barista training?!

Well, by some sort of miracle, construction on the cafe site started this week AND the espresso machine was successfully installed in the liquoring room so the past two days I have actually been able to do some barista training with Mageche, the cafe manager, and Denis, the lead roaster. Of course, we don't have the hopper for our espresso grinder. Nor all the milk that was requested and budgeted for. And I wasn't given any of the requested equipment for viewing training films like Espresso 101. And people have been constantly coming in asking for cappuccino, or dragging my students away to take care of other matters. But I've actually been able to do what I came here to do, which is pretty incredible. I woke up on the wrong side of the bed this morning, but somehow, probably due to a latte, I ended up on the right side.

Mageche had previous experience as a barista, and has spent the past few months reading everything he can, and the past month training in South Africa, so he is pretty competent. He also seems to be a good teacher, very comfortable explaining things as well as serving demanding and impatient KNCU employees. I feel very comfortable leaving the cafe in Mageche's hands. Denis was a bit tired and overwhelmed, having spent most of yesterday roasting and cupping before training started, but he was a good student, picking things up quickly and doing well. I think he has a lot of potential as a barista. So despite all the continued frustrations, it's been a pretty good and rewarding couple days and I feel better about the state things will be in when I leave, and about what I have contributed.

Tomorrow I leave for a week in Zanzibar, coaching the national barista champion to prepare for the World Barista Championship, to be held next month in London. Then back to Moshi for two days before returning the the US.

Wazungu Overload

Upon my return to Moshi I got to spend a couple days with a delegation organized by Just Coffee, a worker-owned coffee roasting cooperative based in Madison, Wisconsin. Apparently I really like people from Wisconsin because I thought they were great. We talked about coffee and coops and cafes. It was energizing and I felt I could openly discuss with them my frustrations and criticisms of KNCU and Equal Exchange, while they honestly shared their feelings about Just Coffee and the farmer coops they’d been visiting. I’m very curious to learn more about Just Coffee’s worker-owner model, particularly as it relates to non-owner employees. They are 1/10th the size of EE and it sounds like far from perfect, but the coops could probably learn a few things from each other. And I’m sure have. The group was only in Moshi for a few days but they had spent a week in Ethiopia, a week in Uganda, and were ending with a week in Tanzania. They may have just been a bunch of coffee tourists, but they were my kind of people: curious and community-minded, taking advantage of an opportunity to learn more deeply about the world and the industry in which they are a part.

On Saturday I met another group of wazungu visiting KNCU, from Café Direct in the UK. I didn’t get to spend as much time with them but they seemed pretty cool as well. The two groups had very similar itineraries at KNCU, but on different days so their paths didn’t cross. I made an effort to bring them together on Saturday night.

Being introduced to these groups as a representative of Equal Exchange, spending two weeks talking about Equal Exchange Café with Kate, and then discussing EE and coops with the Just Coffee group has gotten the gears moving in my head again. I’m thinking about EE cafes, and with the same passion and angst I had in Boston. Kate jokes that it’s only in body that I don’t work there anymore, and in a way it’s true. I’m constantly trying to stay updated on the café’s goings-on, and thinking of ways to help it. Both the EE and KNCU café projects are so rich with potential that it’s all the more frustrating when they fall short.

You can't get there in a car

Kate was sick on Thursday night but by then we had already arranged to leave the next day so at 7 am on Friday a dhow (with a motor and, sadly, no sail) picked us up from the beach in front of our hotel. It was a wet and choppy ride to Zanzibar that I somehow imagine would have been more pleasant if we had been sailing (and certainly if Kate had been feeling better). But it was finally a clear and sunny day and I discovered I had a knack for telling time by the sun, though it certainly helped that we were practically on the equator. Four hours later we arrived at Kendwa, which, with five people on the beach, seemed crowded and overrun to us. Still, there were pristine white beaches and warm, clear, calm turquoise water. We stayed at Kendwa Rocks, which Kara had warned me was a bit spring break-y, and I instantly knew what she meant and that I would probably hate it in the high season. But it was low season and had nice and affordable bandas (we ended up with one with a hammock in front) and a nice bar and restaurant and nightly beach bonfires. It was quite lovely really, though the first night the mosquitoes were ravenous. We happened to be there for their monthly full moon party, which we stopped by for a little bit, but found ourselves falling asleep so we left early.

Friday was the only really sunny day we had at Kendwa, though we didn’t really mind the rain. When it rained it rarely poured, and when it’s so hot the rain is never that unpleasant. We had kind of turned into beach bums at Pangani and that trend continued at Kendwa. We didn’t do much of anything though our one must-do activity was to visit the turtle aquarium at the tip of the island. At first I thought we would walk up the beach but by the time we got our act together the tide was high and we would have to cut through an exclusive resort and then through the bush on the coral cliff. I thought with two of us we would be fine on the trail, but Kate was more sensible and cautious so we turned back. Instead we made elephants and turtles in the sand and went swimming. The next day, though the tide was low, it was raining, so we took a taxi to the aquarium to see the green turtles. They have about 20 turtles that they keep until they are about 20 years old so that they have a better chance of survival and the endangered population can recover. We got to feed seaweed to some of the bigger ones (they are called green turtles because the seaweed they eat makes their fat green) and we got to hold little 4-day-old ones!

After three days luxuriating in paradise, we finally returned to the real world beyond the gates of the resort and went to Stone Town (which is still in Vacationland). Our first stop was the Zanzibar Coffee House, which is closed for renovations for the month of May. However, as I will be returning there at the end of the month to help coach the national barista champion for the World Barista Competition, I got in touch with the café manager, with whom we had lunch at another café and talked about coffee. She directed us to a lovely hotel run by a friend of hers, where we had two double beds, air conditioning, en suite toilet and shower with hot water, a private porch, free internet access, a free welcome drink on the roof, and delicious breakfast.

Monday evening we walked along the shore to Forodhani Gardens, a beautiful and clean park along the water where we bought some fresh and delicious seafood street food for dinner, as well as fresh-squeezed sugar cane juice. We watched the sun set as the park filled with hungry families and hungry tourists. We spent Tuesday wandering around town, getting lost and found, telling guides we weren’t interested, exploring the market, avoiding getting run over by bikes and scooters, eating passionfruit gelato and drinking passion juice. Stone Town is definitely my kind of city – small, cute, and old, with plenty of fresh seafood and great ocean views and breezes. After a sundowner at Mercury’s (named for Freddie Mercury, who was born in Zanzibar), we returned to the Gardens for dinner, where we learned how to say “Obama” in sign language.

Wednesday morning we wandered around a bit more before our ferry to Dar. Kate had a final bottle of Bitter Lemon and a final glass of passion juice, while I did some research into signature drinks. Then we had a short but bumpy boat ride to big, hot, muggy Dar. We checked me into the YWCA, got some food and my bus ticket for the next day, and a few hours later Kate flew back to America. The next day I boarded a bus and returned to Moshi.

Almost paradise

From Mombo we hopped on a bus to Tanga, a small, flat, quiet city on the coast. My first priority in Tanga after checking in to the hotel was to see the ocean. Unfortunately the main part of Tanga faces a bay, so I would have to wait a day to see the open ocean. Most of our brief time in Tanga was spent in the company of a young “guide” who called himself Mr. Africa. He was friendly and helpful and never led us astray or asked for money but he was quietly persistent and we had trouble shaking him off. We considered spending a day in Tanga, renting bikes and perhaps going to visit some caves, but we were sore and tired from climbing down the mountain and Monday was rainy so after sleeping in and taking the opportunity to check our email and visit the ATM we headed to Pangani. With Mr. Africa, of course. I had mentioned that we were hoping to arrange a dhow to take us from Pangani to Zanzibar, something I knew we could organize through our hotel, but he took us to the Pangani Cultural Tourism Office. For the sake of convenience and because Mr. Africa had been helpful and would probably get a commission, we booked our boat there, after some careful negotiation on my part. Then we hopped on the ferry across the Pangani River and headed to the Beach Crab Resort, another German-run place where we were the only guests.

We stayed at Beach Crab for three nights. It was gray and rainy most of our time there, but still warm and incredibly quiet and relaxing. We went for walks on the beach and read and napped and sang songs and drank gin and tonics and had delicious 3-course dinners. I tried swimming once and the water was warm but there was too much seaweed and sand being brought up by the waves. The worst part was the tap water which made our skin feel waxy and tasted terrible for brushing our teeth. Still it was beautiful and except for some cute and friendly kids who were amused by our coconut horse, there was absolutely no hassle. We could have stayed longer, but Zanzibar was calling.

Defying gravity

After a few days of anxiously waiting for the planes to fly again because some volcano in Iceland decided to erupt, Kate arrived on schedule on Wednesday, April 21. The subsequent two weeks were spent traveling through northeastern Tanzania to Zanzibar. But first, of course, Kate had to learn all about coffee, since she is a barista traveling to an origin country. First stop on Thursday – Kahawa Shamba. It wasn’t much different from last time I was there – we even had the same guide – but we went to a different farm, brewed coffee through a sieve, and got to see a couple red cherries, though still not enough to pick and depulp. After returning from the farm tour, I showed Kate to KNCU and around town, stopping at the Coffee Shop and the market and running into many people I may or may not have known who wanted to talk to me. That night we made dinner and I introduced Kate to Konyagi (local gin) and Bitter Lemon, her new favorite soda.

Friday we headed out of Moshi (finally!) and into the Usambara Mountains. On the bus we sat next to a nice teacher from Lushoto, the town we were going to. In Lushoto we stayed at Muller’s Mountain Lodge, a nice German-run place where the only other guest was an American volunteer-teaching at the local university. We were very welcomed by the friendly staff. After dinner we played cards by the fire while our new friends Stephan and Ramadan watched curiously.


On Saturday we hiked to Irente Viewpoint, stopping en route at Irente Farm for a picnic lunch of farm-made cheese, quark, jam, and rye bread. Kate played with chameleons along the way. At the farm we read a bit about the history of coffee cultivation in the Usambaras. The Germans had tried to grow Coffea Liberica, without much luck, but there are still many coffee trees left in the area for me to have fun spotting and identifying. We spent another night at Muller’s.

On Sunday Mr. Muller dropped us off at the Cultural Tourism Office, where we arranged a guided overnight hike to Carter’s Point, where an American who liked paragliding had built a little cottage at a point at the edge of the mountains overlooking the plains and sisal plantations. After exploring the Lushoto market and eating lunch, we hiked out of town, through ridiculously steep farmland, and before long arrived at the point. After checking out the view, we napped, and then enjoyed a cup of tea on the porch of our hut as the sun set. After tea we enjoyed a warm shower in a place with no running water or electricity. Rustic luxury. Then we gazed at the stars while waiting for dinner. Unfortunately I was starting to feel ill, probably from something I ate at lunch or the tea water. Kate reports that the food on the top of the mountain was probably the best on the trip, but I only ate a few bites and then went to bed, while Kate stayed up talking to our guide and reading. I was sick in the night but by the morning I felt much better, though not completely. I managed to eat a chapati and drink some smokey water before we started our hike down the mountain. It had rained a bit in the night so the steep slopes we descended were slippery. I basically slid down the mountain. After hours of walking through beautiful farmland with friendly farmers we finally arrived in Mombo, the town on the main road where we’d be getting the bus. I’ve never been so grateful for flat land, or bottled water. Kate thought the hike was probably the highlight of the trip.

safari njema

On Sunday afternoon, April 11, I left Moshi to go on safari. First we picked up my travel companions, 18-year-old Rachael from England and 19-year-old Boldwin from Holland, who are volunteering at an orphanage outside of Moshi. From there we drove out, through the dark and endless countryside, to Mto wa Mbu (“River of Mosquitoes”), the village outside of Lake Manyara National Park After a walk through the village and a drink (Safari beer for me, since I was on Safari) at a local bar, we had a late dinner and then went to bed in our clean and basic ensuite room at Fig Resort. We woke up early Monday morning for an early morning game drive in the park. En route to the hot springs we saw plenty of baboons, some giraffes, zebras, impalas, and buffalos. But really we were looking for elephants and some of the famous tree-climbing lions. We stopped to eat our boxed breakfast at the hot springs, and then continued deeper into the park, in search of lions. And then we got stuck in a muddy ditch.

At first I stayed in the car, reading a little, not sure what I could do to help and afraid to get out of the car lest a wild animal suddenly appear. But eventually we all got out to try and help but it was futile. The left rear wheel kept spinning and going deeper into the mud, and the 4-wheel drive wasn’t working right so the other wheels with traction and power couldn’t pull it out. Finally another car appeared. They had a jack that we were able to use to lift the car up and then throw rocks in the hole under the tire. With the help of the rocks and 7 people pushing we were able to get the car out of the hole. And into another one. So then again we jacked up the car, threw rocks under the wheel, and pushed it out, for good this time. By then it was about time for lunch, and the car had to go to the garage to get its 4WD checked out, so we headed back to the gate. En route, we came across a large herd of elephants on both sides of the road. After marveling at them for a bit, we continued on. On the final stretch of road through the jungle, there was a single large male elephant, walking towards us and blocking any way forward. We ended up having to back down the road about a kilometer before the elephant went off into the trees, allowing us to pass. In the late afternoon (after my first hot shower since I’ve been in Tanzania, since I’m never patient enough for the hot water at my house) we went back for another drive, stopping by the hippo pool. Unfortunately they were a bit far out and submerged, so we couldn’t see them very well, though there were also lots of pelicans which was cool.

Monday night we stayed at the same hotel, and then Tuesday morning after breakfast we headed west to the Serengeti. We drove through Ngorongoro Conservation Area (but not the crater) en route, where giraffes and zebras and buffalo and cattle and Maasai all peacefully co-exist. The conservation area was originally part of Serengeti National Park, but except for staff and researchers, people aren’t allowed to live in national parks, so the Maasai protested their displacement and got the status of the area changed. They can live in the Ngorongoro area so long as they don’t upset the balance of the ecosystem.

On the other side of Ngorongoro we passed into the Serengeti, a wild open prairie that made me think of what the Great Plains must have been like to Lewis & Clark and the travelers on the Oregon Trail. Considering how much trouble our LandCruiser had on roads more worn than those of the Oregon Trail, I can only marvel at the journey by Conestoga wagon.

Along the dusty and straight main road to the Serengeti gate, we saw two pairs of lions mating in the distance. We also got to see the wildebeest migration crossing the road. The line of wildebeests extended to the horizon in either direction, spotted occasionally by some zebras or antelopes. Zebras and wildebeests often live and travel together because the zebras cut down the grass so its easier for the wildebeests to eat, and the wildebeests are better at detecting predators (with their noses – their site is pretty bad). We stopped at the gate for boxed lunch and bathrooms, and to check out the view of the plain from the top of the hill. We then spent the afternoon driving around en route to the campsite, seeing plenty of gazelles and elephants and giraffes, but nothing really new or exciting. At the campsite we set up tent, had dinner, played cards, and chatted with some other travelers around a campfire before bed. Going to the bathroom in the middle of the night was terrifying because of the animal sounds around us, and in retrospect I don’t know how or why I walked all the way to the squat toilet rather than just squatting outside my tent.

Wednesday morning we woke up early for an early morning game drive. We weren’t the first ones out but then everyone in front of us stopped to take pictures of some buffalo, which were old news to us, so we took the lead. We ended up on a muddy road through the plain. I thought I saw the footprints of a big cat on the road, so I think our driver may have been following those. But then we got stuck. Another car came slipping and sliding down the road and we warned them not to continue so they turned around and drove out through the grass. They probably couldn’t have helped us out anyway because they didn’t have any traction themselves. We weren’t completely stuck either. Eventually we followed their lead and drove onto the grass to get out. But then right as we were about to get back on the road, we got stuck in the mud in the grass. So we got out and we tore up some grass to put under the wheels and we pushed and we got nowhere. Eventually another car came with a chain, and they pulled us out. And told us to go see a leopard in a tree. So we went and saw the leopards in the trees and some lions in a tree and finally got back to camp for a late breakfast.

After breakfast we drove to a hippo pool that was much cooler than the one in Manyara, because we were closer and there were more of them and we could look down at them in the pool. So we watched the hippos for a bit and then drove around and saw some gazelles and giraffes but nothing too exciting. In the late afternoon after lunch we drove out to the Maasai Kopjes, searching for lions. No luck of course, though the landscape was very “Lion King” and I had the soundtrack playing in my head the whole time. We also saw some ostriches. We stayed at the same campsite another night. This time there may have been lions in the area at night. Luckily I didn’t have to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night.

Thursday morning after breakfast and packing up our tents we went on another game drive around the Simba Kopjes en route to the gate. Of course there were no lions hiding out there. Boldwin was getting tired of looking for lions and wanted to see the wildebeest migration. He didn’t seem to remember that we had seen it on our way in and would see it again on the other side of the gate whether we wanted to or not. Finally, on our way to the gate, right off the main road, we found a pride of lions lying in the bushes. Actually, someone else found them, but we found their cars. Eventually the other cars left so our driver decided to drive on the grass a bit to scare the lions. We got the male lion to come out and move from the back on the bushes to the front by the road. Then the driver opened his door and got the lion to jump at us and growl (though remain at a safe distance). Rather than pressing the photo button on my camera when this happened, my reflex was to press the power button. Oh well. Eventually we saw enough of the lions and continued on to the gate for lunch. On the other side of the gate, on our way to Ngorongoro, we saw the wildebeests again, as predicted. At one point, in the boundaries of Ngorongoro, we drove off onto a side road to get a closer look, before continuing on to our campsite on the rim of the crater.

It was cold and rainy on the rim of the crater, though fortunately the rain did not start until after dinner. I wore layers and drank lots of tea. The two other groups there that night had been at the same campsite in Serengeti the night before. After dinner we played Danish Trivial Pursuit with them until I was too tired and cold. My comprehension and pronunciation of the Danish clues was not as bad as I had expected. Luckily only one person actually knew Danish (the Dane who brought the game), so he translated everything.

In the morning we woke up early, had breakfast and packed up, before heading into the crater. Of the three parks I would most recommended Ngorongoro Crater because you see lots of different animals and all of them pretty close. The only animal not in the crater is giraffe, because there are no acacia trees, but they live outside the crater in the conservation area so you can still see them. We saw a lake full of flamingoes, some zebras and wildebeests, and some old male buffalo and lions. Then, near a herd of wildebeests, there were a bunch of cars stopped, and there were two female lions hiding in the bushes, looking for breakfast. Unfortunately for us and the lions, the wildebeests smelled the threat and moved away. But then the lions decided to walk out into the road, right up against the cars, which was incredibly exciting.

Eventually they moved on and so did we. In the middle of a herd of wildebeests and zebras that was blocking the road, we all decided we had to pee. So I squatted behind the car while a zebra watched. After this pit stop we drove on. In the distance we spotted four rhinos and we think a baby rhino, but it was a little too far to be completely sure. Eventually we drove off to the picnic area for lunch. I spotted a water tank so I figured we must be close to the picnic area; I started looking around carefully to see what the amenities might be. Instead of a picnic site I saw an old male lion hiding in the bushes not far from the road. This lion was especially exciting because I found it, not some other car or even someone else in my car. When we stopped to look at it we noticed there was an old female even closer to the road on the other side. So we watched them for a bit but they didn’t do much and then we continued down the hill to the other side of the water tank where the picnic area was. We had to eat in the car so that the eagles didn’t steal our lunch. Then we went back to the lions, who were now on the same side of the road. As we watched they moved right next to each other right by the road and were very cute. So we watched them for awhile and took pictures and my camera which had been acting up all week, saying the batteries were dead when they weren’t, finally gave up. But conveniently those were the last animals we saw. After looking at the lions for a bit we headed out of the crater, out of the park, and back to Moshi in time for dinner.

building a brand

The past week has been spent in an intensive market research and branding seminar with consultants from KIT, the Royal Tropical Institute of the Netherlands. The workshop started slow, with lectures on market research. I found the initial classroom aspects a bit dull; it didn't help that I was suffering from a renewed bout of homesickness. The first afternoon we went to Arusha to interview consumers in supermarkets. Unfortunately due to the holiday many of the supermarkets were closed by the time we got there. Seeking coffee drinkers who spoke English comfortably, I ended up at Africafe where I enjoyed a decent but expensive latte, complete with rosetta, and stared longingly at their majestic La Marzocco GB5. Energized by my latte, I enjoyed the chance to interview coffee drinkers. The major finding of our combined research, in the stores, on the streets, and in the cafe, was that almost all coffee drinkers in Tanzania drink Africafe instant coffee. It's quick and easy and tastes good (I personally disagree with the last point, but apparently it's good for instant at least). This definitely poses a challenge for KNCU because the ground coffee market is just a small section of the small coffee market. But as we learnt in our focus group blind taste test on Tuesday, we have a superior product that both coffee people and Africafe drinkers prefer, and which retailers and institutions are interested in purchasing. The market may be small but there's definitely interest in our product. I think there's a lot of potential for KNCU Gold, rebranded as Union Coffee. The trick will be promoting our product to get people to try it in the first place, and then maybe even convincing them that making coffee from roast and ground beans is almost as quick and easy as instant, and tastes so much better.

The workshop definitely got more interesting by Day 4, when we finally started working on branding, developing a brand key, brainstorming names, exploring the 5 Ps - price, product, placement, promotion, pack, thinking about slogan and promise and logo. After plodding through research and theory, we had finally reached the action portion of our week. Ideas were shared, designs made, things happened. What the follow-up will be is to be determined. We lost about half the workshop participants after the first day, but I think the people who remained throughout the week are pretty dedicated and hard working and have what it takes to see this project through, provided they continue to get enough support from the managers and board of KNCU to make things happen.

In other news, I leave tomorrow on safari to Lake Manyara, Serengeti, and Ngorongoro Crater. I'm off in search of lions and elephants.

coffee talk

Tuesday I headed out of town again to visit Mama Mary Machange, the farmer I had met while visiting primary societies the other week. She lives in Uuwo, a little village just past Mwika, a town notable for all the bananas and mangos being brought there and loaded onto trucks. I was a little anxious because this was my first time traveling outside Moshi on my own, and I didn't know exactly where in Uuwo to find her, but it ended up being very easy. Conveniently I have picked a friend who lives on the main road, which, though not paved, is still passable in the rains. Over coffee, chapati, and farm fresh bananas, I asked her questions about her farm and her life. Although her English is pretty good, especially considering she has no education past primary school, I still struggled to formulate some of my questions in a way that I could get the kind of answer I was looking for, and was often unable to press for a deeper answer. But I also ended up with some answers I wasn't explicitly looking for that were just as valuable. I wanted to learn more about the co-op, and what it means to Mary to be a part of it, so I was trying to ask why she had gone to the meeting with the Dutch lady where I had met her. I didn't get that answer, but she ended up talking about gender, and being a woman in the co-op. In that coop of 867 members, only 52 are women. My guess is that those 52 are all widows like Mary. But Mary noted that the coop used to not listen to the women at all, but now they are. This is true in the courts of Tanzania as well - Mary noted that her husband had had other children, sons, who had wanted the property when he died, but now the magistrates recognize Mary's property rights. I asked her why the coops have started listening to women, and she said it was because of the world decision, that women are like men. That's progress and globalization at its best for you.

The anthropologist in me wants very much to spend more time in Uuwo learning about Mama Machange and her life as a farmer, beyond conversation in the living room and a brief walk around the farm. We will see.

Yesterday I met with Stephen Vick of Sustainable Harvest, a coffee importer that reinvests 2/3 of its profits in non-profits at origin. There seems to be a lot going on in the coffee world in Moshi (and in Tanzania), but it's still small enough that it's all connected. The winner of the Tanzanian National Barista Championship, who works at the Zanzibar Coffee House, was trained and coached by Stephen and later by Kara. No wonder she won... Sustainable Harvest is working on building a barista training and cupping center in Moshi. KNCU is similarly working to improve the quality of coffee and baristas in Moshi. There is a lot happening, even at its slow pace. There is a lot of entrepreneurial spirit and development and economic growth going on; quite a change from the America I left behind.

the snows of kilimanjaro

This morning I awoke to a new view outside my window: fresh snow had fallen on the peaks of Kili during the night.

I haven't been posting much because there hasn't been much to write about. I am no longer bored but I occupy myself with the trappings of daily life - checking email, doing internet research, meetings to discuss various upcoming trainings, long lunch breaks, listening to the rain, drinking coffee and tea, hanging out with my roommate, reading books, and studying swahili. I've spent a lot of time this past week thinking about what's next for me, weighing my options and my desires. Things are starting to fall into place.

This weekend the director of Visions in Action was in town, as well as a short term Visions volunteer through IEEE who is living in Arusha. It was interesting to hear more about this NGO I've become somewhat affiliated with. Over dinner we discussed sustainable volunteering. I am quite certain that by the time I feel comfortable here and understand the system and what's going on and how I can best make a difference, I'll be getting ready to leave. I have the benefit of taking over where Kara left off so a lot has already been figured out and established, but there is no one coming to replace me. But I am also not willing to wait infinitely until the cafe opens, as approval for construction keeps getting pushed further and further back. Maybe I'll just have to come back once the cafe is open and do some barista training. Or maybe I'll have set up a sustainable barista exchange program between Equal Exchange Cafe and KNCU Cafe, to the mutual benefit of both parties. (Anyone know any good grant opportunities?)