Makoko Stilt Village Pt 2 of 2

The first part of this blog on the Makoko Slum covered the building of the school there. This place was just so interesteing, and for six months I was there two days out of the week, so it would be remiss of me not to add a few more photos that I took in the many hours I spent there enjoying my time with the locals...


In the early days, once we'd established contact with the Bale and made a few friends in the area we looked around the swampy slum at the two other schools that try with limited sucess to educate the thousands of children in this particular part of the slum.

This school was a single story, open walled place built on a fill platform.
During the We season the floor would be mud and it was difficult to hold classes (in french)

The second school was a tiny attempt at a two storey building that was dark and cramped
Far from ideal conditions for kids to attempt to learn

They had to stop using this classroom on the top floor as one corner had sunk in the mud about a foot or so and so all the desks kept sliding back into the corner everytime the kids sat down.

Most to the houses are made from timber offcuts from the sawmills adjacetn to the slum. The locals cut timber on the far side of th lagoons (30-40km away) and float them over the be cut. The roofs are thatched palm leaves. The open-walled "rooms" are where the women smoke large quantities of fish for sale around the city. The result being that after a few hours in the slum your eyes hurt and you smell like you've been rooling around in fish barbeque and burnt plastic...

As there's no infrascture, the water is your road and your sewer and your play area. A few bores have been drilled so there's a couple of central water areas where larger canoes can be filled and the drinking water sold throughout the slum. Impromptu wiring is hung from hut to hut for when someone has a generator everyone else can join in.

If you're not in a canoe, you risk your life on the few walkways about the place.
They take up valuable space and materials and it's easier to use canoes so there's not many of these. I always used to be pertrifed of falling into the water.

The women get around in these small flat canoes seliing everything from hairspray and rat bait to fish curry and pencils

I couldn't do it, but the local kids never seemed to mind the water.

They often pop up next to your canoe and say hello - getting as big a shock as you when they saw you were white...

Otherwise there were very few areas that had been filled where the kids could play
(this is an empty shipyard where that make canoes)

The women of these tribes often wear these huge hand woven hats that cover their whole canoe.
This lady has come across some polystyreme floating in the bay and collected it for sale in th slum. It often helps to have things that can float when your house is made of sticks over water.

Rather than going to school (not that any shcools really exist) Most kids work. Boys fish and girls sell around the place

This is the lunch lady serving up fish steam and cassava to the workers at the school site.
Though I did eat village food on occaision, everyone said I'd get really sick if I ate her food (even though it smelt so good)

The men of Makoko would set up in the old shipping channels as the tides changed and catch fish with and lines.