Malte Vogl

First impressions of studying physics in Kenya

December 2005

We arrived in Nairobi shortly before noon on Friday, 6th of October. First, the many people overwhelmed me, but then I saw someone holding a sign that had "Jochen and Malte" written on it. This was Thomas Nyang'onda, a doctoral student funded by DAAD who plans a research visit to the Hahn-Meitner Institut through the Berlin-Nairobi Exchange. He was picking us up. After a warm welcome, we went to the bus, which brought us to the city centre of Nairobi.

The trip on the bus went through some of the poorer outskirts of Nairobi, which allowed me to get a glimpse on an aspect of life in Kenya. The bus was driven very dangerously in my opinion, but later I learned that this is just the normal way of driving. At the city centre we had to change to a matatu, a small Nissan bus which can carry up to 14 passengers. This trip was a bit stressful because of our baggage, but we made it to the Chiromo Campus where the building that houses the Physics Department is situated.

We left our baggage at Thomas Nyang'onda's office and looked for the Chairman, but he was very busy and therefore we first went to the student halls. There Ozoo, the housekeeper, showed us our future home, which were two small rooms, separated by a wooden wall. I first was shocked because of the size, but soon afterwards I was happy to be able to put down my baggage and to have finally arrived where I would spent the next academic year. It was very nice that we had the same rooms as our predecessor, because there were not only books, cooking equipment and blankets but also a plant whose leaves covered a good part of the ceiling.

Thomas Nyang'onda then brought us to the city centre again so that we could withdraw some money for the weekend. This was again very strange. First of all because of the crowds around us all looking at us while the small children were shouting "mzungu" (European, white) and because in my head were still all the warnings about pickpockets and so I wasn't relaxed at all. But, of course, we made it without a problem, went back to the halls, said good-bye to Thomas Nyang'onda and went to bed.

Although my impressions of the first day were mixed, we had a good start in Nairobi. On Sunday, we went to visit the city centre on our own to orientate ourselves. On Monday, we had a very pleasant meeting with the Chairman of the Physics Department, who gave us a short overview of do's and don'ts on campus. He also informed us that the university wouldn't start before 31st of October, which meant that we had a good three weeks holiday before us.

The Chiromo Campus itself is very nicely situated. It lies on a hill a bit above the city with lots of old trees and nicely trimmed bushes and flowers. The way from the student halls to the Physics Department is only about five minutes through the campus and it is always a pleasure for me to see all the trees, flowers and palm trees. The Physics Department is on the second floor of the Science Building, where also the Mathematics, Meteorology and Geology Departments are situated. It has two good PC pools and the lecture rooms are always big enough for the small groups of students (the biggest lecture has around 40 students). It is a small group of people that studies physics so that after a while you know most of the faces and, of course, all of them know you. There is always a lot of greeting and handshaking at the beginning of the day, which is very easy-going.

We had lectures for over a month now and the impressions of them differs widely. Some lectures are very interesting and productive for me. Others are sometimes only boring. This may partly be due to the fact that I already heard most of the material at my home university, but might also be due to the Kenyan teaching system. In Kenyan schools the pupils often learn by heart. Of course, that is different at university but still many repetitions are annoying to me and also dictation in Kenyan English is difficult.

We have now started to attend some Master degree courses, but only to listen to them because as undergraduate students we are, of course, not allowed to participate in the tests. The physics studies at the University of Nairobi in general seem to be more practically orientated compared to those at TU Berlin. There is always a wide variety of examples in every lecture and the deeper theoretical background is often not explained.

So far I am really enjoying my stay. I could also say it even becomes better and better every day. The everyday life is a great mixture of studying in the morning and living in the afternoon and evening :-). In the morning between the lectures we are often sitting in one of the nearby cafes, doing some homework or just reading. In the afternoon we go to the city centre or meet some friends and on the weekends we often go on little safaris. I also started to learn Swahili in my free time and I am right now able to understand some conversations, which is very much appreciated by Kenyans around me. So right now my only fear is that some day far, far away I might have to go back to Germany.