Falling about... or falling down

PUERTO PRINCESSA, PHILIPPINES: These cheeky Badjao kids were in hysterics laughing at me. I had pulled a face after stumbling on their rotting walkway between shanty homes built on stilts over the sea on Palawan Island, Philippines.

I was visiting with organisation called Kanlungan ng Ama (KNA) – The Fathers Shelter – which helps rescued street kids and works with the Badjao sea gypsies. Its staff cut down 50 of their farm trees to rebuild the walkway for the villagers.

The Badjao are a unique people group found across the Philippines and Malaysia, They are a poverty-struck people that make their living on the sea, fishing or collecting pearls.

The main central bridge walkway through the middle of their village was vital for the community to reach their houses and boats, and was in very bad condition. The bridge (as they call it) was falling apart and was patched up with whatever they can find, but people were regularly hurt or fell through. So, KNA worked side-by side with the local Badjao men to replace the bridge.

Change the world... for one person at a time

TSOKA VILLAGE, MALAWI:  A young girl watches the opening of a new mother and baby clinic, the first time she’s seen such a thing. It’s not her child strapped to her back... she looks after her brother every day while her mum (her dad died) scratches a living any way she can. No school for her then.
But she knows there will be help, advice, maybe even free medicine when she needs it, which is life-changing because the family can’t afford to buy any.
It is all paid for by UK charity donations through relief & development agency Seedsowers Trust. Its volunteer workers installed the village borehole, provide famine relief whenever necessary, and fund indigenous income generating projects. And they support an orphanage in the south of the country.   www.seedsowers.org.uk

How long?

DEBRA ZEIT, ETHIOPIA: The man sits and dreams of his new home... one that he will own... one with more than one room for him, his wife and his expanding family (currently four kids). It will have a latrine. And an external kitchen which won’t fill his living space with health-robbing smoke from the charcoal fire on the floor every time they prepare a meal.
It’s more than a dream, because along with other villagers he is working with Habitat for Humanity to build his and other homes. Working together, side-by-side, producing mud brick blocks from soil and a smattering of cement.
Building a foundation from local volcanic rock chunks and slowly the walls rise from the ground. Paying it off in the strange currency of bags of cement. He’s so proud.
www.habitat.org

What will it take to rid the world of this curse?

LILONGWE, MALAWI:  It’s been said the west has the ability and money to rid the world of malaria - but that still seems a distant prospect for various financial reasons.
So that remedy is too late for this young boy shivering under a tree in a small rural village. Malaria parasites have already invaded his blood and the fever and headaches have started.
If it gets worse, it’ll lead to hallucinations, coma, and death.
His parents, like many, cannot afford the drugs that would help relieve the symptoms and he is in danger of joining the statistics of the disease they say kills a child every 30 seconds, mainly in sub-Saharan Africa. All too many of these children are AIDS orphans anyway, with nobody to help but themselves.
Come on world... other countries have virtually eliminated malaria... what’s it going to take for these countries that can never afford to do it themselves?

Sir John on climate change

WIMBORNE, UK:  Climate change - now that’s a major issue of our time. And Professor Sir John Houghton knows what he’s talking about.
As an eminent scientist, he has held prestigious academic & governmental positions in the fields of atmospheric physics, climate change, environmental pollution and sustainable development.
He is a former chief executive of the Met Office and was winner of the Albert Einstein World Award of Science 2009 for his work in environmental science.
As a committed Christian, he writes and lectures widely on the relationship between Christian faith and environmental concerns, as at this event supported by Christian development and conservation agencies Tearfund, Christian Aid and A Rocha.

Schooling that will lift them out of this...

NAMATALA SLUM, UGANDA:
I shot this picture fast before the kids ran up to the camera - or away from it, you never can tell how they will react. No time to aim, just shot from the hip.
It’s mid-
morning and ideally many of these youngsters would be at school, but it rarely happens, too many younger siblings to care for, or no money in the house to pay for the basic supplies that get you into school. It is Namatala slum, after all.
Well, it’s changing, slowly. Child of Hope has built a new school right in the heart of the slum, from where it provides free education, food, clothing and healthcare for kids that would probably never go to school. Ever.  All to give them a massive foot up towards the ideal of a real job and a future.
Everything is stacked against these kids, the gloom and despair in the slum is tangible. But it’s a start, and a big one. www.childofhopeuganda.org

Where coffee is an honour

DEBRA ZEIT, ETHIOPIA:
I was photographing the tiny rented home of a family in the process of building their own home, thanks to Habitat for Humanity.
There I was humbled and honoured at the same time.
The mum (she lived in the one-room hut not much bigger than my garden shed with her husband and five children, all sharing one single bed) commenced the classic Ethiopian coffee ceremony.
Crouching on the floor (there were no table or chairs), she roasted the beans in a flat pan over a tiny fire in the middle of the room, ground them with pestle and mortar, doing it so vigorously that the hard mud floor broke under the pressure. The ground coffee was slowly stirred into the black clay coffee pot locally known as 'jebena' and the coffee strained into tiny cups from a height of 12 inches.
Well, I’m a coffee-lover, but that was the best and most treasured cup of coffee I’ll ever have. www.habitat.org

300 miles and £4K for African kids’ education

BOURNEMOUTH, UK:  Jonathan (‘Z’) Wilkinson and a few mates stop off during a gruelling 300-mile bike ride from Lands End along the south coast to provide education for vulnerable children in Africa.
They raised nearly £4,000 for Soteria Trust’s vulnerable children’s venture, Project Ibadan, which aims to provide education for needy children right through from nursery age to secondary level in Nigeria. And Z, as he prefers to be called, worked for the charity free-of-charge for his gap year and went to Ibadan to see its project launched.
www.soteriatrust.org.uk

You try weaving with half your fingers missing

ADDIS ABABA, ETHIOPIA:  There’s an amazing sense of community at The Leprosy Mission’s hospital and rehab centre, where former leprosy patients - many seriously disabled – work and enjoy friendship and a purpose for living.
Thousands of Ethiopian people suffer from the stigma of leprosy with devastating social and economic results. But TLM fights for a stigma-free society, where isolation and discrimination are eliminated, where people affected by leprosy and their families are fully integrated into society. Living in dignity and free from poverty. And it does that in over 50 countries.
www.leprosymission.org

Splish, splash... kids just wanna have fun

TSOKA VILLAGE, MALAWI:  Kids enjoy showing off at a new borehole fitted by UK charity Seedsowers Trust. The fresh water supply had an enormous impact on this community, one of the poorest villages in the country.

Water remains one of the huge issues for rural African villages - previously there had been no fresh water available at Tsoka and women walked for miles each day to get it... and carry it back.

www.seedsowers.org.uk

Two secretaries and a death threat

IBADAN, NIGERIA:  At Soteria College I came across two women converted from Islam to Christianity who had found a future in all the poverty – despite a death threat hanging over one of them.
Olayinka (pictured) got a job as a secretary after her course, which was funded by UK donations via Soteria Trust.
The charity has now re-built the college - and a school - in which it provides as many free scholarships for poorer kids as it can raise.
Her friend, nicknamed ‘Angel’ - like so many of Prospect’s graduates found a position within a few days of finishing - her qualifications had given her the chance she needed. I can’t show her picture because she has a price on her head for her death. Her Muslim father didn't like her conversion.
www.soteriatrust.org.uk

Got a story to tell?

Hope you liked these real-life picture stories. If you think photography like this will help you motivate people to change the world for the better through your charity, NGO or not-for-profit, call me on 01202 697201 (UK). I'd love to help.