Today we have our second sensory evaluation in Sub-county Treasury office.

I came to this office a week before the experiment. They were very enthusiastic to help me. We decided to conduct experiment in an open space near the office gate. It is convenient for passers-by to find our experiment site, and it can accommodate more participants. I rented some large tables from the grocery store to make sure there was enough room for participants.

Similar to the first test, Eunice acted as a community expert. She guided the participants to fill out the questionnaires. Maureen and Monicah acted as assistants. They will also explain the question in Swahili when the participants don’t understand it. The whole experiment took seven hours and it went very smoothly.

So far, my internship is coming to the end. I will leave on August 15th. The rest of the work is uploading data, summarizing and writing reports. I can’t believe I’ve been here for three months. I’ve met many interesting friends and been helped by many people. In the past three months, I have experienced many difficulties and I also encountered many amazing things. I learned a lot from this internship. I believe I won’t forget this wonderful experience.

Today, we held our first sensory evaluation at JKUAT.

I arrived at the laboratory layout site at 8:00 am and move the questionnaires, consent forms and other stuffs to the venue in advance. After that, I had a brief meeting with our student group, to emphasize the points that should be paid attention to in the experiment. Then we measured the room temperature, the sample temperature and put the sample in the thermos and then carried it to the laboratory.

The experiment officially began at 9:30. Before the experiment, we assumed that the response rate was 15%, and we have distributed about 500 flyers. In fact, the response rate was more than 15% on that day. Considering that I am a foreigner and I may bring bias to the experiment, I stayed in the next room during the experiment and did not appear in the experiment, so I did not take any pictures.

In the experiment, Eunice acted as community expert to guide participants to complete the experiment. The laboratory can accommodate 14 people for each trial, and each trial takes an average of 20 minutes. The whole experiment took six hours and it went smoothly.

Today’s task is to investigate fruit varieties, and the brands of millet and milk. Before sensory evaluation, we need to identify the types of fruits in Kenya, and then synchronize them with Tanzania site. Based on affordability, accessibility, taste and nutrition, we will determine the fruit varieties and brands of millet and milk used for sensory evaluation

In Kenya, we can buy fruits in open markets, supermarkets and local stores. Chatting with the local people, I learned that they usually go to open markets and local stores to buy fruit, and the price is more acceptable. Today, I went to these three places to investigate.

It is an off-season for fruits now. There are not many kinds of fruits in particular.

However, there are many brands of milk here:

I also went to see if there were probiotic yogurt in the supermarket. Unexpectedly, there is only one brand of probiotic yogurt in JUJA City Mall. This also means that probiotic yogurt has great market potential here.

We got the ethical approval from the Kenyan side last week. We can formally start preparing our experimental work. This is really exciting.

After discussing with the professor, we plan to conduct stratified sampling. Among the different students, random sampling was conducted according to the proportion of the number of people. However, because it is in the summer session now, many college students have already taken a vacation or started an internship. The first step we need to do is to do statistics on the number of students in session. I went to the departments of each college to do statistics.

I got a introductory letter from department of food and nutrition. When I went to the department office information from various professions, they understand my background and know that I have obtained approval from the college.

The entire process of collecting information takes more than a week. The college staffs are very nice. Even if they don’t have the information, they are happy to take me to other offices to find this information.

It’s a little regrettable that during the summer vacation, there is no way to include all the colleges in JKUAT. But we still have enough student population in session now. Of the five colleges, there are still three colleges that are still in session. We will have enough students population!

We have collected the data now. The next step is to recruit participants and prepare our study.

I’ve been in Kenya for a month. I am very happy to meet many friends here. During this month, Wenjing and I were preparing for sensory evaluation. We met Eunice, Monica and Maureen at JKUAT. Eunice is a master student in food and nutrition. Monica and Maureen are also undergraduates in food and nutrition. During this month, we worked together and ran several simulations of sensory evaluation and sample preparation several times. We met some challenges in making samples, but we all did well and solved these problems. I think we are a very good team, and I am very proud.

In this program, we do sensory evluation on probiotic mango juice, probiotic pineapple juice, probiotic orange juice, probiotic Uji, probiotic yogurt.

Our daily life is also very happy and full of small surprises.

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Last but not least, Wenjing has completed her internship. She left Kenya this Friday. We have had a very pleasant cooperation this month. Thank you for this happy time!

This is an amzing experience!

June 8th: We took a car to Ambosili National Park at 6:30. It’s about 4 hours’drive. After arrival, we checked in and had lunch. The hotel is great! Rooms are facing the grassland. Traveler can see animals passing through the grasslands in the evening and in the morning.

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We did the game driving from 4:00 pm to 6:00 pm. Usually animals return to high places at this time, so people can see more animals. However, unfortunately, we didn’t see any lion at the first day.

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June 9th: We did the game driving from 6:30 am to 9:30 am. We saw lions today! When the lion passed through the grassland, the other animals dared did not move, and looked at the lion until it left. What a wonderful picture!

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Tips:

1. Take mosquito repellent water with you
2. Telescopes help you to see animals more clearly.
3. You can buy postcards at the shop near to the hotel.
4. Bring sunscreen

We arrived in Nairobi on May 12, and it took us 17 hours to get here from Canada. We transited in Frankfurt. It was already 8 p.m. when we arrived. Then a drives picked us up and took us to the hotel. It takes an hour from the airport to Juja.

May is the rainy season in Kenya. Most of Kenya’s territory is on the East African Plateau, with altitudes ranging from 1500 meters to 2200 meters. The climate is very mild. In the afternoon, the temperature reaches about 26 ℃. In the morning and evening, the temperature is about 14 ℃. Average sunshine duration is about 12 hours. Sunrise time is 6:30 and sunset time is 18:30.

After the first night in the hotel, Dr. Arnold took us to the dormitory of JKUAT. The dormitory is very large and equipped with a stove and a refrigerator.

The foods in the canteen are also delicious. I enjoy the food here. Their main meats here are beef, lamb and chicken. Legumes are also indispensable in their daily diet.

Thanks for joining me!

Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton