Muslim school girls at Uluwatu Temple on the Indonesian island of Bali (February 21, 2017)
Among the many topics I photograph is school kids, and my portfolio leans more toward girls than boys. Why? At least part of the answer, I think, is that girls tend to be gentler, kinder, and more inspiring. Also, I can’t recall ever being attacked or shot at by a school girl, or given the middle finger. Boys, on the other hand, while often wonderful, can aggravate the hell out of me. In Syria a boy once shot me in the back of my head with a pellet gun. A Tibetan novice once shot me too. Girls have never thrown firecrackers at me (Mexico), rocks at me (Palestine), or ordered their dog to attack me (Israeli settlement). Boys have.
There’s a lot of beauty in the world, and it’s often best seen on young faces, and in watching young people interact with one another. No offense to boys — I may eventually dedicate a post to you too — but, well, ladies first. Here are a few photos of girls taken in 2017.
Three girls in Ubud, Bali (February 11, 2017)
A group of fourth and fifth grade girls from the city of Kandy enjoy a school field trip, which included eating ice cream shortly before sunset at Galle Face Green in Colombo, Sri Lanka. They shared an ice cream with me too. (March 30, 2017)
Two friends walk a dog in Ankawa, a suburb of Erbil, Iraq. One of these girls is Christian, the other Muslim. (May 15, 2017)
Kindergarten in Mosul, Iraq. What you don’t see in this picture is the front gate riddled with bullet holes. (May 24, 2017)
Yazidi children outside a tent in Sharya IDP camp in northern Iraq. They and their families fled the 2014 ISIS advance in which many Yazidis were killed and others were captured and subsequently trafficked by ISIS. That girl on the left…I’ll remember her for the rest of my life. Through her kindness and beauty, she drove home the depth of my anger toward ISIS, a group that has destroyed so much that was good and beautiful. (May 28, 2017)
Two friends in the old town of Midyat, Turkey (May 31, 2017)
