Making Soap with Local Women's group

Jpe Moyo Local Women's Group, Majengo, Moshi

As part of the free school/nursery volunteer project, the local women who started the group meet twice a week to discuss ways to make money.  They has been a bit of bitching between the ladies and the group has split.  Some have gone off with the tailor and the Leader is making most of the bag making profit.  The Chickens kept in the house on the property have been sold now, and they are over making bracelets, so I came up with the idea of perhaps making soap with Aloe Vera (as this grows everywhere).  

I have never made soap before, so google became my best friends for the last few days as I researched whether I could actually make soap from shop bought soap (as the actual process from scratch is complicated and God Knows where we can buy the ingredients from in town!!)

So I saw this bar of soap in a coffee shop in town and bought it for 2000 Tsh ($1.25) and showed them it as an idea. (This soap was made 16 hrs drive away by a convent and proceeds go to the orphanage there)

 

I explained the process I had researched, and they were happy to give it a go.  My Swahili is limited, but my charades actions are awesome, so are my drawings to explain!

I bought 2 bars of the cheapest soap (sabuni) I could find in the supermarket for 900 Tsh unfortunately, it was all scented, but I though - oh well, it's an experiment! I bought some coconut oil for 1000Tsh and some cling film for 2900Tsh = 5700 Tsh (approx $3.50 total) and the women arrived at school with their Aloe Vera, pots, and fire and so we began... (the kids were forgotten about today sadly, but they were happy playing for longer than normal, and even quite interested in what we were doing)

Aloe Vera Juice added to melted soap
+ 4 spoons of coconut oil

We grated the soap bars, covered them in water to soften for a while and then heated the mixture to boiling until melted.

Melting the soap

Aloe Vera, also grated and then filtered for the juice.

Pouring into the molds

Molds made from a variety of shapes

Leaving them to set

I am really hoping that the women will now be able to sell their product.  We also discussed other possibilities, such as adding passionfruit seeds, oat, lemon, mint, honey and whatever local produce they can get. 2 bars plus other ingredients cost me 5700 Tsh and we made 10 bars. So there is some profit to be made, if they can sell locally and to Mzungu (white people!)

Life at Hostel Hoff

Life at Hostel Hoff:

Main Hostel and eating area

Breakfast is served at 7 - 9am.  Most of the 30 volunteers are gone by 8.30 to their various projects.

Most return by 1 ish, head into town for lunch and a wander.  Returning for dinner at 6pm.

Volunteers are mainly Danish, with a few Norwegians, Canadians, American and Brits thrown in.

Petch doing the Laundry.  Although it is included in the Hostel Price, we have to do our own underwear - BY HAND! There is no washing machine! 'How do I do it?", he asks. "Just scrub away at the bum and ball area", I reply!

Our building. Room next to showers and toilets.  Very essential in the rain.   

The food at the Hostel is amazing.  The cook cooks off 2 gas hobs for 30 people.  We almost always have a salad, a meat dish and then rice or pasta, as well as fresh fruit in season.  At the moment it is mango's from the garden, pineapple, watermelon, avocado, and always bananas.  There are 5 mango trees out the front.

Hostel Hoff, Moshi, Tanzania

The first 3 months of our volunteering in Africa experience begins in Moshi.  

Moshi is a small town about 40 mins from base of Kilimanjaro. We can rarely see the Mountain, as it is always covered in cloud.  We've had the occasional sighting, and it's very snow covered at the moment. 

Hostel Hoff allows people from all over the world to come and volunteer in the town (or surrounding villages).  

First day in Moshi, Weds Feb 5th.

Tour of town with Mary (local and hostel manager) Showed all good restaurants, banks, bought internet sticks/phone sims.

First day of work, Thurs Feb 6th

Emma's Day:  

On a packed Dulla Dulla (minibus for locals) to Machega Village.  Walk to building with 7, 6-7 yr olds and 2, 14 yr olds in a room about the size of a king size bed! A small blackboard and some wooden benches.
No teacher arrives.  We chant ABC as this is still on the board and I try to introduce some games from my French teaching experience!! Interesting! Some skipping and more alphabet chanting and counting, followed by some further classroom counting! Resources very limited. Children have books and badly sharpened pencils!

Children on floor using benches to write on

Brenda, 13 and Happy, 14 copying from my kindle. 

 Esther, 4, Iddy, 6, Shkuru, 6, and Raheme, 5, Clara, 4, and Aziza,7

The Classroom

The teacher is called Nelson, a 20 yr old local Tanzanian volunteer, not a teacher by profession.  He finally arrives close to the end of the morning and takes us to his house for lunch cooked by Aunt. Nice house in middle of the village. Nelsons English is limited but we get by.

I am placed with a Canadian girl called Michelle, who has been on this project for about 2 weeks longer than I.  She is not a teacher either, and is grateful of some of my ideas for the classroom.



We make 2 house visits also with Arman, the Project Coordinator and translator. Visit 1 was to Romano, 72 yrs with HIV and very bad asthma.  We will get him a puffer in town. Visit 2 was to an Older lady, I forget her name, but has a lump on back of neck and a terrible cough.  It is inappropriate to take photo's at these visits.

After a long, hot and dusty walk back to Hostel Hoff there are BBQ preparations and then a pretty heavy downpour and storm! 
The electricity cuts out regularly too! Even without the storm.

Petch, at nearly 5pm has not returned home from a trip to the village where he is building houses for them. Today he was buying materials to start the building of houses for people with sticks, mud and a tin roof as a home.  When he arrives back at the Hostel, He has been for several beers with Marion and Arne. Arne is live on Manager of Hostel and is girlfriend, Marion, is running Rich's project about an hour away.  They had a VERY eventful day...

Petch's day:

I'm building houses. 11 of them by the end of April....which aint going to happen. The project is in the foothills of Kilimanjaro, about an hour from Moshi, up a mountain road, "The Mountain Road of Death".

Day 1's task was to pick up two loads of bricks...sounds simple. We hire a small truck (just a bit bigger than a ute) and head off into the sticks to find the brick yard. The yard consists of a mud field with towers of 'Bricks'. They use a mould to squash wet mud/clay into the shape of a brick. These are then stacked as high as a house, with caverns below for firewood. The whole thing is then set alight and the bricks bake. This means that when they're ready for collection by us they're still hotter than the sun. Luckily, the locals you hire to load the truck have asbestos hands and feet, and they climb up the brick towers, start chucking them about and loading the truck. 

Loading at the Brick Yard

Bricks and maker

 After about an hour of madness, including various truck drivers almost reversing at speed into the brick towers, and the towers occasionally collapsing in places due to the caverns below, we're loaded.

Off we go, but before we do, we have to pay 'Brick Tax'! Sounds like they're pulling my plonker, but apparently it's real.

So we head off up "The Mountain Road of Death", three of us in the cab and the Village Leader on the back of the truck. Bouncing along this rule for miles we hit a steep hill, the truck can't reach the top. The driver tries to rectify the situation by taking longer and longer run ups. Everything in Tanzania can be solved with more power. 

My arsehole is quivering with each attempt as there's a 100 foot cliff about a metre from the road. My hand is hovering over the door lever so I can open it and jump out should the truck get too close to the edge. The truck then almost reaches the top before coming to a halt. 10 seconds later after we've jumped out, the truck slides uncontrolled about 20 metres down the hill, is a nats nut away from pulverising a local's motorbike, and then hits a mound and comes to stop. 

The whole truck is leaning over to one side and looks precariously like it could topple which would then send it down the cliff. It's decided we need to unload some bricks. 200 bricks removed, everyone is knackered. It's at this point I think "What the f**k am I doing!". Stuck on a random mountain in the middle of nowhere, absolutely drained, trying to get some stupid piece of sh*t truck up some b*stard hill!. The last time I had this feeling I was getting cramp whilst lying in a puddle of mud, stuck half-way down the mud-mile at a Tough Mudder. 

Eventually we get the truck up the hill, unload the bricks, drive back to pick up the other bricks still at the bottom of the hill, then unload them. This whole episode took about 6 hours. The truck driver then looks at us and asks if we want to go and pick-up the second load. Our reaction was "F**k that for a game of soldiers". The second batch was left for the next day. Driving back we decided to ride in the back of the truck as at least this way we could jump off "The Brick Truck of Death" in a second. Scary as it was, I've never felt so alive! 

Unloading the 200 bricks. I'm on the side instead of the top as then I can jump off easily should the truck start to slide/tip.

Our "Brick Truck of Death" named confusingly "The Sound of Japan". Drive must be a big J-pop fan.

It took us 6 hours to make one delivery of 700 bricks. We'll need 22 brick deliveries, 11 sand deliveries and 11 cement deliveries. Then we need to build the b*stard things! It's going to be a long 3 months! Hardships aside, I've loved every second of it and we haven't been here a week yet!