Here are a few samples of how the Hamlin Fistula Hospital has been using my images. It is an honor to be a part of this effort to reduce maternal mortality and injury.
Category Archives: Medical
Ethiopia: Hamlin College of Midwives
Join me as I travel to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia to meet some of the world’s bravest women as they support each other by reducing infant and maternal mortality and the occurrence of the physically and emotionally devastating condition of fistula.
It is a great honor to be asked to visit the Hamlin College of Midwives to capture the essence of their 2011 graduation ceremony. On October 15, 2011, the Hamlin Fistula College of Midwives will graduate a second class of trained midwives. After the ceremony, these newly trained women will return to their rural villages to care for new mothers and assist extremely difficult deliveries.
Every day, 1,000 women and 8,000 babies die due to complications from pregnancy or childbirth. And for each maternal death, at least 20 additional women suffer devastating injuries related to their simple desire to produce a family to help work the fields to sustain their food source. These World Health Organization statistics are sobering, especially when contrasted with the kind of care that is received elsewhere in the world.
The Hamlin College of Midwives is responding to this crisis by training local rural women much needed midwifery skills and supporting them as they set up services in their rural home villages.
Come along as we celebrate these midwives and the mothers of Ethiopia! I will be documenting this momentous occasion, as well as other aspects of the beautiful and innovative Ethiopian culture. I will also be writing guest blog entries on Phil Borges’ Stirring the Fire website.
We are hoping that a collective cheer from around the world will be heard as these Ethiopian women extend one of the most loving gestures to one another: helping a mother deliver the life that grew inside of her.
Each midwife has been able to be trained without having to pay fees, which they could never afford. Your help is critical in making this possible. Donations for the midwife college are being accepted now at the Hamlin Fistula USA website.
For Dr. Catherine Hamlin’s story, read about her book here.
Halloween + One Old Soul Boy
I watch preparations for Halloween on the streets. My nine-year-old friend who passed away this year seemed to be able to parse out his mind from logic and the overlay of structure…and help us all believe, really believe, in dragons and spirits and totems and the mish-mash of spirits that help us along. Perhaps he did know something we can’t understand. Perhaps he did tap into something “out there” beyond our mind’s capabilities or willingness to grasp.
I think he knew that he would live far beyond what anyone could imagine. Gage is right here: magical, deliberate, thoughtful, balanced and oh-so wry.
ASMP Best Of 2011
My work documenting emergency obstetrics in rural Ethiopia was chosen to be in the American Society of Media Photographers “Best of 2011” project list. I am hoping that this will bring about increased understanding of the difficulties surrounding maternal health that are present in rural settings. The Ethiopian government is actively developing solutions to address these problems as quickly as they can, with minimal resources.
Here is an interview that details this project and others that I am working on, plus some of my philosophies and business practices.
Catalyst Magazine: Dr. Tim Bletscher
What an energetic group of people work in the office of Dr. Tim Bletscher! Everyone was upbeat, caring and most have worked in this office for decades. Dr. Bletscher has spunk and charisma – sure takes the fear out of going to the dentist.
I made all of the images for the story, including this cover shot and all inside story images. It was a great assignment.
Ethiopia: Presentations and Discussions
Here is a list of upcoming lectures/slide show regarding our emergency obstetrics efforts in Ethiopia:
February 17, Portland, OR
Portland State University, 2:00pm classroom discussion. Call for details.
February 17, Lake Oswego, OR
Lake Oswego Reads, 7:00pm, Marylhurst College, 17600 Pacific Highway
April 19, Portland, OR
Medical Society of Metropolitan Portland, 7:30pm, Embassy Suites Hotel, 319 SW Pine St.
May 15, Portland, OR
The Development Salon meets in the Park View Room at the Mirabella in South Waterfront. 4:30pm Wine Reception, 5:30pm Discussion. Mirabella is located one block east of the OHSU aerial tram base at 3550 SW Bond Avenue. Call 503-688-6806 for further directions.
May 16, Bend, OR
Cascade Camera Club: Bend Senior Center, 1600 SE Reed Market Road. Doors open 6:30 pm; meeting begins at 7:00 pm.
Ethiopia: The Shoe Shine Boy
Yemataw, body lanky and now molded into our doorway, asks if I need anything.
Water to be fetched? Floor to be cleaned? Chicken slaughtered?
I am completely captivated by his most kind eyes – the kind of eyes that play with you, turn you upside down and inside out, fully aware of their capability and effect. How can I possibly resist engaging with this impossibly charming young man?
And indeed, I want to.
He assumes his service role with aplomb and grace, with a dash of mischievousness. I look at him, and I am witnessing heaven. And a bit of hell as well, as I realize I will too soon have to say goodbye to this riveting soul.
As days turn into weeks, Yemataw becomes part of the fabric of our lives. He shows us how to conserve water. He laughs as we run and hide while he slaughters what is soon to become our dinner. He eats with us, and shares our joys. His head at a constant curious tilt, his amusement rests just below his surface, relaying to me that he knows far more than he lets on.
His story begins to unfold as we walk to market. Fatherless at the age of six, he has assumed the role of family patriarch, wanting only to fulfill his promise to care for his mother, who lives an eight hour walk away.
On occasion, I offer to help him supply his home, a small former storage room the width of his floor mattress, with little light shining through the small window. No thank you, he responds. That purchase is too expensive. Just help with my education at some point, if you must.
One morning as we prepare to set off to see an outer clinic, he asks to join us. I tell him I will see if there is room in the lone hospital truck, which doubles as an ambulance. With ever twinkling eyes, he tells me he will pray for a seat. As we pile into the truck, I see him in the distant, fervently polishing the shoes of the doctors, his main income position, eyes darting from shoes to our car to the shoes and back again. I want to give up my seat to make room for him.
Yet, loss is an everyday occurrence here in this dusty and remote town of Mota. Hope, however, always prevails.
I see, instead of disappointment, a wide smile, eyes dancing. He shines faster as though to say without words Chigga Yellum! (No problem!). I won’t deliberate on loss. What is the use of that?
I return early, and walk to his room. He shows me the things he reveres: a lone poster tacked up crookedly, a warm blanket, two plastic buckets, a small pillow. I search for the well-used hotplate we had earlier given him and I don’t see it. Did he sell it at market? No, there it is.
Yemataw left his village a few years ago and went to work as a tanner for 12 birr (less then $1.00) a month. He picked up English, practiced it wherever he could and eventually found his way to Mota, where he assumed his current position of Principal Shoe Shine Boy and Gofer.
Many a doctor and ferenji (white foreigner) use his services. As I watch the interactions, it is clear that Yemataw is dearly loved. One by one, the doctors line up for lunchtime shoe shines, their western clothes peeking out from under their white medical coats. Handsome they all are, confident also. They have found their way to a secure and well respected position. Chigga Yellum.
Yet, here I stand, observing this scene, and I long to be in Yemataw’s presence most of all. He who knows the human spirit perhaps best of all of us who are formally educated at high levels. He who knows how to focus on solutions, always, rather than dwell on his problems.
I find my heart bursting open over this young man. Can I ever go back to my contained and restrained self after feeling so much love, over and over each day, for a human spirit such as Yemataw? I long, each morning, to see this young man, he who can start and end my day in the most brilliantly, sparkly way.
We find each other a few times every day, laugh hard at the myriad of problems that befall us (which there are, assuredly, many) and set off for his tasks at hand: floor mopping to the sounds of Michael Jackson music, market purchases with gentle patience, translation with gusto, soul soothing with vigilant sensitivity.
At market one day, I offer to purchase a gabi for him, as he does not have one of these Ethiopian traditional cloths. He refuses it. I purchase it anyway, and he shows me to the tailor who can sew it into one gigantic piece. As we wait for the gabi to be sewn, we walk to the local juice bar and sip on spritzes silently, keeping our communication to only smiles and heartfelt sustained eye contact. I love this wonderful human being.
Days begin to slip into the sad realization that soon we will be leaving, and here today I am now saying goodbye. I reach for the gabi he helped me purchase at the Mota market and say “Think of me when you wear it. Please?”, echoing his words he said to me when a day earlier I tried to give him an abandoned scarf I found.
This time, he accepts the gift.
And as I drive away, tears falling freely because they simply come easily here, I see him in a far distant field, looking zealously my way, hands held high in the air, holding the white gabi so that it sways like a flag in the warm morning breeze.
As I watch his form fade into the distant horizon, I am comforted by what I have learned from Ethiopians over and over again: the physical form is less important than the spirit of humanity, and I know he is coming home with me.
Ethiopia: A Male’s Love
I came into this country set to focus on and expose the plight of women, how their frail under-fed bodies give way and break under the enormous pressures of their lives, from their daily hard work to child birth complications to relentless back and forth fetching of firewood and water for their family’s meals. Instead, the tender gestures of the men repeatedly beckon my curiosity and catapult my heart.
I will forever remember the image of these men, eyes searching for assurance, hope and a sign that their loved one will be well. They speak in almost inaudible whispers, “eshie, esh, esh”, (yes, yes, yes) murmuring as I try to communicate through body language and nuances. I extend my hand, hold their eyes with mine, and know sadly that I can’t reassure them of the health of their loved one. I can only offer my Western bred feeble attempt to return the gentle love they express through their delicate manners.
Without doubt, my heart beats for the men of Ethiopia.
One after another, they offer me a jarring counterpoint to my preconceptions of the barbaric circumstances I have heard about: rape, abduction, child marriages. Believing that these things do exist, I see no signs of the capability of these heinous behaviors.
I don’t think the heart can be directed willfully. And today, once again, I feel my heart opening and expanding into deep crevasses that were long ago hardened by a series of youthful poor choices and the history of watching first hand the abuse of my own mother.
These men toil the fields, tend to the animals and can’t bear the sight of their loved one at the throes of unbearable pain. They pace the hallways of the maternity ward, for days, after selling off their cows to pay for the hospital services, searching they eyes of anyone who looks confident. They carry her gently and lovingly for many miles and days in search of medical help.
Will she survive? Will she come home with me? How can I help?
Eshie, esh, esh.
An extended hand is met with a strong grip, from a place of desperation, never wavering their yearning that is born from hope. Passion at its most exposed and vulnerable level, they reach for the health of their loved one.
I also witness these traits outside of the hospital setting, as I watch the interactions on streets and in small villages. There is an unfamiliar and incredibly seductive way that the men protect the well being of the women they love. I know I am romanticizing, and that abuse and excessive control do exist toward women. I see this on occasion. But by far, and so surprisingly, I see the grace, love, and extreme tenderness that the males feel toward women here.
Many before me have remarked about the intense eye contact found in the eyes of Ethiopians. It is almost like their ancient ancestry and lack of colonization give them powers that the rest of the world does not possess. As one Ethiopian man recently told me while sitting at an airport, “Everything starts, and ends, with the eyes.”
If this is indeed true, and my own eyes are not deceiving me, then I never want this love affair to end.
Ethiopia: A Gabi Comforts
I remember the day my father told me that “Blankie” was lost. I was devastated, having held onto the remains of that blanket since the day I was born. I remember the love I felt for the threadbare piece of cloth, how it comforted me when I saw it after a long day of playing in the woods or riding my bike. Years later, my father confessed that he and my mother had decided on that day that it was time to throw it away. I felt betrayed.
When my oldest son Ben was around 8 years old, he had an “Oatmeal Bear” that replaced his beloved Blankie, and during a visit to San Diego, we inadvertently left it behind, tangled in the bed sheets. I went to great lengths to get it home….calling the hotel every day, asking if it was found. The hotel staff kept saying it was not there. I finally had the idea of asking them to check at the laundry service company, and sure enough, they found it and sent it to us. I think I was more excited than Ben was to open the box when it finally arrived in the mail.
Letting go of good things is something that I talk frequently about with my children. It is easy to let go of something bad, but incredibly difficult to let go of something good. It takes a special courage, and belief that better things are yet to come. There is risk with this also: what if the next situation does not work out as well?
I left my corporate job, one that I truly loved, when the first of my three children was entering college, a very difficult time to decide to do this. I was petrified that I would not have the same financial security than when I had this steady job in the lucrative field of Information Technology. Yet I knew that photography was my first love, and I had never tried to make a living from it. If I did not do it now, then would I feel up to the challenge when I retired? Would I even be around then? The concern of never making the leap outweighed the risk of remaining status quo. And I was right, my income did decrease extensively, and it has not always been easy to live with the question regarding where the next photo assignment might come from.
But I gained many things that I could never have attained had I stayed in my comfortable job. I learned firsthand about marketing and public relations and accounting and client relationships. I also learned how to shift my business plan as the field changed. And by far, best of all, I got to see extreme delight when people were happy with a photo I had made. Today I enjoy consistent and incredibly fulfilling work, and I will go to my grave thankful for those who believed in my talent years ago more so than I did, and were there to encourage me to give this a try.
As I navigate the issues that are present here in Ethiopia, I love to watch how important an Ethiopian gabi is to the villagers. They are comforted by the softness of the cotton, men and women wrapping it over their heads and shoulders. I see them stroking the edges when they are worried. I watch them shivering in cool evenings and wrapping up in their gabi to stay warm.
When I purchased my own, I could not help but remember how it felt to have a blanket be a source of comfort. As I move through these days here, my gabi brings me peace and inner warmth. When I wear it outside of my room into the town center, many villagers tilt their head and exclaim “Firenji! Gabi!”.
They know what this big square of cotton brings to me. And as I take yet another important new leap after I return home, I am happy that this gabi will be there as a source of comfort and a reminder that it is nice for even grown men and women at times to be wrapped in something soft and shielding as we make our way into the throes of uncertainty.
(Photo of me by Jay Wright)
Ethiopia: Degie’s Story – Part 3
I enter the room cautiously, not wanting to disturb the family. They motion for me to come all the way in, and when I do, I see beaming faces and hands outreached, scrambling to make contact. I am only the photographer, not a doctor, but their joy and appreciation are boundless: Degie has lived through an obstructed labor and childbirth, and the baby is thriving. I look at Degie, and her smile is wide, tears are in her eyes. I grab her outreached hands and shake them like a mad woman. I too am thrilled to see such a difference in her well-being. I can also detect concern regarding how she will comfortably make the long walk home.
She slowly uncovers the tiny baby boy next to her, her first-born child, and the cool air makes him stir. Lips plump, tiny fists pumping the air, he opens his eyes and makes a sucking sound that makes us all laugh. He is content. I motion outside for someone to come and translate for me, and I tell Degie that I think she will make a wonderful mother. I also tell her that I have never seen such devotion from an extended family, at least three members sitting at her bedside around the clock, waiting to see if she needs anything.
In rural hospitals, the family must provide basic care for the patient. They feed them, bathe them, and sometimes even administer simple nursing tasks. Degie’s sisters, brothers and grandparents have provided exceptional care for her. It is not always like this. At times, there is no family support. These perhaps are the most difficult situations to witness. When a person comes in great crisis, and they have no one to support them, most likely they have no means to pay for services and they reluctantly must turn away. It is heartbreaking to watch a very ill woman, laboring with a child, have to leave the hospital grounds based upon inability to pay the fees. Once again, our souls reach out to her and want to pay the fees, but the hospital administrator strictly advises us that this creates more problems than they can handle once we are gone.
What do they do? Where do they go?
This is simply a way a life here in rural Ethiopia. Our minds turn to how we could possibly make the payment of fees sustainable. An on-going fund for destitute patients? A plea to the government? We don’t know these answers.
But Degie is fortunate in that she has many brothers who sold cows to pay for her surgery, and have taken time from the fields to carry her home. They gently walk her to the makeshift stretcher, and tenderly move her down onto it, covering her with a gabi. A chaotic flurry of hands dip into injera and food is passed around. The men are fed quickly so that they have strength to make the arduous walk over rock strewn terrain back to their village. After a bit more clamoring as they decide who is in front and who is in back, they reach down and pull up on the stretcher, lifting Degie’s body high onto their shoulders. The sisters pack up the food and scurry behind, barefoot with gabbies flowing in the wind.
I watch them turn away from the hospital and walk together down the rocky road toward their village, their feet hitting the ground in rhythmic unison. And as they disappear into the horizon, I see the faint outline of a group of men carrying a woman toward the hospital.
