Oh my goodness!! I am filled from head to toe to with joy to finally be able to say that we have tea in our hands. It doesn’t even feel real, so much is riding on this. We are responsible for more than ourselves now. It really is a little scary to think that something Eavan just started is already a very important part of girls lives. We are both a tad overwhelmed with Eavan being a senior and me a freshman, we both have full plates and are having to majorly adjust. Though we know the outcome will completely be worth it knowing that we are helping the girls so significantly.
Cooking the Old Fashion Way
Later that day we went back to our temporary home and tea plantation where most of our little group went back to work for the rest of the day. While Beatrice and I stayed back to start making dinner. We started by making a fire using branches we had gathered, the “stove” we used was two large rocks put next to each other with a pot placed on top and the fire going underneath. Beatrice and I were making beans and we started by sorting, washing and soaking them. Then after getting the water to boil we began the cooking of the beans which continued for about 4 to 6 hours. After the bean were ready we let them cool and bon appetit!
Our Little Field Trip
Our second day in Muranga we went on a “field trip” to one of the tea processing factories with some friends we made the day before (Beatrice, Agnyss, and Carol). At the factory we went on a tour around the whole building. We got to se the whole drying and blending process from the tea leaves from being freshly plucked yesterday to being completely dried and ground. At the factories they make 4 different grades of tea each one goes through a little bit different grinding process. The thinker the ground the lower the grade, and the highest grade grounds are the definitely the strongest tea. We also did a taste test of all the different grades of tea, and let me just say that even the lowest grade tea was too strong to drink alone. Which is why drinking the tea alone is very uncommon in Kenya, the tea is usually drunk with more than half of the cup filled with whole milk and a few spoonfuls of sugar.
