When we returned from Athens and I tried to organize my thoughts about the refugee village in Ambelokipi, I realized this wasn’t where my heart is. Just as I was interested in the urban response of a situation like Katrina on New Orleans, there is something about the “urban response” of migration into cities and its creation of temporary communities and slum conditions that interests me. I began to look back at Sham Shui Po and this time compare it to the area of Gerani in Athens. Just as Sham Shui Po acts as a “temporary” holding space for immigrants into Hong Kong, Athens has its areas that immigrants migrate towards. Once such region is called Gerani and also has the condition of rooftop slums. It is here that I think my potential site will lie, and this is what I now want to explore. As I consider between Hong Kong and Athens I think about what lessons I can take from the already strongly tied communities that exist in Hong Kong’s rooftop slums and how I can potentially use them as precedents for what Athens could be.
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