Yearning to Photo Free

Now that I've been in Burundi for awhile, I see it increasingly through the eyes of a resident.  I'm still set apart from your average Burundian by skin and by language, but I know how to get around town, where to find things, how to get my point across with a little French and a lot of hand-waving.  I feel my difference less.

While I still love to see the countryside through the lens of bike-riding, I'm seeing Bujumbura more and more through an actual lens - the one on my camera.  Here's some images from a spontaneous Monday morning out-on-the-town shoot.

My first subject, a statue.

It's a sort of local Statue of Liberty, I guess.  "The woman is the pillar of development," the statue's base declares.

Odd though it looks, this figure really is an iconic emblem of Burundi's women, who can often be seen walking, wearing no shoes, beside the road or on a steep mountain footpath, a hoe on their shoulder and a baby on their back.  Though they usually aren't carrying a torch.

While the women prop up the country and light the way, the men, apparently, slumber at their feet.

Note the resourcefulness, at least, of using one's flip-flops for a pillow.

Then a beer truck caught my eye: Primus is the locally-manufactured light lager.  Here, beer is just as important as petrol.  Maybe more important, since bicycles outnumber cars.

Pillars of development that they are, the women ride sidesaddle on the bicycle taxis with such grace.

Another public artwork was next for my camera lens.  This large Burundi-shaped painting welcomes visitors coming down from the hills on the main highway from northern neighbor Rwanda.

And of course, there were kids to snap along the way...

...and heavily loaded bicycles zooming downhill...

...and more locally manufactured liquids.

Then there was a young construction worker eager to shovel hard for my camera.

Finally, I took a bicycle taxi ride back toward home.

As in any developing country, shooting in public can quickly become overwhelming, as I tend to attract instant attention.  Within two minutes of taking my camera out to shoot the statue I had an audience of twenty men calling out to me in Kirundi and French.

I mostly ignored them.  But it feels just as weird to ignore people as it does to have one's skin (and large camera) make one the center of attention.  I've learned to shoot quickly and move on.

Well, nothing ventured, nothing gained.  And, with this venture, through my lens Burundi starts to become a home, not just a place I live.