jake lyell photography

Observations in Lima:

Jake — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 14:15:35 +0000

Peru’s capital is a teeming megalopolis of street vendors, exhaust fumes, cathedrals and bright lights. Following my most recent assignment with Heifer, I spent four days photographing some of Lima’s 8 million residents. I’ve divvied up the following photographs into what became four dominate themes: work, devotion, transit and leisure. From the wealthy suburbs of Miraflores to the up-and-coming pueblo joven of Villa Maria, Lima enjoys a stronger economy than the rest of this developing country. For this reason, many leave their homes elsewhere to make new lives in this boomtown on the Pacific.

Work…

Devotion…

Transit…

Leisure…

My Grandmother the Obama Fan

Jake — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 14:17:56 +0000

So I am back from Peru now. I have a lot of great photographs from Lima, but before I get to those, many people ask what I do when I’m at home. Here’s a little bit of insight into my life in Virginia…

I don’t put my camera down when I’m back home, though I’m not as good at toting it around as I am when I’m on assignment. I’m still trying to get into the mentality that I am always on assignment, even when I’m not in a foreign country. On Wednesday I went down to Chesapeake, a 90 minute drive, to hang out with my grandmother. Above, our lunch outing at her favorite restaurant, the Pirate’s Cove.

At 85, my grandmother still gets out and does her own shopping and errand running, though at a slightly slower pace than she’s perhaps used to. Her shopping destination of choice: Walmart, or Walmark as she calls it. For her, nothing beats the convenience of one -stop shopping.

My grandmother likes to hear about my latest travels and look over my photographs. My late grandfather was a Chief in the US Navy and their family spent years in Japan and Korea, two countries where I have yet to travel. She also keeps up with politics and world affairs and can talk my ear off about US history since 1942 as if it were yesterday. The war in Iraq in particular is an issue that irks her, and one on which she speaks out.

In my grandparents’ day, war was a last resort and something to be avoided at all costs. She is still angry at the casual, hasty way in which our country invaded Iraq, and the continued expenditure of resources there. McCain’s continued support for the war is one of the reasons she’s casting her vote for Obama in November. “McCain will just go along with what Bush has done. He’s a Republican and we need a Democrat back in office,” she says.

“They talk about him (Obama) being young, this that, and the other, but that’s what we need.” She goes on to compare Obama to JFK: “I remember when he was a young Catholic, and everyone had reservations about voting for him. But I feel the same about Barack Obama, he’s just what the US needs to give us new life. I just think he’s got more ideas about this country moving forward… he’s younger and more energetic.”

Having lived abroad extensively, my grandmother is also worried about the way our country is perceived throughout the world: “Nobody respects the US anymore.” She doesn’t think a McCain presidency would do much to improve our country’s standing. With less than three months to go until election day, the two candidates now appear to be in a statistical dead heat among likely voters. An Obama victory may lie in bringing out unlikely voters who may never have cast a ballot before. One thing’s for certain: I’ll make sure my grandmother gets to the polls on November 4th.

High and Dry - out in the sticks of Northern Peru

Jake — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 18:03:08 +0000

I can’t be sure what comes into mind when you think of Peru but I imagine your thoughts are similar to thoughts of Egypt: ancient ruins and exotic kingdoms. Lately when I mention I’ve been in Peru the next question is usually a bright and inquisitive “Did you visit Machu Pichu?”

Unfortunately I did not, though it’s not a total loss as I much prefer the company of the locals to 50 or so backpacking gringos. While some might have to do a Google search to match the country of my latest destination to its continent, Peru’s ruins, its mountains, culture, customs and even cuisine have put it squarely on most westerners’ mental gazetteer.

This is my second journey into Peru. My first was exactly one year, and maybe 12 or so blog entries, ago. Back then I found some very dire living conditions in the Amazonian city of Iquitos, but nothing as desperate as the struggle for life and death that I’ve witnessed many facing in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Peru can be classified as moderately poor country, where around 44% of people live in poverty and around 13% live in extreme poverty. It is most fortunate that one would be hard pressed to find starvation or rampant levels of HIV infection here. Most people are making do but are still striving for a better quality of life; I suppose we all are. With increasing foreign investment and trade, however, Peru’s economy is expanding. It is a country that is rapidly changing as globalization expands and as people leave their agrarian lifestlye for the cities.

Despite our ever-expanding global village, there remain frontiers so remote in this vast country that their inhabitants have never had contact with outsiders. Though my most recent journey was not so pioneering as to have stumbled upon undiscovered peoples, it is possible that Christian (writer and traveling companion) and I were the first gringos ever to visit these villages, at least for some time. Christian and I actually began the Peruvian leg of our trip in the warm and dusty region of Piura, near the Pacific Coast. We took a detour to the Andes in search of photographs and stories of alpacas.

Somewhere between the cities of Chiclayo and Cajamarca (I still haven’t pinpointed exactly where) lies Incawasi, a district of Lambeyeque province. In the villages of Incawasi (Quechua meaning House of the Incas) ancient tradition continues to thrive. The district’s inhabitants continue to adorn themselves in colorful dress while maintaining their agro-centric lifestyle much as they have for centuries past. At first I was want to think that the colorful garb was a show for the newly arrived visitors, that I was experiencing the equivalent of an historical reenactment at Colonial Williamsburg.

However, not much has changed here in the past 500 years since the fall of the Inca Empire. Though tourism is a massive industry in Peru, the isolated villages of the North remain a little-traveled backwater. Heifer began to work in this impoverished area a little over two years ago, providing villagers with instruction in productive farming, tree-planting and sustainable agriculture. Villagers received guinea pigs, used as food (they love them up here) and especially prized for their fertility, as well as alpaca, whose wool is used to make clothing or is sold or bartered for goods.

Above, Christian and Feliciana Calderon (37) converse though two translators, one for Spanish, another for Quechua. Here at 13,000 feet, Heifer is helping to streamline Andean agrarian traditions such as irrigation, fishing and the domestication of animals such as llamas and alpacas. Heifer is also introducing new conventions such as reforestry and gender equality, the latter of which is taking some time to catch on.

I say that not much has changed here in the last 500 years. The quality of life has improved somewhat in Incawasi since Heifer began working here two years ago, but Incawasi then fared just the same as it had two hundred years ago. The real change has come within our own society, so that we now look at another that has not kept pace with ours and say that lack of education among children is unacceptable, or that land to work and proper shelter in which to live is a fundamental right.

The people of Incawasi will not starve without Heifer’s help, but it is very likely that without the aid of the guinea pig or alpaca projects here, this district would lag a century behind in its development. Because of Heifer, it is on track to becoming not only a self-sustaining community, but a healthy and prosperous one. Above, Martina Sanchez Barrios (26) weaves clothing from sheep and alpaca wool.

The land of el Morante, 100 miles north-west of Incawasi couldn’t be any more different from the nearby Andean communities. Lying at sea level, this dusty, parched land is almost uninhabitable; in fact it was deemed such until recently. The government owned the once-vacant land here but in the last two decades began leasing it to lower income city dwellers who wanted to move in to make new lives for their families.

The new community is made up of hardy pioneers who constantly fight the region’s adverse conditions in order survive and, in some cases, prosper. Their greatest challenge: water. Unlike Incawasi, where fresh water flows freely from springs into strategically engineered furrows, the people of el Morante must trek long distances to the nearest watering hole.

Some families have closer access than others. However, for those we visited the journey involved waking each morning at 3 o’clock, loading up their donkeys with empty barrels and caravaning two and a half hours to the well. If all goes as planned, they will return home again, their barrels full, by 11AM, just as they heat of the day becomes most unbearable. Above, Perpetuo Cueva (42) and his neighbor Yolmer Delgado (41, far distance) travel to the well to fetch the day’s water. In the interest of sleep, we did not join them for the entire journey, traveling by truck to meet them at daybreak along the way.

Gender roles vary from culture to culture, especially in the developing world where they are often clearly defined. In el Morante it is the job of the men to fetch the water, unlike in African societies where the women inherit the task. The men of el Morante are charged about 35 cents per barrel, money that goes toward upkeep of the well and gasoline to fuel the pump that brings it from 180 meters underground. Because the water is so far below ground, building a second well is no small feat, and so for the moment this well must meet the needs of communities far and near.

Above, Maria Cuenca (44) takes laundry off the line. It doesn’t take long to dry here. A new well which is under construction just outside her house will save her husband 5 hours of commute time a day. Despite this, all of her children have left the area in pursuit of an easier life in Peru’s cities. Citizens here used to petition the government and NGOs to bring running water to the villages. They have now realized they would not be able to afford the subsequent spike in property values as a result of the service.

Sheep and goats are the only animals that people raise out here. It’s much too dry for cattle. Below, Madeline Quispe (38) and her husband Yolmer Delgado (41) have the best looking garden in all of el Morante, raising beans, tomatoes and kasava. They use manure from their goats as fertilizer and water from the well to irrigate the sandy soil.

Roxanna Garrido (28, far right) is the sole teacher at this one room school in el Morante. She technically lives in the city of Piura, three hours away. She comes to the village for five days at a time and returns home on the weekends. All of her students come from families that are Heifer participants. The fact that they are able to afford the services of a qualified teacher to lead the classroom is a result of extra income earned as a Heifer Project participants.

Whether it’s the high cool villages of the Andes or the dry scrub desert of el Morante, the demanding life of these inhabitants puts our own into perspective, making life in Western society, with all its stresses, feel like a vacation. Those of us who have experienced want in our lifetime should be ever grateful of our plight.

Flights, Frontiers and the Fleas in the Andes

Jake — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 20:54:54 +0000

From the moment I walked off the plane to get my baggage in Quito, I was out of breath and a little light headed. At 9000 feet, Quito does funny things to a guy used to living at sea level. It wasn’t long before we came back to a more familiar altitude. After sleeping just four hours at the hotel, we hopped an early morning flight down south to Ecuador’s Loja (low-ha) region.

On this most recent assignment with Heifer, Loja’s airport was the starting point for Christian and me on our journey west toward the Peruvian border. In just an hour’s flight from Quito we landed in a beautiful valley in the Andes Mountains. After taking some breakfast in Catamayo, we set out for an 8 hour drive to the border - five of which hurdled us through bumpy, unpaved backroads that gradually spiraled down the mountains into dry scrub forest.

The destination was a village called Hacienda Vieja, which straddles the border with Peru. Because of the remote locations of homes we visited on this trip, we were able to stay with the families that I photographed and that Christian interviewed. Below, Celia (left) and Monfilo (right), our first hosts, in their kitchen. We stayed in their home for two nights, along with an annoyingly gregarious rooster who seemed not to know the difference between 2AM and sunup.

I much prefer staying in houses and foregoing a regular shower or fancy dinner in order to witness the daily lives of my subjects. The lack of amenities and occasional discomforts are more than made up for in the experience of living life much as it existed in the States 100 years ago. Below, a portrait of Celia and Monfilo made during their younger years hangs on a wall in their home.

Some five hours of winding mountain road away from the nearest town with a market or fueling station, Hacienda Vieja relies on its own means to survive. Farmers here grow what they need to feed their families and use donkeys as the primary means of transport. Unlike many NGOs who operate in areas that are easily accessible, Heifer makes it a point to change the lives of those in hard to reach places as well.

With an average life expectancy of 75 years, Ecuadorians’ longevity exceeds that of most developing countries. Above, Felipa Sarango, is a venerable 107 years old. Unlike the elderly of Ecuador’s cities, she has seen little change in her town throughout her lifetime. While most young people move to urban areas to seek a life outside of farming, the successes of Heifer’s agricultural programs in Hacienda Vieja have helped to keep some of them around.

I wish I were fluent in Spanish, or Castillano, as it’s called down here. I’m thinking of returning to Latin America in the slow time after Christmas to take some lessons. Photographing in Ecuador was a bit more difficult than other places I’ve visited. Usually Christian & I are each provided with an interpreter, but on this trip only one person assisted us both.

As Christian does the writing, it was more important for him to make use of our interpreter, leaving me to pantomime direction where my Spanish skills failed me. Sam, our interpreter (below, left) was an interesting and hardworking gentleman. An American who has lived in Loja for over 30 years, he married an Ecuadorian woman and they’ve raised their children here.

It seems on nearly every excursion I make into the developing world some sort of animal, insect or even human attempts to get the best of me. In the past year I’ve been bitten by a dog in China, contracted Dengue Fever from mosquitoes in Haiti, hacked in the arm by machete-wielding thieves in Kenya and mobbed by monstrous fire ants in Zambia.

Yes, I can genuinely say that I’ve had ants in my pants; and it’s not pretty. Unfortunately, these experiences tend to bolster many an American’s perceptions about the “third world,” and make it appear a more precarious destination than it is. Perhaps the reality is that I’m simply accident prone. I had come to expect some sort of incident upon venturing this time into South America.

In reading up about Ecuador prior to my trip, I found out that there are many a species of poisonous snake that inhabit the trees and tall grass of rural areas. I immediately thought, as bite-prone as I am, a snake bite would get me this time around. Nothing quite so dramatic was to be my fate. As it happened, I awoke in the middle of an otherwise peaceful night itching all over. Crawling out of my mosquito net with my flashlight, I fumbled through my bag for my insect repellent, sprayed myself and the foam mattress where I slept.

By the time I awoke the next morning I was covered in what looked like chicken pocks. Some sort of insect had made a feast of me the night before and left me scratching through the next week. In addition, I would break out in itchy, burning hives on my legs and arms daily for a couple hours before they would subside again. Upon arriving at my next portal to the world wide web I searched through the Wikipedia articles on bed bugs, bubonic plague and the various pock-producing diseases outlined in the heath-risks section of my Lonely Planet Ecuador guide.

If my wiki-diagnosis is accurate, I had fallen prey to a case of fleas-in-the-bed and a subsequent allergic reaction, common throughout much of South America. I should have guessed. After a series of anti-histamine creams and pills, where I again had to use a mixture of Spanish and sign language to communicate with the pharmacist, I seem to be doing fine. As I write this entry in Lima, almost two weeks after the incident, I’ve been hive-free for two days.

From the border, the trip continued back through the towns of Alta Vega and Mangahurquillo, where we stopped along the way further documenting the lives of Heifer project participants. Above, Maria Cacay-Merizalde and Amadeo Cayay-Rodriguez on their farm in the foothills of the Andes. Below, phone booths in the town of Alamor.

The sun was setting over the Rio Zamora on our flight from Loja to Quito, but the trip was not even half completed. We had spent just five days in Ecuador. The next day we’d have part of the day to rest in Quito before flying down to Lima in the afternoon. We’d continue our work throughout Peru for another week.

Stay tuned for Peru…

a Change of Scenery - my week in Ireland

Jake — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 20:54:19 +0000

Not exactly an assignment, but still mostly a working week, I’ve recently been in Ireland. The occasion: my friends Ryan and Aoife gathered the closest of their friends and family from throughout the world for a week-long convergence in County Wicklow, just south of Dublin. At the end of the week the two bonded in holy matrimony on a hillside near the town of Blessington.
Though we’ve known each other for about 15 years, Ryan and I became good friends when he returned to Richmond a couple years ago after living in Chicago, Italy and Ireland, respectively. A talented web and graphic designer, we’ve collaborated on a few projects as well. He is the architect of this blog and my forthcoming website. Both of us well traveled, we share a love of other cultures and ways of life. Shown above on the windy moors, Ryan holds on for dear life.

Aoife, from Dublin, was studying abroad in Chicago when she and Ryan met. She then studied in Italy and Ryan went with her. Along the way, the pair (shown above) have made friends everywhere they’ve gone, many of whom came to the wedding in Ireland, where at least seven nationalities were represented.

This is the first year that I have begun to take my camera everywhere I go. Not just when I’m in a foreign country but to a party, or movie, or even the grocery store. In many ways, I think it’s changed the way I look at things. For one, I now feel that I’m always on assignment, that I’m always charged with the task of taking interesting photographs, whether or not someone has commissioned them.

As a photographer who seldom takes a photograph that doesn’t include a human being, I concentrated more on the people of Ireland and their environments than on it’s beautifully green landscapes. Here I was able to gain more confidence in approaching subjects to ask if they’ll allow me to photograph them, and seldom was I turned down. Carrying my camera with me at all times forced me to be so bold, lest I return to the hotel empty-handed. Above, a retired man outside his tenement building north of the River Liffey. Below, school kids take the bus from Dublin to Blessington. “Are you some sort of famous photographer?” the girl asks. “Not yet,” I jokingly reply.

To call me a devoted U2 fan would be an understatement. Though we stayed out in the countryside, I made several day trips into the band’s hometown of Dublin, keeping my eyes peeled the entire time for U2 landmarks and even once sipping a pint of Guiness in a bar owned and frequented by Bono and The Edge. U2’s Dublin was a Mecca of sorts to me. Never am I so berated for the love of a band than among my own circle of friends in the US, who constantly poke fun at Bono to annoy me. It was great to be amongst allies.

Though this is the first time I’ve visited, it is apparent that today’s Dublin is not the same city of the 80s and 90s. Although in some sectors it has not lost its working class and industrial flavor, Dublin is in many ways a posh and metropolitan European capital. It is clearly undergoing an identity crisis. Despite being Europe’s fastest growing economy and a top destination for immigrants from Eastern Europe, voters recently rejected the Lisbon Treaty, a European Union constitution-of-sorts that streamlined EU integration and further centralized power in Brussels.

Ireland is dotted with ancient and medieval sites. On a day trip I visited Glendalough along with Bill, Jeremy (fellow Richmonders) and Andreas of Germany. The site of an ancient Christian monastery, it was founded around 600AD and today contains ruins of churches, towers and countless headstones. Above, Bill strolls through the graveyard at Glendalough.

Never without a song when there’s a pint in your hand, the week was peppered with Johnny Cash, Guns N Roses and U2 singalongs. These groups seemed to elicit consternation on both sides of the Atlantic, but became the glue that bound our various cultures together.

At the end of the week, a dapper Ryan (above with the best man, Barry) wore less conventional attire for the wedding, even riding into the ceremony on his future father-in-law’s bicycle.

Above, Aoife walks to the altar with her father. She and Ryan were married in a stone enclosure on a country hillside, where friends and family encircled them. The guests then used bits of rope to tie an unbreakable knot around the enclosure, recalling Ryan’s years of training to be an Eagle Scout.

Every step of the wedding was planned by Ryan and Aoife, and it remained true to form for the couple. Shunning tradition and employing symbolism, Ryan even baked the wedding cake (although with some last minute help from his mother).

I’ve shot a fair amount of weddings in the past. I’ve approached them as any other cultural event that I document -as a story to be told. Lately, however, my schedule has been so packed with overseas assignments that booking a wedding has become logistically impossible (I’m writing this entry from an internet cafe in Ecuador).

Last August I had almost booked a last minute wedding. The bride had even sent in her deposit when I got a call to go to China. It was a difficult decision, but I ended up taking the overseas assignment. I now have to put my time and energy into doing what I have endeavored for years to do and what is now happening - photojournalism.

Ryan now lives in Europe. I hope that during my travels I’ll still be able to visit him and Aoife from time to time. The fact that so many of their loved ones traveled thousands of miles to be at the wedding in Ireland is a testament to the kind of steadfast and upstanding friends that they are.

Good times ahead.

Kilimanjaro to Victoria Falls - Documenting Heifer’s work in the African interior.

Jake — Sun, 15 Jun 2008 02:55:57 +0000

Traveling in the developing world can wear on one’s conscience. Although the simplicity of lifestyle and overwhelming hospitality found there can be extraordinary, more often than not, essential needs are not being met, and daily life is a struggle. As my friend, writer Christian DeVries put it while remarking how fortunate we were to be born in America, we (Westerners) hit the jackpot in the global lottery.

Lucky we are indeed. It is my observation that those in the States, regardless of background, who truly work hard and make good decisions can provide for their own needs and those of their family and possibly even save a bit on the side. This is not the case in many places in the world. Work ethic is certainly an essential ingredient in success; but drive, determination and hard work mean nothing when the pillars of society are not in place to reward such attributes.

These same thoughts were stirring in my mind last year while in an open-air restaurant in Iquitos, Peru, on the Amazon River. Until a few moments prior my greatest anxiety was how I might purge my mouth of the intolerable fiery sensation leftover from consuming the world’s hottest chili pepper that had innocently garnished my plate of octopus and crawfish.

A young man, about my age approached my table peddling newspapers, magazines and talk time for mobile phones. Without success at mine, I watched him as he criss-crossed to each table in the crowded restaurant without making one sale. I could genuinely feel the discouragement in my own heart that I’m sure he felt inside, and I also knew that this discouragement was nothing new to him. I wondered what kind of home he might go back to empty handed that evening.

What is different about my assignments with Heifer International is that the day is spent documenting progress and change. I dwell on successes in farming, education, economy and family life, not sickness, injustice and upheaval. The people I photograph, if they haven’t already done so, are climbing farther out of the desperate circumstances into which they were born. Never is it discouraging work. On the contrary, it is inspiring.

Heifer Project International (HPI) is a development organization that fights poverty and hunger by implementing long-term agricultural programs that lead to self-sustainability. Usually that program is an integrated approach that combines a variety of solutions to meet this goal, helping the farmers along the way with whatever materials or training they may need. For example, Mr. Ndossi, above, received cows from Heifer. He uses milk from the cows that he doesn’t drink to make cheese and sells it in the market. He spreads the cows’ manure on his coffee and banana trees as fertilizer, producing more at harvest time as a result. He also shovels the manure into a pit where it gives off methane. The methane is piped into his home where it used to light lamps and as fuel on his gas stove. Mr. Ndossi has no need to chop down trees for firewood or buy candles in the market. He has plenty to eat and earns a steady income.

On my third assignment with the NGO, I have recently been traveling in Tanzania and Zambia. While it’s true that I mention Heifer quite a bit in this forum, it’s not simply because they are a client; Heifer’s approach to ending poverty works, and to this I am a witness. Above, Yedida Matonya is a Heifer recipient (project participant) near Dodoma, in central Tanzania. Below, participant Ryness Himululi helps her daughter Jennifer with her school work near Ndola, in Zambia’s Copperbelt.

Heifer’s effectiveness as an NGO can be attributed in part to its community-based organization. More often than not, community groups will approach Heifer after hearing of the success of other project farmers, rather than the other way around. After a dialog with local HPI country staff, Heifer will then form an animal or agricultural project that best fits the needs of the given geographic area. Below, Kulwa Selemani farms chickens in Tanzania’s Coastal Province, near Dar Es Salaam.

As a project is established, country staff select members of the local community to act as intermediaries between themselves and the project participants. Supervisors must show leadership skills and a desire to help their neighbors before undergoing training on how best to implement Heifer’s 12 cornerstones (ideals such as Sustainability and Self-Reliance) in the community. Sister Alexandra Buretta (below) is one such person. At the age of 69, she supervises a Heifer pig project with over 200 participants in various villages on Tanzania’s Mt. Kilimanjaro. By using community-based supervisors and local staff, HPI employees are already versed in the language, culture and community nuances in which they operate.

Tourism is booming in and around Arusha, about an hour west of the great mountain. The city is the gateway both to Serengetti National Park, where wide-eyed travelers come to spy big game like elephants and giraffe, and the snow-capped Kilimanjaro, where trekkers can ascend Africa’s highest peak. Many Tanzanians come here in hopes of finding employment in the tourism industry. Most residents in the area, however, benefit little from the constant influx of foreigners to the area.

In 1999, residents of the Village of Mkuru (above) approached Heifer International and requested assistance. The village, located in a dry, isolated region one hour North East of Arusha, lies at the base of Mt. Meru. The residents here are members of East Africa’s formerly nomadic Masai Tribe. In 1999, children in Mkuru did not receive any formal education. Soil quality was low due to overgrazing, and infant mortality was high from lack of access to medical facilities. Heifer concluded that cows or sheep were not what the village needed to improve their way of life. Though these are familiar livestock to the Masai, HPI in turn introduced 12 camels to the village, along with training in veterinary care, plowing, and camel breeding.

You won’t find many camels farther south than Northern Kenya’s Chalbi desert. Though it took a while to catch on down here, they turned out to be just what Mkuru needed. In the dry, harsh conditions of the village, the grazing habits of sheep and cows make them ultimately unsustainable, eating the vegetation that does grow and trampling away what is left. Camels do not compete with such livestock, preferring thorny scrub brush to grass; and unlike hooves, their soft padded feet don’t contribute to soil erosion. Known for trekking long distances without needing to refuel, camels are shoe-ins for the area’s low water table.

“When we get camels we are happy because they changed our life,” says village chairman Isaya Shakwet (above right). “Camels can carry a lot of goods like water and supplies. We are able to take people to the hospital by camel.” The improvements are many. The overall nutrition of the village has improved since 1999 as residents are drinking milk from the camels. In addition to the animal’s use for its plowing abilities, crop yields have increased as a result of better soil quality. Families are being fed larger meals and are earning an income by taking the abundance to the market. Parents are now able to afford medical and education fees for village children. “Through camels we get a lot of income… We pay doctors once a month to come out and give medical care to pregnant and nursing women. Our community is improving a lot because of all of these things,” continues Shakwet.

As if all this progress is not enough, Mkuru is now earning the majority of income in the tourist industry. Tourists arrive in the village where they begin a 3 or 5 day Safari on camelback through Northern Tanzania’s rugged wilderness. Even after Passing on the Gift (a system where animal recipients give offspring to other villages in need), Mkuru now has 26 camels in the village - more than enough to provide for the village needs as well as meet the demands of carefree foreign adventurers. Before 1999, no one could have predicted the changes that would come about in this village in the next ten years, and no one could be more pleased than the villagers themselves.

Bordering Tanzania to the Southwest, remote and landlocked Zambia is one of the world’s poorest countries. Sparsely populated, its 12 million residents are quartered mainly in and around its capital Lusaka and in the Copperbelt region to the North. HIV/AIDS has had a devastating effect on Zambia’s population and economy. Today, nearly 17% of the country’s citizens are living with the disease, causing the average life expectancy here to sink to just 38 years. Above, the main thoroughfare runs through the town of Mumbwa in Central Province.

With such overwhelming statistics, HIV/AIDS has had an effect on nearly every family we visited, including the Kalusa family. When we visited them in a village outside Mumbwa, Mr. Kalusa was away attending the funeral of a relative. His wife Bess Mutelo is 38 years old, and together they have nine children. As if nine weren’t enough to provide for, the Kalusas have also taken in Bess’ mother Olipa, as well as seven other children - relatives whose parents have died. Below, the Kalusa children bring water from a well dug by HPI in the village of Mika, near Mumbwa. Well installations are not something that Heifer is particularly known for. However, when it became apparent that a great need for them existed in rural Zambia, the NGO stepped in.

In addition to a nearby well, the Kalusa family has received goats and draft cattle from Heifer. The goats provide meat and milk for the family. The draft cattle provide milk as well but are mainly used for plowing fields. With sixteen children in the house ranging from 8 months to 24 years, there is no shortage of hands to work the field. However, in years past, providing enough food to go around was a problem. The use of manure as fertilzer and the cattle’s plowing abilites have a significant effect on crop yields. Remarking on successes of the project, the oldest son, Loswell Mutelo says, “The biggest impact I have seen is that we produce more food than before. We are a big family but we are able to feed ourselves.”

In light of the recent spike in global food prices, especially in the developing world, the fact that this family of 19 is able to raise enough food to provide for themselves is remarkable. In fact, they produce more than enough milk and vegetables to feed themselves; they are able to take some to the market, thus earning an income. The excess produce is reflected in one of the houses on the Kalusa’s compound, where Bess Mutelo, the family’s matriarch, displays her collection of fine dishes.

Is the Kalusa family rich now? Not by our standards they aren’t. But like many farmers that are Heifer participants, they are past the point of worrying whether or not they will find enough food and are putting priority on things like education and caring for those in their community and family that are in need. In more ways than one, they are passing on the gift.

Our journey ended in the town of Livingstone, near the Zambia/Zimbabwe border, where a different attraction is drawing large numbers of tourists. A massive gorge of the Zambezi River, Victoria Falls stretches 1.7 kilometers from end to end with a height of 108 meters. Though the falls can be viewed from Zimbabwe as well, sightseers have all but given up venturing into its political instability. They come from all around the world in droves to lay eyes on the falls and don rain ponchos to protect from the endless spray emanating from the rushing of water into the deep basin below.

More refreshing than the cool water of the Zambezi, however, was to be outnumbered by the hundreds of middle class Zambian tourists who came to glimpse the falls at the same time as I did. Only then could I begin to visualize an Africa where its citizens had not only attained the necessities of life, but also the luxuries of leisure.

-Jake Lyell travels regularly with freelance writer Christian DeVries to document the work of Heifer International. The quotes in this post were provided by Mr. DeVries.-

Above and Beyond: witnessing aid in Tanzania

Jake — Thu, 01 May 2008 10:10:08 +0000

For the better part of the year I have been in East Africa. Tanzania became my refuge back in December when my mom’s voice (”Promise me you’ll always do the smart thing”) rang in my head to leave the Kenyan city of Kisumu following the outbreak of some brutal post-election violence. Kenya has settled down now and I hope to return later this year.
Tanzania is a country with which I am well acquainted. Eight years ago, my first foray into the developing world was to Tanzania where I taught in a summer ESL program in a primary school in Moshi, at the base of Kilimanjaro. The country was to prove quite captivating; this March marked my fifth journey there. Experiences in Tanzania in years past have shaped me as a person and influenced the career path I’ve taken. Returning at the beginning of this year for the first time since I’ve considered myself an established photographer, I was eager to try a more mature eye on the country.
In Tanzania I was able to document the work of two NGOs: Heifer International and Light in Africa (LIA). The two organizations, which are unaffiliated, operate in some of the same areas of Tanzania but differ greatly in size, scope and organization. Heifer and LIA have vastly different goals; Heifer is a development organization whereas LIA can be loosely defined as a relief organization. The humanitarian work of these groups meets different needs of those they serve. Large and small, the work is from the heart and is changing the lives of some of the most vulnerable Tanzanians. This post will focus on LIA’s work in Tanzania. I’ll focus on Heifer’s work in the area in a later post.

It seems odd to call Light in Africa an organization or an NGO. Yes there’s an office and staff, and a even a company letterhead but it operates almost like a big family. Lynn Elliot, “Mama Lynn,” is the matriarch, the founder and CEO. She came from England in 2000 on what she calls direct assignment from the Holy Spirit to “deliver these children safely into My arms.” She founded a children’s home in the foothills of Mt. Kilimanjaro but moved down to the town of Boma Ng’ombe on the Arusha-Moshi highway in 2003.

Since 2003, Mama Lynn’s ministry has expanded from raising some 40 orphaned or abandoned children to around 150. Many of the children she cares for are afflicted with HIV/AIDS. See my PEPFAR post for more on this subject. Far more than a children’s home, now operations include a food kitchen in the desperate town of Mirereni (shown above), medical dispensaries in several remote villages, and housing and hospice care for many elderly and disabled people. However, this is by far not an exhaustive list of LIA’s current and ever-expanding duties. “Whatever God puts in our path, we will care for,” Mama Lynn says. Below, she slaps fives with children waiting for a meal at Mirereni food kitchen.

This Whatever God puts in our path policy keeps Mama Lynn in a mode of constant ministry and her house full of guests. She has very little personal time, save for prayer in the morning. At the time I visited, Mama Lynn had been spending an increasing amount of time in the aforementioned mining town of Mirereni. In addition to operating a children’s home in there, she established a food kitchen there the previous year. Below, children in LIA’s Mirereni Fleeze House.

The kitchen now serves over 400 hungry adults and children a day. Many who attend are children of Tanzanite miners whose parents work in deplorable conditions for extremely low pay. The food kitchen serves not only to fill hungry stomachs but also to keep a pulse on the community, identifying other needs as they arise.

Take for instance Anna Mapena. Shown above with her baby boy of nine months, Taigo, she is 40 years old and lives in Mirereni. Mama Lynn and I first met her lying on the doorstep of the town’s only medical dispensary (built by LIA volunteers). The doctor there could not do anything for her condition, which was later thought to be Nephrogenic systemic fibrosis. I was unable to photograph her in the state in which I first saw her: sick and in pain, lacking dignity. I couldn’t do it without first gaining her trust and letting her know my intentions; so I didn’t even ask. That week, Mama Lynn brought Anna along with her husband, Sakita, back to LIA in order to begin treatment for her skin condition at KCMC hospital in Moshi. It was there that I shot the above picture.

Paulo Nangu (above) is a man who slipped through the cracks of Africa’s traditional gerocentric society. Husbands and wives sometimes have children numbering in the double digits to insure that they are cared for in their last years. Paulo and his wife, who died many years ago, were never able to have any. A migrant worker, he ended up in the town of Magadini. There he developed a tumor in his leg and became too ill to work. Villagers there would trade off providing what they could in the way of food, shelter and clothing. On a trip home to Magadini, a LIA staff member heard of his plight and brought Paulo back to live at the guest house.

Paulo (above center) receives food, clothing and a place to live at LIA’s guest house. “Here I am happy because I never sleep hungry, but there I went to bed with no food,” he says, looking back to his former life. He considers Mama Lynn’s charity an answered prayer. Mama Elihuruma (below) expresses similar thanks for the help she’s received. To her, LIA is “a close friend you can run to for help.” LIA stepped in as she was being driven off the land she was renting while caring for her severely disabled child, Elihuruma. Light in Africa volunteers pitched in to buy her a plot of land and build a house for her and her family. LIA still funds and facilitates physical therapy for Elihuruma.

Operating on the examples of Jesus laid out in the gospels by providing for those in need, Mama Lynn is unabashedly outspoken in her Christian faith. Rising early in the morning for prayers and continuing her heavenly dialog throughout the day, she often fasts meals. “I was anointed by God to come out here and do the work,” she says. “I could not do it any other way… I rely totally on the Holy Spirit.”

However, Mama Lynn has refused to identify with any particular Christian sect or denomination, preferring her autonomy. She remains accepting of volunteers at LIA of any faith or no faith at all. She keeps in close contact with the Hindu community in nearby Moshi, who have dubbed her the Angel of Kilimanjaro. Furthermore, she receives food donations from Muslim merchants in town.

Brushing aside the inevitable comparisons to Mother Theresa, Mama Lynn humbly states, “I’m not a holy person, I’m a social worker,” thus recalling her former occupation in the UK that has given her much needed experience in the care of the vulnerable and disenfranchised. Mama Lynn’s daughter, Laura Cox, was an integral pillar of LIA before returning to England last year to better educate her children. Laura (below) still makes occasional visits and eventually plans to resume her full time role at LIA.

LIA receives no regular funding from any religious, government or charitable institutions nor do they hold fund-raising campaigns. Mama Lynn operates solely on what is given to her by passing volunteers or those that choose to arbitrarily deposit money into her Paypal account. “We pray for people to be inspired to help with God’s mission.” This way, she says, she is more clearly able to discern God’s will and the purposes of her ministry; if she is to help someone or begin a new work, the funding will become available.

Her living-by-faith financial strategy is rare for NGOs and unheard of to many Tanzanians and government officials, who from their view perceive all westerners as having no bottom to their bank accounts. Charitable work is seen as big business in Africa and for some NGOs it is. For Mama Lynn, who refuses to pay bribes, the resulting lack of cooperation from local government has been exhausting. Things are improving of late however, since the election of President Jakaya Kikwete. His anti-corruption and NGO-empowering policies have yet to fully filter down through the ranks of the old guards still occupying positions of power.

Recently, recognition of her work has been on a national level. Mama Lynn was last year an honored guest at a luncheon hosted by President Kikwete. Mama Salma Kikwete, the Tanzanian first lady, has twice made visits to Light in Africa.

Driving the dusty, bumpy, ever-shifting route to Mirereni, Mama Lynn comes to a new fork in the road. “Which way do you think Jake?” she asks. “I say right, but you can always go ahead and forge your own path,” I wittily respond. It wouldn’t have been out of character. “I’ve tread enough new ground by now thank you” she laughs. But somehow, I think there’s more yet to come.

Copyright 2008 Jake Lyell. With thanks to Laura Sechu.

Saving Lives - Africa, PEPFAR and the Bush Legacy

Jake — Wed, 27 Feb 2008 13:20:00 +0000

The President is just back from a whirlwind tour of Africa. He swept across the continent in 6 days, leapfrogging to friendly and peaceful countries while dispatching Secretary Rice to areas that need a little work (see my Kenya post). While much of the headlines these days deal with wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Bush administration has been waging a more silent war against AIDS in the developing world.

I’ve spent the last month in Northern Tanzania, observing the work of an NGO called Light in Africa. Light in Africa, or LIA, began as a children’s home on the foothills of Mount Kilimanjaro. Since work began in 2000, founder Lynn Elliot (aka Mama Lynn) has gradually expanded its ministries to include food, nutrition and medical programs to the surrounding areas. The operation has since moved off the mountain to be mainly concentrated in the village of Boma N’gombe. LIA now raises some 150 children, around 40 of whom are living with HIV/AIDS. Below, children at Light in Africa’s Pilgrim House for boys.

A marked change has come since former visits I’ve made to LIA in 2002 and again in 2004: all the children who previously lived (or sadly, died) from day to day with the effects of HIV now have access to antiretroviral drugs without cost. Furthermore, the children receive regular checkups from doctors and nurses. Thus, children whose quality of life was once severely diminished can now live a relatively normal life compared to their peers who are not infected with HIV. Below, Omega and Felix are two of about 40 children at Light in Africa with HIV.

Antiretroviral drugs suppress the replication of the HIV virus in the body, allowing more T-cells to grow. T-cells are needed for a strong immune system in order for the body to fight off diseases and viruses. Such drugs are expensive. The majority of people around the world infected with HIV lack access to them either financially or geographically. It is little known that George W. Bush has made it a goal of his administration to change this. Below, Sonya lacked antiretroviral treatment from an early age. Her condition is now moving from HIV into AIDS.

Doctors recommend beginning antiretroviral therapy when one’s T-cell count falls below 350 and surely when reaching dangerous levels below 200. When word of Phineus reached Light in Africa, their social worker, Samueli was sure he could not be saved. Samueli had been dispatched by Mama Lynn to bring the child, whose parents had both died of AIDS, under her care. Phineus was langushing at home in bed, nursed by his grandmother with what doctors would later find to be a T-cell count of 6. Upon seeing his condition, Samueli returned to LIA without the child. By now accustomed to miracles, Mama Lynn insisted Samueli bring Phineus to live at LIA.

Two years later, Phineus (shown above on a recent checkup) is now healthy and lives once again with his grandmother. He receives antiretroviral drugs and health screenings from nurses and doctors at a local hospital or LIA’s clinic. The medication and care he receives are made possible with funds from PEPFAR, the President’s Emergency Plan For AIDS Relief.

Passed by Congress in 2003, the Global AIDS Act that authorized PEPFAR was first touted in Bush’s 2003 State of the Union address. The program has continued to be funded each year since and was greatly expanded in 2006. The funding is distributed both to trustworthy local governments as well as to aid-groups and hospitals in the field. PEPFAR is currently working in 13 “focus” countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, in addition to Vietnam and Guyana.

In addition to structured prevention, care and treatment programs for AIDS, the act also authorized funds for the prevention and treatment of malaria and tuberculosis. Despite the relative lack of publicity, malaria is the continent’s most deadly disease, though AIDS can be more debilitating for a longer period of time. The incidence of co-infection of HIV/malaria and HIV/tuberculosis is also common. As of 2005, an estimated 24.5 million people in sparsely populated Sub-Saharan Africa were suffering with HIV. Though the area accounts for just 12% of the world population, it contains a disproportionate 60% of the world’s total AIDS population.

Two hours from Moshi by dusty, bumpy, almost-undriveable road to the dry Tanzanite mining town of Mererani, nurses from KCMC hospital in Moshi have come (thanks to a lift from Mama Lynn) to conduct HIV tests. Enough funding for the program exists for the hospital to regularly distribute antiretroviral medications to the village should enough people be found to have the virus. Word spreads quickly of the nurses’ presence and within a few minutes there is a line of twenty or so people waiting to be tested.

Sun pours in an otherwise dark room where tests are being conducted. The atmoshphere is tense. One man, after waiting all morning for the nurses’ arrival, is overcome with the anxiety of knowing his diagnosis. He removes the tourniquet from his arm before nurses can take a blood sample. After a few minutes he again consents to the test which later comes back positive. It seems that many who enter already know their fate and request antiretrovirals before the test is even administered. After the first 90 minutes, all but one of the villagers tested is HIV positive.

Assuming that KCMC approves the outreach to Mererani, the HIV+ villagers there are more fortunate than most. Even though antiretrovirals are freely administered in hospitals, they are far out of reach for people in remote areas like Mererani. The drugs may be free, but getting to and from the hospital requires bus fair, meals and a day or more away from the shamba, or field, where most people earn a living. Furthermore, queuing at a hospital in Sub-Saharan Africa is often a multi-day ordeal.

This is where PEPFAR’s work is most effective. By bringing the medicines as well as medical workers out into the bush, PEPFAR is sustaining the lives of many who would otherwise have stayed home.

“I know it is about life, and it is! But what do they do out in Checkireni (another remote region of Tanzania) when they don’t have the money to feed their kids and have to come up with 10,000 shillings to get to KCMC?” says Laura Cox, Mama Lynn’s daughter and fellow worker at LIA. Sadly, for most, there is no answer.

We return to Light in Africa later that evening to find that social services has delivered two more children to the orphanage: Hasani, a boy aged four, and his sister Azziza, aged 2. The pair look as if they have come from a famine-stricken refugee camp; Hasani weighs about 16 pounds and his sister not quite 10. They suffer from AIDS and Tuberculosis. The two however, did not come from a refugee camp, but from a mother who is dying of AIDS in a hospital bed at KCMC; they are despairingly inconsolable and in tears at being separated from her. Above and below, Mama Lynn and Laura administer antiretrovirals to Hasani and Azziza.

Within a few weeks in Light in Africa’s care, Hasani has shown improvement and is able to walk while holding someone’s hand. Azziza (below) does not fair so well and is checked into the hospital with pneumonia.

Despite its generous and far-reaching effects, PEPFAR is not without its critics. One third of the program’s prevention budget, or 6.6% of the overall budget, is spent on abstinence-only programs, to the chagrin of some public health experts who are concerned that Christian or moral agendas, rather than those of public health or human rights are PEPFAR’s motivating factors. Certain restrictions for funding are also placed on organizations working with prostitutes.

Whatever the motivations, according to PEPFAR’s reports, the program has administered antiretroviral therapy to some 1.4 million people. Though a tremendous amount of work remains, the results are significant. As the program expands, people are healthier and living longer, economies are strengthened because of a greater workforce, and HIV infection rates are decreased giving greater hope to the next generation. Time will tell whether or not these achievements will be overshadowed by the administration’s foreign policy failures elsewhere in the world. But one thing is sure, as the President leaves office next year, he leaves Africa in much better shape than when his two terms began.

Turning Blue: Virginia’s Democratic Fever

Jake — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 13:13:40 +0000

Momentum can be a dangerous force. Just ask former Senator George Allen, whose political career as a darling of the Republican Party was brought down by the momentum of the Macaca incident in 2006. Were it not for such a slip (and the hoopla that followed), Barack Obama could well be riding his current wave of momentum to a race in November against Allen, who was a very early GOP front-runner for the nomination. While Virginia won’t be selecting a nominee from its native sons or daughters this time around, it will certainly play a more crucial role in the nomination process than in the past.

Obama swept Democratic primaries and caucuses held across the country Saturday and Sunday, and poles have suggested that he will continue to fair well on Tuesday’s primaries in Maryland, Virginia and Washington, DC. That Obama momentum was felt by thousands of people inside and outside of Virginia Commonwealth University’s Siegel Center on Saturday night in Richmond, where the Democratic Party of Virginia hosted its annual Jefferson-Jackson Dinner. Below, a police officer works to keep Hillary and Obama fans from spilling into the street.

The raucous crowd inside, overwhelmingly in support of Obama, often became vocally impatient for their candidate to take the stage. Addressing the crowd early in the evening, Clinton had a bit of a disconnect with her audience when compared to Obama, who would speak over two hours later. Her supporters were out-shown and out-shouted by those of her rival.
In a broad attempt to combat perceptions of un-humanness, Hillary Clinton continued a recent trend of laughing and smiling incessantly on the campaign trail and at the podium. Noting primary and caucus victories on days subsequent to performing the stunt, political strategist and pundit Ross Catrow predicts that Hillary will have a tearful moment before the cameras on Monday, ahead of key primaries in the Mid-Atlantic.

The event was also a rock-star rally of sorts for local Virginia Democratic politics, which up until a few years ago, would usually have hosted its annual dinner at the back room of a Ruby Tuesday’s. A man named Mark Warner changed the Party’s prospects, however. Taking the governorship after Republican Jim Gilmore’s reckless term came to an end in 2001, Warner showed Virginia how to run a fiscally sound government while maintaining important social and education programs. Warner’s policies helped Virginia steer around many of the economic problems facing other states in post-911 America. Below, the Virginia Governors from left to right: current Governor Tim Kaine, Mayor of Richmond and former Governor L. Douglas Wilder, former governor Mark Warner.

“Remember when I was governor that year?” the Democratic heavyweights schmoozy it up backstage.
While Wilder and Kaine have both endorsed Obama, Mark Warner does not plan to endorse a candidate until the nomination is sealed up. Anticipating a seat in the Senate next January, Warner wants to ensure a smooth working relationship with whoever occupies the Oval Office. As the Democratic candidate for Senator, the popular Warner should win handily against the current GOP front-runner, the aforementioned Gilmore. With Jim Webb already in office, Virginia will have two Democratic Senators and a Democratic governor for the first time since the Norman conquest of 1066. Okay, so if it’s happened before, it was probably back in the 30’s.

The big question is… can Virginia bare to vote Democrat in the general election? Could it be turning into a blue state? If Clinton were the nominee in November, I dare say Virginia would tip McCain. However, Obama is a much easier shoe for Virginians to slip on. Obama’s record (or at least rhetoric) of reaching across the isle to get things done is a strategy that has proven effective for Virginia Democrats like Kaine and Warner. Below, Obama and Kaine wave to a sold-out crowd on Saturday evening.

Obama has proven he can gain support among independents and moderates. He is a once-in-a-lifetime candidate able to attract young and old with his compassion, wit and charisma. The Superdelegates who may decide this race for the nomination would be wise to keep that in mind. Meanwhile, as McCain tries to beef up his conservative credentials, he will likely alienate independents who supported him. That makes for an easier race in the general election for Obama. But with the delegate race in a dead heat, let us not look solely at Obama’s current momentum to sum up the outcome; look at the numbers. Hillary has long-sought the nomination, and to think she would give up before it got into overtime would be what Bill Clinton would describe as a “fairy tale.”

Words and Photos - Copyright 2008 Jake Lyell

“No Raila, No Peace.” Kenya’s Bloody Tribal Unrest.

Jake — Tue, 29 Jan 2008 15:38:57 +0000

No one predicted what has come over Kenya in the last month since its disputed presidential elections. But since then, the country has fallen from the grace of being one of the most-stable countries on the African Continent to being the host of machete wielding street mobs of young, angry, disenfranchised men. Tourists and ex-patriots have largely left the country as security and the economy have plunged amid the unrest.

In all likelihood, Orange-Democratic Movement leader, Raila Odinga, won Kenya’s presidential election against incumbent Mwai Kibaki on December 27th. Raila, an ethnic Luo, widely led in opinion polls up until the election, accusing Kibaki, a Kikuyu, that he had not done enough to tackle corruption. Kenya’s other various minority tribes have long been hungry for a more prominent role in government. With the slow and non-transparent way the votes were counted in the days following the election, many were convinced fraud had taken place.

I knew something strange had come over the city on December 29th when I took an early morning stroll on the shores of Lake Victoria in the Western city of Kisumu, the hometown of opposition candidate Raila Odinga. The election results had not yet been released but tension was in the air because the results had been delayed for a second day. I was followed down a dirt road by two men, when one, bearing a machete, announced somewhat casually that, “We are going to kill you.” It was a little too casually in fact, for he was not convincing enough for me to readily cede my camera.

Nevertheless I began to scream for help as I was hit twice in the arm with his (luckily dull) machete and knocked to the ground. I screamed as loud as I could as the two men tugged on my camera bag while I took a few kicks. I could not physically let it go. It was impossible. I had come to Kenya to work, and work was now my life. Within a minute, several dockworkers heard my cries from inside the port and came running, sending the thieves to scurry off down some nearby railroad tracks.

I was left only with bruises, scrapes and a small laceration where the machete had hit. Thanking my helpers profusely, I marched on to my hotel in order to wash up before going to the police station to report the incident. The police were surprised that this would happen in a normally safe and peaceful town. However, within the hour the city descended into chaos as a shocked police force stood in passive observance of mobs looting shops and burning the houses of anyone not of the Luo tribe.

The fact that I had just walked away from a machete attack camera in hand may have given me an air of invincibility, but I began to photograph the mayhem as it unfolded on Kisumu’s streets. In a tense moment of being surrounded by a crowd, a man named Joseph stepped out and began to mediate between me and the mob, demanding they go about their business and let me do my job.

Joseph stayed with me like a guardian angel for the next several hours as the rioters looted and burned every shop in town and did the same to the houses of rival tribesmen. Even the livestock were not spared. Goats and cows were savagely torn apart, their limbs paraded around like trophies. All the while chanting “No Raila, no peace!,” the rioters seemed indifferent that I was documenting their actions.

This phenomenon was to last only a short while however, and after a few attempts at my camera and a few more close calls with machetes, shooting became impossible. Joseph and I holed up in my hotel room and prayed for peace to come over the city.

Calm came to the city that night after the Kenyan army marched in, firing tear gas and rubber bullets at anyone left on the streets. But the quiet was to be only temporary. On the following evening, the Kenyan Electoral Commission announced the results in Kibaki’s favor and swore him in within 30 minutes of doing so, prompting new and increased outbreaks of violence.

Unable to get food or water and out of cash, by this time I was waiting at the airport for the next flight to Nairobi. After waiting 12 hours for the flight, it was canceled due to security concerns. I was able to make it on a later flight with a different airline that evening. The riots that had taken place the previous day in Kisumu were no longer just an affair of Western Kenya, where I was, but had now spread throughout the country. As our plane flew out of town I could see the flames engulfing the streets and buildings below.

The violent aftermath that has engulfed Kenya has not subsided in the past month. It has begun to take on an eerie resemblance to Rwanda in 1994, whose genocide occurred under similar post-election tribal strains that descended into civil war. Mediators including former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, have failed to nip the problem in the bud. Last evening, Mugabe Were, an Orange-Democratic Movement MP elected on December 27th, was killed outside his home in Nairobi. Officials have stopped short of calling it an assassination.

Since its independence in 1963 Kenya has been ruled by only three presidents: Kenyatta, Moi and currently Kibaki. All men have followed the pattern of being ever-reluctant to relinquish their presidential powers. Despite his failure to implicate corrupt government officials as promised before winning his first term, Kibaki is most remembered for making primary education universal for all children in the country.

After years of peace and functioning democracy, Kenya’s brutal tribal tensions have come to a rolling boil and are now exposed to the rest of the world. But before too much sympathy is given to Odinga and his supporters, there isn’t much evidence to show he would have acted any differently as an incumbent. While most likely the true victor, Odinga and his ODM party is also the likely perpetrator of electoral irregularities according to the New York Times. Let us also remember that Kibaki, the current incumbent, himself came to power in 2002 as the opposition candidate of change, vowing to rid the country of corruption but keeping many of the crooks from the Moi administration in office. At the center of the problem is a nasty tribalist mentality that will continue to draw blood and tear apart the country unless ordinary citizens can look past tribe and see one another as united Kenyans.

With thanks to Joseph Otieno.