Slumdog Architects

We have arrived to Accra in search of a better economy, and have moved into the largest slum of the city. Now that our bulk luggages being stored around the city with our friends, we are free to live with the city as our living room, the market our source of daily bread. We only come home to sleep. It rained heavily the day before last, and we began perfecting our skills of gutter-jumping. Pants rolled up and ready to go, we are living in the heart of Accra. The rainy season is intensifying and there are malaria mosquitos everywhere. In the next few days Gabriela will attempt to get a job with the market queens of Agbogbloshi, while the boys focus on the more "manly" activities of bulk-breaking.

Old Fadama is strategically located in the city. The settlement lives with the Agbogbloshi market, however, the sellers from this area also operate around the entire city.

Mapping a slum is not easy. The settlement is extremely dense and home to about 100,000 people. We are hoping for a very high quality sattellitte image soon from Quickbird, and in the meantime using google earth, space syntax, and GPS to map the are.

We are also developing our character sketches and scenarios. Soon we will interview Jean-Jaque's mother and wife to Akokora from Wiaga. She is a migrant worker who has been residing in Accra for 3 years in hopes to find ties to our previous study.