Oct 22-23 Settling In

ARRIVAL!



Dilhun, Henriette and I arrived at Jomo Kenyatta Airport in Nairobi at 1:30 a.m. - right on time! Our arrival coincided with Isabel's flight from Portugal and 

the four of us were met by the smiling faces 
of Raphael, Wilson and the team from D.O.T.  
What a warm Kenyan 
"Karibu sana" (Very Welcome) we received!

                                          KARIBU SANA!

After a few hours of rest, in the morning we met some of the IBM team that had already arrived 

and we went on a walk around Nairobi. The Country Lodge Hotel where we are staying is close to downtown, so we walked through Uhuru Park and came across the Kenyatta Conference Center (KCC). 

The KCC is 32 stories high and from the top we had a great view of all of Nairobi. We could see Mount Kenya in the distance. We could also see the memorial for Jomo Kenyatta, the first president of Kenya and many other interesting features of Nairobi.


From the top of the KCC there was one view that intrigued me:

What was it? The Saturday Masai Market!

We left the KCC and walked over to the market where I had a very unique shopping experience. I was surrounded by Kenyan men who call themselves shopping guides. They are paid by the market to take tourists through.
They carry your bag for you and they call it a "Maybe Basket" If you point to something you like, you say "maybe" and into the basket (bag) it goes. At the end of all of your shopping they settle you on a bench in the shade of a tree and you negotiate prices for each item in your "Maybe Basket". The more items you buy the more discount you receive. And my two shopping guides, Patrick and Henry are paid 10% of the total from the vendors you purchased from. I was wary at the beginning because their strategy is to separate you from your group and thus encourage you to buy more. But after seeing that everyone was in the same situation as me, I settled down and quite enjoyed my shopping experience.


We ended our first day in Kenya with a lovely welcome dinner, hosted by Muriuki Mureithi and Alex Mutungi from D.O.T. 

Sunday morning was spend heads down working with our sub-teams, preparing presentations for the clients. The first sub-team  is working with the Kenyan Association of Manufacturers (KAM). At 3 pm on Sunday we all went to the KAM offices and sub team 1 presented their work plan to KAM. It was a very successful meeting and they are off to a great start.




We came back to the hotel and my sub-team (Team Twiga) put the finishing touches on our presentation for the Ministry of Higher Education Science & Technology (MoHEST). We meet our client Monday morning at 8 a.m. sharp!