Day 2 started with a heavy rain, which we jogged through, half-asleep, to get from our hotel rooms to the breakfast room. We were all tired, but the coffee at breakfast helped rouse us from our stupor. We touched base again with Khanjan over breakfast to review our plan for the day, with an emphasis on how we would modify our structure plans and how to break that to Jawara.

We picked up Jawara at the clock tower in the rain. After chatting for a few minutes, we brought up our concerns about the house and that we would like to just discuss a foundation with the builder instead of a whole house. Negotiations with the builder were intense. There was a bit of a communication barrier and we relied heavily on Jawara to relay our intentions. The builder was certain we needed a deep foundation which would use a lot of cement. He wanted 1.5ML for his work before any resources and workers were paid for. After a few minutes, we stepped into the car to converse. We communicated our findings with Khanjan & Naakesh while in the car, and then with Jawara. Didn’t make a commitment due to heavy costs & waiting to see how discussions with Sheku went.

We left the site for the marketplace and bought 25kg lime from one of the shops we’d surveyed as well as received two bags of sawdust for free from another shop. This shop was run by one of Jawara’s friends and we plan to continue business with him barring that the wood shavings are of the right species. We are worried they could be anti-fungal. After obtaining the items, we headed to Sheku’s place to discuss construction cost. He told us he has a pressing project and could not start our work until Saturday. He would be cheaper than the builder as he would pay his workers himself, but the time frame worried us. Finally, we headed to the hotel to begin the spawn expansion process using a bucket from Will & David’s
room. We videotaped ourselves showing the rough process to Jawara to get him acclimated to the work we would be doing.

At around 11am, we arrived at the world hope office to discuss gro house construction with Khanjan. We crunched the numbers in the conference room and grabbed quick snacks from nearby vendors. We met with Khanjan and gave him our estimate which was still very high for us. Khanjan again reinforced that we are too concerned with design rather than getting the work done in a temporary setting. Khanjan also asked Jawara for his opinions regarding the prices we received, and mentioned the idea of us using his in-development house for a few months. Jawara definitely did not seem happy or comfortable with the idea so it was decided that we would renegotiate with both builders under Khanjan’s lead. We then left with Khanjan at 1:25pm to meet with the different builders (sheku and jawara’s friend). We met with Sheku at around 1:35, negotiated for a few minutes, and eventually agreed to him starting the concrete pavement construction (1.5M Leones) on Wednesday, 3 August. He will let us know what items he needs from us. We got a good deal with Sheku, hence didn’t need to meet with Jawara’s builder friend. Moreover, it’s ideal for us that Sheku is working on the GRO House construction since he has history with the project and resonates with the mission. We arrived at the office at 2pm, and discussed next steps in terms of construction, the cultivation process, as well as market validation tests to be carried out over the coming days.

Will headed out with Jawara to find out market prices of bags and buckets to be used in our production process. He came back at 3:45pm with some promising findings. Will found three types of bags varying in price, size, and sturdiness. Large blue translucent bags were 2KL each. Slightly smaller purple translucent bags were 1KL. Sturdy black bags that were smaller still went for 2KL each. During this time, David drew up three plan sheets to provide to Sheku tomorrow in hopes for him to better understand our intended design, specifically the beams for hanging bags. The team and jawara sat down in the conference room to talk about obtaining substrate as well as market pricing/competitor/user research. Our plan for the coming day is to check up on Sheku and get a solid material and cost estimate as well as when he can start construction. We also intend to source substrates and begin market research in hopes of learning more about potential distribution outlets for Jawara’s mushrooms. We are aiming at supermarkets and also want to expand to general market interest for mushrooms to understand long term demand among average Sierra Leonians.

David, Will, and Jawara enjoying the site while Muz knocked out by David after a brief argument.