Safari Pics!!

So I've figure out how to get pictures up, but it still takes a while so it probably won't be a regular thing.


Our driver went a little of road for this one. Shhh



Peek-a-Boo



Not even as tall as that tree. Big deal



Fight! Nah just kidding they just be playin'



Baboon. I got nothing clever to say about this one.



Here's the elephant that almost killed those English people



Colourful



The N'gorongogo Crater



Zebras in the Camp



Proof I was there, and proof that I'm cool

Walking on the Wrong Side of the Walk

There is one thing in Tanzania I just can’t seem to get used to. I am sure many of you know that they don’t drive on the right side of the road here (pun intended). It’s a little weird at first, but it seems normal enough to me now. What fewer people have probably thought about is that they also walk on the left side of the sidewalk. It’s never occurred to me before that people in Canada will always yield to the right. When ever I am walking directly towards someone (it’s even worse on stairs) I will move to the right, and they will move to the left, equaling us still walking directly towards each other. Doesn’t seem like much, but this is probably the social custom that has cause me the most grief so far.

So I haven’t gotten around to blogging in a while, as I have started to run low on interesting things to talk about. If anyone has any particular questions, feel free to ask, and it might help me out for my next blog.

I want to begin (sort of) by letting everyone know I will not be going back to Vancouver at any point this summer. I get into Toronto on August 27th, and have recently found out I need to be in London by September 1st, much earlier then I previously thought.

Stealing

Since many people here have very little, and the police presents is quite low (and those you do see are often quite corrupt), theft is obviously something we have to always look out for. However, the community has responded to this problem by taking it into their own hands. I have seen a child get hit in the face for attempting a swipe a potato from the market, and have heard if someone ever steals anything of real value, a mob will form out of basically anyone nearby, men and woman. If (when) caught, the culprit will be beaten to a pulp, and in many cases worse.

On the plus side, this has resulted in a strong trust in your neighbor. On the dala dala’s, I regularly see people taking each other’s purses in make more space, and in order to make proper change, shop keepers will just borrow from anyone nearby without hesitation on either parties part.

People will also help others with money in any way they can. Recently, I accidentally dropped a 2000 TSh bill (About $1.50) into a kind of covered concrete ditch when passing it to a friend, and we were unable to reach it. A crowd quickly gathered to give us ideas, and finally one girl reaches down through a gap with a stick in her hand, and proceeds to move the bill closer and closer to a place where she can finally reach it. It is returned to us without any thought of reward, and the crowd disperses like nothing happened. We personally would have been willing to leave it, but realized that would may be insulting to those around.

Food

For meals here, I basically have four options. First, I can go to one of the nicer restaurants, generally something Indian or European inspired, and expect to pay about 10000 TSh for a meal. Next, I can have street meat, which is usually barbequed chicken, fish, beef, goat, or mutton with French fries, paying around 4000-6000 Tsh. Third is the standard Tanzanian restaurants, where I get a similar selection of meats, but all deep-fried instead (Tanzanian food basically means deep-fried. It’s not calories that are the biggest problem for locals here, but nutrients). Sides are rice and beans, and the price is 3000-5000. And finally, I can cook for myself.

Cooking my own food is for the most part making rice or pasta, with a sauce of some kind to put on top of it. While the ingredients are very fresh, there isn’t a lot to choose from, and for the most part is some combination of onions, garlic, tomatoes, potatoes, green peppers, and carrots (and I can throw in a can of beans or mushrooms if I am feeling adventurous. Basically, most of these sauces end up quite similar, and quite vegetarian, for around 2000-4000 a person.

Last week, I decided to change this, and bought and cooked meat for the first time. But overall, I found it much too tough and chewy, and have decided to leave cooking the meat to the professionals.

Sister Schools

Two schools in Mwanza have been partnered as sister schools with another two from London, Ontario (through Western Heads East), and we have been placed in charge of spending the money raised in ways agreed upon between the schools.

For the Buswalu School, I just went yesterday with the principle to pay the down payment on fifteen desks and four tables from a workshop nearby the school. I have to return next week to pay the rest, and then get to go with the tables to the school to have a look around.

The Mtoni School, presently much better equipped in terms of desks and chairs, decided to go a different direction and purchased a computer and printer. There has been some debate over weather or not this is a good purchase, largely due to the fear of theft. Nevertheless, assuming they manage to keep it safe, I think it could be a very good purchase, and allow the school record keeping and document making abilities well above that of what they presently have. I’m scheduled to go Monday to give basic computer lessons to some of the staff, and hope that at some point some students will have the opportunity to have some practice as well.

Well not the most traditional purchase, it does has the potential to help raise the quality of education in a different way, and I look forward to seeing how they end up using it.

The Project

The work with the yoghurt Mamma’s has been less hands on as of late. Since informing them of their less then ideal financial situation, they have been doing a much better job of getting out to the market, and July has seen a noteworthy increase in sales and profitability.

There were two major issues regarding the internal relations of the kitchen, and the other interns and I think addressing them has and will continue to go a long way into getting the kitchen back on track.

First, due to the fixed schedule that resulted in the Mamma’s always working with the same people, two different “groups” formed, each under a different leadership figure. Both groups thought that either they were doing more work, or that the other group was making more money. This resulted in individuals not putting in the extra effort required, and caused overall productivity to drop.

Secondly, one of the two leadership figures in the kitchen recently decided to start up a second yogurt business of her own. While not really in competition with the Tukwamuane kitchen, it has created a lot of resentment from the other Mamma’s. Not only does it show a lack of commitment from the groups appointed chairperson, but it has also resulted in a sizable decrease in the time she spends working with the group. Interestingly enough, instead of using this to unite the remaining group members, the second leadership figure responded by starting another yogurt kitchen of her own. She has also been having the Tukwamuane buy extra milk to sell to her at cost, in some way shoving her other business in the face of her co-workers. In addition to the previously mentioned issues, Western Head East (WHE) is upset because the yoghurt these two Mamma’s have been distributing is not probiotic, the main reason they were given the skills to make the yoghurt in the first place.

While the first issue appeared to be having a larger effect on the kitchens operations, it has also been much easier to deal with. Since the Mamma’s have recently been spending more time at the market, they have been working in larger groups, and no longer with just the same people. Additionally, since the two “leaders” of the group have been spending less time with their fellow Mamma’s, the rest of the group has in some way bonded over the bitterness they feel towards the whole situation.
The second issue has been more difficult, as all Mammas’ are part owners of the business, and are therefore difficult to discipline. In addition, WHE has no legal authorization over the kitchen, so as interns we can only make “recommendations”. However, the apparent plan is to have everyone sit down together, and basically give the two “lone” Mamma’s an ultimatum in regards to which kitchen they plan to go forward with. In addition, they will be holding a vote at the next group meeting for a new chairperson, letting the two Mamma’s know that their power is not guaranteed. Finally, we hope to update the group’s five-year-old constitution, and make opening a rival business just cause for expulsion.

Changes

Intern’s success year to year hasn’t always been as great as many individuals hope. This has largely been contributed to cultural differences, and the Mamma’s unwillingness to change. But I have also found that a large reason is that many of the changes made are just changed again by the next set of students. The biggest example of this is bookkeeping, with each new set of interns trying to change it in some way. While there are many things I would have done differently from the start, I have to weigh any changes I want them to make against to likelihood that it will just do more harm then good.

The biggest modification I hope to make is in regards to their pricing scheme. Presently, there is no discount for buying larger amounts, and in many cases customers could buy multiple cups of the smaller sizes, and end up getting more yoghurt for less money. The problem with this change is it’s not just the Mamma’s who have to adjust, but also their entire customer base (many of whom are quite used to taking advantage of the pricing, as the better value sizes sell much better).

Expansion

WHE hopes to open a new kitchen in Mwanza in the near future, so working towards this goal has been taking up an increasing amount of our time. We have recently met with a one new woman’s group, and plan to meet with one or two more, at which point we will decide who we think is most capable of running a kitchen efficiently and effectively. However, before a group can begin operations, we will need to obtain start up funding to purchase the necessary equipment.

To do this, we have been looking through different local, national, and international organizations that give money to like causes. We have found many potential grant opportunities, but most will take at least a couple months (at best) to receive, meaning we would have to leave the finishing touches to future interns. In our favour is that we are also looking for loans of little to no interest in the place of a grant. Many times, when a group is given everything for free, they never understand the full value of what they have, and do not work as hard as then need to to be sustainable. When the money needs to be paid back, it lets them know that failure is a possibility, something we don’t think the Tukwamuane group has ever really felt.

One Month Down, Two To Go

Safari
This last weekend I finally went into the wild on a safari with a group of about 12 other people. Places visited include the Serengeti, which is basically just The Lion King in 3D, the N’gorongoro Crater (formed over 2 million years ago by the volcanic eruption (of a mountain larger then Kilimanjaro) so explosive the whole volcano went with it), one of the most densely populated mammal habitats in the world, and the Olduva gorge, the location of some of the earliest hominid (pre-human) fossils ever found.

Some of the animals sighted include lions, cheetahs, elephants, giraffes, hippopotami, rhinoceros, crocodiles, hyenas, monkeys, baboons, buffalo, warthogs, a fox, flamingos and lots of other birds, to go with the countless numbers of zebras, wildebeests, gazelle and other deer like animals, to name a few. I was surprised at the number of animals that would hang out right near the roads, with our driver even having to swerve and stop quickly a few times just not to not hit one running in front of us. More then once we even saw lions cross the road right between two cars.

Sadly did not get to see any leopards, as we had really hoped to see one up in a tree. Also never saw any hunts/kills, but I hear that those are quite rare to come across.

Only saw one male adult lion, but he was doing what male lions do best. Sleeping, with a quick 10-second burst of something else, which supposedly they do about 700 times a week in “this” season.

We had only seen cheetahs from afar until the last day, when our driver went a little off the path (which can get you in lot of trouble) to a tree hiding four young ones just lying about. This was especially nice as generally any of the more rare animals had about 5-10 cars parked in front of it before we even got there.

As we were camping, when the second day began we spotted a small herd of buffalo grazing maybe 20 meters from our tents, which we all though was pretty neat. This was by far trumped at the next campsite, however. When attempting to build a fire in the dark, someone pointed out an elephant in the bush next to us, where I had just been a little earlier collecting thing to burn. Then a little later, we came across a pair of Zebras just wondering between the tents. The next morning, another elephant was found very close to the campsite, and I almost got to see my first kill. A couple of English people, against the warnings of everyone nearby, decided to go into the bush to find a cell phone lost the night before (not sure why he was in the bush the night before in the first place). After walking maybe 5 meters away from the elephant, we see it start flaring its ears, and even take a couple steps towards the pair (at this point I though they were done, as it looked ready to charge). With everyone yelling at them to “Get Out Of The BUSH!”, they final emerge with the cell phone raised in triumph, to receive a stern warning from the camp ranger. The people most displease with all this were the English guys in our group, who started to see where their country was getting its reputation from (the genius’s almost killed by the elephant are future doctors).

This night at this campsite was also the coldest I have been in a long time, easily worse then any recent memory in Canada. I had heard it was going to be bad, and brought the warmest clothes I had with me. Unfortunately, I didn’t bring anything very warm with me to Africa. Then in addition to being under dressed, due to a situation outside my control my shoes were inaccessible, and for the first extended period in my life I was reduced to wearing socks and flip-flops.


The project
I have been getting many questions/comments regarding yoghurt and the project am working on. I want to start by saying I do not personally make any yoghurt, and do not even spend too much time around the yoghurt-making kitchen.

The main purpose I am here for is to 1) assess the sustainability of the kitchen in Mwanza, as well as the WHE project in its entirety, 2) work on expansion in the Mwanza area, as well as 3) try and put together a general framework for expansion for future groups all over east Africa to use.

So far, most of my effort has gone towards the first objective, as it was a much bigger issue then we first thought when we got here. I’ll begin by saying that most people here don’t think of business in the same way we do in Canada, and generally go about their lives in a very day-to-day fashion. This leads them to have difficulty correctly comparing cash inflows (revenue) with cash outflows (expenses) when thinking in terms of profit, especially when expenses are not paid for immediately.

The long term focus for the yoghurt kitchen in Mwanza has been to get production high enough to help a sufficient amount of people in the community, allow each Mama to take home a good salary, while generating enough left over funds for future investment in other projects or woman’s groups. While production was still not at this desirable level, it was only when examining the kitchens cash records that I found yoghurt sales to be at a consistently lower lever then milk purchases. This meant yogurt was going bad each day, and would either have to be thrown out or distributed to the Mamas families, significantly affecting the kitchens profitability.

This was all quickly evident to the fellow interns I am working with and myself, but the problem was conveying the situation to woman with no formal business training and little education in general, without hurting their confidence in their ability to run the kitchen independently (the goal is more or less to get each kitchen to a sustainable point and move on).

We have since tried to shift the focus away from production to sales, working with the kitchen on ways to increase revenue, while trying to figure out schedules to keep the workload fair. We have seen positive results over the last week, but need to see it over a much longer term before we can be too self-assured.

In regards to my second overriding objective while in Africa, my group has found some contacts for potential groups that could operate a kitchen in the future, and plan to put some meetings together in the near future. Additionally, we are looking into different sources of financing to get these groups going, some of which may come from organizations WHE has worked with in the past. This objective should be the main focus for the rest of my internship, especially during the next month, as there is only so much work we can do with the present kitchen.

The last objectives will mostly wait until the final 2-4 weeks of my time here, and will require me to compile information from many other interns from different kitchens, past and present. The more of an understanding each intern has of the people and business climate in East Africa, the more valuable this framework will be, but this is something that only comes with time. Also, the longer I wait, the more current the information will be, and the more time others have to put together what they think is most valuable.


Sports
Sadly, Argentina is out after a humiliating loss to the Germans (or so I hear, I missed the quarterfinal games while on safari). Now Holland, my #2 team, takes the reigns after their massive upset of Brazil. I know many Germans and Dutch staying in Mwanza at the moment, so that would be a fun final to watch.

As for the Canucks, I think they are looking good for next year after some shrewd moves by Gillis to address the teams weakness’s on the bottom six and insufficient defensive depth. With San Jose and Chicago both losing important players due to cap problems, and Lidstrom and Rafalski both getting a year older in Detroit, I like the Canucks chances of taking the West next year, and hopefully more.

And I guess I’ll throw a way to go Lions in there. Way to Go, Lions!