Above The Media

I just tried to capture some of the colours and the vibe.

I have met and spoken to many different Kenyan people in the last few days and my experience has been overwhelmingly positive. They are warm, friendly and approachable. Kenyans have pride in their country and pride in the way they present themselves. They don’t brush you off or ignore you – good listeners. They respect and tolerate one another, work as a community, and appear to be without prejudice and cynicism. I think South Africans can learn a lot from the people of this nation!

Here are a few random photos from the Trade Fair scene.

Hello! Once again a rough and rushed collection of words. Two full days have gone by since my initial impressions of Nairobi and there are so many thoughts I wish to share, but so little time…

Yesterday (Saturday) morning the three of us, Tim, Stefan and I, met at the hotel’s restaurant called “The Terrace” at 8am for the buffet breakfast which is completely amazing to a devoted breakfast fan like me! Actually we have done that all three mornings so far and I have no complaints. My to-do list was a little more demanding than I prefer on a Saturday  morning – I had to get nine different posters designed and have them ready for printing before 3pm when “Copycat Ltd” closes. I decided to just work at the hotel where electricity and internet are close at hand. Playing it safe I had the design work done at about 1pm. Being no stranger to the dark art of printing I expected a couple of hiccups to arise, after all, this is Africa! Posters on flash-disk, Tim and I jumped in a taxi and made our way to the city center only to find that that Copycat only prints in black and white, and certainly does not print to our desired size – A0.

By a stroke of luck we found a company called “Touchy Creations” two floors up from Copycat, who prints large posters in colour. Touchy is situated in a  seriously tiny office space, just big enough to contain a desk and a very impressive HP Designjet Z3200 Photo Printer. To make a long story short, the young man working there (who was hoping to knock off at 2pm) stayed until after 7pm to complete our printing. I felt really bad, but he was an absolute hero and we gave him 1000 Kenyan Shillings extra for his efforts. The people here are so relaxed and accommodating, always willing to go the extra mile, even without any promise of reward.

Touchy Creations

During the time the printing took (it was really slow), we walked into the city and visited the traveling Masai Market. Wow, what an experience! Let me explain… The market itself is an average curio and crafts market similar to any you would find in South Africa, but the interaction with the vendors is 100 times more intense than anything I have ever experienced before. Anyone with a white skin is “Mzungu”, a white man, a tourist. And they will go to any length to separate you from your Shillings. The moment you set foot in the market you are targeted by two or three men known as brokers. They offer to act as your market guide negotiating “better” prices for you and it is practically impossible to get rid of them. Of course the prices they “negotiate” are well above what you should be paying and they get their cut. They are very friendly of course and once they had established I was from South Africa they said “Oh, you are Africana (Afrikaner)! We are brothers!”.

Masai treasure

If you are a nice guy like me, you are completely out of luck because every curio vendor has perfected the art of emotionally manipulating you into believing that you owe it to them to buy their stuff. Five minutes in there is exhausting. It is also quite difficult to find anything authentic in the market because a lot of what you see there may very well be mass produced in China. However, among the Obama sarongs and tourist trash, there is hidden treasure to be found, and if you manage to ditch the brokers and work your bargaining magic with the actual stall owners, you could walk away with some great Kenyan keepsakes. The sense of community is astounding. A stall owner will not hesitate to promote and sell their neighbour’s wares and when it comes to giving you change, someone with a money-pouch will be called from five stalls away to aid the transaction. It is as though there are very few barriers here when it comes to dealing with money – pay now, pay later, pay me pay my friend, it’s all the same! It makes me feel a little guilty when I think of how conservative and jealous we are over our money.

A funny little observation about the locals’ speech – they give you “leceipts” and “lap” your fragile curious in paper.

The racial barriers here are also very different from South Africa. Sure, the locals try to charge us whites Mzungu-prices making as much money as they can from the tourists, but that’s where it seems to end. Even in the crowded market with people surrounding me and tugging at my arm I did not feel threatened. It is very easy to sense that the diffence here is “local vs foreign” – NOT “white vs black”. It is refreshing. People are open and unguarded in their approach.

After picking the posters up at about 7:30pm, we walked over to an Italian Trattoria where I had a pizza pie and some red wine for supper. When we got back to the hotel, Neil and Jason had just arrived from Cape Town to complete our party of five. They were eager to investigate the Nairobi nightlife, so the five of us bundled into a taxi and we made our way, tyres scraping the wheel arches, to a popular bar called Gipsy. Joshua, our Kenyan colleague, and his girlfriend Tara joined us there.

I mentioned the delicious pineapple drink, Alvaro, in my first post about Nairobi. Alvaro is made by East African Breweries, the same guys who bring us Tusker Lager, but it was sometime during Saturday evening that I realised a rival pineapple drink from the Coca-Cola Company, called Novida exists. Kenya is basically split into two factions: Novida drinkers and Alvaro drinkers, both equally passionate about their beverage of choice. Joshua attempted to convert me to Novida, but it’s true what Cat Stevens says, the first cut is the deepest. As Joseph, the construction-foreman at our show stand describes Alvaro: “It is so good”.

We spent the majority of Sunday morning at the fairgrounds overseeing the preparation of our Mocality stand. It was really starting to look like something! I posted a few photos earlier, but I hope to add more once the actual fair is in progress.

I was determined to see some of the Kenyan landscape, so after a grilled chicken sandwich at the hotel for lunch, I hit the road to a well known lookout point over the vast and beautiful Great Rift Valley, 45 minutes from Nairobi. Fortunately it was a clear day and the view was amazing. Unfortunately the lookout point is inhabited by curio vendors promoting their wares just as aggressively as their Masai Market counterparts. Well not quite as bad as the Masai Market, but they still managed to cash in on my Mzungu money. “Hakuna matata, hakuna matata!” They deliberately use as many recognisable Swahili phrases from The Lion King as possible. Now that’s one trick I didn’t fall for - replying to “asante sana” (thank you very much) with “squash banana”.

A very roughly stitched together panoramic view of The Great Rift Valley. Click to see the large version!

For Sunday supper we visited a(nother Italian!) well known restaurant called Osteria in Kilimani, Nairobi. We sat outdoors near a fire and the atmosphere was really nice. The five of us took a bet on how many businesses Mocality we would be able to sign up to our directory during the next week of the Nairobi International Trade fair. My guess was the most modest of all the numbers. We will have to see…

A broken down Land Rover at the fairgrounds.

They have this drink here called “Coca-Cola”.

In Kenya, bananas are not beeg…

…but Madiba is beeg, very beeg!

Your friendly neighbourhood Tourist Info Centre. Tucked away on the 3rd floor of a dark little building in the city.

Some shots of the hand painted art that covers most walls in the Nairobi International Trade Fair grounds. Some artists were still busy doing some last minute work for the show tomorrow.

Tim and I took a 45 minute drive out of the city to go and look out over the vast plains of Kenya’s Great Rift Valley. Here are a few pictures of the sights along the way.

Two more colleagues, Neil and Jason, arrived from South Africa last night. Here are a few pictures of the five of us and the progress at our exhibition stand.

The very sturdy custom roof built for our stand by the locals...

Since arriving here three days ago, Nairobi has not felt very foreign to me. In fact it feels and looks like I am somewhere in the North of South Africa, maybe Nelspruit? Here are some random photos of the city to give you an impression.

It’s already 00:30 and I’m only getting down to writing something now. I won’t have time to edit this post so it will probably end up as an incoherent and random bunch of sentences, but I just want to commit the words to black and white before they escape me.

Dad and Mom came to see me off

Tam and I

Discovering the wonder of corporate perks, I made my way past the monster queue in the frantic domestic departures terminal of Cape Town International and checked in at the vacant Premium Class desk without delay. After a merry bon voyage breakfast at Juicy Lucy with my parents and Tam I took the very front seat of a Boeing 737 and landed at OR Tambo less than two hours later. Strong tailwinds apparently shaved about 15 minutes off our flight time of which I spent most reading the Cape Times.

My business class status afforded me the luxury of an interlude in the First Class Lounge toilets before I hastily made my way to the International Departures Terminal. Our designated boarding time came and went. When my fellow passengers and I were finally shuttled to the plane (a similar Boeing 737) we parked next to a sleek German luxury foreign affairs vehicle delivering the reason for our delay. The stately (presumably Kenian) ambassador and I had the entire front section of the plane to ourselves where we individually enjoyed ample legroom, smoked salmon starters, a selection of reading material and duty-free in-flight shopping. Ok, he did the shopping, I just read the Time from cover to cover. It was the 28 September issue so I felt a bit like Gary Hobson from that Early Edition TV series. The clouds were amazing so I took a few pictures.

My arrival at Nairobi International airport was incident free except for my pen falling apart while completing the blue immigration form with the 4mm² spaces to enter your details. Nairobi is an hour ahead of South Africa, so I landed at about 20:30 Kenyan time. It was already dark, so I could not see much of my surroundings on the taxi drive to the hotel. Many of the lit-up brands on billboards and buildings were familiar though. I could also see that there many trees dotted along all the roads we traveled. The traffic became fairly dense as we approached the city but we reached the hotel in about 15 minutes.

The hotel has an old fashioned look with colonial style decor and plenty of old sepia photographs of white people taming the land lining every wall. After being showed to my room I went downstairs to meet my colleague Tim, who arrived two days earlier, for a mandatory and very welcome Tusker Lager. The loud, hyperactive techno versions of all popular songs you can think of seemed a little out of place in the muted atmosphere of the hotel’s bar overlooking the lush courtyard but they served as a lullaby sending me off to bed.

I got my requested wake up call at 7am and met Tim and Stefan for a delicious selection from the hotel’s extensive breakfast buffet at 8. Tim and I made our way by taxi to the East African Magazines (EAM) office where our Kenyan colleagues are based. I finally met Cobus, Kenny and Einstein (real name) whom I have only had telephone and email contact with in the past. Tim, Einstein and I spent the morning sharing two desks in the tiny office dedicated to our project: Mocality – Africa’s largest mobile business directory in the making!

Tim in the Mocality office

The purpose for our visit to Kenya is to prepare for Mocality’s debut exhibition at the annual Nairobi International Trade Fair. I have spent the last year creating the Mocality brand and the last couple of weeks in Cape Town have been devoted to feverishly designing promotional material and branding for our stand at the Trade Fair. This morning I had to design a few last minute additions to add to our presence at the show.

The 2m and 3m printed banners I designed and illustrated lying in wait.

At lunch time we joined other EAM workers on an enclosed porch for a tasty roti and stew served by what seems to be a dedicated office cook. The weird thing is we didn’t pay, so I asked Einstein later if they always get free lunch. It’s not free, he exclaimed, they come round to your office to collect the money later. It often works that way in Kenya he says, they are somewhat relaxed about receiving payment - you only pay later for services. Well, no one ever came round for that lunch money.

On the way to the Nairobi International Trade Fair grounds by taxi

At about 13:30 we made our way to the fairgrounds where the show will kick off on Monday. The focus of the Trade Fair is largely agricultural and unlike other expos, shows or fairs you may be accustomed to, the exhibition stands here are all permanent structures, buildings connected by a little network of streets. Many look like they my have been houses at some point in time, including our site.

The Mocality stand taking shape...

There I met Joshua, the leader of our Kenyan crew along with our Mocality product ambassadors – young people, most of them graduate students, who go door to door in Nairobi business districts creating awareness about Mocality and signing businesses up on our directory.

Tim, Joshua and the Mocality ambassadors

The entire fairground was buzzing with life, everyone preparing their exhibition stands in one way or another. A common trend appears to be adorning the outer walls with murals depicting scenes relevant to the exhibitor. A lot of the signage is hand painted, buildings are bright in colour, blue, red, yellow, green. Many stands have little flowerbeds sporting colourful flowers to add to the array. Our renovators took the liberty of creating a little rock garden complete with painted yellow rocks. There is a wonderful naivety coupled with a decidedly DIY approach that I can’t help but admire here.

Unlikely artists

The culture is very laid back and I noticed a real lack of urgency in people. People hang around a lot, just sitting and waiting for nothing in particular. Nearby someone was trying to get an old Land Rover started. A large group of supporters gradually gathered, nobody doing anything to really help except lean against the vehicle and while away the time…

We took a walk around the grounds to just to explore and take a look at some of the activity. On the way we stopped at a bar and bought an amazing non-alcoholic pineapple flavoured malt drink called “Alvaro”. It is delicious!

Things here also don’t seem to be driven by rigid logic. What I mean is, there is a fair share of randomness and as Tim advised me “you just have to go with it”. One example, the foreman of the construction crew renovating our exhibition stand/house insisted that Tim and I each take a short ride on his bicycle: “Can you drive it? Show me!”. Also, we came across a tractor exhibition and to one side, displayed proudly on a mound of rocks was a very non-4×4 sedan. The stand next door to ours belongs to Kenya Medical Research Institute and a signage guy was busy applying brand new vinyl lettering to the board outside their building. He found it quite acceptable to apply some artistic expression to their slogan which now reads “better health In search of”.

The Traffic in Nairobi is hectic. There are many traffic circles, very few traffic lights and it appears very few rules. Close shaves aplenty. Yet, I got the impression of overwhelming tolerance, hardly any hooting at all! There are trees everywhere, anywhere there is not a road or a building there seems to be a tree. There are many trees. And (maybe because of all the trees) many birds. I was surprised to see large numbers of Marabu Storks and falcons right in the city!

Instead of air freshener, a can of Raid is perched on the toilet tank in the en-suite bathroom of my hotel room. I thought that odd enough, but this evening room service knocked on my door, can of Raid in hand, offering to spray my room. I politely accepted in fear that they may know something I don’t… After spraying each corner of my room the lady seemed satisfied.

Most car license plates start on KA here, resulting in a lot of KAK numberplates.

I have a lot to still do tomorrow morning so I am calling it a night!

I spent my last night in London watching Scottish “post-punk” outfit, We Were Promised Jetpacks live at a small club/pub called The Lexington.

Jon accompanied me and I am very glad we went. We arrived just in time to see The Citadels - second of three opening acts. I was immediately impressed with their indie rock sound as they opened with an anthemic little gang-vocal number, their voices in perfect harmony. It is important to note that they have followed the indie band recipe book to the last ingredient: five members (including a whispy blonde femme fatale and the mandatory bearded frontman) playing a delicious variety of musical instruments including a flute, synthesizer, tambourine, cow bell and extra floor tom. The girl even sings the lead at times making for some interesting variation. I don’t think it would be absurd to keep an eye open for these guys on MTV in the near future.

I don’t remember the third (second for us) band… Who were they? Anyway..

Before striking out upon the late night tube ride back home, we got what we came for.

We Were Promised Jetpacks come across as an unassuming bunch of lads. Their almost-awkward frontman and his unmistakeable accent makes you feel right at home.
The guitar riffs are driving and coupled with generous use of the bass drum, form a mesmerising rhythmic foundation. There is something old school and undeniably nostalgic about their songs. I found myself kidnapped and involuntarily dropped of at a comfortable place in my childhood from where I was reluctant to leave. The name of the band suddenly makes a lot of sense: it refers to those naive, glassy eyed expectations of your youth, the ones that could only end in disappointment, yet leave you falling asleep with a smile as you realise that this probably is the best of all possible worlds. At the same time there is nothing fatalistic about this theme, i mean, we might still get those jetpacks… Right?