Crevasses, Frontier Towns and Living in the Wild West

'Nairobbery' is the cliche for the stresses of Kenya's capital, but after four years here I wouldn't say it really hits the target.  And the time my bag was stolen in a shopping mall, it was recovered a day later with a somewhat restrained 3000 KSh (around $40) - only a part-payment - taken from the more substantial wodge of cash with which I'd been planning to do the week's shop.  Yet sitting yesterday in a gathering of the expat accompanying partners from Tom's work the quiet talk in twos and threes was of the stresses of life here.
'In twenty five years of overseas postings, some to very difficult places, this is the hardest.'
Another: 'This is the posting which made us decide to change track and head back to the UK again.'
But which are the facets that so stress here?

Chewing the fat with some Mum mates last week as we swapped stories of outlandish encounters here, one, who had grown up in Africa and lived in some fairly wayward European countries, said, musingly,
'I get from my childhood I may 'need' to pay a bribe, a 'fine' when I'm in the wrong. But the thing is, here there isn't really the rule of law. Here, the fine is levied without there needing to be any offence at all.'
A survey published this week by Transparency International reported that 70% of Kenyans asked agreed they had paid a bribe to a public official this year, - the third highest rated country in the world, after Sierra Leone and Yemen.  They can't ALL have done something wrong.   And the impact of that is, I think, as with a bullying teacher who lashes out without reason, others scurry past with eyes downcast, heads down, hoping they won't be the ones to trigger the quixotic temper today. If you trigger the mine you're on your own with it.  'Too bad' people may hiss from the side of their mouth, as they scurry past but basically, survival of the fittest, sauve qui peut, and you're on your own.

A good mate, settled here for some twenty years, describes Nairobi as a frontier town. Which conjures up dodgy backstreets and shady dealings. Another recalled how her friends in well-ordered (but still African) Cape Town called Nairobi 'the Wild West'. Not Somalia or South Sudan where the laws are yet to be drafted. But somewhere, I'd say from a worm's eye view, where having the letter of the law on your side doesn't stand for much.  Enforcement is what counts and your ability to enforce by fair means or foul.  And all too often it isn't the sheriff with the ten gallon hat who rides into town to enforce the mutually agreed law but someone with their own personal agenda. Or no one at all.

It's not something you might see on first, or even second glance.  Tourists passing through can marvel at the malls and chic dress shops. Those here on short-term contracts may breathe a sigh of relief and steam on well-trammelled routes between Gipsys bar, the United Nations complex in Gigiri and the sleek consultants' hangout, Art Cafe.  But a few months in, you hear the horror stories which betray chasms and neglect.  Of a Kenyan professional who had a car accident on the main,busy Thika highway after dark, but not late, on a Saturday night. And who was discovered dead in the car next morning, as no one had reported the incident or gone to investigate as it careered off the road. The security briefings at which you are told, should you see someone lying injured in the middle of the road, to drive on by, - even, some say, to drive over the body to escape if need be, - as it could be a scam in which you get carjacked - or you get lynched for having caused the accident. Children abandonned or orphaned, living independently on the streets, or in their villages.

A well-respected Head of Science at an international school working here for the last twenty seven years, had his work permit renewal rejected a few months ago.  He sat at home off the books for three weeks while representations were made.  And then got it re-issued.
'They were just chancing their arm with the school authorities,' he said wryly, a week later. He was just collateral damage. But for him, his family, possible deprivation of his income, question marks over his country of residence of twenty seven years, for no transparent reason at all. A mate of mine described her long-ongoing divorce case. Her ex-husband boasted to her he had bribed the family court. So he is getting away with truly minimal payments for upkeep of their children, despite his comfortable income.  But what can she do? Not much in effect. Another very well-connected mate detailed the saga of the land in a prime development area left her ten years ago. How the deeds were stolen when they were lodged with the courts. How driving past after a tip off the plots had been re-fenced and divided up - a sign someone else was trying to grab the land and make a fast buck.  All around us, plots of land bear painted signs 'This plot is not for sale', so no one can pretend to be the owner and 'sell' it on to an innocent buyer.

What scares and stresses me is how individuals can fall through the cracks. Individuals who could be me and mine.  Just because there was solid ground there a moment ago, oh look theres a swallow hole and 'Where's she gone?' How so many choose to look away from tricky situations, from distress, and walk on by rather than stop, do the difficult thing, have the tricky conversation, offer support.

I was told of a newly arrived young expat wife, arriving in Nairobi some two months after her husband. Her husband lost his job within a month of her arrival, but didn't tell her. Carried on with the motions of going to work while trying to find something new. As well we all might. While she carried on trying to settle in a new country, make a new home, surrounded by other expat spouses who knew the reality of her situation, that she didn't know, but they didn't feel they could tell her on such a brief acquaintance.

Or thinking of the new mum on the playground a week before the end of the summer term.  We swapped phone numbers, she came to coffee, we had a nice chat. Then came the summer holidays. Six weeks into the autumn term I realised it wasn't just that our kid's after school activities no longer overlapped. Not that she'd got a driver and no longer did the school run herself. Not that she was always in the gym when I phoned. Or 'out'.  She wasn't here any more.  That might not matter in Europe. But here, where networks and security are key, well it felt it really did.
'Oh yes, the partners her husband was working with changed their plans just after he'd arrived. So they had to turn round and go home.'
Its not that life is changeable that distresses me. But that I, others, no one noticed she wasn't there.  No one sent out a search party.  Stuck, in distress, in a car after an accident, and those passing by don't stop, to look and help.

I think its particularly hard if you work here in a regional role, - if Nairobi is your base and your home, but not where you spend most of your time. If you're regularly away in DRC, or Uganda, in Somaliland or South Sudan. A few days after the earthquake in Haiti I suddenly realised that the family of a mate of mine were based in Haiti. There had been wall to wall coverage of the earthquake. But because she's often away, I hadn't made the connection to her. I felt I knew her well, but we'd always met elsewhere. I'd never been to her home, didn't know where she lived. Five days after the earthquake, when I went to see her, it turned out both her parents were still trapped in the family house. That her siblings had had to give up digging by hand to get them out, as really all hope had been lost. She had been in contact with friends and family by skype, by phone. But no one in Nairobi had yet been to see her. No one from her office, which was five minutes walk away. Nor of her other friends. No one at all as she went through a double bereavement, and loss of all income for the rest of her family. A friend from her choir came later on that day. But what an indictment of a city, of a community.

The image which sums the stresses up for me is high altitude climbing. Above the snowline. A place where the air is thin. Things may look stable on the surface, but crevasses can open up. Things can go awry, and there you are, dependent on yourself and your team. If you're lucky you've put in enough, have built the strong relationships, have lucked upon a group with the mentality that if you fall into a crevasse others will pull together and pull you out.  Harambee, its called in Swahili, - the mentality by which villages host events to pay for unforeseen funerals, to contribute school fees for talented children who otherwise wouldn't go to high school. But that's a choice. And somehow here, all too often I'd say its seen as value-free, if, imperilled as the rest of the team is too, they turn around, and rather than rescuing you, they instead cut the rope and walk away. Traumatised maybe but uninvolved.

Kenya Made Easier

Just as you get to feel confident in a location, you move on. Which are the pearls of wisdom I've picked up on the way I'd want to pass on to Nairobi Newcomers?

• Hire a driver for the first few days and sit next to him in the front seat, map open on your lap, marking his cut-throughs and routes. Nairobi barely has street signs, having a robust sense of where you are and some key landmarks reduces the panic.
  Get him to explain the rules of the road to you. 'We are bigger, so we go first' were the memorable words from Eric the Driver as our Prado bore down on an inoffensive Toyota Corolla.  You watch pedestrians doing it too. Red number plates or mzungu driver? Likely they've taken and passed a driving test at some point, probably get the car serviced occasionally, lets just nip in here ahead of them and assume they have a foot covering the brake for a nifty emergency stop.
  
• As soon as you get your ID, sign up for an mpesa account. Mobile money makes things so much easier - for paying the monthly internet without a queue, to pay staff remotely so they can travel up-country without risking a pocket full of cash on a matatu which might get robbed.

• Manage your expectations. Things take longer. Far longer. Getting the AA of Kenya formal reports to value two cars, a purely commercial transaction, took seven visits. A work permit took eight months and five visits including intervention by BigBoss and BigBoss's aunty.  And cluster activities. Once you've found a parking space, do all the things you can do in this one location. Tomorrow is another day, another location.
  
• Who are the people I wish I'd found earlier?  For car mechanics, Tinu at the garage at Oil Libya, Peponi Road. For a caring, excellent children's doctor, Dr Nesbitt at Gertrudes Childrens Hospital. For lazy birthday cakes, Java Westgate or Velvet Chocolate, next to Nakumatt Ukay.  To teach the mysteries of victoria sponges and tasty salads, Lakuku Karen.  For reviving medicinal cocktails, an Afternoon Affair at Zen Gardens, upstairs at the Sankara or the two for one deal at Onami, Westgate. For upbeat uproarious interactive Swahili lessons, Peninah 0724 348401. For an expert trampolining & gymnastics coach Bernard 0724 243611. For expert, ethical help registering a company or applying for a work permit, Erastus CPA. For DVDs and box sets, Discover Movies upstairs in ABC. In an emergency, when your safe with all travel documents won't open six hours before the flight leaves, safepickers 020 374 6321...
  
• Which scenarios are useful to prepare for and what solutions have inspired me?  Get your Swahili teacher to cover the scenario of being shunted in the car.  Nothing more frustrating when you've just been pranged by the car behind and are sure you are in the right than for the conversation to lapse into Swahili. And great the feeling of success when you chip back into the conversation, in your best Swahili, nope, actually I'm not in the wrong here, please can you write down your name and number and insurance details.  I've also found 'Tabia mbaya' 'Bad manners' a very helpful phrase at times.  When the waiters in a restaurant at the coast are talking about us, secure in the knowledge we won't understand.  Collapse of stout party. Haha.
  
  Decide how you will respond in the traffic without resorting to roadrage.  Initially, geek-like, I had the kids sing rousing revivalist hymns from the back row to power me on from a cowering wreck in the corner. 'And did those feet, in ancient times....' Now, more confident, more stroppy, I silently mouth obscenities, enunciating very clearly, so you see the idiot driver who has cut me up in a very dangerous way screwing up his face, concentrating hard, wondering exactly what I am saying. A friend imagines firing an imaginary gun taking out each of the tyres of the malefactors. A member of the Quaker meeting reflects that 'You are my neighbour. And you too. And you too.' But that, for me, makes her a candidate for sainthood, not in the reach of mere mortals.  A member of a diplomatic mission was recently caught on camera 'making lewd gestures' at another driver, which went viral via twitter, so we've all been warned not to.   So I don't anymore. I just think them.
  
• Get out of Nairobi at least once a month. Cabin fever ain't pretty. You don't realise how stressed you've got till you're out of it.  Big landscapes, no razor wire, African sunsets, - this is what we need.
  
• Retreat at times. The French say it well, 'reculer pour mieux sauter' - to retreat to get a better run up to it.  At times you need to hide under the duvet with a stack of good books or escapist DVDs. Its all part of culture shock. Its cheaper than a trip to the spa. And bouncing forth a few days later, equanimity restored, no one need ever know you've read your way through 17 Dick Francis novels and five school stories from when you were 9. Unless you choose to tell them about it on your blog when you're leaving the country .....  And alternatively, and in parallel, find some good cronies with whom you can cackle over an Afternoon Affair (see above) at today's utterly shaming scenario, when you were in the wrong yet again.
  
• Make Kenyan friends. I've met such great and inspiring people with such inspiring stories, have had such a laugh with colleagues in the office. After three years one of them told me that what I thought I'd been doing as a mark of respect when shaking hands with more senior/respected visitors, actually looked like the birdy dance from the 1980s. Oh no. All those respected African statesmen wondering, why is that mzungu doing the birdy dance instead of shaking hands with me?????
  
• Don't let security fears stop you doing things. Much. We had some terrifying briefings at the start, but it matters to get out and chance your arm.  Yes I take a security escort car when I'm coming back late at night alone or through a dodgy area, yes I put towels over mirrors at coast hotels to protect from breaking glass in a bomb blast, but don't let the fears stop you from going out and having fun. I do do the security checks, have driven past our gate when being followed, have stopped using certain restaurants during security scares and opted away from shopping in the Israeli owned shopping centre.  But its not as terrifying as the briefings make out. Try not to worry.
  
• And my favourite places?  Acacia Camp on Kapiti Plain/Athi River for a Sunday bike ride amidst zebra and giraffes followed by a tasty Sunday lunch.  Loisaba Laikipia, for pure luxury, views of 100 miles in each direction up to Mount Kenya, fantasy land. Open House for a Friday night curry. Mailu Saba on the edge of the Menengai Crater for the most stunning location, great cooking and an ethical safari camp which provides employment for older siblings bringing up their orphaned younger siblings. The view from the restaurant at Sands at Nomad, Diani, for picture postcard perfect beaches.  Shela beach in Lamu for aimless wandering and shell collecting, unhassled and unhurried. And, should you be trying to have a quiet, studious work meeting in Zen Gardens one Friday but be interrupted by the raucous middleaged women howling in laughter at the next table, I'm afraid that might be us. Just don't ask me to shake your hand in respect.

Birthday Honours

Saying thank you isn't big in Kenya. Exasperated, I've coached one member of our staff,
'In my culture, when someone gives you something generous, like say a contribution towards school fees for your kids, you don't try to bargain up their contribution.  You smile, winsomely, and say 'Thank you.' Even if its a vile jumper which doesn't fit.'

But it matters. Which is one of the reasons why this week's Queen's Birthday Honours list felt important for me. I'd call myself a socialist. But trumping that, from abroad, up close to two of those honoured, I feel proud to be part of a country which says 'Thank you' to its citizens who step up to the plate, take on inordinate responsibilities in intractable areas where it isn't clear by any means they will be garlanded with success. Who gulp when asked, and are willing to stand holding the baby on areas like Somalia. And sometimes, and in these cases, make a difference. But as this isn't a fairy tale, sometimes, despite their best efforts make a difference by their stalwart presence and engagement, by their striving and standing next to those in distress, but not in terms of tangible outcomes, and yet have been willing to do so all the same.

In my second year on the Kenyan playground as famine was brewing and later raging, you could look around and tell those working on Somalia.  Not all of them of course, its not a pass to sainthood, some were just treating it as another day another dollar, but of many, you could tell.  Drawn. Twitchy. Strung-out and hollow-eyed. Over-caffinated even at a 730 am drop-off. The partners telling of being woken by the other's anxiety dreams at 3am each night.  Of how they would then get up and work again, because how could you put this dream to bed, when it wasn't a dream but reality for some quarter of a million people not far away, in a country which you were being paid to try to support.  A caring humanitarian worker telling me at a dinner party of how her day had been, supporting her NGO partners working amidst dying people in a deeply insecure environment where mobs would kill for the computers they were using to keep the spreadsheets and to report back.  Of a friend saying, one year in, this was the worst work stress of their career ever. Yes, even worse than when they were working for Amnesty and hearing at 4pm on a Friday night that 15 people in the region they were responsible for were to be hung next morning, and being the one responsible for the research, for getting out the Urgent Action to activists, to trying to mobilise support. And knowing at the same time that their partner was back home with a six month old baby, desperate for their support and for the weekend to begin.  How many of us who sat down with their partners before they travelled to insecure areas with close protection, filled in the sign of life security questionnaires in case of kidnap: 'How far (honestly) can you run?', 'Any birthmarks or distinguishing features?'  and had those serious conversations.  'If you did get kidnapped, given that your employer has a commitment not to pay ransomes so as not to stimulate demand, at what stage should I remortgage our small three bed terrace house to pay it alone? How long should I wait. Or who else should I ask for sensible advice?'

When we were moving to Kenya I bounced, naive and tigger-like, up to a grizzled Irish NGO-mate close to retirement who'd been working long-term on the Horn of Africa. 'Tom will be working on Somalia.' And my Irish mate sighed. Looked at the floor. Looked teary-eyed. 'We had such high hopes for it 20 years ago,' he said, wearily. Sudden flash of insight that people can spend their working lives giving their commitment and creativity to causes which won't turn around in their tenure. Maybe not in their lifetime. I couldn't do it. Success, impact, matters too much to me. But it matters that people do.

Quakers make much of our history working against slavery, helping run the Underground Railroad for fleeing slaves, advocating, petitioning. But I only realised recently that this was a campaign which spanned two hundred years. Ten generations. What commitment of those in generations three to nine, where it was clear nothing much was happening anytime soon, yet to carry on, at risk of their own lives in some cases, without much prospect of success but because it was the right thing to do.

I don't mix in the same circles as million pound contributors to party funds and bankers, so the people I've known who've been honoured do all, in my opinion, so richly deserve them.  A Quaker mate, in our twenties, who was honoured for services to the children of Chechnya, establishing and running a key service there without heavy duty support at a deeply insecure and unstable time.  My empathetic and creative ex-boss in an inner London university who went on to take the lead in another financially insecure and challenging inner London university. A British friend in Madagascar who set up and ran for some twenty five years, a loving, caring remand home for orphans and those referred by the courts, where even the money for food had to be raised.  Holding not one baby but some seventy, taking on responsibility to put food on the table each day for twenty five years.

When we lived in Hertfordshire some days I'd look around the Mums on the school's Walking Bus as the primary aged kids reached the top of the hill and trooped into school.  The kids would be well turned out, clutching healthy lunch boxes, bookbags holding filled in slips and signed reading records. The Mums would be unkempt, bedhair, mismatched shoes. All the efforts that morning had gone into getting the kids up, ready and to school. You first, me last.  And I'd want to stand at the door and give those Mums a (small, plastic, Tescos) medal. But never did.  For me being a pillar of the community isn't about standing up above others, a ten foot Colossus amidst four foot pygmies.  Its about being willing to take the weight of the burdens on your shoulders and act responsibly and responsively. And it matters we say thank you and celebrate those who do. Here's me raising my glass, 'Thank you, and well done.'

Applying for Jobs from Overseas

Well yes, it was an uphill slog. I'm an expat Careers Adviser. I support clients applying for jobs in third countries.  Help them consider and articulate how their experience in Somalia is of relevance for Zimbabwe. Some 80% of them get the job. I know there's a massive recession, hundreds of applicants for each job in some fields. But I thought getting a work permit and setting up a company in Kenya was the difficult bit. I don't think I apply for jobs beyond where I'm at. And yet nonetheless which are the missing links it took me a while to grasp when I was looking for work back in my home country, UK, for myself?

Well first, and obviously, each person's situation is different.  You can't predict your own progress by those of your friends. Many of my clients are the ones with the primary expat jobs in their family, snazzy job titles and IN the corporate structures.  We all know it is much easier to find a job when you have a job. As I say to the other half of my clients, the accompanying spouses, it is very much harder when you've lost the entry ramps and informal networks.  I've kept up with my referees, have kept them updated, - but its harder to get the soft information and onto the specialist linked-in and professional body groups if you're working abroad in another sector.  'I'm one of you really' I email in plaintive tone to the group's admins.  All a bit too needy.

The sector makes a difference. It is far more productive to apply from another country when your sector is international development. When an email address ending in a far-off country domain is an accolade showing you've already won your spurs. Or when you are seeking posts in another country office for the large corporate which sent you to Kenya in the first place.  Those of us seeking to return to a non-global sector in an austerity-hit insular market from a foreign clime, well its different.  And you're addressing not only the reality, but other people's perceptions of the reality. 'Kenya = mud huts' or 'Kenya = Safari Pit Helmets & Out of Africa', - neither of which are perceived as helpful brands to show you as a key innovator in a university careers service.

The internet and jobs websites are a massive boon. Thank you www.jobs.ac.uk, www.agcas.org.uk, www.tes.co.uk and the ICG. But boo hiss to online applications which allow no space anywhere for free text to explain a non-standard situation in three slick sentences.

'The past is another country. They do things differently there.'
Things move on. Many of the big issues in university careers work are the same as when I left - teaching & learning in an innovative way, supporting clients to get good quality experience to position them well in a difficult market, outperforming the rivals, entrepreneurship, employer engagement, good guidance skills, every last measure to help people get those jobs - but things which were twiddly add-ons four years ago - providing services and workshops online - have become major parts of the job.  We do things online at BigCorporate too (unlike in much of Kenya), but of course the 200 word competency questions don't allow for the fact that my clients  in the main can only afford phones after they've been at work for several months, and that none of them have laptops. It doesn't mean that I don't develop & market innovative services in an innovative way if I can't answer a question like:
'And can you tell us about a time when you used social media in an organisational context to meet a training need.  What did you do and how did you know it was successful?'
But you need the self confidence to produce a more homespun example.

Its a risky business for managers hiring staff. They want to feel assured that you get and can perform in the context. Have skills which add value. Specialisms where you can lead the team.  But, beware pitfall, also, where you can lead the team in directions they want to go. Its hard applying from a different context. Much of what I've learned in Kenya has been about how to be creative, resourceful, develop twin-track approaches which cover belt and braces both, and to lead in a difficult, different, insecure environment where I'm in a tiny & very visible minority. And judging by the body language in at least two of the interviews, even toned down magnolia examples can throw the panel, demonstrate the yawning chasm of LifeElsewhere, get interviewers feeling deeply twitchy and insecure, - not what you want.  Yes panels want interesting examples, but all too often, I fear, they want interesting examples which hit IN their comfort zones. And that's the gap too for transition between field and headquarters. On paper the competencies look the same. In practice the realities and skillsets don't overlap, never the twain shall meet.

Friends of mine were catching up recently about a third friend who has become a consultant based in an idyllic but non-metropolitan far-flung part of the UK.
'Yes yes, its great on one level, but the problem is he is too far away, he isn't bumping into potential clients at donor meetings or coffee shops, - and out of sight is out of mind.'
And return is a bit like that too. You can affect nonchalence on the form:
'I will be in UK between x and y [carefully covering the dates of the interview] should you wish to shortlist this application.' No one wants to shortlist a candidate who might be asking for international fares in the current climate, better to meet this one head-on. You also don't want to sound that too much is hanging on this lone application lest they get cold feet.
'It would be helpful to know as far in advance as possible to help me to cluster appointments. I would be unavailable on x and y.'
On the other hand you can make it sound too easy. I heard of one Kenya-based Deputy Head who flew back to UK for interview at his own expense four times when each time the job went to the internal candidate, before he netted his own catch.  If you know in advance that the internal is the front-runner, don't use an overseas candidate as the makeweight.  For me, at one interview recently at a burgeoning university in the North East it became clear that all the other candidates already lived within two miles of the institution. They already had permanent contracts in precisely this role in rival institutions, just wanted to move closer to home. Had all attended the same regional conference on the previous day. Again, the body language of the manager - who failed to give me any eye contact in the hour long pre-briefing of four of us - made it very clear she thought I was the outlier. And that wasn't overcome through the interview, when two of the panel of three sat, arms folded, for 45 minutes.
'I'm quite nice really,' I wanted to say. Though by the end I was feeling more feisty, wanting to lean over and tap them on the chest.
'I've flown 5000 miles, at my own expense, to come for this. I'm not a gatecrasher. You invited me. I've done the preliminary (free) consultancy project you asked for, designed the workshop and the presentation, been observed giving guidance to one of your students. You might at least pretend to put me at ease, or to consider I might have something of interest to share.'

Not that its much easier when the panel has the bright idea to interview remotely.
'Skype doesn't work very well here,' I email, trying to combine proactive solution-finding with realism.
 'Can you send me a mobile number so I could text if our power goes, so you aren't left waiting without contact.'
'Oh it'll be fine,' they replied, secure in the knowledge they skype their governors in Clapham and Droitwich without incident. 10 minutes into the interview - which I'm holding outside for the best reception as it isn't raining, be-suited to get in character but with our free-range chickens pecking my toes, - the headteacher broke in, weakly.
'I really can't hear a word you're saying. I think what you're saying sounds interesting, but I really can't tell.  Can you send me an email of what you were saying...'
Or my client who had an interview by videolink in a booked internal meeting room. When seven colleagues bustled in, loud and self-importantly for an impromptu meeting in the double-booked room.
'Trying to have a job interview here' he hissed at them out of the side of his mouth so the far-off panel wouldn't notice his strident tone, as the gatecrashers opened their notebooks and settled down for the duration.  In vain. Had to decamp to the broom cupboard to conclude the interview by phone.

There are a range of difficulties for the non-resident interviewee. Not least the penchant to give a tour of the campus to the candidates. Which requires a coat, since this is generally conducted in the driving rain.  Thank you thank you my generous mate who has lent me her warm, toasty, appropriate Jack Wolfskin coat for each of the interviews of the last year, in lieu of the scraggy winter coat I binned when we left for Kenya, and have been too mean to replace while out here.  I'm sure it all helps.

Recruiters, consider how your rejection letters might be received. I know its the bit of the job no one likes, which gets delegated to the lowly admin assistant, but a thoughtful, intelligent one powers the downcast interviewee for weeks (thank you University of Warwick). Whereas this written feedback from a self-importantly Elite Institution got me outraged and spitting feathers:  

The panel 'agreed that while you do have substantial experience in counselling and careers, they considered that you do not have substantial employment experience in a sector to which our alumni and students aspire'.
Humph. Of course they see the field of candidates. Its a competitive process and its their right to make that assessment, - though I do find it perplexing as I've worked as a international consultant for three European Union agencies. Nonetheless it speaks volumes of their attitudes.  What I'd want to retort (but didn't) is:

'Maybe even more important than my professional experience, is that - not on the form - I've also worked in credit control, as a security guard, as a cleaner and waitress, a care assistant, a temp, in a children's holiday camp and as a language teacher and translator, - and realise that your students and alumni too might need to do this as stepping stones or interim to their professional aspirations.  And it might be helpful to have a member of careers staff who understands this and isn't demeaned by it, - because I do wonder what messages your students are getting, if this is what you say in written feedback to a fellow practitioner!'  Falala.

In the end I decided I needed specialist help. Career guidance makes a difference. It may be my field but you can't give yourself a massage. And yes, a short sharp specialist careers interview offered really helpful feedback, helped me up my game and I got the next job in a great institution, in a really interesting role. Hurrah.  But a longer, far more uphill process than I'd encountered before on previous returns from stints abroad in the EU, from postgraduate study or childcare, in previous recessions.

So which are the tips I wish someone had given me:

* Before you leave your home country, convert to a career break membership of your professional body.  They'll offer publications, newsgroups, maybe career guidance, maybe cheap professional liability insurance if you set up shop abroad. But getting in with them, from abroad, ain't easy.

* Keep your eye on the ball back home, keep up your CPD, check how regulations and issues are changing. What implications does this have? And if you're in a highly regulated profession it might be worth considering going back for a month each year to keep your registration up to date.  If you're in a sector where you need criminal records checks, - or have children in whose schools you might want - or be forced - to help out, even as a volunteer on a working bus or a reading mum - well make sure you get the proof you haven't been convicted/charged with anything in the host country before you leave.

* Plan at least 18 months in advance for professional return, to update your skills, revive your networks, receive and read key new books via very longwinded post, attend the national conference for networking if funds allow.  If you're moving to a third country, consider the needs there, the assets in your current place, the links and transferable skills you could develop or offer.  Could you take on a short project to demonstrate your prowess in the new field?  Its always easier to get good experience at the end of the previous posting, building on your understanding and contacts, than at the start of the new posting.

* Consider which additional experience abroad would add lustre to your case. In my experience, and that of most of my clients, experience abroad is very devalued in the UK context - unless Abroad is the key business of the organisation - so you're applying based on the experience you had before you left. Nonetheless confidence will out, and knowing you've achieved to your utmost in your current context has to help at some level.  But can you publish that research paper or run a free workshop for a prestigious client? How can you demonstrate the level at which you've been performing to a new market which can't read the signals of the brands you've been working with, the challenges you've overcome?

* Recruiters are conservative, especially with non-resident applicants where there might be some doubt about their claims, where the most recent referee, however acclaimed, isn't in the same networks, where you haven't seen the applicant in action. Initially I tried applying for a new sector (careers work in schools) based on the work I'd been doing in Kenya in this field. One headteacher was upfront with me.
'Yes you were the front runner, have very strong experience. We liked you, you would fit in. But your experience in university admissions was mainly abroad. In Africa. We can see you've had a national impact in an internationally competitive field. But Head of Careers is just too important a job for us to take a risk, however small. Sorry.'
Be realistic about how big a switch you can do. In general you aren't going to get a promotion on immediate return unless you're staying within the same organisation. Transitions to new sectors based on overseas experience will be tricky too.  Sadly UK-based experience is what counts for most recruiters in these risk-averse times, even when, as in higher education, its a global market.  Be willing to be flexible, to either better focus your message or to adapt where you target to feedback from the market, however wrongheaded you may think it.

* Save, hard. As a teacher at our kids' school said, tongue in cheek, when congratulated on her new job back home: 'Yes, we can eat again.'  But it adds up. Flights, hire cars, travelodge rooms and somewhere to hang out between stage one and two of the interview, ain't cheap.

* Articulate your needs in the application form. 'Our post takes six weeks. Communication by email is best.' I couldn't come back for interview during the six week period around Kenyan elections, as we were apprehensive there could be violence, and the family needed me here. In the end it wasn't a problem, but I felt I needed to be clear upfront. But be willing to be flexible.  Most universities are now selecting by two and three stage assessment centre processes - not ideal for a candidate hoping to fit it all into one or two days - and in the end I had to bow out of University of London's extended four stage process. Sadly just not viable.

* Think hard which achievements are the most relevant for the new context. Get feedback.  When you are transferring within the same context you can usually be clear that the examples you are most impressed by are those which speak most eloquently of your competencies. But into a new context it can just articulate dissonance.

My example of training and sending undergraduate mentors out into the bush to offer outreach guidance support and to talk high school teachers through how to write a university reference doesn't speak of creativity, innovation and resilience in the UK setting, but of do-lally failure to focus.  Why didn't they just phone head office or look it up on the internet?  Or ask someone local who knew how.  Hard, from the UK, to imagine schools which don't have phone lines let alone internet (or computers), where teachers are highly respected but lack professional networks or any contacts with anyone with experience overseas at all, even a week's holiday in the neighbouring country.  Just as other people's holiday photos are rarely that fascinating for public consumption, so too the highs and lows of your professional achievements abroad will likely need radical trimming and strimming before they hit the spot back home.

* Which is why career guidance helps, but guidance with skilled practitioners who understand the issues and the context, - and don't give cookie cutter answers, but think on the job and say when they don't know. I went to C2, the Careers Group, University of London's commercial careers service where they deal with streams of mid career professionals - and it shows.  Not cheap at £160 for a one hour session - but precisely the specialist support & focus I needed and couldn't have got in Kenya to help me get the job.

And what do you think, what were your experiences?

Pricing, Power and Fairtrading

We're decluttering like crazy prior to an international move.  Uneasy choices are being forced. Books are heavy, so too is Secondborn's much loved, daily used trampoline. Which will out?

Yesterday was the Flea Market at our local International School. Very strict edicts issued in advance - you can set up between 0730 and 0830 only, with 1000 Ksh fines for each 10 minutes after that you take. Massive pressure carrying disintegrating boxes of the contents of your home up flights of stairs in full sun in less than an hour.  Tiny tables for the volume of stuff. And being placed next to a family selling forty suitcases of clothes which drew literally thousands of low paid customers who walked through, over, behind, between my lesser stall, a steady stream of tens each minute in search of a bargain.

Uneasy contrasts between the mass pulling power of the next-door clothes stall selling shoes at a dollar a pair, and the box of Build a Bear clothes I was trying to offload.
'What are these?' people would say, staring skew-eyed at a sequined Hannah Montana top too small for the smallest baby.
Trying to explain how in the West children have toys which are pampered. Trying to hide the Build a Bear skateboard and Harley Davidson biker outfit deep at the bottom of the pile. Even long-term expats shook their heads, recognised how long they'd been out of the country. Shamefaced.

Everything had been cleaned and sorted. Jigsaws had been counted, games had been ordered with rubber bands and all the bits. I'm not trying to make a massive profit. But it is expensive moving countries, and decent goods should command a fair price. Goods are very expensive in Kenya with 33% import tax, and I was charging cheaper secondhand UK prices. They should have been seen as good bargains. £8 for a £40 child's carseat. 80p for a pink sequined purse.  You can't buy them at all here, let alone at anything like that price.  And no one NEEDS a pink sequined purse.

But boy oh boy did my hackles rise at the attitudes of many of the entitled, monied Kenyan women I dealt with. Who acted in this, as in other ways, that their money bestowed power and they were going to use it to push me far far beyond fairtrading. Yes bargaining is part of the culture. I am happy to bargain. But there does need to be a realisation of the power of the seller too. Of their need for a bottom line in terms of price, or, increasingly for me, in terms of respect.  I start off quoting a fair rate. Which was seen, by the majority, as a sign of weakness. Which they halved in their counter bid. No, I would say, I started with a fair offer, that is what I would like please. Some acquiesced. But several were just unable to see a seller as an equal. One woman, trying to buy a child's carseat.  That implies she has a car. I was already quoting less than 25% of what it would cost new in UK. Probably 10% of its cost in Kenya. Yet she halved my bid.  No, I said.  And no again.
'I'm leaving' she said in threatening tones, still clutching it to her chest.  'I'm leaving, you will LOSE this sale.'  'Fine.  You are welcome to leave. I suggest you go and search the rest of the stalls for this product at a rate you consider fair.  Its a shame you are unwilling to spend a fair rate for your child's safety.'
And eventually, forking out, she opened her wallet brimfull, with 30,000, 40,000 £300, £400 in there, 30, 40 times what I was quoting there. Huh.

Some sellers to whom, in the end, I refused to sell.
'These are our children's toys. We have happy memories with them. I have been quoting you a fair price and been willing to come down a bit more. But I've decided now I don't want to sell them to you at any price.'
And how good it felt to have the freedom to be able to be that clear. And later, to hear the sweet, elderly Korean woman next to me adopt the same tactic, which surely is very very disrespectful in her culture too.

The theft. People to whom one quotes a fair rate for a luxury item. Who purse their lips, shake their head, loiter. And then, when I'm distracted by someone else, steal the item. They really wanted it. I wasn't being reasonable. So they took it.

'Oh my God,' gasped seasoned worldlywise Nairobi hands to each other as we cleared up at the end. 'Never, ever again. They were truly awful weren't they?' And they were.

I've recently joined a facebook group of mums resident in Nairobi. But oh my, the discussions there between fellow Kenyans, about their nannies. Whom some pay, it turns out, 4000 KSh a month - less than half of the legal Kenyan monthly wage. Around what you'd need to pay for a sandwich lunch for three in a not very plush expat caff.  Seem to expect nannies to work each day of the week, without Sundays off. And moan about their expectations when at this rate they can barely afford enough to eat, let alone to rent a room in a slum, to send their own child to school.

I will be grateful to be back in UK. To be surrounded by people, women, who know what it is is to care for their own child, to change their own child's nappy, to mop their own floor and their children's pools of vomit. Who know that doing this isn't always pleasant, but is one of the ways that one builds relationship with a child, by being consistently, lovingly there. Who have a sense of great gratitude to those talented, skilled, good humoured childminders who become deeply valued loved members of the family, of whom one knows, if the chips were down, they would rescue your child from a fire at risk of their own life.  This is what matters in life. Valuing grounded relationships, consistent love, acknowledging and respecting the contributions we each make.

And to the woman who wanted the game of Smath and the pink sequined purse and had to go away emptyhanded. I hope you dreamt of them last night. May you learn to treat those you think to be lesser than you better in future.  

Job Interviews Abroad

Each culture has its twiddly bits. Its good to be able to display them at job interviews. Your BBC received pronunciation, your tidy spoken Welsh, your ability to juggle a glass of fruit juice and some chewy sandwiches and make polite conversation with the team. But all too often, as a foreigner, you blunder on by, not even realising the manhole without the manhole cover until .....Oops.

A Belgian mate of mine explained to me twenty years ago:
'And that's the bit in the job interview when you pull out your party card and put it on the table....'
Oh. Durr.  Well how in many interviews have I let that pregnant pause just pass me by. And I suppose a card from Blockbuster just wouldn't do.

Interviewing for a student job as a Fruehstuecksfrau in Berlin - (hotel cleaner and kitchen staff for breakfast prep) I had to boil six eggs in an alien kitchen.  That went just fine, but once in post my supervisor had the day off, and I managed to explode all 50 boiled eggs at once. Oh the shame of it.

Six months into life in Kenya I went for an interview in the placements office at an evangelical university. I'm a Quaker. I'm confident talking about my faith life. I just don't expect to do it at a job interview.  In fact I'd even think it might be something to get you excluded from the running.
'No, I don't know about risk assessment in teaching & learning, but let me tell you about a thought I had the other day...'
Towards the end, when all had gone swimmingly, out came the killer question.
'And have you been saved?'
[Gulp. Look behind me to see if there's anyone else this might be addressed at.]
'Saved? Errr...'
[Highpitched] 'I pray. I listen to God in my life and try to act on it. I've served my local church as an Elder for the last six years, responsible for the spiritual life of the meeting.'
[Leaning forward & insistent]  'But have you bathed in the blood of the Lamb?'

It wasn't a meeting of the minds. They turned me down, though I was the only applicant. The problem, as they made clear, was that being Saved wasn't a claim I even wanted to fumble my way towards. I'm stroppy on this. I'm not going to have my faith life coerced into your belief system. Either you listen to what I want to say, and see if it measures up - it didn't - or not.  But Being Saved isn't what its about for me, and I'm not going to bluff it and stutter a feeble:
'But I'm confident with a two day refresher course I could be saveable...'

It rankled. I got wild eyed and pointy stabbing fingery at innocent bystanders for a while afterwards.  Six months later I got linked in requests from the two members of the panel. We don't want your skills because we think you're damned to perdition - but we'd like to link in with you. Huh.  No way. This heathen is walking by on the other side thank you very much.

On the other hand at BigCorporate where the job involved supporting students to write autobiographical college essays I mentioned sheepishly, diffidently towards the interview's end,
'And I studied Literature, that might help.'
I thought they'd fall about, insisting they only wanted staff with Econometrics or Auditing with Advanced Astrophysics.
But 'Marvellous' they said heartily, 'that will be a great help.'
A great solace that was. I repeated it to myself at low moments for years. Though mentioning it to a Polish friend last week she said sceptically,
'But weren't they being ironic?'
Sinking feeling, maybe they were. Maybe, horror of horrors, this is a case of the penny dropping three years late. Another sign of the foreigner adrift.

Four years on I'm returning to the UK for job interviews. And somehow the landscape has shifted, my timing is off and I've lost my native touch there too. But that's a story for another day.

Sometimes

Sometimes things don't go, after all,
from bad to worse. Some years, muscadel
faces down frost; green thrives; the crops don't fail.
Sometimes a man aims high, and all goes well.

A people sometimes will step back from war,
elect an honest man, decide they care
enough, that they can't leave some stranger poor.
Some men become what they were born for.

Sometimes our best intentions do not go
amiss; sometimes we do as we meant to.
The sun will sometimes melt a field of sorrow
that seemed hard frozen; may it happen for you.

Sheenagh Pugh

And breathe again. We've all been holding our breath. Been unclear whether there would be violence at the release of the election results. There was an uneasy wait of four plus days of counting. The official audited results weren't released at 9am, nor at 11am as the invited VIPs had been told but not till 2pm - and you can hear the groans of even the great and the good on the tv feed, as they get yet another song from the choir not the results. And yes the results are disputed, some ballot boxes went astray and there is a court case pending.

But the results were received in patience and without violence. As happens in democracies, almost half the country voted the other way. But people have gone back to work. 'A people sometimes will step back from war'. Maybe others never thought violence, widespread unrest, was on the cards. But for me, where I was sitting, I didn't know.  And so for me, those who were disappointed handling disappointment without violence, this is a great gift to be celebrated.  Thanks Sheenagh Pugh, love your poem.

A Country Holding Its Breath and Memories

Nairobi is eerily quiet at present, in the interregnum between election voting and release of the final results. Usually gridlocked roads are deserted. Many expats have left for a brief holiday. People are lying low. Very few matatus are running. Local shops are opening late - shopkeepers are only leaving home after they have done their due diligence phone calls with friends in other areas:
'Its calm here, is it calm where you are? Right then, lets go.'
And they're shutting early. SecondBorn's school is one of the few which is open, and yesterday he was one of only six children in his class.  As a friend said: 'The country is holding its breath.'  For in the last elections in 2007 it was after release of the disputed results that the violence erupted.

I wasn't here then, though Tom was. He had flown in for a routine visit to this city he knows so well, and had ended up interviewing highly distressed people in emergency IDP camps in the area in which he'd spent his twenties.  I remember his shaken voice down the phoneline as he called from a hotel lobby surrounded, not by tourists and business travellers, but by the middleclasses fleeing to more secure areas with their grabbags. The sense of a known, loved, safe world turned upside-down.

Stories have power. The quiet stories from my mainly privileged friends, and from my far more precarious students, of that time and others, have, I realised shaped my understanding and reality. I wasn't there then. But I have a sense, at one remove, of the then reality for many who were.  And it makes me shaky, jangly, though I hope, pray and believe - with the rest of the country - that this time things will be different.  But like on the anniversary of a bereavement, those stories and memories are alongside us, are concretely there with many of us.

Sitting on the grass of the school playground a fortnight ago with friends who were here then, they admitted they were feeling headachy, shaky, unsettled, queasy, out of sorts.  One described realising in 2007 that all the surrounding families had left the rural area in which she lived, that she and her son had been left behind. Described hefting her backpack, taking her six year old son, and striking out into the bush on foot.  Another described realising things were spiraling out of control in her up-country area. Visiting her local police station, to which 300 distressed people had fled in hope of security. And of returning in the afternoon with food and cooking pots, to discover the crowd had now grown to 2000.

There's a split too I think between those who believe that basically, deep down, whatever happens, they personally will be safe. Who have guards at the gate and some spare resources. Or those for whom, in their young lives, this has already been proven not to be the case. Helping my students with their reflective essays for their US college applications, we often have to sift through their memories of that time before we locate those stories which best show the small individual slice of life which sums up who they are in the world, as an actor, someone who has impact, a potential college scholarship holder.  Understandably, these big traumatic memories of that time overshadow the rest.

A girl told of a terrified knock on her family's door. Of her friend from a minority tribe begging to be taken in, - her house was in flames. Of persuading her parents that despite the risk they had to do this.

Another student, an orphan, who'd been brought up by his three years elder brother, describing the anguish with which he discovered that the brother had been shot dead in rioting when out shopping for food for the family's meal.

A third student, also orphaned, who with his younger siblings lived left alone amidst the carnage, until an Elder from his parents' former church came to get them, to take them into his home.

An elderly Quaker woman in the local meeting describing how she'd managed to stop the mob from torching her house.

A girl describing fleeing with her family to her primary school which she'd left three years earlier. Of camping out there for six weeks with other families, of trying to distract and comfort scared children as the mothers took their lives into their hands to search ever further for firewood to cook the little food there was.

The sense that, for some, this has been a pattern in their life. My student from Molo, a hotspot area, who was born in an IDP camp during a cholera outbreak, and who has been displaced back there each election season of his lifetime, his father dying there of a heart attack last time. 300,000 people were displaced then. 100,000 still live in camps. Over a thousand were killed. Small wonder it darkens the landscape.

Some twenty plus years ago I spent time in Bosnia for an NGO in the month after the Dayton Peace Accord. We visited courageous individuals and micro-NGOs to see what support and funding we might offer.  A really vivid memory is of Viva Jene, local women therapists and counsellors, who were working with the thousands of women who had suffered mass, ongoing, gang-rapes as their husbands and sons had been separated from them and, they feared, killed.  Then - and for some fifteen and more years afterwards - the women had no proof of what had happened to their 8000 menfolk and boys. They were desperate, lobbying, requesting, beseeching - hoping, as you would, for the slightest slither of hope. That they might yet be alive, interned somewhere. As the therapist took me through the packed waiting room, showed me the bleak, desolate paintings done in art therapy, she said wearily:
'For some, the war is over. For we, who try to support our clients, we relive those experiences and the terror everyday.'

Watching the silent, solemn, endlessly patient queues of voters on Monday I was struck by the atmosphere. Our guard got to the polling station at 4am, two hours before its dawn opening, and waited in line till 330 pm, before he could cast his vote. He then came to work to relieve his mate, so that he could go and vote.  Queues to the School Lane polling station near our home were at least 1.5 km long only two hours into the day. And yet people queued in the 30 degrees heat, and waited, to have their say. What commitment.  But the atmosphere was unusual for Kenya, for anywhere. Solemn, resolute, determined. Silent queuing. The atmosphere of waiting outside Finals exams, nervy, apprehensive, but conscious that this really matters.

So we wait. So many Kenyan friends seem clear that the country wouldn't let unrest happen again. But the stories and memories are there, swilling around, unvoiced though they may be. Its an uneasy peace and a queasy feeling in the stomach, inviting those stories to sit down at the table with us, while we wait.

Where's your Tow Rope, Darling?

Five minutes after waving a cheery goodbye to a mate who'd come for a quick cuppa, there was a more subdued follow-up phonecall.
'Umm, you know that unmade unfinished very steep road by your house that we're not supposed to use because of carjackers? I broke down on it. The clutch cables gone.'

Second doubletake. My tow rope - one of those never-leave-a-Kenyan-house-without-it implements - like your house keys in UK - is still in the back of Tom's car where we dumped it after rescuing him from the four foot ditch.
'But BrokenDownFriend where's your tow rope?'
'Ummm, its still in the back of the car of the mutual friend we towed to the pub quiz a few months ago. Only he's moved back to UK again now.'

So I and Ronald the handyman bowled down the forbidden road. We stopped another twenty cars as they steamed over the hill. Kindly faces adopted that 'ooh yes expression'.
'Tow rope, yes we have got one. Only its....(elsewhere)'
So we left Ronald guarding the stranded car while we scurried off to find a mechanic. 'Bring your tow rope'  we said firmly as he got in the car. 
'No, no, I'll just drive it here.'
And sometimes can-do attitudes overcome all.  Arrived at the stranded car on the unmade one in three road, the mechanic just reversed the car downhill and made off, into the distance.
'Is he going to drive it in reverse all the way, 4km, to his garage? And oops, BrokenDownFriend, he was meant to be giving you a lift. Hop in.'

But when we finally made it to the garage, via the sedate route, the gung-ho mechanic was nowhere to be found. Nor the car. After a 10 minute wait still no sign.
Sinking feeling.
So we dropped BrokenDownFriend home and set off home ourselves.

Twenty minutes later, nearing the site of the initial breakdown, we are passed by a  pristine, well organised, undented pickup towing a car.
'Look, THEY'VE got a tow rope. Oh look isn't that our mechanic they're towing?'
Leaning out of the window of the towed car, waving cheerily at his good fortune at snagging the one car with a tow rope and a kindly enough owner to give him a 4km tow, is the mechanic and friend's car, which had broken down again two minutes out of sight.

Its a state of mind thing. From the UK perspective, there are many things we could have done better, more directly, more effectively. Joined the AA for one thing.

And yet from the Kenyan perspective, that image of the ebullient mechanic who'd come out without any tools or any equipment of any kind, but had managed to finesse himself a tow home, well that made us roar out loud, and giggle all the way home.

And now I ask you. 'Where is YOUR  tow rope?'

Hope

'The sun'll come out tomorrow
so you gotta hang on till tomorrow
come what may
tomorrow tomorrow I love ya tomorrow
you're always a day away.'

It's getting to be a middle-aged maudlin habit for me.  I roll along to one of our children's tea-time concerts expecting a press-ganged conscript parental teatime torture, and end up being unexpectedly moved, - tearful even -  with the beauty and musicality of pint-sized singers.

Today it was a ten year old girl singing Tomorrow from Annie which started me off.  But also watching our kids, now aged ten, sing together arms around each other in a more relaxed, caring, cohesive community than yesteryear.

It feels that all of Kenya is waiting, bated breath, for the upcoming elections in March and April.  Waiting, not in the sense of UK elections, in a politicised but take it or leave it way. But here its an active preoccupation, like being heavily pregnant, an additional reality which is ever with us. The last elections were followed by significant violence, killings, thousands of people fled in terror, - many still displaced - several of my students lost homes, siblings, parents, friends, many witnessed violence, sheltered friends at risk of their own lives, saw houses being burnt out.

The upcoming elections overshadow all manner of decisions. Buying plastic sheeting recently for our leaking roof in the rains I asked how sales were going. 
'Oh no one is buying sheeting this year because of the elections.'
They are four months off, sheeting isn't that expensive, but people are saving cash they might need to tide them over rather than investing in a home they might need to leave. I warn my students to give their personal email on their college application, not the business one, in case they decide to relocate to their village for safety. Hotels are planning to send their staff home on unpaid leave. International schools have moved their holidays to span the election period so no one runs the risk of being caught in the wrong area. Expats wonder what to do with their kids if the schools are shut, mid-term. for two months and we are on lockdown. How much junk modelling could a family bear? And for those with less protection, or vivid memories of last time,  well it is an active preoccupation and choices made could really matter.

So it is all the more powerful today to watch kids with all manner of surnames which betray their ethnic and tribal origins, standing arms around shoulders. Shahs next to Kariukis, Scotts by Njuguna, singing together.  May this tangible united community of privileged kids be a reality which holds for the most vulnerable, like my students' families, too.

'The sun'll come out tomorrow
so you gotta hang on till tomorrow
come what may
tomorrow tomorrow I love ya tomorrow
you're always a day away.'

Fancy Dress and Fondant Icing: Skills for Expats 373

'What do you wish you'd known - and done to prepare - before you moved to Kenya?'
Well not first or second priority, but at some point I'd have welcomed signing up for an immersion course in housewifely arts of the 1950s at our local FE college. I'm not completely hopeless. I cook from scratch, can botch together a child's fancy dress costume overnight, know where to place the gaffer tape and safety pins so it will probably withstand the test till the end of the day.  But away from the safety net of a handy charity shop on the corner, a Tescos selling useful accessories and ingredients - well maternal support, fancy dress in particular, is all more tricky here.

It struck home on our first Book Day at the Kenyan school. First and SecondBorn were happy in their self-designed self-chosen homespun costumes. Until D-Day minus 30 seconds, when we passed a mini Gandhi walking past us up to school. White loin cloth, stick, glasses, flesh coloured swimming hat for a bald head. Why did no one tell us the standards were so high?  In Book Day Assembly I was bowled over by the collaborative effort of several children for Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator.  Tent poles, plastic sheeting, several burly dads shifting the creation - and one great glass elevator erected at the back of the hall, complete with a Charlie, Grandpa Jo and Willy Wonka. Culture shock has many faces.

Last night our vampire returned home enthused from the Halloween disco.
'Eric won the best fancy dress prize again! He was a robot, with cheese spray to spray from his arm and a real lit up light bulb on his head.  Can we do that next year?'

Or the Romans Dress Up Day, passing the centurion with helmet topped by a gold sprayed bootbrush turned upside down, crowning his glory.

This excess creativity seeps into other areas too. 'Make a 3D model of a specialised cell' (year six homework). SecondBorn and I were pleased, preening even, with our prototype labelled sperm cell.  Until he returned home bubbling over with details of his friend's baked, edible animal cell cum cake.

Our children, by thirteen and ten are kindly and accepting of maternal limitations, for example on party fare. So its a cake, Nigella's biscuits in the shape of numbers, chocolate fingers, hoola hoops and cheese and pineapple on sticks again and that's a signature family tradition.  Friends with five year olds have a harder time. Urgent messages placed on facebook groups betray a deeper anguish:
'Who is coming out from UK who could bring me six packs of fondant icing for me to make marks one, two and three of the bloody Barbie cake?'

This week at BigCorporate I was travelling down eight floors in a lift with the office rubbish. Quick as quick I sorted through it, purloining three pieces of (otherwise unobtainable) polystyrene packaging for this weekend's 3D contour model.  It's an everyday image, each week tattered men sort through our rubbish before the rubbish van comes, taking out the edible, reusable and resellable.  Only now I have joined them.

Learning not to Flinch

When in Rome, do as the Romans do. Adapt to the host culture. It was one of my bedrock assumptions till life in Kenya.  And in Kenya I try to do it too.  But whereas in Germany, Belgium and Italy yes my mind, manners and understanding were expanded but I personally didn't feel contorted out of shape, well here in Kenya I feel I'm becoming a harder, more brittle, less responsive person. Not a nicer one.

At BigCorporate I'm one of two non-Kenyans of thousands of staff.   My students, many from the most challenging backgrounds, have shared their deepest stories with me as they prepare their US college applications. It's a moving time to hear how major hurdles have been overcome. But I can't help thinking that these are the brightest, most resilient survivors, and left by the wayside are their weaker peers, who couldn't manage to make it in circumstances that adults in my culture wouldn't expect to have to overcome.  And such are the pressures on our resources, mental and emotional, that I don't give more than give a passing thought to those who couldn't make it.

So what are the stories that the students have shared?

Of his male circumcision ceremony aged thirteen, conducted with only the running water of the river as painkiller, followed by a month living rough in the bush as the wound heals. Don't flinch or cry out as the knife bites or your peers won't respect you. This is how a man should behave.

Of being left on holiday with the grandparents while the parents have to work, and overhearing the grandmother arranging for your (female genital) circumcision ceremony against your and your parents' wishes.  'It'll all be done by the time they get back.' Of trust betrayed.

Of being orphaned aged ten, the eldest of three siblings. And of the measures taken to beg maize seeds, plant a shamba, tend it at dawn before school and at dusk after school, to raise the money to pay for food and school fees for the family. Taking on a man-sized burden aged ten, the age of our wayward son.

Of your Physics and Chemistry teachers leaving your rural school two years before your high school exams. Of the headteacher press-ganging you to take over, and of, for the next two years, teaching your peers and the year below you subjects which no one has ever taught you. And, on probing,
'And how did the classes do?' 'The Chemistry class came second nationally in KCSE, the Physics class fifteenth.  No that had never happened before at the school.'

Of younger siblings dying of HIV without necessary care because the family's money was going to feed the habit of the alcoholic parent.  Of terms, years, spent out of school because the child could not raise the school fees and the parents looked away.  Of life in a society in which many go uncared for and you have to fend for yourself.

At our children's school I and others get frustrated by the gaps in warm fuzzy child-centred implementation. At the obtuseness of staff unwilling to see how this might feel to those in the school's bottom billion. But I do get it too. Warm fuzzy child-centredness is not the Kenyan reality for many.

We and our children have been through brutal situations you wouldn't anticipate in a UK context. The school bus of year three (seven year old) pupils coming back from a match, which passed the bodies of eight alleged thieves shot dead on the road by police. The alert staff member who ordered the bus to
 'Look to the left', away from the bodies.  And the sense from the school that this was so ordinary that they didn't bother to tell the parents or warn that there might be adverse reactions.

Our ten year old's ten year old friend who was carjacked and held up at gunpoint.  Our friends - over fifteen of them - who have been held at gunpoint and robbed during the three years we've been here.

Our housekeeper requesting the day off to search for a new school for her nine year old, who had been beaten till her back bled by the maths teacher in her select, expensive, private school.

Incest and rape disclosed in open plan offices.

A friend who grew up in Kenya described her mother's memories of pick-ups full of bodies of people killed during the independence struggle being driven past. My students describe their experiences in the terror of the post election violence of 2007, of random violence and of their experience of this as a pattern. One of them was born in a displaced persons camp during a cholera outbreak, and in his 18 years alive was displaced back there in the next two waves of violence.  A sense that life isn't secure. That nothing can be counted on. That you focus your energies where you can maybe make a difference, but that may mean tunnel vision as we ignore those who would need our help.

So yes, we adapt, but how I long for a welfare state, for emergency services who respond, for social workers and a legal system which seeks to meet the needs of the vulnerable, flawed in its implementation though they may be.  And if you live in a country where you have these still, well don't let them wither away, look first to a reality where they are only a distant dream.

Transitions

It's that weekend when Mum, Dad, Granny, a beanbag, three new frying pans and a fresh-faced queezy feeling fresh-hatched student all squeeze into a car en route to university. A mate of mine here has just returned to UK to help purchase the potplants and shift the suitcases with their son en route for college. For us it marks three weeks since FirstBorn started boarding school in UK.  I'm back in Kenya, back Home, but home feels different. Something is missing. Someone. So I've been thinking on transitions, on tales from friends in the same space and of our experiences in the last few weeks.

As FirstBorn and I sat perched on the edge of our chairs at the lunch for new international students and their families on D-Day, H-Hour at the new school, a kindly soul told us of her grandfather, who had spent his early childhood in Eldoret, Kenya.
'And then, when he was seven, he was sent off to school, on his own, on a steamer to UK.  He didn't see his parents again for a year and a half.'  Poor mite. But it puts our anguishing into some perspective.

Several of our friends who grew up in Kenya a generation ago describe memories of traumatic arrivals at UK schools, of immersion into a very different reality. One described being given a five pound note in case of emergencies before being left. Described considering what to do with it, and doing what you do in Kenya. He found a handy tree, buried the fiver under the tree, left his marker stone so he could find it again.  Post office accounts or handy envelopes left with the housemaster an alien universe away.

A mate who was housemistress at an international boarding school in Kenya 15 years ago described their then reality.
'There was only one phone on the whole compound, for staff and pupils alike. You'd all queue up, - and the guard in charge of the phone would stay in the room with you while you made the call - even when you were a staff member! If you wanted to say something private you'd have to clear the queue from the room.' Aargh.

So yes, things are far easier now. There is email, skype, mobiles, texting. I do feel that she really is in good hands. But she's still a very long way away, and we miss her desperately.  But it helps to hear the experience of others. A mate last year described tapping on her son's bedroom door to wake him of a school morning, tapping as she'd done every other day for the last x years. But of course, he wasn't there. Another, in this her son's second year away, described counting suitcases at Heathrow as she returned. Recounting them. Something's not quite right. No, the problem isn't the suitcases, it's that its not quite right without him here with us.  For me its the empty space at mealtimes that sets me off. We've had to shift round the table, so everything is off centre, so none of us are where we were before. As we aren't.

FirstBorn seems to be settling. She's found friends and fun things to do.  She's sent enthusiastic texts and emails, - and now they are coming far less frequently, a good sign I feel. She claims to have practised her flute at least once. And, out of character, even to have gone on a voluntary run.
'Once. But not again. I haven't changed that much!'
But this isn't an experience for the faint hearted, child nor adult. Not as dire as for that tiny seven year old, but heart-wrenching nonetheless. Hearing of problems that you can't solve for them, of issues that you attempt to coach through in your laborious enigmatic text speak.  A mate here whose adult children are students in UK:
'Her boyfriend split up with her over the summer. Seeing her little face and downturned smile on skype and not being able to do anything much to help, being stuck here when she needed me, oh it was awful.' 
I heard at third hand of a Kenyan student studying abroad whose passport got put through the washing cycle once too many times.
'He couldn't get it sorted in time, couldn't get back, had to spend his first Christmas away from home.'

Others, outside the experience, say sweepingly
'Oh it makes them very resilient. You don't need to worry. They adapt.'
Yes they do, and so do we. But that is the armslength cliche, and this is the soft underbelly of the reality for now. Tables laid with one place too many. Favourite foods placed into supermarket trolleys and set aside at the checkout. Mums with bleary mascara hugging each other on the playground, 5000 miles away.

Preparing for Boarding School

I know its one of those contentious topics. My working life has been working in state sector education, its where I choose to put my efforts, I know how much the input of one family can make a difference to a school, and yet here we are, Firstborn off to boarding school 5000 miles from the family home. I think, if we're honest, we each have areas where we fall short of our best lights. If you're tempted to write to me today about our decision, don't, today, D-Day minus Two, ain't the day, take the time instead to muse on your own less consistent areas.  But I thought, nonetheless I'd write on preparing for boarding school from the expat perspective.

Visiting the final choice school in rural England last year the head told us with relish about their first boarder from Afghanistan, who had just joined the school.
'A week in when I asked her what she'd found different, she grinned, and told me she'd just seen a woman on a bike, cycling!  You don't see that in Afghanistan, she said.'
Firstborn and I have now been back in UK for a week, engaged in the frenzied expat shopping scavanger hunt of items for a new school, a new season. :
'Yes you will need a jumper or two. I know they aren't that stylish, but warmth matters too. Yes and some gloves. And you want your goretex raincoat to be longer than that. Yes even longer than that.'
Standing back and recognising that items that were acceptable in not-very-judgmental-Nairobi, now look shabby even in not-very-swish-South-Wales. As we've scratched our heads in despair, comparing the list of essentials with the paltry pickings we find, that Afghan girl - and her bemused mother facing the same shopping list - have been vivid before me. Because difficult as it is to find astro boots in Swansea, I'd guess its far more difficult in Kabul, or on first arrival in a new country.

So what advice would I give to others from my experience?
Plan ahead. 
I thought visiting our dentist in March for an August departure would be ample time to get a brace diagnosed and fitted. But no. For while Nairobi has orthodentists, first they take a cast and x-rays, which are sent to a sporadically held Dental Panel in another country, to assess whether this brace is really needed and therefore might be part-reimbursed, or is just cosmetic.  We got an email from the Dental Panel two days before FirstBorn left Kenya, - but we now need to wait for the cast and the x-rays to wing their way back to Nairobi, for the brace to be made. Halfterm maybe?

Confer with experts.
Life in UK has moved on in our three years abroad. I am a timetravel waif from the 1970s dumped into 2012 without any of the necessary skills.  Thank you my UK mum mates who advised on clothes shops for 13 year old girls (New Look, H&M, River Island; Jack Wills & Hollister if you've come into the money).  And facebook friends and the managers of several phone shops who patiently explained the pros and cons of different mobile phone payment options, several times by the end.  Thank you expat mums who recommended tracing round the feet of SecondBorn so I could still get Clarks school shoes for him, while he stays in Nairobi. Snarls to those Swansea Shoppers in stitches, listening to the mother daughter changing room dynamic 'You can't wear that out', squared, cubed and fastforwarded when you're buying clothes for a new culture, where the vagaries and negotiated boundaries of Nairobi dress codes are irrelevant.

Manage your emotions
FirstBorn is flying the nest. I can't protect her from what is coming next, she'll be independent, without me - so my residual role as Mum for this stage is to ensure there is a nametaped mattress waiting beneath the clifftop, and that she has appropriately sized, sourced, regulation coloured wings to wear as she flaps away. Or so it feels in my surge of panic. 

I know this feeling of old. As she rushed off to pre-school, could she reliably wipe her bottom independently?  As SecondBorn started school, could he find his gloves, scarf and coat from the pile of others on the floor of the classroom?  And now, aged 13, can she do enough of the other things needed for independent twenty first century living?

As we scurried around South Wales's shops under a teetering pile of five towels and a skype headset we have discovered our own rhythm. Reduced to tears by the man in the small independent sports shop we stopped for our first reviving coffee at 9.05 am.  When confused, when stressed, when anxious, when faced with a long list of clothes for a season you haven't encountered for the last three years, a cup of tea every 90 minutes is primary health care.

Make sure you have a postal address
This is not a trip to do exclusively from cutprice travellodges. This is a trip where you need a kindly friend or relative to receive the parcels of ebay purchases, and a flourishing local market to supplement the shortfalls. Alarm clocks, skype headset, laptop bag and hockey stick. Welly boots and school shoes, trainers and padlocks. You need access to someone's internet, to rejoin Tesco Clubcard (now only online), to arrange insurance for the flute, excess insurance for the hirecar, to liaise with the soulmates who will jolly you along as you howl into your pint.  You'll be doing those Mum things, - shaping gumguards - which you just can't do from a travellodge room. Today's instructions required a saucepan, boiling water, a slotted spoon & a mirror - possible from someone's house, just impossible when all you have is a Corby trouser press and a dinky kettle (fused).  And anyway an extra set of hands will come in handy for the marathon nametaping extravaganza that lies ahead.

Bring multiple proof of address and identity.
You'd think money launderers might be dealing in bigger figures than a debit account for an under-16 year old with an ATM card only and no overdraft. But we have to comply with the same legislation. As I brought out the piles of correspondence which proved only our complicated situation but not the address in which I was trying to open her account - how many 13 year olds have utility bills in their name anyway? - the kindly manager heaved a sigh. And thought, I think, if I were a money launderer, I might have prepared a better story. It's the kindly logic I love in UK.

For me this is a time of huddling close. Huddling close to our Firstborn while she's in my grasp, and to our denuded family on the sofa once I'm back. But huddling close too to my mates, the other parents going through this in Kenya. This stage (13+) is a time of boarding school for all but a handful who continue school in Kenya, whether its boarding in Kenya for the majority, or abroad, for a few. So all her peers are away too, though closer to hand than her.  As I loiter in Britain waiting for the first weekend when I can spring her from school, I'd been wondering what I could do that would meet my needs to be stimulated, amongst people, but allow me space to be probably actively miserable too.  I'll be going on a walking holiday, alone, in Cumbria, where I spent so many happy childhood and teen holidays, and to a writing conference. Distraction therapy I hope, while our love makes her way, with us at one remove.

Things You've Imported to your Home Abroad

It's the holiday season and so the scene is being played out in airports all round the world. Flustered expats affecting to look nonchalent as they check-in seven bags over the limit, each of non-standard contents.  I remember checking in to go to Madagascar, bemused by the man trying to check in two kitchen sink units, not flat pack, as carry on luggage. Now I know better.

Before we moved to Kenya one of Tom's colleagues came to stay with us, six foot plastic slide from the Early Learning Centre under his arm. 
'Well you can't get them in Kenya, so it seemed the only way....'
His willingness to set out on a commuter train and two tubes in the rush hour from suburban Hertfordshire all the way to Heathrow with a six foot slide gave me an inkling of the expat urge. But only an inkling.

While Tom was commuting regularly between Kenya and London interesting parcels would be delivered to our doorstep for him to carry in. A Landrover engine on one memorable occasion. I bought three months' supply of babymilk for friends whose newborn would only tolerate one make of milk, a make they couldn't then get in Nairobi.  But many visitors don't understand quite how much it matters. A friend of mine still speaks bitterly of her boss who refused to carry in the black-out lining for the curtains for the newborn. 
'Six months we had to wait till someone would bring it. Six months of broken nights because she was too idle to check in her suitcase. Talk about support.'

A Burundian mate of mine extolled the virtues of fresh Burundian fish.
'My Mum gets them fresh the day I fly back. We wrap them in newspaper in the middle of my suitcases. As long as the cases don't get lost they're fine....'
My brother-in-law is a beleaguered cheeseaholic in Rwanda. Last stop for any family visiting both us and him is the trip to the supermarket, to stock up on a suitcase-ful of Kenyan cheeses.  And we aren't on the sidelines here. Friends of ours have imported out 48 mincepies, a Christmas cake and chocolate coins for stockings. Or five packs of marzipan, chocolate chips and some marmite.  I've brought back 300 extra-strong teabags to this tea-producing land.

As we've been here longer I've got more daring. In our first year a skateboard ('offensive weapon, not carry-on baggage') was my least traditional import, though Tom managed a whole electronic drum kit, without the accompanying nine year old for whom it was intended, realising.  SecondBorn has got into juggling this summer, and has been wheedling on the subject of a unicycle and juggling clubs.  This year I'll be hoping to pass off a bigger size cello (hold baggage on which excess baggage is paid, which also runs the likelihood of getting battered to smitherines) as a guitar (may be carried on if it fits in the overhead lockers, no excess baggage payable - spike in the suitcase.)  Together with the unicycle and clubs I'll look as if I'm about to busk my way round Africa.  Wish me luck.

What have you brought out, and how did you go about it?

Mara Migration

What does the annual migration of up to two million wildebeest into the Masai Mara, through the Mara river, have in common with teenage discos?

We've been planning to see the wildebeest migration for the last three years. The Masai Mara is only five hours drive from Nairobi, but the prices for a family of four if you choose not to camp are eye wateringly expensive. And somehow, while we camp elsewhere in Kenya, I've found it difficult to get over-enthusiastic about camping independently in the middle of a national park brim-full of lions and other predators.  So we opted for a posh lodge, for a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

Posh Lodge was idyllic. In its own conservancy, without a perimeter fence, it was open to all (animal) comers.
'Just make sure you stay in your tent at night.'
At night in our safari tent you could hear the lions coughing, the hyenas hooping, all from very very nearby.  Off on our dawn gamedrives we met the pride of thirteen lions as they woke up, not two miles from our tent, a family of hyenas playing at their hide, a cheetah and her cubs.  But we've now been on lots of gamedrives, can spot and identify the game, what we were really keen on was to see the migration, to see the wildebeest power through the Mara river, to brave a crossing in which many perish.

The migration is a natural phenomenum, following seasonal timings not dates in the calendar. The wildebeest move when the grass in the Serengeti plains has got dried up and exhausted, following the rains, seeking the new shoots in the Mara. But some years, if the Serengeti grass keeps on giving, then the migration doesn't happen or happens very much later.  This year it's been underway for at least the last two weeks, perfect timing for us we thought.

Driving from Posh Lodge to the Mara river we drove through thousands and thousands of wildebeest and zebras who'd already crossed the landmark river. Some had only half a tail, - the rest still in some crocodile's mouth. Others had big gashes on flanks but had managed to get away. One addled bloated croc lay in the shallows with a zebra leg still dangling from its mouth.  And some wildebeest, babes, mums, stood alone, apart from the flock - a danger sign, with lions looking on, and safety being in the herd, one of a crowd, - but searching disconsolately for their mum or babe, missing, presumed dead.  Left alone, left behind, exhausted after a 300 mile trek, you could see that their chances were going to be slim.

Around the campfire we'd heard travellers' tales of the previous day's crossing. Watching the zebras who made it, the wildebeest who got to the edge, and got swallowed by the canny crocodile waiting on the higher ground on the other side. What I hadn't understood, till we got to the river, was that some days, in full flood of the migration, with all the thousands of wildebeest at the river's edge, some days the crossing doesn't happen.

We got to the river by 9, having left the camp at 630. And spent most of the day at one of the three crossings, or driving between them, seeking where today's party might be happening. The wildebeest got ready in their protective columns, like children waiting in line for the day's school. They approached the water - go on, you go first, no you, go on - and backed back again. For hours. The body language was that of a teenage disco. Scary moves in community, committment hedged around.
'Would you like to dance with my friend over there?' 
We watched grizzled wildebeest stride forward, with tentative yearlings in their footsteps, take the air, sniff, scan, - and retreat. There weren't the fond farewells, mother to babe, one might expect in human rites of passage. But fear was in the air and testosterone, and for the onlookers a real sense that these wildebeest understood what was at stake.  After a few hours the wildebeest started running in their columns up to the water. Here we go... And then the frontrunner looked at the river, at the crocs and did a graceful swerve, so the wildebeest ran in a large mile-wide circle, round and round, like crazed circle dancers for the next hour.  We've got to run off this testosterone somehow.

What stopped the wildebeest attempting the river, fulfilling their migration, getting to the green grass, on the day we were there? It was a Sunday, so local families as well as experienced safariguides were out in force.  Twice cars parked so tightly on the bank above the crossing place that experienced guides were muttering,
'There's no place for the wildebeest to get out.'
Imagine finishing the Tour de France, and having your way to the perilious final sprint finish blocked by onlookers. So it was. And where were the wardens to stop this from happening? It's the peak season, there are only three crossing places, not too much to ask to have a warden monitoring each of the places, making it possible for the animals to cross? But the Mara wardens, so we were told, get paid off by the big hotels to look away. I don't know if its true, but find it amazing given the tourist dollars coming in, the number of jobs depending on this, that it isn't better patrolled. If the animals decide not to cross that's up to them, that's gamewatching. But if their way is blocked by recalcitrant idiots, so they can't cross, well that is a tragedy.

Eventually we switched our attention back to the wildebeest who'd made the crossing, were on the greener bank. But rather than resting on their laurels after a dangerous crossing safely navigated, hunkering down on deck chairs, they too were running round in circles. For a while it looked that those who'd made the crossing the previous day might be crossing back.  Look at me....And that happens too - testosterone again? - that animals don't eat their fill before crossing back in a few weeks time, sometimes, regularly, they do the crossing multiple times.  Not the brightest creatures, wildebeest, but courageous beyond.

There were lions around. Scores of crocodiles in the water and on the secure ground, lurking. Maybe there just weren't enough wildebeest for it to feel safe.  Maybe they waited till the tourists went for their dusk sundowners, and made the crossing then.  And us? We drove home and watched the airbrushed version on a Great Migrations National Geographic DVD. Not the same, but better than nothing!