Allgemein

Delicious! Pho is a traditional Vietnamese beef noodle soup and one of my favorite dishes. And I love the atmosphere in the pho shops – all are focused on eating. In January 2023, we had the pleasure to visit East Asia with a stay in Vietnam. Pho for breakfast, Pho for lunch, Pho for dinner. Go Pho!

“My home is my castle” – true, if one has a home. Others have to seek shelter in constructions that hardly deserve the term “building’. The Planta Building is located in the Smythe Road Community, on Old Road, one of the many slums in Monrovia, capitol of Liberia, on the West African coast. Run by a lady who sets the rules, its inhabitants are called “Zogos” – Liberian English slang for “zombie”. Mostly unemployed young men, who try to make ends meet by all necessary means, many of which fall outside the law, Zogos are often the abandoned children of former child soldiers from the cruel civil war that raged in Liberia between 1989 and 2003. The Planta Building is not only a shelter, but also a space for prayer and community. This booklet is part of a series of portraits shot in February and July 2022. – Munich, November 2022

Koya, Kurdistan Iraq: Headquarter of the Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iran (KDPI). The HQ was attacked by the Iran Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) on September 28, 2022

“This operation will continue with our full determination until the threat is effectively repelled, terrorist groups’ bases are dismantled, and the authorities of the Kurdish region assume their obligations and responsibilities,” the IRGC said in a statement read on state television. Thirteen people were killed and 58 wounded, according to Iraq’s state news agency. Iranian authorities have accused Iranian-Kurdish separatists based in northern Iraq of involvement in protests in Iran that have led to the deaths of dozens of people.(Al Jazeera 29.9.2022). The pictures were shot in the morning of October 13, 2022. The closest I came to see death, yet. – Frankfurt, November 2022

Most of us have to work in one way or another to earn a decent living. As they say, there is no free lunch in this world. But some have to work harder than others, toiling in unbearable, life-threatening conditions for just a few cents a day, enough to buy a bowl of rice. Under a burning sun, the polluted air hanging like a dense fog, the young people I met in early October 2022, fifteen kilometers southeast of Sulaymaniah, Kurdistan, Iraq, belong to an industry recycling the world’s garbage. Protected only by worn-out sneakers, they separate trash from the Sulaymaniah region, an area with a population of about two million, at a huge dump site where the garbage extends to the horizon. Here, plastic, wood, and metal are divided by hand, then sold to local companies by a work force barely surviving at the bottom rung of the value chain. – Munich, December 2022

Have you ever asked yourself where the garbage goes that we inevitably produce while spending time at beautiful beach hotels? I followed the garbage collectors in Southern Sri Lanka. What I found one can see below. The sour poisonous smell and the hazardous working conditions for 3 USD per day cannot be captured but need your imagination while watching the pictures. I am grateful to Keerthi Iresha and her team who let me experience a workday with open arms.

In February 2022, I visited again Liberia, West Africa, for family reasons. In the capital, Monrovia, I had the opportunity to take portraits in one of the many slums – “Smythe Road”, near Old Road Market…
The area is probably no bigger than half a square kilometer and without any recognizable boarder, and part of a seemingly endless community of worn-down houses, sheds built of metal sheets, with some single fire trees showing optimistic red colors when in full bloom.