Janneke's weblog

Hello there!

Here another message from Nairobi. I again have had a very interesting weekend. On Sunday I went once more to Mathare. As people already told me, it does get heavier the more you walk there. One cannot really sense the poverty in the way people act and how they look, because most of them often look very cheerful. Children always smile whenever you walk there, and also adults greet you mostly very politely. They do not ask you for any money or food, and they generally do not look very starved. A lot of them actually look very well clothed. And, whenever I go there I get offered plenty of food which I cannot even finish! However, the more you walk in Mathare, the more you see the different layers that are there. There is waste everywhere and the sewage system is running openly trough the streets and goes directly into the river. There are children (mainly from single parents) who collect pieces of steel in the river and sewage to earn some shillings. The air is not what it is supposed to be, and in the trees and plants that live in Mathare are extremely few. The population in this slum is about 600.000. There are different sections, and the one section is richer than the other. Some sections exist of high flats of concrete, where people live in a room of about 20 m2. Some streets look like one big waste belt with some huts on them, some streets look more like shopping streets.

In Mathare I met Erick, a young man who lives in Mathare. I visited his house, had some chai with cake, and then we went to church. It was located in a school. It was amazing to see how many churches there were. Only in the school there were two misses going on! We got inside the class room. There were about 4 people standing in front of the class, one of whom was the preacher. He was speaking very loudly and very passively about God. All the people were sitting on the benches and had there heads on the tables in front of them. It was as if they were in heavy pain. It was very interesting to see. I have been told that in some misses the people start shouting, and that they get in a kind of trance. I’d love to experience this one day… When the preacher was done with his talk, I had to present myself. I was seen as the special guest (because of my white skin).

After the miss we had some lunch (rice with beans) and then went to Erick’s brother. It was in the other part of Mathare, so I have the feeling that I have seen half of Mathare now. It is somehow interesting to see how people live there, but it is also a very hard way of living. I think there is so much more to these people’s lives than one can see when you just walk there. There are many many community based organizations, self help groups and ‘merry go rounds’ (a kind of gathering of people to collect money). However, I also heard that people can be very harsh on each other. Of course, poverty and lack of food can make people act in weird ways.

This Saturday I was in a totally different environment. Nairobi has so many different sides! The area of the UN is very wealthy, and there are so many white people here. There is a forest nearby my house. I went running together with my housemate, and we went trough the forest and the fields for 2 and a half hours! I can still feel my muscles. But it was so beautiful! It was really like a tropical rainforest. The air was so fresh, and parts of the forest smelt like eucalyptus trees. We saw huge trees, plants living in and around the trees, we saw monkeys and even a bush bock. We ran trough little villages, which was amazing to see. The people living there were farmers, they had small plots in the forest, near the river.

I am now very much involved in YEP. I have been appointed secretary, and this includes the challenge of developing a good structure for the organization. I really like to be involved in this, since YEP has some difficulties finding its strategy and thus maintaining a decent amount of members.
This Friday I am going to Mathare again, together with the new members of YEP. Last Tuesday there were many new interns who were interested in YEP. YEP is such a nice way to get to know people: interns as well as local residents!

I’ll keep you updated!

Hello again!

My second weekend was great. It was the first time I went outside Nairobi. I went to Hell’s Gate, a national park about two hours away from the city. There were zebra’s, giraffes, gazelles, elands, wild boars, and loads of huge birds. It was so beautiful! I went there together with my two housemates. We walked to the gorge, and went down with a guide. It was an adventurous walk, we had to use our hands at some times. The area has volcanic activity, and it was so interesting to feel that the water that came outside the rocks was hot! At some spots it was even nearly boiling! If you walk there and experience the park, you cannot be anything else but amazed by the beauty and sophistications of nature!

Whereas last weekend I was almost the only one in my house, now it is packed with people. We are 8 at the moment, and we even have to share beds. It is very nice, with very interesting people who tell the most wonderful stories about all their journeys.

Yesterday I went to Mathare again. I went together with a girl from Canada, to give computer lessons to the local youth. We went by matatu, a small bus for about 12 people. You always have to squeeze yourself in, since it is not that big. Often they have very loud music, and there are even ‘disco matatu’s’ with loud music, lights all over and even a tv screen! I haven’t been inside one yet, but I definitely will one day!
Anyway, our trip with the ‘normal’ matatu was an experience on itself. We took the ‘short-cut’ through all the small streets of Nairobi. I had the feeling that we had seen half Nairobi before we arrived. It had been raining the previous day, so the roads were extremely bad. There were holes everywhere, and we were swinging madly. We had an average speed of I think not more than 8 kilometers per hour. There were little stands everywhere, and especially lots of shoes that people sold on the road. It looked a bit as if we were driving in the middle of a slum. At one point in time I wandered whether we would ever be able to get out there again. The sight of broken matatu’s and a whole truck that was fallen in the river was not very encouraging. However, after 45 minutes we finally reached Mathare, and gave our lessons. Next Monday we will go again.

My work for the UN is going fine. It is a bit searching for work in the beginning, I think I have to get into it a bit. I heard a lot of interns do not have a lot to do at first. However, I think I will have to work a bit independently. It is a very new organization I am working for, and I think they just need someone who is going to find out what the role of the PEF is and how the PEF should manage its tasks. So that is quite a challenge, which I like!

Well, that’s it for now. Hope you enjoyed my stories! Have a look at the pictures, if you’re interested!

Greetings,
Janneke

Hello everybody!

I arrived in Nairobi, and I am still not robbed, so don’t worry too much J. I am having a great time here, and I think I will be having an even greater time in the coming 4 months that I will be here. When I arrived at the airport, I was picked up by a taxi driver. He immediately started to talk to me as if we knew each other for years and as if he was my best friend. When I arrived at the place I would be staying at, I met two people who live there. They were just going out for diner, so I joined them. We had a party with other interns from the UN. It was great fun. This weekend I was somehow alone in the house, since all of the interns were traveling. I decided to call Janneke, whom I had been in contact with before I arrived here. She invited me for her goodbye party. Up till Saturday morning I did not have the feeling that I was in Africa. Everywhere there are white people, everybody speaks English, the weather is quite like it is in the Netherlands, and the area I am living in is very rich, with lots of green around. Nearby there is the so called village market, which is a huge shopping mall with everything you can find in Europe AND in Kenya AND in India. So I am not lacking anything. In terms of housing, I am very lucky as well. I have a big bedroom with a bed for two, there are several bathrooms in the house, a swimming pool and two huge sitting rooms. And I am even paying less than I was doing in Wageningen!

Today I officially started working. I had to collect my pass. I am an official UNDP staff member now (see picture)! The PEF, the Facility I am working for, is very new. It is located in one of the compartments within the UN Compound, which is a huge green park (many trees, rivers and pools in it) with many UN organizations. The office of the PEF is very new, and I have a brand new working place with everything I would wish for: computer with access to internet, desk, telephone, printer, etc. Today I had to arrange most of the formalities and my installation here, but tomorrow I will really start working. I will begin working on the website of the PEF/PEI, and I will also get in contact with people from the Poverty-Environment Partnership, an informal network of NGOs, governments and other agencies working on issues that concern poverty and environment. Philip Dobie, the director of the Facility, is a really nice guy, and he told me I had lots of work to do. Let’s see!

This weekend I went to Matare, one of the slums in Nairobi (see picture). It was quite an experience to walk there. It was a huge area covered with small buildings built up by pieces of metal and wood. There were several flats as well. There was litter everywhere, and also dogs, goats, cats, ducks and chickens walking around. It was a strange experience, because it did not felt as if people living there were poor or to be pitied with. They were actually smiling a lot to us, and all the kids were shouting ‘How are you?’(even the smallest ones, who obviously did not know what it meant).

I went to Matare with another intern because there was a project of the YEP, the Youth Empowerment Programme, which is an organization run by UN interns. They are setting up a school in the slums, and also a kind of latrine for the people. Very interesting projects, I think I will be involved in the YEP as well.

That’s my stories for now. Hope I have updated you sufficiently.

Bye for now!
Dearest greetings,
Marjanneke