Atasehir

I’ve realized that I am really drawn to these photographs of children. Every now and then I include a work by Salgado of an adult, but mostly the children catch my eye. I’m not exactly sure why; maybe I can identify more easily with them or maybe it’s just an instinct to nurture.

Regardless, I chose this photograph because of the children in it. I was looking through this book full of black and white photographs and every photograph is full and dark and sad faces and each face is full of pain and trail, every photograph but this one. This one stood out because these children are running and laughing, they’re having fun.

I think that if I were more talented I would Photoshop these children out of this background and put them in a park, on a playground, or at a friend’s house. I would put them inside the city they live by, I would make their surroundings match their emotions.

The truth is, though, no matter how much I can try to Photoshop, that this photograph was taken outside a city in a refugee camp that has no external aid (Salgado). Many of the people who moved here because their homes were destroyed in an earthquake with a magnitude of 6.3 still live in tents (“1998”).

They’re still happy. It makes me wonder how much our society groans and complains, and compared to this photograph and this life I don’t think it is warranted. If children half the world away can live in tents and garbage and have fun and laugh, then there is no reason why we can’t. If humanity is resilient in Istanbul, it must be resilient in Seattle and New York and Salt Lake City.

Salgado, Sebastião. Migrations. New York: Aperture. 363. Print.

"1998 Turkey: Adana, Ceyhan Earthquake." Www.sciencedaily.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 13

 Mar. 2013.