In Nairobi I lived in a neighborhood called Olympic, located in Kibera, which also houses the largest slum in Sub-Saharan Africa. The Kibera slums are commonly known among development workers as the darling of the NGO-world… and it’s true. Not a day went by where I could walk around my neighborhood and not see a mzungu, as foreigners there are often called.

It was interesting working and living in two different areas. While I lived in Kibera, I made the hourly commute every day to Mathare (the second largest slum in Nairobi). The commute, to put it bluntly, sucked and I didn’t especially enjoy waking up at 7 to get to work at 8. However, living and working in the two areas allowed me to see some key differences.

As crazy as it is for me to say, Kibera is well-off compared to other slums. That’s because of all the support of foreigners who enter Kibera, all the foreigners who can work in Kibera for months and never even know that a slum like Mathare exists. I don’t blame them; I was in that same position just a year ago. Who wants to work in only the second-largest slum in Nairobi? That’s not sexy, nor is it especially exciting to tell people. Most people who haven’t been to Africa have never heard of Mathare, while Kibera is far more well-known.

While Kibera will always be, in a lot of ways, my first love, I grew aware this summer of the differences in attitudes between a slum that is constantly receiving aid and a slum that has been left to fend for itself. While Mathare does receive some aid, it doesn’t compare to the sheer amount that seems to overwhelm Kibera. I have walked every inch of both and just the difference physically is astounding. Whether it’s the number of foreign run clinics or schools or buildings, Kibera outnumbers Mathare in all of these.

The differences go further than just infrastructure and projects, however. It goes down to the psyche of the people, a concern for me that has only grown further the more I delve into learning about and working in informal settlements. As people used to receiving aid and assistance, many of the residents of Kibera think less about how they can leverage themselves off the help they are receiving from foreign organizations to become self-sufficient, and instead grow to expect that there will always be aid somewhere, someplace*. I know of a woman who came to work with one of Dignitas‘ partner schools in Mathare who went to Kibera first. The school she approached refused her assistance, insisting that she build them a new school before they would consider allowing her to partner with them. It is behavior like this that makes me wonder over the impact of the years of aid projects and organizations in Kibera. How do we measure that? Do we ever stop to think about what our presence, simply as a foreigner, does to the attitudes and psyche of a group of people? Does a sense of entitlement and expectation develop that really shouldn’t be there?

Mathare is very different from Kibera in this way. Though foreigners do show up and volunteer their time, the people of Mathare are very aware that Kibera is the main attraction, the place that wazungu are drawn to. The sense of self-sufficiency that has developed is different. I encountered more people in Mathare who, rather than expecting aid to come forever, looked to see how they could build upon whatever they received to carry themselves along.

One of the biggest things I’ve learned in my time and research with slums, in my struggles to understand what an effective development project should be, is that if the people of an area are not empowered, nothing will last. I’ve been around Kibera long enough now to see projects fail (sometimes all it takes is a year) but I hold a special hope in my heart for Mathare now, a place where I sense real change can happen. With Dignitas Project‘s leadership and empowerment trainings, I’m excited to see where things will take us.

*I don’t mean to make generalizations about Kibera and Mathare- in fact, I have met just as many people who are inspiring and looking to change their communities in Kibera. But at the root of it, among the “average” community member, I feel I have sensed this difference.