Photo Essay: Faces At a Street Market in Ethiopia

I was moved by the way certain faces, I want to say friends, but these were faces of strangers that just drew me in. I still wonder about the little girl with her Amharic Homework, the little boy in green who followed me around, the boy digging in what appeared to be trash, the woman in yellow. Ethiopia was even more moving to me than Kenya. I can not tell you why. I made a point of meeting their gazes; it felt like a way of respecting them. What I wanted to say to them was that I cared about them and wanted more than anything for their lives to be healthy and happy. They spent their lives so simply just to earn a couple of dollars to make it through another day. I grumble about American luxuries that others have that I do not, but when you are over there, you are embarrassed by the wealth we each have. You see the beautiful faces, those radiant smiles, and material agendas shrivel to the bottom where they belong.