NEWS After a tumultuous month in garbage collecting community, Garbage City in Cairo, year 3 at the School of Architecture is back at home. With them they have a newfound sense of its role as an architect, but also frustration.
For those who only see the town in a picture, it is difficult to believe that people live and work in what looks like a dump. Garbage city is several generations’ self-sufficient garbage collectors. Out of the 14 000 tons of garbage generated daily in Cairo, the garbage collectors in Garbage City takes care of 7 000 of them. 80 percent of them are recycled. A recycling dream may seem, but behind the amazing numbers the reality is completely different.
- We had a romanticized picture of Garbage City before we got there, and saw it as a model for the rest of the world, says Karin Olsson, Klara Junvik and Veronika Mikolasevic.
After about a week, reality took Karin Olsson, Klara Junvik och Veronika Mikolasevic by surprise. Children run between heavy vehicles on the narrow streets, woman sort hospital waste needles with bare hands, men stand in vapors from the plastic that is recycled. People living with garbage everywhere, all the time in an unhealthy environment. The frustration and feeling of powerlessness took over.
- It was so disturbing Garbage City is marketed as a sustainable society where virtually everything is recycled. But when you see the people behind, it seems almost hopeless, says Karin.
- They sit there in the garbage, there's no dignity in it. It became evident how extremely different lots we have in life, says Clara.
In a typical residential building the ground floor is filled with trash. That's where they are taken care of. On the next floor they live with television and carpeting. At the top floor is where animals are kept. All the inhabitants are collectors and takes care of garbage, but competition is fierce.- Garbage City is highly individualistic. Even though the same type of recycling is conducted within the same family you do not help each other out. Everyone only cares for themselves and doing his own thing, explains Veronika.They outraged over how the money hunger is driven at the expense of human health. The average life expectancy of residents in Gabage City is just over 50 years. "At what price?" Is the question they always return to.
During the month-long stay in the garbage collecting community students have gathered information to identify areas in Garbage City. An essential point of this project is to explore which role the architect can play in the development and improvement of standard of living in a time when half the world's population lives in cities.
- Lots and lots! It was like an explosion, this is the way it is!, Says Veronika.
To Karin the meeting with the people was the strongest and the biggest difference from all previous teaching during the education. Klara filling in:
- All of a sudden it became realistic. We had to dive into the uncomfortable, we met people who live there and it is important to realize that what we do has consequences.
- It doesn’t matter how awful we feel about them living there, we can not just tear down and build new ones. It's not possible. It would ruin everything for them, says Veronika.