We know Kung Fu

Two weeks of teaching has passed and I had a chance to teach a full day class - Financial Plan. Teaching is not as easy as I thought, it sure need lots of preparation and high level of concentration as students might as you many challenging questions. However, the hardest part is to teach basic accounting in only 1.5 hours. At the end of the class, they were supposed to know how to prepare the whole financial statement. Students in our class have different education background, some of them understand the concept right away, but some of them need more time to digest the information; it was not easy to make sure everyone understand within the tight timeframe. Another challenge for the students is to apply the financial plan to their own business. Preparing financial forecasts is one major component in our course. Our students are very hard working, they collected information from suppliers and competitors within few days. However, in Canada, market information is easily accessible by internet and databases. In Kenya, market information do not get centralized; therefore, it is very difficult for our students to estimate revenue. Also, almost everything is negotiable, and this makes revenue projection even harder as prices are different for each customers. Adding more time in lecturing financial plan would be necessary in the future.

Speaking of negotiation, I am becoming an expert through practice. We negotiate everyday. From cab fare to a bottle of water. I was shopping in Maasai Market - a market that only opens on Tuesdays and Saturdays and sells jewellery, crafts, arts, souveniors, etc.- for about 5 hours and almost 2 hours was spent on negotiating prices. I learned that if I am not sure to buy, I should not ask for the price. Once price is asked, the seller will follow and pursuade you until you make the purchase. Since I am obviously a tourist, they normally start the price ridiculously high. I was looking at a necklace and asked the price and the vendor listed 2750 shillings ( ~$45), i made an offer for 500 shillings ( ~$8) but he rejected. I left the kiosk and kept shopping. 15 minutes later, the vendor showed up again and I found out that he has been following us. We end up agreed the price at 700 shillings (~$12) after another 15 minutes negotiation. I learned the the trick to get lower price is to pretend walking away. When I was leaving the market, a local lady showed a Kung Fu pose to me. This remind me that Alvina was once asked in a local disco whether she knew Kung Fu and the kenyan wanted to learn from Alvina. Thanks to the movies, we individuals of Chinese descent were viewed as Kung Fu experts that can jump from wall to wall and roof to roof. One of my students in class even asked me if Kung Fu is in the curriculum in school as required subject to learn. Since it would be to my advantage, I did not deny that I don't know Kung Fu (in fact, I learned Tae Kwon Do).

I finally had a chance to visit Kibera on Friday. My first impression was that there were many people on the street. There is about 1 million people living in Kibera. We walked for about 30 minutes and were being stared by many people. I remembered that a website describe Kibera as a place a tourist should never go because you would be lucky if you come out in underwear. We were very cautious in Kibera, there was a local lady following us and asking for money, and many kids come up and ask for money as well. Kids were friendly, many would ask you "how are you?". Brent were approached by a little boy, he has some bottle caps in hand and we thought he was offering that to Brent as a gift. In fact, he was just pointing at Brent's camera and he wanted that. In Kibera, many people were struggling for money, even for kids. Kids can only see money in their eyes; they are like bamboon that live in Lake Nakuru, who look cute but have to be agressive in order to survive in this tough environment. Hopefully in the future life in Kibera can change and kids can get out from this poverty. SE101 would be a small step in helping this community to create more employment for better lives. When leaving Kibera, I saw one Asian lady walking by herself in Kibera, many of us was shocked but I guessed she will be fine since we Chinese know Kung Fu.