some updates on where I am and what I have been up to...

Just a blink of the eye, over three months have gone by but aha I am still in Kenya. A lot happened and a lot are still ongoing. I have about a little over five weeks left in this mad country. I am counting on days -- I know it will be heartbroken to leave but then home is calling on the other continent. Plus, the fact that everyone else is going back to school on the other other continent and I am still lingering on here made my internal balance tip over a little bit for a little while...

Some “big-deal” events during the past two months:

1. Received the new president of Mount Holyoke College in Nairobi and later embarked on a mind-boggling trip with her across Kenya

It was such an unexpected but definitely fortunate opportunity to join Lynn and her wonderful team (check out her blog that keeps the detail of the trip) including Clarice her partner, the founder and director of African Center for Engineering Social Solutions (ACESS). I knew Lynn’s coming to Kenya and her project from the campus email she sent. I contacted her and she put me in touch with Clarice, from which I learned more about ACESS and was very much inspired.

After having spent a week-long trip with the whole team, for me it really represents a development model I personally had never experienced myself. It stood away from the usual political diplomacy of official development assistance from the west and approached it from a civic and institutional angle. And what is most mind-boggling is that all players are all in somewhat equal positions because each single one of them contributes and empowers and inspires each other. I still couldn’t believe I had actually the “technology transfer” taking place right in front of eyes – when the three engineering students from Hartford taught the workers at the local construction materials company, and when the workers tried out themselves and offered that they had ideas how to make the same thing with locally available materials! Lynn's blog did a way better job detailing the trip.

2. Funded the Rural Energy Enterprises Network program under the African Youth Initiative on Climate Change -(AYICC-REEN)

My work with the African Youth Initiative on Climate Change - Rural Energy Enterprises Network (AYICC-REEN) has also made me able to offer valuable insights into ACESS’s engagement with youth groups in Kenya. This poses a whole different track of my time spent in Kenya and it goes back to my abroad semester in Denmark (sorry that this has gone into some sort of chronological confusion but life story is actually always continueous, yet sometimes parallel or it comes back to you later when you can never imagine).

I “lingered” on after the Copenhagen Climate Summit and studied at the Danish Institute for Study Abroad in Copenhagen the following spring semester. From both the courses and my involvement with Energy Crossroads Denmark Chapter – a youth organization focusing on energy issues -- I had the chance to learn more about the highly developed and efficient Danish energy supply system and its advancement in wind energy, and create value and opportunities for the society and youth themselves amidst the seemingly conflicting nature of climate change and development. One of the projects I was involved was about the financing and promotion of improved cook-stove in developing countries (Nepal, Uganda and Cameroon were the three countries we had activities). I made the commitment before I left Copenhagen for Kenya that I would start a chapter there.

So the final product, with the help from other AYICC colleagues, was REEN. We defined it as a program under AYICC-Kenya whose mandate is to serve as a network of energy initiatives of AYICC’s various local youth groups and with external partners and resources, to enhance local efforts in fostering sustainable enterprises that take care of both people and the environment. Our main interests center on energy efficiency and appropriate energy technologies to address social and environment issues and create values, namely the promotion of energy-efficiently biomass-burning cook-stove, biogas digesters, small scale biofuels production, solar, and other simple but appropriate renewable energy solutions.

Right now we are still in the process of visiting youth organizations all over Kenya and engaging external partners such as GTZ Kenya and ACESS to enhance the local groups’ work, as well as that of our partners’. We have been able to identify nearly 10 organizations and actually went to visit and interviewed three, all of which were absolutely mind-boggling and inspiring. Later on we plan to host workshops/conferences for people to come to share their expertise and organize some leadership training. And now UNEP is very interested in what I am doing, at least articles will appear in UNEP's website and one of the youth publication –TUNZA (means care in Kiswahili)!Yah!

Now we have included water project because of our involvement with ACESS. As ACESS is also keen on harnessing the local youth talents, we hope to generate some synergy in terms of introducing ACESS’s line of products to REEN’s member groups to expand the network and influence. In the meanwhile, the innovative model ACESS presents I think in many ways could be very instrumental and enlightening to these very talented and energetic young entrepreneurs who have been constantly amazed us during our visits.

This track of work in Kenya is very important for me as I absolutely value the experience with grassroots organizations in delivering more tangible results on the ground, more so than just sitting in UN’s cool and comfortable offices and never really sure how the work could be measured in real sense (as opposed to number of visits to UNEP’s website, for one thing). I have long been interested in international development in the context of climate adaptation and mitigation. I have never really expected to have the opportunity to actually initiate something of my own. Capacity building of the rest of the team is also crucial now given I will have to leave in over a month and they need to be ones to carry the project on.

3. "what is ahead in China?"

Right now, besides UNEP and REEN, I am also helping with the organization and preparation of China Youth delegation to Cancun, so hopefully I will make it to Mexico in December. I will finish my work here in Kenya in middle October and go back to China to help with COP16.

For me I feel committed to this group of inspired and talented young Chinese and I want to continue to contribute my energy and efforts, building on top of experience of being part of the delegation to Copenhagen last year. You can read more about the story at http://www.mtholyoke.edu/news/stories/5681849. AA also has an article on this http://issuu.com/mhcalumnae/docs/2010_spring1.1 (The picture was involuntary tho…)

For the new COP 16 team as a whole (a new one actually with several participants from last year), although it is almost a default that nothing major will happen this time, but I think the process of learning and awareness raising among the wider young Chinese and communicating our message and actions to the international community are more important and need to be sustained.

4. "MoHos are like Chinese people, they are everywhere!"

Meanwhile other MH student and alums bubbled up like pop-corns in Nairobi. We met one alum working for UNICEF here in the same compouand I work and another is the director of Forum for African Women Educationalists. Both have expressed interests of joining the alumnae mentorship program and the later even setting up some MH student intern program. Another Mount Holyoke class of 13, Ujwala, her dad actually sits in the office next to mine...The three of us were actually to meet during COP 15 but we never made it and no one had thought we'd join each other here in the monkey-ful compound. Oh and not to mention Hilda the true Kenyan who was working for ACESS for the whole summer in Nairobi. And her fellow class-of-2012 who showed up during the dinner at the resturant called Carnivore...And I am definitely missing several more MoHos from Kenya who I havent had chance to meet yet.

5. The stage belongs to the animals living in the lion kingdom

During the month of August I had two free safaris to Maasai Mara, the wildlife heaven in Kenya. Gratis is the benefit from laboring in the UN and going to colleges like Mount Holyoke. But hey, anyway, just snap shots for your appetitie:

more to be found at http://photo.163.com/superwangyit/#p=0&m=0&page=1