“Some periods are very nice on the coffee plantation. When it was in full blossom at the beginning of the rain season, it radiated; it looked like a cloud of chalk amidst the fog and drizzling rain – over six hundred acres of plantation. The cocoa tree has a tender, slightly bitter scent, much like the blackthorn. When the plantation grew red with the ripe berries, we called every woman and child whom we call tote to go gather the coffee from the trees with men. Afterwards, they took the coffee down to the roasting facility by the river with carriages and handcarts. The great coffee-dryer turned and turned and rolled the coffee beans inside its iron drum, making a similar sound to that of water rolling the pebbles on the beach... Later, the coffee was hand-peeled, selected and sorted and put in the bags, which were then stitched with a saddling needle. In the day or two, the coffee will be seaborne and we could only hope that everything goes well on the big sales auctions in London.”
Karen Blixen, Out of Africa, 1917
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