Fabian Wißbrock

First impressions of studying physics in Kenya

December 2006

My first impressions of Kenya - to put it in a nutshell: We had a very rough start, but things are running much better by now.

When we arrived in Kenya, we were very happy to find out that the University of Nairobi (UoN) was not affected by the country-wide strike of university lecturers. But the first time we came to the University of Nairobi we were really shocked to hear that the people who are in charge of the exchange at University of Nairobi considered it to be expired. They would only allow us to study at the UoN if we agreed to pay tuition fees. For me - not having a scholarship - this would have been a big problem. Our only success for the first day was that the custodian of the Chiromo student halls agreed to give us a room, even though I did not have my complete papers at that time. The room was the same room which the former Berlin-Nairobi Exchange students used to live in. They left us a lot of books and equipment, which we really appreciate. In order to avoid paying tuition fees we had to clear the usual bureaucratic hurdles. Most of the times it was impossible to meet the people that we were supposed to meet. And when we met them, we were told to go to the next office and ask for help. Altogether it took us one and a half month to solve our problem. But due to the support of the Berlin-Nairobi Exchange, Dr. Dittrich from the Hahn-Meitner Institute in Berlin and many people at the University of Nairobi, we were finally registered as occasional students.

Since we were not allowed to take exams in the postgraduate courses, we decided to take mostly fourth year courses. As most of the former exchange students have already stated, the level of the lectures differs widely. Some are very good (especially Statistical Physics with Dr. Monyonko), others are not really worth a visit or should at least be accompanied by a good book. But since the campus library is very well equipped with good books and it is even possible to copy a whole book for a few Euros, this is not a big problem.

About one month ago Dr Dittrich from the Hahn-Meitner Institute in Berlin arrived and helped to build up a new laboratory for semiconductor and photovoltaic research. This is also part of a programme initiated by the Berlin-Nairobi Exchange. This new lab is very well equipped with a lot of valuable donations from European institutes and universities such as lasers, spectral lamps, monochromators etc.. We are already looking forward to do our fourth year student research project in this lab, but for now we have to lay the foundations by developing a deeper insight into solid state physics.

Although we did not have much time for travelling yet, you never get bored in Nairobi. There is such a wide range of interesting people to meet, reaching from European expatriates who fell in love with Africa and plan to stay here forever, to people who live in the slums and would like to get out of it as soon as possible. Of course, there are a few people who approach you because they always expect a muzungu (white man) to own a lot of money. But you also meet a lot of people who are just happy to meet you and who are very eager to hear about life and politics in Europe. For some people it also seems to be a status symbol to have European friends. Besides the typical African hospitality this might also be a reason for the many invitations you get. In the regions which are not swarmed by tourists muzungus are mostly known from TV, all the children will greet you with a warm "how are you?" and you will always have to shake a lot of hands. One time we were invited by a lawyer friend of us to a wedding in a very rural area, where there is even no electricity and no TV. We were greeted by about 20 children who sang traditional Swahili songs praising our arrival. After the usual handshaking we were told how blessed this wedding was since we were the only whites in that village since more than twenty years. Later people were very astonished when we accepted the invitation for a beer. Since the only whites they knew before were some Italian missionaries, who never drank any alcoholic beverages, they expected all whites to be that abstinent!

In Nairobi the traditional African meals are not very popular and most people rather stick to Western style chicken and chips. For us the greatest culinary pleasures are all the fresh fruits which really define a different league of taste compared to the ones you get in Europe. And in the evenings we regularly prepare some traditional European dishes, which are very popular among our Kenyan friends.

Although I tried to write an objective report on my first impressions by also mentioning some negative aspects, it has to be said that our overall perception of our time in Kenya is not negative at all. On the contrary, we are having a very good time here. Altogether I can recommend everybody, who can afford to learn a little less about physics but a little more about life for one year, to come to Kenya.