Not sure if you guys have been checking out the imagine1day blog, but it looks like Shannon is doing some pretty amazing things. I’m super jealous.
I definitely miss her and really looking forward to hearing about her experiences.
If you talk to her, can you guys please convince her to come to Kenya once she’s done after this weekend? That’d be wonderful. Thank you in advance.
Work went well this week as I continued to really figure out what it is that I’m doing here.
The primary startup that I’m working with is a company called M-Pepea (Mm – pey – pey – ah). The founder is Daniel Munga. His idea is to allow people to take out emergency loans using their mobile phones. We’ve been spending the last two weeks working on the sales pitch to clients, presentation materials, financial models, business processes, website, budget and the overall business model. It’s a lot to work on, but it really isn’t feeling like work.
We had a really good moment yesterday where we went through our business plan together and really spent some time fine tuning what we need to focus on. I saw a spark in Daniel, that I hadn’t seen so far, where he got excited about improving his product. I’m looking forward to next week as we’re hoping to actually test his product using 88mph employees as the guinea pigs.
So how does this all fit in with the future? Not really sure actually. The promise of coming here is that the mentors are supposed to naturally pair with startups they find interesting and ultimately become a partner in the businesses. I’m considering myself more of a consultant at this time and know that after December I’ll be heading home.
Other work I’ve been doing around the office has been setting up a WordPress site for Manyatta Rent. Always good learning some new skills and definitely fun.
I’m hoping to work a little closer with Closet49 (online fashion store) soon to learn a little about ecommerce sites. Also planning on helping Gamsole, which is a group of Nigerian guys who make games for smartphones. I’ll keep you posted on that progress.
First off, for those of you who don’t know what an escarpment is that’s ok, I didn’t either. “An escarpment is a steep slope or long cliff that occurs from erosion or faulting and separates two relatively level areas of differing elevations.” So now we may proceed.
After seeing the flamingos we continued on to the Nguruman Escarpment where we would be staying for a couple of days.
The landcruiser has these great portholes on the top that allow you to sit on the roof. We spent the next hour sitting on the roof while we drove from desert into a jungle-like area. We spotted a couple of giraffes and zebras on the way. This part was most excellent.
The biggest difference I could find between Kenya and Namibia is that Kenya isn’t divided into giant farms with fencing around them. It seems like animals and people are free to roam wherever, so definitely more of a chance of seeing random wildlife pretty much anywhere.
We pulled into Ngurumani late in the afternoon. We stopped to fill up with gas. Jacob entertained the local kids with some magic. Shortly thereafter a couple of us checked into the guest house while the others headed on to a campsite. I chose the guesthouse due to the promise of a shower. I went to bed at 8pm and slept very well.
Decided to forego on the usual today and headed up to the shopping center for lunch. The Junction is the large mall near my office which pretty much looks like any other in the U.S. The interesting part of this, and why I’m posting, is that you sit down at your table and each food place sends a waiter over and gives you a menu. So there you are sitting with 6 different menus from fast food places. I went with Chinese today.
Our adventure this weekend revolved around Lake Magadi. To quote Wikipedia, it is the southern most lake in the Kenyan Rift Valley. The lake is 80% soda ash and is highly alkaline. This makes it a perfect place for flamingos.
The first thing we noticed when we arrived in town was a giant factory. This is home to the Magadi Soda Company, which is now owned by the Indian Company, Tata. The town had a swimming pool so it was clear that the factory’s presence has allowed the town to prosper.
I unfortunately didn’t get any great pictures of the actual soda ash, but image a giant lake full of grey mashed potatoes. That’s pretty much it.
The car did not break down in Magadi; however, we were in need of fuel and the town was all out. Apparently the next truck with petrol wasn’t due in until Monday. Crossed our fingers that they would have fuel in Ngurumani, our ultimate destination.
Here are some pics from the area. I’ll have more later in a related post for our return trip home.
We left on Saturday morning early. Loaded up the 1970s Toyota Landcruiser of Nikolai’s and headed out of Nairobi.
We got a full mile down the road and the engine died. We all go out and started pushing. About 10 people joined in to help push the white guys car. One guy down the road came to have a quick fix.
We were able to get the car started, got another 100 yards down the road and it died. He follow us and put some tape on the fuel line, started again. We all piled in, drove 1000 yards and died. By now we’re calling Nikolai’s mechanic to come take a look and talking about postponing the weekend. A couple guys walked up and said they were mechanics. These guys seemed legit as they were sucking on the fuel line to see if any fuel would come from the tank to the engine. No fuel = blocked fuel line. 20 min later we’re on our way. It was pretty crazy how many people were willing to help, but definitely always looking for money. UPDATE: Dean makes a good point in his comment. People do help here more than you’d find the U.S. It’s unfortunate that we’ve lost that sense of community as we ‘progress’.
From there, things went pretty well with the drive. Standard huge pot holes everywhere. We stopped to let the car rest, have some lunch, see some of the surrounding sites.
It was actually very similar to the Namibian landscape near Opuwo. We pulled into Magadi about mid-day and were ready for the rest of our adventure.
Not to spoil it too much, but the images you saw in the post are very similar to others that come later.
Apologies on not getting out the tales from the weekend, but I have a ton of photos to get through that I want to make sure to include.
In the meantime, there’s a food place out behind our office building. It is a small corrugated iron and concrete block building about the size of a one-car garage. I’m not sure what these are called, but they are where local people eat and local food is served.
I have eaten at this place 3 or 4 times since I got here and realized that it’s actually pretty good. They serve a plate of beans, kale (sukuma), chapati, cooked cabbage and a carrot salad (very similar to salsa). Grand total 50 Ksh. That’s equal to less than 60 cents for the whole meal.
I hope to share some more information soon, but we had a great trip to Lake Magadi this past weekend. I’m exhausted, but wanted to leave you with a little teaser.
The weekend was full of:
I look forward to sharing this all with you hopefully by tomorrow.
In case you were wondering, thought I’d share a little bit about the weather in Nairobi. It’s actually quite nice right now. Every day is just about the same with highs in the low 80s and lows around the low 60s. Nairobi’s elevation is 5,450 which helps keep the temps down throughout the year as compared to other regions of Kenya.
It’s nearing a short rain season which means that it just kind of rains in the morning and now and then. Pop up stuff. It seems to help keep the air quality better.
As for air quality, seems ok generally, but the cars/buses here are horrible.
Ever since my first day (4 days ago), a group of us have been taking Swahili lessons in the morning for an hour. Looks like we are planning on continuing this for the foreseeable future. Definitely a way to wake up and rack the brain in the morning. I can’t remember the last time I had homework either.
A couple phrases for you:
Karibu (care – ree – boo) – Welcome
Asante (ah – san – te) – Thank You
Kwa heri (kwah – hairy) – Good Bye
Things are busy around the office. I went on my first sales call today for one of the startups, Mpepea (Mmm – pey – pey – ah). I am the mentor assigned primarily to Mpepea. The business is designed to make it easy for people to get emergency micro loans via their mobile phones. The technology uses Mpesa which allows people to pay for things using their phones. No need to carry cash around.
The primary things we’re working on this week are financial models to prove viability to customers and investors and sales pitch materials to ensure consistency and quality in the sales. And it’s my 3rd day.
I’m working with the founder, Daniel, every day to help drive business activities to get this in a place by December to show to investors.
That’s not all though, I’ve also started lending a hand to a couple of the other groups to help with brand development and website work. Here’s the new logo for Manyatta Rent.
They are allowing people to pay for rent via their mobile phones thus saving them tons of time waiting in lines at the banks and having to then take a receipt to their landlords. Hearing about the problem makes me happy that the U.S. has such a great postal service, checks can be trusted and we have online payments now.
Computers and internet are just too expensive here to make that really viable which is why these mobile solutions are so big.
I forgot to mention it, but I posted all of my old blog posts from Kenya (Part 1) and Namibia to this blog. Feel free to peruse the archives for my previous experiences.
Would it be bad if I said that I miss the Opuwo-style Africa?
I really can’t complain. I have a pretty nice place (pictures will come soon), there is a pool outside, I have hot water, electricity is fairly consistent, work is right next door, wifi is at home and at work and there is a giant mall about 500 yards down the road.
I went shopping for the essentials today at Nakumatt and they had everything I could ask for and more.
I guess I figured it out. I kind of miss the experience where THE store would run out of produce after one day. The simplicity that comes with living away from a large city.
I can’t really say I’m upset or unthrilled with my current situation; I really do like it a lot. I guess I’m just being nostalgic.
If you need to reach me, and quickly, my phone number is +254 0722 118 066. You can send me a text message using the same number and be sure to include the ‘+’.
You can also text me using jb@jbwoodruff.com if you have an iPhone and you’re using iMessage.
Not sure how I’d feel today, I actually woke up fairly well rested and ready to learn why I’m here.
Our office is literally next door to where I live on Ngong road which makes for a carefree commute; aka, no mutatus.
The day started with some Swahili lessons at 8:30. We’re going to be doing this every day for quite some time apparently. Not for any other reason than to learn the language because everyone at work speaks English. Should be fun though, I even had some homework tonight.
Next was me learning a bit about the various businesses that we are working with so thought I’d share some basic thoughts: rent payments via mobile phone, game development, mobile music downloads, dating site, emergency loans via mobile phone and online gambling. Not necessarily the most altruistic businesses, but most are very useful for a mobile dependent population.
Normal business days involve us starting at 9:30am with a group meeting and then it appears we’re pretty much doing work to help in any way we can. So far, most folks have paired with startup to provide some dedicated help.
Today I helped by doing some logo design and providing general advice for a couple of businesses. Tomorrow I begin working with Mpepea. Given my attentionally deficient behavior it should be nice to have a couple of projects to work on at a time.
My coworkers are mostly from Denmark and others being from England and the U.S.
I’ll leave you today with a couple of images from the office:
Shannon’s journey through Ethiopia is underway and it looks like they’re already having tons of fun. If you are interested in following them along the way check out their tumblr site: http://imagineethiopia2012.tumblr.com
The battle is on again. Not sure why, but these Kenyan mosies are loud. 4am and all I hear is bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. Lights on. Dead mosie. Lights off. bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzZZZZZZZ!!!! Lights on. Dead mosie. Lights off. Repeat. You get the picture. I’m buying a net today.
So I had all day Saturday to get ready to go. I was pretty much all packed, the weather was beautiful and I had a list of things. So I got my run in, I had my delicious Qdoba burrito and I got to watch my Nittany Lions pull off a come back. That all left me with approximately 30 minutes to actually pack and tie up all loose ends.
Being a Woodruff we tend to forget things. Frankly, if I don’t forget something then I feel that I’m somehow doomed. So what did I forget?
Thank you to Shanna for taking me to the airport and helping to keep me calm. The past couple of days have been quite the emotional stress and I think it was harder this time around than when I was supposed to be gone for a year. I think it might have something to do with a cute blonde wife of mine. She’s the best.