poems and essays and I really enjoyed that. Seeing the students doing the same really warms my heart and brings back some warm moments of my childhood and education experience too. I have done workshops before when I was in high school to "junior grade" students but I have never felt so intrinsically motivated, satisfied, and appreciated as I feel now. It's really quite special feeling.

My mom is a teacher too, and since I was young, she told me that education is a meaningful profession because it is about knowledge empowerment and we should never become a teacher just for money or because there is nothing else to do. I never really understood what it truly meant until yesterday.

One of the proposals that we chose to work with was a girl who wanted to operate a wholesale banana kiosk in Kibera slum. I spoke with her personally today, and she told me how she had refused to follow the norm to get married and have kids. She said she can have a future of her own and take life in her own hands and not depend on men. I cannot say it any better than she does and that really touched my heart. I am so glad to be here because many people who I know are more fortunate and live in Vancouver - they think about marrying rich. You will not believe how intelligent these people are.

We had a university professor come in to talk to the students today, and he said, "Yes, we are poor, but that is no excuse to stay poor." This is very well put - we may be born underpriviliged, but we have the tools and means to advance our own lives if we are determined to do so. It is quite the inspiration.

On a side note, here are some fun facts:

- People love my hair. They asked me if I dyed it or if my hair actually has two different colours. They don't believe that my hair turns out the way that it does without blowdrying. Shampooing and conditioning daily is quite the luxury in living standards here.

- The average income is 8USD/week

- We have had Indian and American food so far. Food is cheap and we don't really have a lot of lunch because we are in the slum, but we are well fed with regular meals.

- Brit slapped a moth in my face last night and it was quite the drama and amusing for the receptionist at the guest house.

Students here are very intelligent and they have the same dreams as we do, if not more ambitious. It is truly inspiring and being so fortunate to live in Vancouver, none of us should complain about homework anymore - anybody can achieve his/her dreams if he/she sets his/her mind to it.