To be honest, contrasts can be found in pretty much any city. New all-glass-and-steel tower built amidst old houses or businessmen wearing thousand dollar suits walking past homeless people on the street, you name it – it’s all there.

When it comes to overall quality of life, in Europe, it looks to me, it degrades somewhat gradually as you move further from the downtown, while in US and even in Canada I found it fascinating that on the one side of the street you may have a bustling city center with business buildings, fancy shops and restaurants but just by crossing the street you find yourself in a neighborhood with rundown or abandoned houses, people drunken or high out of their minds and general feeling of abandonment, disrepair and danger.

From what I’ve seen so far, Accra seems to be even more extreme. Everything looks almost seamlessly mixed up so seeing a fancy hotel with a beautiful restaurant terrace right next to which runs open sewer almost doesn’t seem strange. Here however, unlike US example above where those nasty places were somehow ruined over time, I have a positive feeling about it since it looks like all the “bad” (quotes due to the fact that , admittedly I look at things from typical westerner’s perspective) things are really remnants of the past and that things are actually getting better.

Having said all that, contrasts indeed are huge.

Both photos above were taken within minute or two walking distance.