Charles de Gaulle airport
A quick note today to let you know I’m on the move again this Friday. I’ll be in France, staying with family outside Paris for at least part of the summer. Hard to say how long, a lot is uncertain. Could be a few weeks or a couple months.
Hold down the fort please (a bit more literally than normal). All my usual channels remain open.
A few photos of Paris from some years ago:
Colorado
I met one of my heroes this week at a talk in downtown DC.
Svetlana Tikhanovskaya is the Belarusian opposition leader in exile. You could call her the president in exile, as she is widely seen as having won the election against Belarus’ longtime authoritarian president, Alexander Lukashenko, in 2020 after she stepped in as a last-minute replacement candidate for her jailed husband (whose picture she carries everywhere). She was a complete political novice but won convincingly according to neutral observers.
It was a stunning victory but only the beginning of a long, ongoing saga for herself and the country.
Lukashenko refused to admit defeat, even as hundreds of thousands of Belarusians took to the streets for months in the COVID summer of 2020. They were so beautiful, both graceful and tough, and stoic as Belarusians tend to be. This was their moment, their ‘color revolution’ (white and red, the national colors) that I thought wouldn’t happen in my lifetime. The regime teetered. Surely they couldn’t beat or arrest everyone into submission.
But that is exactly what happened.
One of the most stirring recent examples of people power was brutally and systematically crushed. Tikhanovskaya, the mother of a young child, was forced into exile in Vilnius. Ever since, she has led a kind of opposition cohort from abroad, meeting regularly with heads of state to keep Belarus on the international radar.
She says she is hopeful that the Trump administration will use its influence to help free what are now thousands of political prisoners in Belarus.
Meanwhile, she hasn’t seen her husband in five years, and she said he has been held incommunicado for the last two. She doesn’t know where he is.
I was able to speak with Tikhanovskaya after the event briefly, introduced by one of her close aides I know personally. He was at the launch of my photobook The Waiting Room in 2012 at the former Montserrat House in DC. The guy in the tie in the crowd shot:
The last time Tikhanovskaya was here a few years ago, I made sure someone delivered a book copy to her, and it’s since been spotted in the ‘waiting room’ of her office in Vilnius. She and I agreed I would try to visit the office when I’m in Europe over the summer.
I’ve been told my photobook is the first to focus on Belarusian culture and identity, which to me is at the heart of their post-Soviet geopolitical predicament, somewhat stuck (literally and metaphorically) between Russia and the West. Not Russian, not European.
So much of what’s going on - in Belarus, the US, and elsewhere - boils down to a battle for culture.
I’m actually wary of didactic ‘activist art’ and even the old warhorse ‘creating awareness’. We are usually all too aware already, the question is what to do. For me, there are ways to make a difference as an artist: how you portray human values, do you elevate and energize people or demoralize them, do you plant the right seeds in the right places, can you take an interest - even a passionate one - in something outside yourself. In a way, through art we help create the world we want to live in.
I’ve always tried to uphold all that in my own work, and nowhere more than in Belarus. People ask me why, do I have ancestry there or something? (No) As I told Tikhanovskaya, I went there because I was curious, I kept going because I started to care, and I made my book because I wanted other people to care.
And for Belarusians to feel seen and to see themselves. It was like discovering a place that hadn’t been shown a mirror before, and the blinds were drawn on the windows.
Besides photographing there on several trips from 2000-2009, my Belarus-related collabs include:
2001 - Exhibition in Minsk with Czech photographer Karel Cudlin as part of our ‘Seeing-Eye’ project, and a workshop that focused on developing Belarusian documentary photography which barely existed then (it does now). The importance of the critical observer in repressive societies.
2003 - Second exhibition in Minsk on an ArtsLink grant, showing my work from Belarus and the US. Interestingly, I got some state media coverage, which generally seemed to see my work as warmer toward Belarus than toward the US.
2006 - Curated and co-organized the Chernobyl20 exhibition, featuring the some of the best photography about the human aftermath of the 1986 nuclear disaster. We had Paul Fusco, Lucian Perkins, Robert Knoth, Gabriela Bulisova, and more. The show opened at the UN on the day of the 20th anniversary, after a special UN assembly on Chernobyl. Then a second opening at the Rayburn building on Capitol Hill.
2008 - Helped bring Belarusian artist Zoya Lucevich to the US for a residency, where she made a body of work that showed at the UN, a first for an artist from Belarus. Zoya has a close ancestral link to Belarus most famous national poet, Yanka Kupala, whose real name was Ivan Dominikovich Lutsevich. (If I recall correctly, her great-grandfather was Kupala’s brother.)
2009 - Invited to lead one of the inaugural summer workshops at a new independent photo school in Minsk.
2012 - Published The Waiting Room book, which won second place at FotoweekDC’s International Photobook Awards.
2013 - Talks at FotoweekDC festival, the National Press Club, and the International Center for Journalists about Belarus and my work there.
It’s a lot but so much of it I could never do now. Belarus has gotten much worse, it was repressive then but you could function. Today I don’t think I’d set foot there, I assume there’s a KGB file on me (yes, they have their own KGB). In her talk, Tikhanovskaya referred to the country as like a prison at the moment.
Talking with her aide (my friend) after the event, he said what Belarusians need is inspiration. We tossed around a few ideas and chatted more about the general importance of art and culture in the battle against oppression.
Especially now that we here in the US are moving in a similar direction, we may need each other.
On the power of inspiration, I’ll leave this on a note from Belarusian author Victor Martinovich, from his intro to my book:
A girl on a trolleybus is standing with her back towards us. We only see a wide boulevard disappearing in the distance, manicured trees on both sides. The girl has a light summer dress and is turned sideways to the observer. We can tell that she is beautiful but also that she is not a model. The scene is not professionally staged; such scenes take place in our lives ten times a day, in a store, on the metro, during a walk home.
But it seems that you can love life again and forgive it everything just for this one scene.
from ‘New York City is Beautiful’
There are now three main galleries in my Prints section, more to come.
Prints are made and shipped directly from darkroom.com. Potential collectors can go to Prints here on my site or browse my darkroom.com pages (linked below).
You may have been following weekly installments for Postcards from America, a compilation of my personal views of the US from the ‘before-times’. I’m up to fifteen images (rolling out three per week for five weeks) and growing. Many years ago, one of my dearest mentors, a little-known but phenomenal and poetic Czech photographer, looked at my Eastern Europe work and said something like ‘very nice, but I’d like to see what you can do with your own home’. So this is for him.
New York City is Beautiful just dropped. It’s an experimental series from several years ago when I was looking for a new visual approach to one of the most photographed cities in the world. The title is somewhat tongue-in-cheek, for a city that has moved from the outward physical dysfunction of my youth to more recent existential dread (COVID, climate, authoritarianism) under the carnival surface. You want color, you got it. And no, I’d rather not give away the secret, very lo-fi, technique used (an idea I actually got from one of my photo students at the time). See if you can guess! DM me, I’ll tell you if you’re right.
Early on I decided Nairobi was a city of contradictions and I haven’t really changed my mind. This set represents a select sampling from my body of work there, trying to understand and come to terms with the place that was home for a year and a half. Frankly I haven’t decided yet what I’ll do with it. Need to let the images sit for a bit first.
There’s also a World section with a grand total of one image so far, an older favorite from Stockholm.
My standard sizes will fit standard frames. Prices are meant to be affordable but what the biz calls ‘respectable’.
Yes, that time has come. The time any artist dreads.
I’m asking you to buy something.
Of course you don’t have to. Or you could do it later, whenever. I would at least love if you check it out.
I could use the support as things remain unpredictable on my work front for the foreseeable future. Huge thanks to my OG paid supporters from Substack, for you a special offer: if you let me know a photo you want I’ll send you the original file free, so you can print at cost at your leisure and as often as you want for personal use.
Since moving off Substack, this newsletter will be forever free.
Thanks and enjoy your Sunday! Please let me know any questions or problems.
I was considering this image for my Postcards from America, and it got me thinking. What DO you love?
Your loved ones, family, friends, your home of course. Your dreams and imaginings. Your work if you’re lucky. Your neighbors if you’re really lucky (as I am). For me, photography is about love. I can’t photograph what I hate, my shutter finger won’t activate.
I love a lot of things in other countries. Many places have quite lovely architecture and sensible social support systems. I’ve often felt I could live happily in this or that country. Kenya is tempting. Finland is a great place, must be nice if you’re Finnish. But as a visitor something is deeply lacking that is becoming more clear to me as I get older: it’s not home and never could be. Especially when you reach a certain age and home is so deeply embedded with life already lived.
Granted I’ve been living abroad, I’ve only been back a few weeks so I might be a bit misty. But in our budding spring I am reminded of a notion of love that is closer at hand.
I’m going to make an outrageous statement: I love this country, more than ever.
Even with everything going on. Because of everything going on. Yes it’s under siege from within. That makes me disgusted with those doing the siege-ing, not the place.
Yes these are deeply disturbing times. Yes I am still deeply critical of a long list of things, as I always have been. As a true American should be. Name a ‘great American’ who wasn’t on some level a contrarian.
In this country it's easy to forget the love part when there is much that repulses. But as we grow angry we also become indifferent or callous to our true bounty and potential.
How can you love a place where the soul-crushing never seems to end? This country can kill you, or let you die, without remorse. The people it rewards are so often the wrong ones, even the grotesque ones. The worst impulses are too often allowed to run amok. Freedom? In so many ways, this is not freedom. Quality of life? The US will never be, I dunno... Denmark. A country that has its basic act together for its people without huge pendulum swings.
But I love it anyway. I didn’t used to say that. Maybe now because it’s under such unique threat. Maybe it’s defiance talking, because it’s mine and I’m not letting these people destroy it. I’m not going to let the bastards take both the country AND my feelings about it. I’m not giving up on what it can be. That day might come but it’s not here yet.
I’m not talking about baseball or national parks or Hollywood. The things that have moved me after returning have been more everyday, local, and connected to my memories.
Sometimes just by going outside and moving around.
The cacophony of birds. My god. But not just the birds, generally - that one mockingbird (hey, he’s back as I write this) that reminds me of the baby mockingbirds we once found and built a little fort for in our yard. The mother would swoop down and feed them, until they disappeared after a few days.
The astonishing tree canopy. Not everywhere is so blessed. But not just trees generally - the ones we planted in our yard several years ago. We prepared the soil for a year before planting. Moving dirt around will bring you closer to your own patch of Earth. Ok, yeah, at the moment it’s a mess (hey, I’ve been away).
The woods nearby. Especially the area of the woods where we buried our dear departed guinea pig Seydi.
My childhood house that I passed recently with my mother. On its own it contains countless life moments.
The cool ‘hippo rocks’ I had to cross everyday on the way to school, that now feel like a shrine.
It helps that I like where I live now.
One night last week I was out for a walk. Passing a local music school after dark, the lights were on, it was open mic night and a good turnout at that. Great vibe.
(Speaking of open mics, I was part of a local Open Mic for Democracy event last week.)
photos by Eric Bond
Circling around a shabby house across the street that is a celebrated DIY art venue, I peeked in as an art-rock band in what was once a living room is nailing it for about a dozen people in what was once a dining room.
Down a darkened street in the historic district, lights emanated from the old, deeply American houses.
Over at the bookstore another night, an author talk about Ukraine. Where, oddly, I met a lovely family of Latvians living here. Talking about my time in Riga in the 90s, they actually knew one of the friends I made there. Wild.
Next door is the music store on one side and the funky local radio station on the other, next to a great recording studio. Music store > bookstore > radio station > recording studio. Damn. What a lineup for any town. If revolution breaks out, put the barricades there.
America is both an actual place and an imagined one we carry around in our heads.
Things in this country I usually carry in my own America-bubble: proper bagels, public libraries, Martin guitars, East Coast autumn, endlessly varied nature, everyday friendliness of people, indie coffeeshops.
When I dream forward I sometimes think of the Hudson Valley.
Of course there’s music and culture. Beyond the stars and obvious pop culture names, plenty are out there that still make America cool: Andre 3000, Beach House, Kishi Bashi, Patti Smith, Thievery Corporation. A radiant Tracy Chapman’s surprise 2024 Grammy appearance with Luke Combs still stirs.
Younger up and coming artists like Jesse Welles (that United Health song guy) and the DMV’s own Yasmin Williams (a new kind of guitar hero for this generation).
Author and commentator Rebecca Solnit has done much to buoy us in these times, and I’ve been discovering new independent voices like Marisa Kabas and Joan Westenberg. Our cinematic canon can still claim the Coen brothers, Spike Lee, and Jim Jarmusch.
This is just a small sampling. Your list will of course vary. I humbly suggest that you take a meditative moment to recall what you do love.
In these perilous times, you already know what you’re against. You will only truly fight for what you love. (Ask Ukraine.)
To be clear, I don’t forgive those who brought us to this dangerous point. My love is not about that.
It’s a weapon to defeat them.
Our next generation of everyday apps needs to better prioritize privacy and ethical ownership. If it collects your data, you don’t want it.
[This is an updated followup to my Substack post a while back, If It's a Digital Coup, It Needs to Be a Digital Rebellion]
“The defaults are becoming dangerous,” I said.
My friend, a pastor, looked at me for a long moment. “That’ll preach,” said the guy who writes a sermon every week.
We had just come from lunch, where I had given him my usual spiel about ‘resistance tech’, about how we urgently need a movement to reassess the apps we use: Google, Meta, X, Amazon. Apps and platforms that have been our popular, comfortable, and convenient defaults, the obvious mainstream choices, even as we ignored their data privacy perils for years.
Apps that have helped create - and continue to fund - the tech billionaires that now seem onboard with authoritarianism. We need to get out of their clutches.
Dangerous?? Strong word.
But consider: does this one help someone surveil you? Does that one track everything you do online, or in real life? Did that one help create a billionaire that is now controlling you as much as serving you, and whose wealth is radically distorting our society and politics?
My pastor friend and I had been tossing around ways to hone the slogan version, the elevator pitch. ‘Non-cooperation with our own oppression’ was another good one of his.
On a walk later I thought of ‘boycott oligarch tech’. I’ve usually used ‘resistance tech’ or ‘rebel tech’ as shorthand.
It’s been surprisingly hard to get the pitch lingo right. I've got my first Resistance Tech community workshop scheduled for next month, so I need to be able to be clear, persuasive - and short. Like ten minutes total (it’s a slot at an unrelated neighborhood event), and I want them to leave with some new apps actually downloaded.
The idea itself is straightforward enough: easy replacements for the everyday apps we've become so used to, but are now becoming outright harmful or even, yes, dangerous.
My goal is a basic roadmap to a better everyday 'tech stack' for average people who don't want to think too much about this stuff.
People who don't particularly like change, but understand there's a problem.
A set of apps with all the functionality you need, a non-surveillance business model, and ethical ownership. Including apps not based in the US and therefore not potentially as vulnerable to American government interference or overreach.
We do have those choices.
Our money is a potent weapon and we don't want it going to the bad guys. Like how we might choose to shop local and not patronize companies that don't reflect their values.
And it works. It's certainly working against Tesla.
Now it's time to apply that to the tech giants that dominate our lives. Imagine if enough people did it.
Time to free ourselves, to disentangle from dependency on toxic tech.
The good news is that it's easy to switch. Quality options are waiting for us. For a starter kit of daily apps, you could break it down into a few main categories, with solutions that you'll feel good about using.
Google, one of the worst culprits in collecting and monetizing our online activity, is of course many things: Chrome, search, gmail, maps are particularly egregious data harvesters. YouTube too, which is a Google product. And Google tracks you even when you’re not using Google. Countermeasures are needed. So Google is spread over multiple categories below.
The apps below are not the only good choices out there, just my suggestions. Your needs may vary of course.
Text/WhatsApp > Signal
Signal is the gold standard for encrypted messaging and voice calls. They don't collect any personal data when you use it (other than your phone number to sign up, which some people do complain about, but they don’t do anything with your number). As we now know, our government is using Signal, so they clearly think it’s secure.
User error notwithstanding, like accidentally adding the wrong person to your group chat.
Texting is inherently insecure (ask Mark Meadows or others after Jan 6th whose text messages were trotted out in court). Even US law enforcement recommends encrypted messaging, for the moment at least, after a major recent Chinese hacking incident.
WhatsApp is also well-encrypted but it’s a Meta product. While they can't read your messages, WhatsApp does collect other data like who you messaged, how often, what time, etc. WhatsApp has been problematic in the past with their handling of that data, and now Meta is currying favor with the regime. You do the math.
That said, WhatsApp’s encryption is the same as Signal and it is very popular worldwide. In Kenya, where I just lived for a year and a half, everyone uses WhatsApp. Less so in the US and more and more people are bypassing it and going to Signal for privacy and security.
Chrome > DuckDuckGo, (also Vivaldi, Ecosia, Brave)
The Chrome browser, like all Google products, harvests your activity to build data profiles of you. Google has more on us than we care to imagine, which can have serious implications. See the link below for a great explainer.
A better option is a non-tracking, privacy-oriented browser with good-guy ownership like US-based DuckDuckGo - my recommendation - or others. Vivaldi (Norway) and Ecosia (Germany) are also very good and European-based if you're looking for that extra insulation from US policies.
Not only does DuckDuckGo not track you, it helps block Google trackers that follow you around the web even when you're not using Google apps themselves.
https://spreadprivacy.com/how-does-google-track-me-even-when-im-not-using-it/
Vivaldi (what I’m currently using) has some cool customization features and built-in free Proton VPN.
Google > Proton
Proton Mail is based in Switzerland, which is therefore governed by strong Swiss protocols on digital privacy rights. You can send emails normally or with encryption.
Proton has long been the go-to for journalists, activists, and others with privacy concerns, recently it's becoming more mainstream.
The paid tier (about $10/month) has Drive and Calendar apps that work very much like Google, along with a password manager and a strong VPN.
The free Proton tier offers their email and basic VPN (more on VPNs below), which is hard to beat.
Google > Organic Maps (also Maps.Me, HERE)
Do you want Google knowing everywhere you go? Because they do, Google Maps is tracking and compiling your movements and activities. It doesn’t have to be that way.
I can personally recommend Organic Maps, an open source, non-tracking phone app that doesn't collect your data. I've used Organic in Kenya and the US and I'm satisfied with it. The user interface is different than Google Maps, might take you a few minutes to learn, but it's simple and works great once you get the initial hang of it. I was especially impressed with its amazing level of detail for walking/hiking directions, even in the middle of a large park where it marked things like benches and shelter.
Organic Maps uses downloaded/offline maps by default, meaning you pre-download the map files for the country or region you're in. That way you don't need a data signal or wifi to use it, which could save your ass. Google Maps can do that too but it's harder to figure out how. With Organic it's easy.
X / Threads > Bluesky
Instagram > Pixelfed
Facebook > ?
Tricky. You don't want to lose valuable communities, groups, and connections, that's the tradeoff if you're trying to get off Meta.
There really isn't a good Facebook replacement out there. I tried Tribel but... yeah, no. I’m still on FB.
Threads is quite active, more two-way engagement than Bluesky, though your toxicity experience may vary. I find Threads substantive and civil, but kind of random. And unfortunately it's Meta. Your call.
Pixelfed is a new-ish, decentralized, European Instagram alternative. For photo buffs there's also the Foto phone app, also quite new. They both seem fine though truth be told, personally I’m a bit over sharing single images in that format. Seems a little pointless.
There's really no excuse for still being on X, Bluesky is a solid choice with non-oligarch ownership. While it can take time to get traction, it's a good place to follow your favorite commentators, news sources, and such.
Google > Ecosia, DuckDuckGo
Again, Google tracks and compiles everything relentlessly. That's how they make money.
DuckDuckGo and Ecosia are two search engines (as well as browsers) that don't. Both use Microsoft’s Bing. Ecosia plants trees with their profits. Both are lovely options.
What's a VPN? A Virtual Private Network hides your activity from your internet provider. It also hides where you are, even what country you're in. Some people use this to watch international programming (like, say, sports in another viewing market). You just toggle it on, and choose a country to pretend you're in. That's it.
Some people might not feel the need for a VPN, but a non-tracking browser and a VPN is a rock-solid privacy combo.
Amazon > Shop local or direct from merchants
Yes, we are all addicted to the convenience of home delivery. Addicted enough to allow Bezos to be in the overlord suite? At least consider canceling Prime, and minimizing or eliminating Amazon shopping. You can always use it to find stuff, then go straight to the merchant.
For books there is bookshop.org if you don’t have a local bookstore.
Broadly speaking they are not the worst privacy offenders. They make their money from selling devices and hardware. They don't need to make money from your data, unlike Google or Microsoft.
If you have Apple products and apps at least use those. Compared to other mainstream options, the Safari browser or your Apple email are not terrible choices.
A side note on encryption: since bad guys can hide with encryption too, there is a deep split playing out in Europe right now, between countries (like Spain and Sweden) who want to undermine encryption for the sake of fighting trafficking, drugs, child porn, etc, and others like Germany who defend the right to encryption for personal privacy.
There’s also a push within Europe to develop their own alternatives to US big tech. I came across this just yesterday on France 24:
Europe seeks tech independence amid strained ties with Trump's America
I don’t have all the answers. My Resistance Tech list doesn't address all the ins and outs of our tech dependencies but does offer a start towards digital liberation. A fresh start.
Feel free to write me with questions - or suggestions for my pitch!
Want a simple list with links to these apps? Download my cheatsheet here.
Jennifer Vasquez - wife of Kilmar Garcia, who was deported to an El Salvador prison in error - arrives at the courthouse in Greenbelt MD for a hearing Tuesday, April 15 about her husband’s case.
Normally I consider myself a lapsed photojournalist but felt the urge to be there.
Washington DC
These are selects from the last few days (click to enlarge), looking for the smaller fragments of resistance following last Saturday’s big protest and before next Saturday’s followup.
It’s been eye-opening getting out there and walking around. On one hand, it’s good to know you can find the pulse of pushback. On the other, I have to say yes it’s a pulse but kind of a faint one. I’m having to look pretty hard.
It’s even some of the same people. At Saturday’s Tesla protest in Georgetown, a couple of the demonstrators recognized me from the Dance Against DOGE at the GSA a few days earlier. I’ve run into a Pulitzer prize-winning photographer more than once, so I guess we’re looking at the same list of events.
Passing cars were mostly in support of the anti-Tesla demo, which included a DJ (same guy from the GSA) blasting great songs. But honking your horn and going about your day is about the same personal investment as liking a post.
People walking by were harder to read, that’s something I couldn’t capture. I didn’t see any MAGA types, that wasn’t the problem. Some seemed mildly sympathetic or curious at the spectacle, at least enough to giggle and snap a photo or selfie. Some didn’t react at all. I heard one girl with her father say ‘at least they’re peaceful’. No one joined in or looked like they were getting too excited, other than the fact that something out of the norm was happening on the way to the cupcake shop or whatever.
Last weekend’s rally did feel like it was ordinary concerned people turning out en masse with some seriousness of purpose. There was energy there. I hope next weekend can match or surpass it. But I also hope we can find a way to keep a more consistent pressure on in between the biggies. It shouldn’t be that hard in DC at least.
The city should be a roiling cauldron. Right it feels like watching a pot slowly, maybe, starting to simmer.
I was thinking it was surprising not to see college students being visibly active (I did see them shopping), but maybe I shouldn’t be surprised given everything. Are they tuned out or feeling the chill, keeping their heads down and their dissent muted? Maybe I need to dig into that more, see what’s percolating at various campuses like GW and Georgetown.
Let me know if you hear of any interesting actions or signs of life.
[PS - I want to say something about Fetterman (image 5). Regardless what you feel about him, I think that guy is still struggling, you can see it in his body language and a grimness in his face. He came out to meet a constituent cohort from Pennsylvania (that I followed from a nearby rally) and while he managed to flicker to life for a few moments, he looked like he would rather be doing anything else. I shook his hand and tried to joke that he was great in the movie The Pale Blue Eye, he’s a blink-and-miss-it background extra in a bar scene. He was not amused.]
Washington DC
Dance Against DOGE, a DJ’d ‘slumber party’, was held outside the General Services Administration building this evening (Wed 4/9), where organizers said DOGE members are working and illegally sleeping.
Fighting insanity with irreverence, joy, and cheekiness.
Washington DC
Somewhere in Pennsylvania
Maybe it was the jet lag, as I just got back to DC a few days ago - I have to admit when I first got to the Mall I was not convinced. Would this be the day we showed up, proved we were serious?
As people trickled in and sort of stood around, it was tempting to be a little preemptively deflated. The speakers kicked off somewhere over a hill. Kind of hard to hear and impossible to see. I was really tired and still in ‘oh look, Americans’ mode after so long abroad.
I don’t even like shooting demonstrations. I don’t like crowds and protests are usually a hot mess photographically. But this is part of what I came back for, to at least be present and do what I can. I decided part of what I can do is sort of diagnostic. As I got a little more tuned in, it was clear there was deep emotion, even trauma, just under the surface. One man passed a priest, started to say something about how we’re all together, and began weeping after just a few words. I didn’t take a photo, just noticed.
Later, on one end of the monument grounds a walkway became a kind of gauntlet, with people lining the low walls on both sides forming a channel for those passing through. The energy built and built, with drums and chants. It wasn’t performative or self-conscious as these things can sometimes be, more of a genuine release of pent-up feelings.
Not just anger and a certain stoicism but joy and camaraderie. Solidarity.
I’m writing this at 5am (damn jet lag) so I can get my Sunday post out on time this morning. Trying to hit publish before I fade again. Hope you’ll think of it like checking the newspaper to see how the demo went. And, like me, you’ll feel a little better about where we are.
In the end I was convinced. I believed in these Americans.
New York City
Websterville, Vermont
Blink and the time has come to leave Nairobi, at least for the moment. Feels like only yesterday we were agonizing about whether or not to take the opportunity to move our lives abroad.
I'm leaving tomorrow for the US to take care of some things, M will stay on a bit longer as the VOA saga continues to unfold. There’s still a lot of uncertainty how all this will play out, and how long it will take. Totally unpredictable. Hope it’s not the last time I see this place, though it very well could be.
The way our time is being cut short was certainly not what we expected, just as we were digging in for another year. What’s the expression? Life is what happens when you’re busy making other plans. Or maybe ‘shit happens’ is better.
I'm sad to leave but so grateful for the experience of a lifetime. Too much to even process, as much as I've tried to do so in this space from the beginning. I could go on and on but at the moment I need to shut up and just reflect. Some places you spend time in mark you, form you, shift your outlook. London and Prague were such places for younger me. Later, Minsk. Now Nairobi too.
I have my body of black-and-white photos but let me share a couple galleries below as a color scrapbook, to convey what the life here felt like. Last chance to bring you along for a moment.
Our plans are up in the air and the world precarious. But we're ok and ready to navigate transition with stubborn optimism. I’m excited to get back and reconnect. See you soon.
Washington DC
Scranton PA
U Street, Washington DC
