It wouldn’t be hard to collect images that tell of a land in despair; a landscape, a people, a potential.

These scenes are common, set up, and ready to be snatched from their context, immortalized and co-modified.

I struggle to capture a portrait of a village child’s giggle. Partly because the moment is so fantastic, so transfixing I don’t want to put anything between me and the magic bubbling up in front of me. And secondly because these kids have not yet learnt to pose for the camera.

Sharing a laugh it crackles back and forth between us like a pin pong ball bouncing off the walls but the moment I hold up my camera their faces quieten into a deep question of why I would bring something lifeless to this moment? I don’t need to capture their best angle or even their entire face for them to receive the image of themselves on the screen with wonder and rapture. Is it too deep to think that just like life in the village they don’t need to be perfect; just present?