My main goal for this week was to get production moved (completely) to the yogurt room in the apartment. That is, transferring the cooking portion of the yogurt production from kitchen stove in our personal kitchen to two gas burners in the yogurt room. Brian and Cynthia bought the burners during their stay. On Monday I traveled down to the gas store to buy the rest of the equipment needed for the change and that afternoon I assembled the items.
The new set-up involves one gas tank that has a single hose connected to a “Y” splitter that feeds two gas burners.

A second gas tank will be purchased in the future to act as a back-up when the other one becomes empty. In the meantime our personal gas tank (for our kitchen stove) will take this role.
Meanwhile, to construct the equipment I had to cut the rubber tubing and attach it to the separate components using metal ties. After affixing all the parts, I checked for any leaks and luckily there were none. The next step was to see if the gas burners could get the water hot enough to boil the water in the large metal basins. When Brian and Cynthia were here, they planned on using electric burners – but after testing the system out, the water could not get hot enough for sterilizing the milk. However, this wasn’t the case again. The water got hot enough and all was in check to begin this arrangement on Tuesday.
That day, Mama Joyce and Hawa were very pleased with the new room when they arrived for production. One of the problems with using our kitchen stove was the height of the stovetop; since the milk needs to be constantly stirred (to prevent scorching) it can become a very tiresome process. Now the mamas can cook sitting on a stool and have the milk below them – making it much easier.

Throughout the week I showed the various mamas how the new burners worked. They were all amazed that no matches were needed to ignite the flame; the burners come included with an automatic sparker. They also seemed to enjoy working in the room itself; there are several windows which provide a lot of natural light and air circulation. Another good aspect of the yogurt room was the door that leads onto the front balcony. Now, when the families pick up their yogurt, they can go directly to this door and do not have to walk through the apartment. I noticed that this aspect and the natural separation from my working quarters adds to the independence of yogurt production to the women – a necessary step for moving forward with this project.
I observed that one of the drawbacks with the new burners is that it’s more prone to fires. I made it very clear to the mamas not to push the burners close to the adjacent walls (which have yogurt-production instructions affixed to it). If the flames got too close to these items, it could spell trouble. After Tuesday’s production, we also changed to arrangement of the burners so the hoses were running parallel to the wall, not perpendicular – reason being we didn’t want people to trip. In the near future, I am hoping to do a review with the mamas on fire safety.
Overall, the new system seems to be going well so far – the mamas collectively enjoy working (entirely) in the yogurt room. Hopefully when production is moved into the kitchen in Mabatini, the mamas will feel the same way.

This week, Kivulini had the grand opening for their new restaurant, called “Kivulini Kitchen” (or KK). The restaurant features two separate eating areas, one serving local food and the other, international. Dallas and I had visited the restaurant before during construction and we could tell it was going to be a big success. The restaurant is situated in a very quiet but populated area on the foot of a large rocky hill. In addition, the restaurant has a small children’s area complete with a Tarzan-like swing, painted animals and a small fort made from bamboo. Before coming to KK, we had never seen a restaurant in Mwanza that even remotely caters to children.
One of the driving forces for getting the yogurt production moved in the yogurt room was because Marcus (who was in charge of building KK) was interested in our kitchen stove for the restaurant. He said that the one they had bought was a bit too small to make large quantities of bread. Marcus and I agreed that we could swap stoves at no cost to one another. On Wednesday, he arrived at the apartment with the Swiss cook for KK where they inspected the mechanics of the stove. Overall, they weren’t pleased with how the oven couldn’t really change its temperature with the gas, as it was always on “full”. Therefore, Marcus and the Swiss cook decided that they would use the stove they already had for the kitchen, and if it was too small for their needs, they would go ahead and make the swap.
That day however Marcus also asked if he could purchase 5L of yogurt for the restaurant’s opening on Saturday. Our first customer! I could only sell him regular yogurt however, not probiotics. Since he wanted it for Saturday, the yogurt had to be made tomorrow (Thursday) at the latest. After Marcus left I contemplated the potential problems for selling the yogurt. For instance, would the Thursday mamas expect money for making this extra yogurt? If I were to pay them for their services, how would the other mamas feel? Surely they may want some of the portions. In addition, would there be enough money to go to each mama; if so, how much? After weighing these options I thought that the best thing to do was to make the yogurt myself for this week – I didn’t want to rush into any decisions I didn’t have enough information on making. I figured that this way, even if the mamas did find out, I would say that I was not profiting from making the yogurt and instead everything will go directly back into the project (which is true).
Marcus said that yogurt is on the menu at KK and that he would be interested in buying around 5L every week. Maimuna and I arranged to hold a meeting for the following Monday to go over this issue with the yogurt mamas. In addition, Maimuna said she would invite a Tanzanian-intern (specializing in agriculture and business) to attend and offer input.

The rest of the week went relatively smoothly, though it seemed I was always on the go. I returned to my Swahili lessons on Monday, which I had postponed for about 2 weeks. Throughout the week I assisted Kivulini edit various proposals, emails and their website content; and on Friday I helped hand out invitations to various members in the community inviting them to the opening of KK
Friday night’s party/opening was reserved for Kivulini staff and close friends only. That night, when I arrived at KK, I couldn’t believe how much work they put into the property. The kitchen and souvenir shop was freshly painted, the kibanda was complete and the play area was already busy with children. The dinner tables were all nicely put on various levels throughout the adjacent hill and all was set for what was a great night.

- Jonathan