Making Peace: How One Girl Used Making to Save Her Village
Photo by Dr Josiah Sarpong on Unsplash
I wrote this piece for a class called Emerging Trends in Information and Technology earlier this summer. I am still working to understand the Ghanaian culture and dialect, so this is just the first draft. I hope to have the next draft out soon, but if you have any suggestions, please feel free to share them in the comments!
Peace shot up in her bed long before the usual sounds that woke her, the chickens clucking or the neighbor women washing laundry. She had barely slept the night before, too caught up in her excitement. Today was the day. She was going on her first trip into Agbogbloshie. Peace's rush to complete her daily chores was interrupted when her mother asked her to check who was knocking at the door.
"Hey, Peace! Almost ready? We have a long journey ahead," came the voice of her friend Kweku. Though Kweku was a few years older than Peace, they had been friends for as long as Peace could remember. For ten years, Kweku and his mother, Ama, lived in the same compound as Peace and her mother, Adwoa. Peace could recall many happy memories exploring Adome with Kweku and their friends. Then one day, it seemed as though Kweku and Ama had disappeared. Peace later learned that Ama had married and moved to Accra. Though Peace was certainly happy for Ama, she missed Kweku desperately, and she always looked forward when he would come visit as he got older.
After Kweku moved to Accra, he seemed different to Peace. He was no longer interested in chasing chickens or climbing trees. Instead, whenever Kweku would visit, he would bring books about African inventors or fascinating technologies that seemed unimaginable to Peace and Adwoa. It was Kweku who convinced Adwoa to let her go to Agbogbloshie. Young women might be able to do many things, but they are certainly not often seen wandering around the place where e-waste goes to die. No, Adwoa thought that there was too much smog in Agbogbloshie and too many risks for a sixteen-year-old girl like her daughter. Yet, Kweku spoke of so many opportunities coming about in Agbogbloshie. He told the story of another Ghanaian man not too much older than Kweku, himself, who had returned and brought new life into Agbogbloshie.
"Kweku, you are early. You have grown so much!" Adwoa cried out as she pulled Kweku into a big hug. She led him to the table and continued, "Please, come and have some fufu. Peace needs to finish the cleaning and her packing."
"Mama, please, I've been packed for days. Let me finish the cleaning, and then Kweku and I will go." Peace was not normally so forward with her mother. After all, she had been raised to know her place, that she was a child under the authority of her parents and a young woman under the authority of men. Still, Peace could not contain her excitement. She had longed to simply see Agbogbloshie since she was a little girl. Now she would be spending a whole week there before returning to school for the fall.
The drive to Agbogbloshie ought to have only taken two or three hours, but with the transitions between trotros, the breakdowns of taxis, and the harsh road conditions, Kweku knew that this trip would take well over four hours, maybe even five. Peace didn't mind the length of the drive. She didn't often get to leave her little house in Adome, except on the rare occasion that her aunt in Canada came for a visit and took Peace and her brothers to the pool at the luxury hotel in Akosombo or when her family rode on their annual trip to visit Ama and Kweku in Accra.
Finally, Agbogbloshie came into view; the horizon was painted with what appeared to be a mountain range, but as the taxi pulled closer, Peace saw that these mountains were not composed of rocks. Instead, she saw piles of refuse littered with keyboards, phones, and chords in a variety of lengths and colors.
"What are your first impressions?" Kweku asked Peace. She thought a little.
"It's...not what I expected," Peace admitted, but then added, "I'm still really excited. You said they have a makerspace here, right? Where is it?"
"It isn't a physical place. You'll see in a moment," Kweku replied.
The taxi pulled into the scrapyard, and the stench was almost unbearable. All around, half-clothed boys, teens, and men stood around fires that burned bright orange as dusk fell upon the red earth. Peace couldn’t believe what she was seeing. Once one could get past the smell of toxic fumes and the apparent desperation that was thick in the air, they would notice the distinct sense that there were people in this place creating hope. Meters away from these boys burning old iPhones were those who seemed to be resurrecting these phones from the dead. Peace saw men stooped over computers typing in what looked to be another language. Others were taking parts out of one machine and connecting them to another. Kweku introduced Peace to his friends who were connecting a car to a computer. He explained that they were making an attempt at creating a self-driving car. This idea fascinated Peace.
Over the next week, Kweku returned to Agbogbloshie with Peace right at his side. He knew that there wasn’t much time before Peace would need to return to school where she might lose out on some of the opportunities she was experiencing in Agbogbloshie. Within that week, Peace had already learned the basics of Python. She spent much of her time talking with Kweku and his friends about their self-driving car project.
“I can’t believe that it could actually drive all by itself,” Peace would say in amazement.
“Well, that is what we hope to accomplish,” Kweku would reply.
“We’ve been working for so many months, but still nothing,” Kweku’s friend Kofi would almost always remind her.
“I believe that anything is possible here in Agbogbloshie,” Peace would say. She often wondered what all a self-driving vehicle might do for her family and neighbors back in Adome. She imagined taxis that could drive them all the way to Kpong in half the time it would normally take. She pictured self-driving ambulances that could rush sick children to the hospital in the capital city of Accra. Peace thought that if she were ever to create a self-driving car, she would like to design a self-driving ambulance. She spent the week dreaming and designing and discussing ideas with Kweku and his friends.
That last week of summer finally came to a close, and Peace reluctantly returned to school. Though Peace always enjoyed school, she could not seem to forget her short time in Agbogbloshie, learning coding and fixing the old car alongside Kweku and the other boys. She spent the first three weeks of classes daydreaming about Christmas break when she would be able to spend time in Agbogbloshie with Kweku and his friends.
Her daydreams were realized sooner than she expected, however, when the head of school announced that the Young Innovators Competition would be starting. Peace made sure to take an extra flyer as they were passed around during the announcement. She wanted to be sure that both she and her best friend Rhoda had copies.
“Remember how I told you about that makerspace in Agbogbloshie? The one called AMP?” Peace said to Rhoda.
“Yes, yes. When you told me? You haven’t stopped speaking about it since the beginning of fall term!” Rhoda exclaimed. Rhoda was interested in making, but not nearly so much as Peace. Peace never minded, though. Her passion for making always won out.
“I only saw men and boys there,” Peace continued. “Imagine if we won this competition and beat out those boys!”
“Remind me again what we would win,” Rhoda said thoughtfully.
“The man who started AMP, his name is DK Osseo-Asare, he’s offered to personally assist the winners of the contest in getting their project off the ground! I bet you anything so many of those boys will be competing. Imagine if we, two girls, beat them at their own game. Think of the look on their faces! Oh, Rhoda, maybe one day we will be great inventors. We might make something so amazing that we become rich, and we can use our money to give our mothers the nicest houses in all of Ghana...”
“Okay, okay! You’ve convinced me!” Rhoda interrupted with a giggle. “What should we build?”
“I had this idea for a self-driving ambulance,” Peace said. “But I don’t think we have enough time to do that.”
“I don’t think I know how to do that! Besides, I am sure it would cost a lot of money,” Rhoda replied.
The two girls thought quietly for a moment before Peace exclaimed,
“I’ve got it! What about an app that helps people connect easily to doctors in Accra? Obviously it wouldn’t help in emergencies, but this might be a great solution to make sure that people don’t avoid doctors because they are so far.”
“Can we do that? I mean, what all do we need?” Rhoda asked.
“I already began to learn Python in Agbogbloshie with Kweku and Kofi and all the boys. Now all we need is to find a way to get their on the weekends. I am sure with their help, we can use the computers there to create our app,” Peace said with a smirk.
Over the next week, Peace coordinated with Kweku and her professors to make sure she and Rhoda had a way to get to Agbogbloshie cheaply, quickly, and safely. She couldn’t wait to spend the next few weekends collaborating with other makers. Throughout that next month of October, Peace and Rhoda made the trip to Agbogbloshie in a school trotro with several other students, all of whom were boys. Peace couldn’t understand why none of the girls seemed as interested in getting involved in the maker movement.
She got her answer when she convinced some of her female peers to join her and Rhoda on one of their final trips into Agbogbloshie at the start of November. When the students arrived in Agbogbloshie, they were greeted by Kweku, who had personally taken responsibility for the students during their visits to Agbogbloshie. Peace’s male peers quickly dispersed throughout the e-waste dump. Some joined Kofi to work on the self-driving car. Others seemed to be working on their own projects: 3D-printed keychains, water filters, or drones made from old car parts. The girls followed Kweku into a small shed inside of which was a computer, a table, and two chairs.
“This is where you’ve been going all these weeks?” one of the girls asked Peace and Rhoda, skepticism tracing every word.
“It seems a bit run down, don’t you think?” another chimed in.
“Now wait, girls. Give it a chance,” said Rhoda. “Peace really had a point about this whole maker movement. When she told me about it at the beginning of term, I thought that she was going a little crazy, too. Everyone knows that only men and boys come to Agbogbloshie. Yes, it’s dirty, but there is so much that can be done here. Just look!”
The girls waited quietly as Peace booted up the computer. She had spent the first two trips into Agbogbloshie fixing up the old Lenovo laptop with the help of Kweku and Rhoda. Once they got the computer working, Peace was sure that running the code would be a cinch. The computer screen lit up, and Peace entered the password. She clicked the mouse rapidly, searching for her creation. Once she found it, she stepped back and said to her friends,
“Girls, I introduce you to Dr. Now, our AI app. May I please request a volunteer?” A girl of about thirteen raised her hand.
“Please, tell Dr. Now if you are having any symptoms. If you are not, please pretend you have a fever,” Peace said.
“You mean you want me to talk to the computer?” the girl asked, clearly confused. Peace nodded.
“All right, if you say so,” the girl continued. “Dr. Now, I have a fever.”
The computer seemed to be processing the girl’s words. Suddenly, the silence was broken by a voice that sounded very much like Peace’s.
“Please, tell me when your symptoms began,” came from the computer. The girls all leaped back.
“The computer is having a conversation with her! Is it witchcraft?” another girl cried out.
“No, no, please don’t worry girls,” Peace said with assurance in her voice. “It is AI. It stands for artificial intelligence. Basically the computer can learn like we do with our brains using code, which is the language computers use. I learned all about it from Kweku here at AMP. If I had never come to this makerspace, I would never have learned about it. My hope is that we can take this AI and put it into an app for everyone far from Accra to use on their phones. What do you think?”
The girls were very impressed. They were so impressed, in fact, that after they returned to school, they all requested that the competition be extended so that they could join. Fortunately, Mr. Osseo-Asare, who was sponsoring the competition, was glad to have girls joining his makerspace, and he happily obliged. The competition was moved from December 1st to December 30th. Over the next several weeks, the professors took students to Agbogbloshie almost daily. There were so many girls that it took two school trotros to bring them all back and forth. This pleased Peace and Rhoda. They knew that they had inspired the other girls to explore the opportunities provided by AMP. When the night before the competition came to a close, Peace closed her eyes, knowing that whether she and Rhoda won or lost, she already gained the greatest prize: the opportunity to be a maker alongside the boys and to inspire the other girls to be bold and do the same.