Going back over some trips I took in 2013 that I never had the time to blog about…one is a trip I took to Guatemala with International Justice Mission to capture first person stories that highlight their work in that part of the world. Here are a few photo selects from that trip:
One of the stories we focused in on was that of Griselda. Late one night, this 13-year-old was grabbed by three men and violently raped at gunpoint. It was devastating for her, and introduced a new nightmare for her family. In Guatemala, criminals prey on girls like Griselda because they don’t fear real consequences. Instead, it’s the impoverished families who are afraid—afraid to report the crime, and afraid they’ll be all alone if they fight it. Watch how IJM relentlessly advocated for Griselda’s family, and how securing justice has changed her young life:
Been thinking a lot about Nelson Mandela this past week. Here is a little something from Madiba lore that I don’t think many people know about…
In 2009 a good friend of mine named Greg Urquhart and I were tooling around South Africa and, while I was photographing some stuff in a prison in a town called Paarl, our guard braggingly said something to us that was intriguing: “Hey, I can take you into the house where Nelson Mandela was kept before his final release from prison.” I had already seen his cell on Robben Island and was thinking he was referring to some place there.
But I was mistaken.
It was a house there in the prison at Paarl. According to nelsonmandela.org, “on 12 August 1988 he was taken to hospital where he was diagnosed with tuberculosis. After more than three months in two hospitals he was transferred on 7 December 1988 to a house at Victor Verster Prison near Paarl where he spent his last 14 months of imprisonment. He was released from its gates on Sunday 11 February 1990.”
This was the house the guard was talking about.
“Let’s go,” Greg and I said at the same moment. And so in a sort of sneaky “dark” sort of fashion, this guard proceeds to quietly lift the key to the house out of a locked box on the wall and motions for us to follow.
I know enough in these types of situations to keep my mouth shut and just go. Here is what we saw, and what I had the good sense to shoot on a half a roll of film I had left in my Nikon F5:
A statue of Mandela outside the Victor Verster Prison
The outside of the house where Mandela was kept after Robben Island and before his final release from the Victor Verster Prison
This is Mandela’s easy chair inside the house
This is where the great Nelson Mandela slept…
In the back yard of the house…if Mandela wanted to take a swim he could…
The courtyard
Urquhart (left) and Sheridan, circa 2009
The guard let us in and stood outside. We were alone in Mandela’s house. I sat in his chair, jumped on his bed, and if it had been a hot day (which it wasn’t), would have jumped in his pool.
Suffice it say I felt the spirit of the man. And it was good.
Last week I followed Medical Teams International into Tacloban, Philippines to see the aftermath Super Typhoon Haiyan (Yolanda), commonly accepted now as the strongest and most intense storm ever to make landfall. Yes, it was bad. Thank God for folks like MTI who are on the ground providing care.
In late September/early October I went to witness the realities of Syrian refugees in Iraq and Lebanon with Medical Teams International. I loved seeing MTI’s work in the field. And I cherished the time I spent with the refugees.
Want to see more? Check out this slideshow of images from the trip:
