New shadow puppets in action for the first time at Sovanna Phum

I hardly took out my camera last month. I needed the break, and my other work takes priority. But a few days ago, I stopped by Sovanna Phum and learned they had a special event that evening–a ceremony and special performance to launch their new set of shadow puppets.  The event was attended by many of the regular artists plus people from the community, a couple of donors or their representatives, and others who straggled in like myself.

Eating in a quiet spot backstage

I’m interested in the families of performers. This boy’s father and mother are traditional arts performers. He is studying to become a drummer and his younger sister is studying dance.

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I would love to chronicle a year of rural village life, tracing the lives of people through the seasons and rituals. But I live in Phnom Penh, and there is no end to what I can do here. I took these last week in Takeo. The villagers were planting rice, because the rains have finally settled in. Cows wander free during the dry season, but now they must be kept away from the freshly planted rice.

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Workers building a new shop in the market pause for lunch

I’m continuing to photograph people and life inside the Russian Market (Psar Tuol Tom Pong). I hope to finish work by November, and we’ll see what comes next.

So far I’ve enjoyed the project. Every time I enter the market I get to practice speaking Khmer and meet new people, most of whom are friendly and enjoy having their pictures taken. This week I’m taking steps to make it official: writing a letter to the governor of Phnom Penh asking permission. I learned that I need permission if I’m not “taking tourist pictures.”

Preparing a fresh duck

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Sometimes Japan surprises you. The cities have great parks, with carefully planted trees and occasional rivers coursing through nearly endless gray concrete neighborhoods. This park by the river in Kouzu has another surprise, an anomaly. An old man tends a shed filled with odd bicycles contrived (perhaps by him) and hand made: pandas, tandems, bicycles propelled by bouncing, and others, plus regular unicycles and ten speeds. And every afternoon he signs them out for free to whoever comes and asks. Kouzu is my wife’s home town. We often went walking and riding by the river when we stayed there.

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The week before he joined an “art party” at the children’s center where he lives.  A teacher has been working with kids at the center since mid-2007, and some of the older students are very good. They helped the younger kids during the art party, taking up brushes occasionally to teach by example. The results were amazing, and moving if you know the stories behind them.

I made a short video documenting the event with some follow-up video the next weekend (when I took this photo). I’ll post that project eventually, but I’ve been asked to wait and keep it fresh for everyone. If they have an exhibition in Phnom Penh, they’ll debut the video then.

I like this photo. I like the image of creating a painting, and it has a subscript for me. It’s a boy at an orphanage painting his home.  I don’t know his particular story, because he’s new to the center, but it’s a fact that the vast majority of children and youth in orphanages have homes and relatives outside the orphanage: grandparents, uncles, aunts, cousins, brothers and sisters. Most still have one living parent (and a few have two). The number one reason they are in orphanages is poverty. There are many orphanages but few family support services.

It’s not surprising that a child in an orphanage would paint his home, but maybe it should challenge us.

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