Saturday, 24 September

Last night Jeanne, Emilia, and I celebrated my birthday at the ARC--the beautiful hotel on campus where we had just finished attending three days of a stimulating international conference: Transformative Research for Sustainable Development. The birthday dinner was lovely--I had chicken, chapatis, fresh vegetables, and, far more important than the food, wonderful company. It was a perfect way to cap off a week of researching and learning, celebrating my aging process, and looking ahead to many exciting days at Egerton and throughout Kenya. Next week, we're going to Nairobi to hear a talk by Gayatri Spivak.

All three of us attended strands of the conference dealing with education, socio-economics, agriculture, math, science, and technology. I was most interested in the education papers dealing with language and attitudes toward different kinds of schools and learning in Kenya, but the great fun of a multidisciplinary conference is learning for the first time about topics such as insurance, credit issues for farmers, and ethnic dress. In addition, we attended a number of plenary sessions covering everything from nuclear power to innovative banking practices. The highlight was an address on Friday by Prof. Amuka from Moi University on the importance of literature, language, and culture in sustainable development as Kenya moves toward an advanced economy as outlined by the Vision 2030 plan. We left the conference filled with ideas and issues to discuss, and with a desire to learn more about all the remarkable growth that is taking place in Kenya right now.