Shwedagon Pagoda, Myanmar.
Today I turned thirty. I spent most of it wandering the streets of central Bangkok. A new decade, a new part of the world for me.
The day of my previous birthday, I was pulling into Juba—the soon-to-be-independent capital of South Sudan—on the bus from Kampala.
Juba to Bangkok. Of what I saw today, the two cities couldn’t be more different. Only the lean-to houses lining a railway track resembled something similar.
A year ago, I was expecting a struggle to begin a career in the world of the news photographer. A year later, I had lived that struggle through some of the biggest stories of 2011: South Sudan’s referendum and subsequent independence; the war in Libya; drought in the Horn of Africa, seen from Kenya and Somalia; and finishing up with the elections in DR Congo.
Now, I can’t help but wonder what I’m doing here, a world away from all that. It’s become hard to take a holiday.
I was taking the “cheap” route to Thailand from Kenya, leaving on New Year’s Day, with more than a little hangover and sleep deprivation.
Nairobi - Dubai - Hong Kong - Bangkok. Two days of traveling, four airports, three planes, and a world of difference.
Hong Kong International. “No sitting” said the sign on the travelator. I was ready to drop. This was first time I had been so far east, and was eager to explore what was the other side of the glass. The round hills rising up. The harbour. But that would have to wait for another trip.
Only a third of the city of Goma has access to running water. The remaining two-thirds of the city rely on private water trucks selling water, or, for the majority, walking to the shores of Lake Kivu to fill jerry-cans. Right next to where these people collect their water, cars and motorcycles are washed in the lake water, the oily run-off draining back into the lake. Not far from here, the boats chug in and out of the port, leaving residue in the water.
In the cross-fire
Elizabeth* sits next to her two year old daughter in the Bethesda hospital in Goma. Elizabeth was collecting firewood in the forest surrounding her home last April, when she was caught between two armed groups; a stray bullet hit her in the leg. She scrambled through the forest to the place where she had left her one-month old baby. For the past eight months, Elizabeth has been in this hospital, while her leg heals. She will never be able to walk properly again, and worries about the future of her children.
* Name changed