A lot like home

Filming: Day 10

There are BMWs in Nairobi. Lots of them. Nooks and corners of the city are swankier than many American cities I’ve visited. And while it makes me happy to see globalization at work, something about becoming too comfortable with global convergence is tragic to me—it seems that as the world gradually starts to look like itself everywhere, we are losing much of cultural heterogeneity. We found ourselves in a very upscale neighborhood near Westlands last night for a small barbeque. In Steve’s words, “if you’d told me one month ago that I’d be sitting at a barbeque in Nairobi in a month, I’d never have believed you.” It was familiar, the house was beautiful and lush and almost disturbingly quiet and secluded. It was no different from home. The potato salad was the same, the chicken was the same, the wine was the same, the company was the same. I listened to a young couple talk about their wedding: a combination of old tribal tradition (Kikuyu) and modern adjustments and accommodations. From what they described, it seemed that time had eroded some of the practicality of clinging onto ceremonial tradition. In a way, I began to feel like my experience of Nairobi was—in that respect—less authentic. It was less Nairobian, less Kenyan.

Today we were invited to Sylva’s church to hear a sermon; it was the most musical sermon I had ever heard (also the only one). The sound of the choir with the echo of the congregation was breathtaking—I could literally feel my skeleton dancing. As Steve so aptly put it, “I think I just found religion again.” Really, it was magical. And I realized in the company of these good country people, singing in unison in praise of something greater than themselves, that in the same way that we must accept change and progress as a function of time, we must also accept that certain elements of humanity will always remain untouched. That something like faith, like music, can unite a multitude of anonymous individuals inspires hope and promise. A forever kind of promise. And these truths will transcend time because they are true everywhere—because they are the fossils of global convergence, the fossils of humanity, really. Sharing commonalities across the globe—in certain timeless ways—can be a very good thing.

So as I witness Nairobi as a burgeoning technology hub—home to the biggest slum in Africa against the backdrop of a remarkable city skyline—I will appreciate its growth and progress not despite tradition, but rather as facilitated by it. Behind every development, I will redirect my energy to search for the custom or tradition that caused it. After all, even the progress of Nairobi must have been driven by a prayer.

 

Neha

Time for some “meta”

Filming: Day 4 (5-30-11)

Nairobi is a technology hub. Bustling with fresh energy, the city is kept alive by the entrepreneurship of young people. This angle of development is precisely what we’re trying to capture in our Kenya shoot. Of course, the intersection of technology and media with microfinance is the more specific subject of the Kenya shoot. And I think this is where things have started to get a little “meta”…at least in my head.

In continuing the search for our woman (our “story”), we started our day with an interview of the CEO of K-Rep, Kimanthi Mutua. K-Rep is a large and reputable bank that relies on a mobile money framework. When we asked Mr. Mutua about how globalization played a role in starting K-Rep, he explained that “the beauty of microfinance is interconnectivity.” By that he meant that countries with existing and sustainable prototypes for microfinance create great models for others to follow—a fairly simple concept, stressing the importance of inter-national communication and collaboration.

Before our next interview, we made a food run to the YaYa shopping center. On our way inside, Bea and I ran into one of her good friends, a woman she’d worked with previously on another documentary. There was an energy about her friend that was young and vibrant and relentless. The woman—a documentary filmmaker herself—was carrying a bag full of newly purchased books on women athletes in Kenya. Bea later told me that her friend is currently working on a documentary about Kenyan politics. The film they’d worked on together in January was about demystifying Kenya to the rest of the world. In Bea’s words, “we wanted to show people that Nairobi isn’t a place where people have giraffes roaming wild in their backyards.” Something about both women intrigues me. Apart from being absolutely beautiful, they share a curiosity driving social engagement and change. Together, they are a part of what seems to be an emerging network of young activists, something that has only been facilitated by social media. And of course, the art they are making is a form of social media itself. Definitely meta.

Our second interview was with an agent of M-PESA, a woman named Sylvia. Immediately, I was impressed by her ability to communicate passionately with the camera. We never had to fill an awkward pause—Sylvia had enough to say, and she invited herself to say it. Apart from her work as an agent for M-PESA microlending, she specifically talked about chama group lending, which decreases the formality of lending practices by replacing accountability to a faceless bank with accountability to a group of lenders. Chama lending is very much a social form of banking.

In reflecting on the day from a macro perspective, I began to trace some commonalities shared by the people we interacted with today. Whether through cross-generational education/transmission (as we saw with yesterday’s interviewees), through inter-national communication (K-Rep), through mobile banking (K-Rep and M-PESA), through social networking (activist networks), or through organized chama lending groups (Sylvia), microfinance in Kenya has become very much a social movement. The form of social or mobile media utilized exists merely as a matter of scale in these various contexts. And there’s a huge parallel between what we are trying to do with this documentary and what microfinance has begun to do with mobile/social media. In the same way that the dynamics and proliferation of microlending has been dependent upon the adoption of social/mobile frameworks, the message of this film can only truly be transmitted through the film itself. That is to say that we, too, are using social media to promote a social cause. Documentary film itself is very much a form of social media. And as we are starting to discover, the “meta” just keeps unraveling.

 

Neha

Shooting in Kenya, Day 3

A new post from our PA, Neha:

Filming: Day 3 (5-29-11)

We were awake at 4 am. Call time was 5:20 for a 5:30 departure for a safari (which popped up surprisingly early in the trip). We’d essentially be killing two birds with one stone (an inappropriate metaphor, considering the context): to capture some wildlife footage and stills for the film and to experience a true African safari. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so connected to my inner 5-year-old Explorer Neha.

Still dark when we left Godials B&B, our safari guide/driver Bonnie lifted the top of our safari van as we raced the sun to get to Nairobi National Park by sunrise. We had only been on the safari trail for two seconds when Bonnie turned over his shoulder and sang exuberantly, “Look, look! Lion ahead of us! Lion!” We shrugged off the claim with laughter, assuming it to be one of Bonnie’s playful antics. But we were completely caught off guard when he suddenly stepped on the gas, accelerating the car at full speed to a point in the trail up ahead. There, slapping us in the face, walked a lion in full flesh and blood. It was legitimately surreal. “People come to Africa and never see a single lion,” Bonnie explained to us, in total awe himself. “This means you must have carried your luck from Chicago.”

And the luck persisted. We saw at least fours lions (one of which was in a tree). We saw buffalo. We saw giraffes. [We saw birds.] We saw everything. It was one of the most unique and unreal experiences I’ve had in a while. To see wild animals in their natural habitat, but simultaneously against the backdrop of a Nairobi skyline—that was such an unusual juxtaposition. It was as though we were witnessing the intersection of generations of civilization. I felt partly inspired, partly guilty. But I will say that there is no feeling like being out in the middle of untouched earth—the land and air taste so much more saturated with life.

On our way back, we drove over Kibera, the largest slum in Africa. The view—an aerial one from up above—was simultaneously breathtaking and overwhelming. Seeing things photographically sometimes distorts our valuation of them. Scenically, Kibera is breathtaking. To a social activist, it’s certainly overwhelming. I think it can be both things at once. The view gave us a taste of the footage we will be filming later on in the week. I doubt that it will be any less remarkable upon our return.

We had an interview at Godials with Grace from Microkenya at 1:00 pm, and with Jessica from M-PESA (mother of Martin) at her house at 3:00 pm. Grace brought her three children along, who were obviously raised well as we could see by their polite conversational skills and gestures. Each claimed to love science at school. Jessica had two young grandchildren at home and talked proudly of her sons and their successes; Martin, after attending MIT and Harvard, started his own microlending operation, and introduced his mother to the institution. She is now largely responsible for it. In revealing her motivation for becoming involved with microlending, she explained to us, “my son wanted to do it, so of course I will want to do anything to help my son achieve his dreams.” It then struck me that there was a subtle similarity between the two women we had interviewed today: both were family women. They represented more than the social work they do and the causes they promote and the women they represent; on a broader level, they serve as the anchors of their families. Grace explained to us how she tried to educate her children about microfinance and savings. Jessica held her grandson Trevor in her lap as she interviewed with us. Children and maternity were an in-built part of their lives; in many ways, it was the pride of their lives and their very motivation. Perhaps the most successful and credible borrowers have also always coincidentally been mothers—fighting to set a good example for their children. Needless to say, the family element is a critical part of our evaluation of microlending in the developing world. And looking forward, if the cross-generational transmission of microfinance education from parents to children persists, there is promise for the proliferation of the institution of microfinance in the coming decades. That’s a unique story to follow and tell today, before and as it happens.

Lessons of the day:

1. Lions aren’t as excited to see us as we are to see them.
2. Baby giraffes are hopelessly neglected children.
3. When WiFi goes out, it’s generally out in all of Nairobi.
4. Restaurants don’t stay open late on Sundays.

Neha on Nairobi

A post from our PA, Neha, about our first day of filming in Nairobi:

Discovering Nairobi

Filming: Day 1

Today, our day began at 11 am. At least, it was supposed to. But like anything else
in Kenya, it’s wise to allow for delays or slight changes in plans. It wasn’t until
about 3 pm that we left to shoot. First, we were reintroduced to our driver, Bonnie,
who doubles as a safari driver (only the best in Kenya, of course). We’re trying
to convince him to take us on a safari during one of our rest days. We were also
introduced to our Kenya liaison, effectively (who will take on a variety of roles while
we’re here): a young, petite woman named Bea (short for Beatrice). After a quick
introduction to both, we packed up the equipment in the car, and we were on our
way to the first stop.

The day’s shooting consisted mostly of landscape material to serve as bookends and
transitions in the documentary. We were to capture the Nairobi skyline, and to get
some stills downtown. Truthfully, it was the perfect opener for our shoot in Kenya,
giving us a feel for the vibe and energy of the place before diving into personal
stories.

Our first stop was an elevated position from which we could clearly see the Nairobi
skyline. A hill, it sloped down into a grassy parkland which opened up into the city.
Groups of Kenyans enjoyed the lazy Friday afternoon in the shade of trees in the
grass. The sun was bright and energizing, and the skyline looked like it was cut and
pasted from any US city. Frankly, Nairobi did not look like what I had expected. And
to an extent, I was overcome with guilt that I hadn’t given Nairobi enough credit
as one of the most rapidly urbanizing cosmopolitan centers in Africa. The city had
taken us by surprise.

The bigger surprise was waiting for us downtown. As we took stills and video on
the streets in the city—of pedestrians, of cars, of roundabouts, of billboards and
buildings—one particular expression came to mind: yuppie. Something about
the demographics downtown was exceedingly business casual, professional, and
young. Women and men dressed in skirts, slacks, blouses, long shirts, blazers,
dress shoes. I felt like a slob compared to everyone else. We snatched stills of
women on cell phones, women in business clothes (which was all of them), women
working, women driving cars—all pertinent to the film. Nairobi felt no different
from any urban center in America—as Americans, we may have expected it to. The
streets were cleaner than many Western cities. Homelessness was hidden, if not
nonexistent. Really, the only difference between Nairobi and New York, for example,
is the color of everyone’s skin. At one point, Megan turned to Bea and noted, “I feel
surprisingly at home here.” Bea turned to us and replied, “Nairobi is that way. This
city is easy.”

One of the first things that struck me as interesting about Nairobi, however, is the
people. Unlike in India, in Costa Rica, in any other country of the world, really, in
Kenya it is difficult to distinguish the tourist from the resident. For one, there are so
many immigrant groups living in Kenya: Indians, Europeans, Asians, etc. That makes
it nearly impossible for one to guess at a person’s nationality—whether Kenyan or
something else. I suppose that’s the most comforting part of Nairobi so far. In a way,
I blend in; we all do. That comfort level is going to make it a lot easier when we find
ourselves interpreting Kenya from behind a camera, at an inescapable distance from
the people here.

Lessons of the day:

1. Dress to impress.
2. Kenyan mangoes are actually otherworldly.
3. “Edible rocks” bought off the streets are never edible. They’re just rocks.

From Dhaka, to Bahrain, to London, to NYC (or: Home Again, Home Again, Jiggitty Jig)

Although I certainly can’t call New York my “home” quite yet, it is good to be back in the states.  I made it in to JFK around 11 and trekked to my friend Issa’s on the Upper West Side.  He had kindly agreed to let me crash until I get the key card for the place I’m staying tomorrow afternoon, which made the night a million times easier.

Hence, I have been lying on the air mattress in his living room since my arrival at 1:30 (the Airtrain kinda takes forever), and I can’t sleep a wink.  Not at all surprising since I don’t really have any idea what time zone my body thinks I’m in.

In the interest of being fair to hole-in-the ground toilets: since my last post, it has occurred to me that the women growing up using these types of commodes probably figured out a way around the age of 3 to not piss all over their clothes/themselves when using them EVEN WHILE wearing pants.  So calling the toilets sexist may be a bit harsh.  The sinks in Bangladesh, however, are really prejudice against Scandinavians (or so I’ve heard).

We have a rough cut of a 22 minute video made from our Paraguay footage, which is exciting in-and-of itself, but it needs a lot of work.  The translation is a mess, for one.  The most immediately frustrating thing was that for whatever reason, when I tried to download the demo while in Bangladesh, I could get audio but no video.  I forwarded the link to my team to get their thoughts about it, and they graciously complied, but I have yet to see it for myself.  I have about 20 more minutes to go on a new download, and hopefully I’ll be rewarded with some visuals.

The making of this demo, even if sometimes frustrating or hard, has been very enlightening.  Coming into this as green as I did (and I still know virtually nothing about making a film, let’s be honest), there were and are so many things I could’ve done differently while on the shoot, and making this demo has forced me to become more aware of them.  It has also lent me a fuller understanding of the entire filmmaking process, from inception of the idea, to building the team, fundraising, shooting, logging, editing, and more.

The demo I’m (hopefully) about to watch will not be the final product I’m hoping for, and I go into this with an awareness of that.  But it’s strange (and somewhat gratifying as well) to think that what I’m about to see is in essence the culmination of more than a year’s worth of work, and it happened because I read a compelling article, was gripped by it, and wanted to make a movie about it.  I don’t know anything, but what I do know is this: it’s possible to decide to do something, and then figure out a way to do it, and knowing that makes me feel better about the world.

THE DOWNLOAD JUST FINISHED!  Sigh.  I’ll let you know how it looks.

P.S. – In my insomniac state, I’ve also just been reading and very much enjoying my friend Danny McDowell’s blog, Man vs. Dissertation.  Check it out: http://manversusdissertation.blogspot.com

Day 4/5 – Sexism at ASA (even the toilets are sexist); Hard Sick Day

Today it rained, and it was a relief.  The morning was unbearably hot and I felt nauseous for much of it, but come afternoon (thankfully after we’d met with the borrowers intended) the rain hit and the heat broke and it was a reprieve.  I’m actually looking up malaria symptoms as we speak (so to speak) but am hoping that it’s hypochondria that I have to blame for my illness (“illness”?).

I’m also growing out my armpit hair (and all other body hair, inadvertently), which is a fun and interesting experience.  I am waiting to see if having long armpit hair means one needs deodorant (or at least antiperspirant) less.  As such, I have begun my transition into Frenchdom.

Hole-in-the-ground toilets were designed for guys.  I never devoted thought to this before.  But if a culture forces you to always wear long pants (even if they’re comfortable and pajama-like (forgive me if I’m being insensitive)), it’s certainly much easier for men than women to navigate anatomical hardware and pants and the latrine and to do so in a timely fashion, etc.  European toilets were also this way when my mom went to Europe in 9th grade, she said.  What gives?

Yesterday we toured the big corporate machine that is ASA.  They charge $50 a day for visits from foreigners, which I am all for – we took up a lot of time at these places, and I am assuming the money goes for good, though I would like to investigate this further. Bangladesh is at this point very accustomed to having foreign visitors check out their MFIs.  The guy in charge of managing foreigners at ASA, however, said a lot of interesting unprompted things when Najm and I went back upstairs after their rehearsed schpiel so that I could get his card.  He said stuff about how women aren’t physically capable of working at ASA because going into the field requires long bike rides (why were there then also no women in the upper echelons of the corporate structure, driving in to work in the Dhaka high rises?).  He said that people ask about the tendency men have to take over their wives’ loans once they’re received (because many MFIs loan exclusively to women), and he was very adamant about it being the “husband’s loan” and this therefore not being any sort of issue.  He also said, entirely out of the blue, something about “bad behavior of field officers” not being “general” even though foreigners come there and catalogue such things and report on them, and he showed some anger when revealing this.  He said that visitors should forget everything they know, the ideas they come to the ASA office with; this seemed to entail the forgetting of basic ideas about equal treatment for people regardless of gender.  At the risk of creeping into melodrama, I remain unsure whether or not he said these things to me as some sort of warning.

The regional branch of ASA that we visited in the capital city of Dhaka was also guilty of discriminatory practices of a different sort that I was witness to even during my short stay.  Our driver ate his lunch in a different room than we did because of their policy on such things, and he later complained that they underfed him and gave him the worst leftover food.  Pretty uncool.

I don’t mean to sound cynical, and I have an awareness that I’m approaching microfinance in Bangladesh with somewhat negative expectations, given what I’ve heard about the glut of organizations here and the way the trendiness surrounding microfinance has phased out other vital social networks for the poor in rural areas.  I saw a lot of good at ASA, but I found it notable that the branch I felt was doing the most good, and did the best job connecting to the women borrowers, was the only one we visited with a woman as the point-person branch manager.  She held the hand of a borrower whose son recently died, patting her arm and exuding incredible warmth as the woman shed tears, telling us that it should’ve been her time to die, she is old, her son was a young, and a good man.  This woman’s name, though I can’t recall it at all in Bangla, means ‘moonlight’ in English, which I love.  We also had this exchange:

Moonlight: What do you think of Bangladeshi people?

Me: They’re very nice.

Moonlight: (smiling, maybe confused) Why you think we’re nice?  You’re white and we’re black. [unsure what prompted this remark, what miscommunication may have happened]

Me: Bangladeshis have been very friendly to me on this trip.  You’re very kind.

Moonlight: [Silent, tears welling up in eyes.  She beams.]

I made a mistake in not requesting before coming here that women be my only points of contact.  We had to remind the men standing behind me from the branch MFI offices not to pipe up and answer questions for the women Najm and I interviewed countless times.

Maybe tomorrow, when feeling better, less tired, more generous, I will be able to evaluate these events through the lens of culture more so; the sexism embedded in everyday life here has a complicated origin, to say the least.  We’ll see.  I’m going to sleep at 7 p.m. Bangladesh time, easy.  Heading back stateside tomorrow.

Day 3 – Happy

So I was wrong.  Today we spent time at BRAC, not at ASA.  BRAC was established right after Bangladesh itself was, in 1972, and it’s the biggest social business in the world.  When we were visiting a small branch office in the countryside, we drank tea using saucers with the ‘BRAC’ logo on them, a nice touch.  Big business in Bangladesh.

Today I was very happy.  For whatever reason I woke up at 1 a.m and couldn’t fall back asleep, so I figured I’d crash in the middle of the day, but truly I think that sweating so insanely when walking around in the countryside is such a good workout that endorphins are moving around all day, and I wasn’t at all sleepy until we were back in the car heading to Dhaka after we had finished.

I met several borrowers today who had taken out their first loan 17 or more years ago (one claimed she first borrowed 30 years ago), and some of them are now pillars in the community, supplying healthcare for free to their friends and neighbors.

The people are amazing.  They make me feel great just being around them.  They’re so excited to have a foreign visitor, and they’re really generous.

Najm is great as well; he quickly picked up the short list of questions we’re asking each woman when interviewing, and he does a great job getting people out of the frame if we need to, keeping people on point, getting them to respond to a question with a restatement of the question for editing purposes – fundamental stuff that makes a documentary better, he immediately grasped and implemented.

Anyway, not to sound overly flowery, but in the car on the way back from the village, I just felt good, in a way I haven’t in I can’t remember how long.  It’s an intuitive thing, but something about being around really happy, excited people is extremely contagious.

Scouting Trip in Dhaka, Bangladesh

So I’ve done a terrible job updating this blog, but I’m gonna change my ways.  A lot has happened since January when I last updated, but rather than trying to recount all that’s going on in a single post I think I’ll update the backlog stuff a bit more gradually.

In a nutshell: I’m currently sitting in a hotel room in Dhaka, with a full itinerary over the next week or so.  I’ll be meeting with a lot of women microborrowers and their families, to try and decide who we should next cover for the film.  I’m excited, and looking to be inspired.  I hope I don’t overwhelm anyone, and I hope I’m able to connect with the women.  That was what I liked most about the scouting trip to Paraguay, and what I was saddest about the lack of when we were on our full shoot.  Or rather, I guess when it wasn’t just me, it was more difficult to get as personal.  Anyway.  I’m kind of going off on a tangent.

Dhaka has something like 17 million people, and the traffic (as you can imagine) is really crazy.  We’ll mostly be at MFIs in the countryside, with one exception.  I flew from JFK to London, then to Manama, Bahrain, and now I’m here.  I left on Wednesday and got here Friday (but travelled like 11 hours into the future with the time change).  The trip wasn’t bad; I slept a lot, and almost all the people I encountered were nice.  The airport in Bahrain was crazy inefficient, though.  I have to remember that not everyone in the world is as interested in efficiency as I have come to be in the past year.

I’m rambling.

More soon…

Last Days of My Scouting Trip

The remainder of my scouting trip to Paraguay, Saturday and Sunday, was pretty low key with one MAJOR exception: the attempted mugging of two of the people staying at the intern hostel where I was also staying.

Thankfully, they weren’t hurt.  Polina, an intern at the Fundacion, and her mother Natalia were walking back to the hostel from a nearby ice cream shop while it was still daylight outside, and a man approached them with a knife.  Polina screamed and ran across the street, and, also luckily, a security guard was nearby.  As I understood it, the security guard made a move toward the man and he ran away.  Nothing was stolen, but both women were understandably shaken up.

This instance highlighted some of the cultural differences between Paraguayans and Westerners.  When Natalia relayed this story to me, my awesome translator, Diana, was also at the hostel.  She had volunteered her time – at no cost!  Though of course I couldn’t in good conscience not pay her – to watch the videos of the footage we had gotten over the past days and write down any gaps in translation.  She overheard Natalia as she was telling me about the attempted mugging, and said, to paraphrase: “Yeah, I guess you guys aren’t used to that the way we are here.  Since I moved back to Paraguay in January, I’ve been mugged 7 times.”

This was a significant statement in and of itself, right!  But probably the most striking thing about it was the nonchalant, even cheerful way she stated this, as though it wasn’t at all a big deal.  Mugging was just something you have to deal with in Paraguay, as seemingly outside of human control as the weather.

The Wealthy Side of Paraguay (Part 2)

New year, and at long last…new blog post.  I wanted to talk a little bit more about my experience with what appears to be a huge gap between the wealthy and the poor in Pargauay.  It was really crazy to see, and something I totally happened upon in that I didn’t expect to be seeing the wealthy side at all.  In getting to see it, I learned a lot about the social (in addition to the economic) climate in the country.

I lucked into getting to experience the wealthy side of Paraguay because Anna, my amazing contact at the Fundacion, happened to be dating a Paraguayan, and she was nice enough to invite me out with them after I had spent the day talking to microborrowers in the countryside.  On Friday, we went to a party at a local club, and it was very much what I pictured “going out in South America” would be like, although I probably (for misguided reasons) associated the things I saw more with the nightlife experience in say, Rio de Janeiro in Brazil.  The club was on the river, and everyone there was dressed to the nines – many of the women (girls?) going out there had had obvious plastic surgery of all kinds.  Soon after arriving we said hello to a Paraguayan soap opera star that my new friends knew; one of them had grown up with him.  We were able to get in without cover, presumably because of connections my hosts had with the people throwing the party, and once inside everything was free. 

After spending the daytime in the countryside meeting families of 8, 9, or 11 existing on as little as $2 a day, the magnitude of the conspicuous consumption was something of a spectacle, and a bit alarming to see.  It was a fascinating opportunity to better understand this disconnect between the rich and poor firsthand.  While there, I asked my new friends and some of the people I met about the political climate in Paraguay, and I got some interesting insight about a burgeoning democratic system experiencing a lot of growing pains, as the country was under dictatorial rule until relatively recently.

The gap between the wealthy and the poor seems to have created a lot of class tension as well.  Wednesday night, after dining at the country club in Asuncion, I was told that a rich Paraguayan man had recently been kidnapped and held until certain political prisoners were released from jail, per the kidnappers’ demands.  At the club, members had stickers on their cars to show solidarity in support of the man’s plight.  Similarly, the son of a wealthy Paraguayan family that I met now has to travel with bodyguards because he’s a rich kid.

So learning all this begged the question: how could a more economically-integrated Paraguay help the poorest people in the countryside?  And how can microlending to women play a constructive part in achieving this goal?  I’m going to do my best to find out.