23/05/2008, 22:00 (EAT)
Jomo Kenyatta International Airport
Nairobi, Kenya
What can I say... First of all, after 2 double shots of Smirnoff vodka that Muhiu, Muli and Phil have pumped in me, I'm definitely not sure about anything around me. I'm at Gate 8 already, 40 minutes remaining to boarding. It's quite boring. It's good that I'm not sober, at least I've stopped crying. I'm just following the signs, not thinking anymore.
The past few hours have been the hardest ones ever in my life. And I know it's not over yet. I'll have a nice sleep to Zurich, then an exciting 90 minutes to Budapest, then after that... The confusion. Where am I? Who am I? What am I doing in Hungary again??? I hope I'm getting some answers over the next 13 months... Coz that's what am going to do in Hungary. Looking for those answers.
Haha, pole sana, I'm not sober, I've warned you in advance! I'm trying to concentrate but it's not easy at this moment. Can't wait to board, I want to sleep.
My past 2 days have been amazing. Farewell paryt on Wednesday evening, nice chillout stuff. Thursday - running around, doing some shopping, MC photos in the afternoon, nyama choma and MC-MCe team bonding. Emma slept at my place that night - packing, chocolate, salt&vinegar crisps, stories... I slept 4 hours. Morning - Nairobi Safari Walk. I wish I had discovered this place earlier. For 300 bobs you get the perfection of silence, peace and tranquility. It causes a state of mind when you get totally clear. When you don't have any thoughts. It helped a lot. Then town, Hurlingham, meeting with Joram - transition meeting about the AIESEC - Wylde International relationship. Chocolate cake, Alvaro, plain chips. Home - packing, crying, R&B, packing, and crying. An sms from Tess: "I miss you already. I can't believe this number is not going through from tomorrow."
I'm about to cry again. Oh gosh, it's not fair. Why is it that you create home again and again and again?
Funny enough, I feel myself to be closer to myself. I mean I know what I want. And I listen to my instincts. Home has become a state of mind. Instincts are friends. Time is working for me. Every step I take makes sense.
But it's hard to understand and it's hard to accept. Especially not that I'm leaving my friends behind. People who I love and for who I'd do anything. But then again: geographical distance can be translated as a matter of time. And time is my friend. It tracks progress. In each relationship in life, there is a progress. So distance, as a matter of time, helps me to make my relationships grow...
...
Cadbury's Old Jamaica. An sms from Dani. Positive thoughts - everything happens for a reason. I feel much better now, the vodka is kinda going away. I'm just terribly sleepy. 5 minutes left...
Kenya... I'm coming back soon. Kwaheri.
Friday, May 30, 2008
Friday, May 16, 2008
Inner smile
15th May 2008
4.30pm, Rongai, Nairobi
I'm sitting at the back of Nazarene University campus, in Rongai. The whole campus is beautiful, but this peace at the back is just wow... Amazing... The only noise I hear is the birds, the wind, and some quiet music from AIESEC in Nazarene's office nearby.
I have come here to deliver some trainings. We were supposed to start at 11am and finish by 2-3pm latest. Well, starting at 1pm didn't really help in our time management, but somehow I don't mind it now.
I didn't plan much for today originally, coz my laptop is with Emma, and I've got a bad cold recently - actually I was even thinking about taking the whole day out and just rest... Especially coz I've kinda overworked myself in the past few weeks (again) and I've felt tired and fustrated.
For the same reason, 2 days ago Emma sent me home to rest and take a break. Then yesterday Leah looked at me and said: "You gal, you need a cocktail." Well, I seriously did. Finally we ended up in Mwendas Leah, Beryl, Winnie and myself, drinking that Blue Streak again that usually kills me... - afterwards I slept in Leah's room at campus, as it was too late to go home.
Today morning I felt like a hero again, waking up at 7am, heading to home to take a shower and change, and also to prepare for the trainings - then I met Maureen at 9.30am at railways, so that we could come together to Rongai.
I'm happy. I've been out of my usual daily schedule and paradigms so much recently. I've also bought a new pair of shows at Bata yesterday. Finally. And I'm not worried about time anymore, is has become my friend. I feel being in peace and harmony with myself and with the world around me. I feel energized and inspired. I feel happy.
And this happiness comes from something else as well... Someone else actually... I don't know what he has done to me, but since Daniel has come into my life, I feel being a different person. He has made me believe in many things I didn't believe in before. He is the cause of my smile each day, he's the sugar in my coffee (that's why I don't need any more ;)), he's the answer for my questions. I've never felt like this before. I just hope that we are really getting closer to the day when the 2 thousand miles between us won't be there anymore - I'll be the happiest woman on Earth.
4.30pm, Rongai, Nairobi
I'm sitting at the back of Nazarene University campus, in Rongai. The whole campus is beautiful, but this peace at the back is just wow... Amazing... The only noise I hear is the birds, the wind, and some quiet music from AIESEC in Nazarene's office nearby.
I have come here to deliver some trainings. We were supposed to start at 11am and finish by 2-3pm latest. Well, starting at 1pm didn't really help in our time management, but somehow I don't mind it now.
I didn't plan much for today originally, coz my laptop is with Emma, and I've got a bad cold recently - actually I was even thinking about taking the whole day out and just rest... Especially coz I've kinda overworked myself in the past few weeks (again) and I've felt tired and fustrated.
For the same reason, 2 days ago Emma sent me home to rest and take a break. Then yesterday Leah looked at me and said: "You gal, you need a cocktail." Well, I seriously did. Finally we ended up in Mwendas Leah, Beryl, Winnie and myself, drinking that Blue Streak again that usually kills me... - afterwards I slept in Leah's room at campus, as it was too late to go home.
Today morning I felt like a hero again, waking up at 7am, heading to home to take a shower and change, and also to prepare for the trainings - then I met Maureen at 9.30am at railways, so that we could come together to Rongai.
I'm happy. I've been out of my usual daily schedule and paradigms so much recently. I've also bought a new pair of shows at Bata yesterday. Finally. And I'm not worried about time anymore, is has become my friend. I feel being in peace and harmony with myself and with the world around me. I feel energized and inspired. I feel happy.
And this happiness comes from something else as well... Someone else actually... I don't know what he has done to me, but since Daniel has come into my life, I feel being a different person. He has made me believe in many things I didn't believe in before. He is the cause of my smile each day, he's the sugar in my coffee (that's why I don't need any more ;)), he's the answer for my questions. I've never felt like this before. I just hope that we are really getting closer to the day when the 2 thousand miles between us won't be there anymore - I'll be the happiest woman on Earth.
Chronomentrofobia
13th May 2008
Comfort Hotel's bar, Nairobi
Noone is actually servicing me, though I crave for a coffee and a plate of masala chips... I have left Fiona in the MC office with my laptop so that she can get all the materials and documents that she needs from it.
I have been working on my portfolio plan for next term, putting down some ideas and strategies. Then I thought: now I have all this, I just need my action steps, milestones and a timeline... Timeline... And at this point something has hit me - my concept of time has entirely changed.
It's not that Kenya is faster or slower than Hungary - no... It's way beyond that. It's a total shift in my perception of time. Being efficient. Wasting time. In time. On time. All these expressions have got a new meaning for me.
I'm looking down at the street, watching people passing by. Then looking at my phone - twenty to one, Mutheu should be arriving in about half an hour. In about half an hour... What does that mean? I know it sounds really weird but I want to define somehow what time does mean to me. I have a feeling that it's somehow an important thing when I am moving from one country to another.
I really like what Sharon Stone said: "Time does not exist. It's only a creature so that we can arrange our meetings." That is time for her. So what is time for ME? As a matter of fact, it does not help me arranging my meetings. Not even scheduling my tasks. It doesn't help me get through pain, and it doesn't really facilitate my life routine - somehow I don't really care about day or night, I don't necessarily eat just because it's lunchtime and I can't tell what am normally doing on Sundays...
Then what do I use "time" for? Hmm. There is one thing, an answer, which am tasting... "to track progress" - kinda making sense. Time is a tool for me to track progress. Wow. I have to crosscheck this in practice. How it works, how it helps me on a daily basis. I'm curious!
...
10pm, at home. Hmmm, I had 1 hour for myself today in the middle of the day, see what it is doing to me??? Hahaha.
Just got home not long ago from town - we were supposed to have a TM team building with my current LCVPs, but finally it was only Emma and Maryanne turning up, so 3 of us went for a "buy 1 get 1 free" pizza at Nandoz. It was relaxing, after a long day. Funny enough, I had thought I wouldn't have had much to do today, as Fiona had my laptop for several hours. But somehow I organized 2 random meetings, one with Mutheu and one with Jose, and then another one with Fiona (after she finished with the laptop), so by 5pm I found myself being terribly tired...
Emma has sent me home after the pizza telling me I really need to take some rest. Well :)
I don't know how am doing that, but even though we're doing on the job transition with both the girls by now, and I'm hardly doing anything that I was normally doing on a daily basis before, somehow the volume of my tasks just doesn't want to go down... I have such a long list of things I still need to do, and I just keep asking myself - when am I having a break...? Not that I don't enjoy it, I do, but I'm a bit worried, coz I don't know for how long I can keep up my level of energy.
Last weekend we had NTT/NST skills building in Westlands, Esther's cousin was hosting us in his flat. Haha, I had so much fun :) First of all, we started quite late as guys instisted on watching Tusker Project Fame, but when I finished by last session for Saturday, presentation skills training, at 1am they were all awake. Finally we decided to watch "How I met your mother" epizodes, and gotta fall asleep by around 4am... I felt like a hero in the morning when I woke up first, at 7am, to prepare breakfast for the team.
Then by noon everyone was truly awake, wowowo, we had a "how to train" simulation with crazy topics, I was curious about their level of creativity...
5-minutes mini trainings on the following topics:
"How to fuck an elephant" (by Renee)
"How to loose a girlfriend/boyfriend" (by Carol 1)
"How to pick up a date" (by Nash)
"How to kill yourself creatively" (by Carol 2)
"The art of being annoying" (by Esther)
"How to see dead people" (by Mo)
"How to chop down a tree using only your cat" (by Emma)
Hahaha, I was laughing my lungs out, when Emma was explaining 4 or 5 different methods for her challenge, with an absolutely serious face; Mo made us almost believe that we'd really see dead people there; and Renee wanted to convince us about the benefits of making out with an elephant and simulated the whole process with Nash :)
Crazy people... :)
I'm thinking about taking Emma's advice and going to sleep now.
Comfort Hotel's bar, Nairobi
Noone is actually servicing me, though I crave for a coffee and a plate of masala chips... I have left Fiona in the MC office with my laptop so that she can get all the materials and documents that she needs from it.
I have been working on my portfolio plan for next term, putting down some ideas and strategies. Then I thought: now I have all this, I just need my action steps, milestones and a timeline... Timeline... And at this point something has hit me - my concept of time has entirely changed.
It's not that Kenya is faster or slower than Hungary - no... It's way beyond that. It's a total shift in my perception of time. Being efficient. Wasting time. In time. On time. All these expressions have got a new meaning for me.
I'm looking down at the street, watching people passing by. Then looking at my phone - twenty to one, Mutheu should be arriving in about half an hour. In about half an hour... What does that mean? I know it sounds really weird but I want to define somehow what time does mean to me. I have a feeling that it's somehow an important thing when I am moving from one country to another.
I really like what Sharon Stone said: "Time does not exist. It's only a creature so that we can arrange our meetings." That is time for her. So what is time for ME? As a matter of fact, it does not help me arranging my meetings. Not even scheduling my tasks. It doesn't help me get through pain, and it doesn't really facilitate my life routine - somehow I don't really care about day or night, I don't necessarily eat just because it's lunchtime and I can't tell what am normally doing on Sundays...
Then what do I use "time" for? Hmm. There is one thing, an answer, which am tasting... "to track progress" - kinda making sense. Time is a tool for me to track progress. Wow. I have to crosscheck this in practice. How it works, how it helps me on a daily basis. I'm curious!
...
10pm, at home. Hmmm, I had 1 hour for myself today in the middle of the day, see what it is doing to me??? Hahaha.
Just got home not long ago from town - we were supposed to have a TM team building with my current LCVPs, but finally it was only Emma and Maryanne turning up, so 3 of us went for a "buy 1 get 1 free" pizza at Nandoz. It was relaxing, after a long day. Funny enough, I had thought I wouldn't have had much to do today, as Fiona had my laptop for several hours. But somehow I organized 2 random meetings, one with Mutheu and one with Jose, and then another one with Fiona (after she finished with the laptop), so by 5pm I found myself being terribly tired...
Emma has sent me home after the pizza telling me I really need to take some rest. Well :)
I don't know how am doing that, but even though we're doing on the job transition with both the girls by now, and I'm hardly doing anything that I was normally doing on a daily basis before, somehow the volume of my tasks just doesn't want to go down... I have such a long list of things I still need to do, and I just keep asking myself - when am I having a break...? Not that I don't enjoy it, I do, but I'm a bit worried, coz I don't know for how long I can keep up my level of energy.
Last weekend we had NTT/NST skills building in Westlands, Esther's cousin was hosting us in his flat. Haha, I had so much fun :) First of all, we started quite late as guys instisted on watching Tusker Project Fame, but when I finished by last session for Saturday, presentation skills training, at 1am they were all awake. Finally we decided to watch "How I met your mother" epizodes, and gotta fall asleep by around 4am... I felt like a hero in the morning when I woke up first, at 7am, to prepare breakfast for the team.
Then by noon everyone was truly awake, wowowo, we had a "how to train" simulation with crazy topics, I was curious about their level of creativity...
5-minutes mini trainings on the following topics:
"How to fuck an elephant" (by Renee)
"How to loose a girlfriend/boyfriend" (by Carol 1)
"How to pick up a date" (by Nash)
"How to kill yourself creatively" (by Carol 2)
"The art of being annoying" (by Esther)
"How to see dead people" (by Mo)
"How to chop down a tree using only your cat" (by Emma)
Hahaha, I was laughing my lungs out, when Emma was explaining 4 or 5 different methods for her challenge, with an absolutely serious face; Mo made us almost believe that we'd really see dead people there; and Renee wanted to convince us about the benefits of making out with an elephant and simulated the whole process with Nash :)
Crazy people... :)
I'm thinking about taking Emma's advice and going to sleep now.
Wednesday, May 7, 2008
Sway
5th May 2008
Summarizing my past week... Damn interesting! I think that's the best expression for it :)
Juliet and Sly have still been in Rwanda (they are supposed to come home sometime soon), and as the MC elect left for Planning Conference on Tuesday morning, it was only Phil and me in Nairobi out of the whole team. So on Wednesday I made my day busy: had a long transition meeting with Quincy, then a lunch meeting with Phil, then a mentoring meeting with Mike (he needed some inspiration), and the top of the day was the LC Nairobi Alumni Cocktail in the evening.
I have actually learnt a lot from all my meetings, especially from the one with Phil of course - but it's interesting how I'm still learning from those talks when I am passing knowledge, or thoughts. And this is something I love about AIESEC - you learn that no matter what role you have, what level you are at, you always can learn something new.
Then, as I've mentioned, the top of the day, Alumni Cocktail! Wowowo, I'm still amused! First of all, I'm proud of that LC of mine, they are doing their job so well. The event was amazingly well-organized, nice and posh, but not too much. It was held at Wasanii. And quite many alumni and corporates participated, I was even surprised how many.
Finally I ended up having some really nice discussions... I was seated next to Beryl for a long while, but as she was giving her speech and some other guests arrived, I found myself amongst 3 aging man. One of them was Kent on my extreme left, then Julius Kip' (I can never remember his full name - Director of Kenya Wildlife Service) on my right, and someone on my left - I didn't have a clue who he was. Then this guy on my left asked me something, so finally we ended up having a nice conversation. I found out that he was originally from South Africa, and lived in Budapest 2 times, once in the 1980ies and once from 1994 to 2000 then he moved from Budapest right to Nairobi. And he also mentioned that he was working for Vodafon there, then we moved to the nice things that he loved about Hungary. Now he is the CEO of Safaricom...
My other favourite discussion was with a guy called Robert. He's half French - half Spanish with some Polish Jewish ancestors, born in the UK, having 5 kids from 4 wives in different countries... And he speaks at least 10 different tribal languages of Kenya, and he keeps on learning new and new languages even now (he asked me to write down hello, goodbye and I love you in Hungarian for him when we meet next time :)).
After all this, my Thursday went quite quietly. It was a public holiday, but we agreed with Quincy, that we go on with transition. So I went to the MC office in the afternoon, found there Jobe from the Dinner OC, trying to find out the names and addresses of the different ambassadors to Kenya for inviting them for Dinner. We had a really nice chat before Quincy arrived. Btw, Phil left to Nakuru for the conference on Thursday as well, so from this day I was the ONLY one MC member in Nairobi... :)
Then on Friday LC Nairobi had their Opening Ceremony for YES project - the LC proved second time in one week only that they are super good in event organizing! Though the number of students were less then they expected, the corporate guests and speakers all came and basically it turned out to be a very successful event. We had 2 ladies from KCB, Manu Chandaria from Chandaria Foundation, Dr Kevit Desai (BoA member for AIESEC Kenya), Richard Bell (a venture capitalist) and the 2 winners from last years project.
My most amazing moment was when one of the winners from last year claimed that AIESEC and the projects has really changed his life... He is now a young entrepreneur, starting up his business, already has some clients and is thinking about growth and growth and growth only. And as his clients are schools and teachers, just imagine how many more life he is changing by his job!
The other winner from last year, Daniel had a very interesting definition for entrepreneurship, I like it a lot, let me share:
"You find out that something is not working well, and you think: Somebody should make it better. And this somebody should be me."
On Saturday we went to Nakuru together with Gathu, Martin and Quincy. Gathu was driving, we arrived to Nakuru in 2 hours instead of 3 - nice drive, tho I had to remind Gathu like 3 times that I didn't have an insurance... But we arrived safe and sound finally. The conference was going on very well. I'm proud of our MC elect and NST elect, they have been doing a great job. I have no doubt that we're leaving AIESEC Kenya in the right hands.
During the night, celebrating Phil's birthday, Godi came with some tequila for the MC and MC elect - I think I drank like 4 shots, hoping that the Kenya Kane afterwards would never reach me... Fortunately it didn't so we went to dance and I managed to keep myself awake till like 4am :)
Next morning during closing plenary I promised delegates I would try hard not to cry during my speech... Well... I didn't succeed... It was really powerful how our memories started coming back from the very beginning of our term, not just from my own point of view, but also the way Leah and Phil were talking about it. It was really deep, really touching.
Hmmm soooo much impressions again, only within a few days. And all this on the top of a lovely, warmish feeling that I've been having recently... :) I'm happy!!!
Summarizing my past week... Damn interesting! I think that's the best expression for it :)
Juliet and Sly have still been in Rwanda (they are supposed to come home sometime soon), and as the MC elect left for Planning Conference on Tuesday morning, it was only Phil and me in Nairobi out of the whole team. So on Wednesday I made my day busy: had a long transition meeting with Quincy, then a lunch meeting with Phil, then a mentoring meeting with Mike (he needed some inspiration), and the top of the day was the LC Nairobi Alumni Cocktail in the evening.
I have actually learnt a lot from all my meetings, especially from the one with Phil of course - but it's interesting how I'm still learning from those talks when I am passing knowledge, or thoughts. And this is something I love about AIESEC - you learn that no matter what role you have, what level you are at, you always can learn something new.
Then, as I've mentioned, the top of the day, Alumni Cocktail! Wowowo, I'm still amused! First of all, I'm proud of that LC of mine, they are doing their job so well. The event was amazingly well-organized, nice and posh, but not too much. It was held at Wasanii. And quite many alumni and corporates participated, I was even surprised how many.
Finally I ended up having some really nice discussions... I was seated next to Beryl for a long while, but as she was giving her speech and some other guests arrived, I found myself amongst 3 aging man. One of them was Kent on my extreme left, then Julius Kip' (I can never remember his full name - Director of Kenya Wildlife Service) on my right, and someone on my left - I didn't have a clue who he was. Then this guy on my left asked me something, so finally we ended up having a nice conversation. I found out that he was originally from South Africa, and lived in Budapest 2 times, once in the 1980ies and once from 1994 to 2000 then he moved from Budapest right to Nairobi. And he also mentioned that he was working for Vodafon there, then we moved to the nice things that he loved about Hungary. Now he is the CEO of Safaricom...
My other favourite discussion was with a guy called Robert. He's half French - half Spanish with some Polish Jewish ancestors, born in the UK, having 5 kids from 4 wives in different countries... And he speaks at least 10 different tribal languages of Kenya, and he keeps on learning new and new languages even now (he asked me to write down hello, goodbye and I love you in Hungarian for him when we meet next time :)).
After all this, my Thursday went quite quietly. It was a public holiday, but we agreed with Quincy, that we go on with transition. So I went to the MC office in the afternoon, found there Jobe from the Dinner OC, trying to find out the names and addresses of the different ambassadors to Kenya for inviting them for Dinner. We had a really nice chat before Quincy arrived. Btw, Phil left to Nakuru for the conference on Thursday as well, so from this day I was the ONLY one MC member in Nairobi... :)
Then on Friday LC Nairobi had their Opening Ceremony for YES project - the LC proved second time in one week only that they are super good in event organizing! Though the number of students were less then they expected, the corporate guests and speakers all came and basically it turned out to be a very successful event. We had 2 ladies from KCB, Manu Chandaria from Chandaria Foundation, Dr Kevit Desai (BoA member for AIESEC Kenya), Richard Bell (a venture capitalist) and the 2 winners from last years project.
My most amazing moment was when one of the winners from last year claimed that AIESEC and the projects has really changed his life... He is now a young entrepreneur, starting up his business, already has some clients and is thinking about growth and growth and growth only. And as his clients are schools and teachers, just imagine how many more life he is changing by his job!
The other winner from last year, Daniel had a very interesting definition for entrepreneurship, I like it a lot, let me share:
"You find out that something is not working well, and you think: Somebody should make it better. And this somebody should be me."
On Saturday we went to Nakuru together with Gathu, Martin and Quincy. Gathu was driving, we arrived to Nakuru in 2 hours instead of 3 - nice drive, tho I had to remind Gathu like 3 times that I didn't have an insurance... But we arrived safe and sound finally. The conference was going on very well. I'm proud of our MC elect and NST elect, they have been doing a great job. I have no doubt that we're leaving AIESEC Kenya in the right hands.
During the night, celebrating Phil's birthday, Godi came with some tequila for the MC and MC elect - I think I drank like 4 shots, hoping that the Kenya Kane afterwards would never reach me... Fortunately it didn't so we went to dance and I managed to keep myself awake till like 4am :)
Next morning during closing plenary I promised delegates I would try hard not to cry during my speech... Well... I didn't succeed... It was really powerful how our memories started coming back from the very beginning of our term, not just from my own point of view, but also the way Leah and Phil were talking about it. It was really deep, really touching.
Hmmm soooo much impressions again, only within a few days. And all this on the top of a lovely, warmish feeling that I've been having recently... :) I'm happy!!!
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