Today I woke up at 4 and couldn’t get back to sleep so I got up and wrote some of my sermon for the Tuesday I get back. I went down to get breakfast at 7. Now that I know the exchange rate I realize that the breakfast is a little pricy. I may look for other options. I met Ken and Matt at 8:40 to go to the university. No teaching today, just introductions and set up.
We will be teaching at the Physical Sciences Campus of the University of Nairobi. It is a nice
campus. We met with our contact first, Professor Bongo, an ebullient, 45ish geology professor. The Navy agency that had set the training up had limited the class size at 20, but Prof Bongo suggested that they were expecting closer to 30. Matt and I feel like the more the merrier, so we are going ahead with the larger class. Then we began a series of visitations and formal introductions as we dropped by the offices of the Chair of Geology, the Chair of Physical Sciences and the Chair of Computing Sciences in turn. Each of these men were gracious, encouraging, and grateful for our efforts. There is an intriguing mix of formality and congeniality in our official interactions here. Everyone is exceptionally friendly but there is an almost British sense of order and propriety to the proceedings. One interesting interaction during one of these meetings was a question about Obama’s chances. They are seemingly very proud of Obama’s Kenyan roots excited about his prospects at becoming the American President.
After the introductions we were escorted to the computer lab, which had 50 machines, of which 21 worked. But the ones that worked, worked well and Matt and I had all of the software loaded in less than 90 minutes. This went far smoother than any of us had expected.
At noon we went to the embassy to meet with our military point of contact. We ate at the embassy cafeteria. They had an African option but it featured tripe, so I went with the far less adventurous, but totally eatable pizza. Captain Mike explained Secretary Rice’s foreign policy tripod of defense, diplomacy and development. Apparently there is some consternation that the D’s are mixing with the Navy getting involved in development. There are some legitimate concerns about the social and ecological implications of some of the water infrastructure projects and it has become a bit of a battlefield between the D’s. So we learned some surprisingly interesting politics. Then we were briefed on ‘the rules.’ No busses, a 10:00 pm curfew, 3 drinks per day, crime is a bigger concern than terrorism. It was all very serious and military. One
interesting contrast with Kabul…none of the green suits actually wore green. One of the rules was that no one wears military uniforms to avoid being targeted. The Captain we met with was dressed in suit and tie. This is a strange contrast to Kabul where even of the DOD civilians had to wear uniforms…presumably so they knew who to extract. I think this is a better plan.
We got out of the Embassy by 2:30 with no further responsibilities so Matt and I decided to go to the Nairobi Museum. It was pretty sparse (the snake house, which sounds very cool, was closed for restoration) but there were a couple of very good exhibits. They specialized in early physical anthropology…hominid fossils. It was pretty helpful and interesting. They also had a stuffed okapi and I got to regale Matt with
my encyclopedic knowledge of a random animal. Unfortunately I forgot the pin number to the cell phone (cell phone use is not something I am known for being particularly good at) so we had an hour and a half to kill and Matt helped me with a couple of things in my later lectures that weren’t clear. He is a hydrology specialist so he has more experience with the material than I do.
I figured out my phone and am trying to call my wife. No luck. Tomorrow we start teaching. I should get to bed. Here is a line from a soccer game yesterday:
Announcer during the Chelsea-Man United game after Chelsea scored the equalizer in the 79th minute: “Chelsea proving far more resilient than their shirt sponsor.” On their shirts? AIG
We will be teaching at the Physical Sciences Campus of the University of Nairobi. It is a nice
campus. We met with our contact first, Professor Bongo, an ebullient, 45ish geology professor. The Navy agency that had set the training up had limited the class size at 20, but Prof Bongo suggested that they were expecting closer to 30. Matt and I feel like the more the merrier, so we are going ahead with the larger class. Then we began a series of visitations and formal introductions as we dropped by the offices of the Chair of Geology, the Chair of Physical Sciences and the Chair of Computing Sciences in turn. Each of these men were gracious, encouraging, and grateful for our efforts. There is an intriguing mix of formality and congeniality in our official interactions here. Everyone is exceptionally friendly but there is an almost British sense of order and propriety to the proceedings. One interesting interaction during one of these meetings was a question about Obama’s chances. They are seemingly very proud of Obama’s Kenyan roots excited about his prospects at becoming the American President.After the introductions we were escorted to the computer lab, which had 50 machines, of which 21 worked. But the ones that worked, worked well and Matt and I had all of the software loaded in less than 90 minutes. This went far smoother than any of us had expected.
At noon we went to the embassy to meet with our military point of contact. We ate at the embassy cafeteria. They had an African option but it featured tripe, so I went with the far less adventurous, but totally eatable pizza. Captain Mike explained Secretary Rice’s foreign policy tripod of defense, diplomacy and development. Apparently there is some consternation that the D’s are mixing with the Navy getting involved in development. There are some legitimate concerns about the social and ecological implications of some of the water infrastructure projects and it has become a bit of a battlefield between the D’s. So we learned some surprisingly interesting politics. Then we were briefed on ‘the rules.’ No busses, a 10:00 pm curfew, 3 drinks per day, crime is a bigger concern than terrorism. It was all very serious and military. One
interesting contrast with Kabul…none of the green suits actually wore green. One of the rules was that no one wears military uniforms to avoid being targeted. The Captain we met with was dressed in suit and tie. This is a strange contrast to Kabul where even of the DOD civilians had to wear uniforms…presumably so they knew who to extract. I think this is a better plan.We got out of the Embassy by 2:30 with no further responsibilities so Matt and I decided to go to the Nairobi Museum. It was pretty sparse (the snake house, which sounds very cool, was closed for restoration) but there were a couple of very good exhibits. They specialized in early physical anthropology…hominid fossils. It was pretty helpful and interesting. They also had a stuffed okapi and I got to regale Matt with
my encyclopedic knowledge of a random animal. Unfortunately I forgot the pin number to the cell phone (cell phone use is not something I am known for being particularly good at) so we had an hour and a half to kill and Matt helped me with a couple of things in my later lectures that weren’t clear. He is a hydrology specialist so he has more experience with the material than I do.I figured out my phone and am trying to call my wife. No luck. Tomorrow we start teaching. I should get to bed. Here is a line from a soccer game yesterday:
Announcer during the Chelsea-Man United game after Chelsea scored the equalizer in the 79th minute: “Chelsea proving far more resilient than their shirt sponsor.” On their shirts? AIG
1 comment:
Hey Stan,
I wanted to try and give you my cousin's contact info. He's our age and has been living in Africa most of his life, so he could be a good resource.
John Haspels
PO Box 21171
Nairobi
cell: 073368705
Now I need to go back and read your entries.:)
Post a Comment