WorldTeach is pleased to announce the winners of our 3rd Annual Photo Contest!
Many thanks to everyone who participated in the Spring 2009 photo contest! The quality of entries this year was incredibly impressive. All of the amazing "Mealtime" photos left everyone in the Cambridge office hungry for more!
1st Place: Anique Pegeron (Ecuador)
The town of Papallacta in Ecuador is famous for its fresh trout, or ¨trucha¨. This is Jaime, owner of Restaurante Paul: a humble, one-room diner named after his son. When we arrived, the lights were off and the door was locked; but Jaime hobbled eagerly to the door, welcomed us in with a friendly smile, and fired up the stove. Despite his crippled left leg and hand, he served us the most delicious trout I´ve ever tasted--along with the traditional rice, potatoes, plaintains, and ahi sauce typical of Ecuadorian cuisine.
Lunchtime Laughs
This photo was taken in the cafeteria at Fundacion Instituto Ecologico Barbacoas, Santa Ana, Cartagena. Students in the photo are in quinto (5th) grade. Diosis and Yeni!
3rd Place: Daniel Moses (Rwanda)
This photo was taken at an HIV/AIDS Orphan Center near Butare in southern Rwanda. All of the one hundred plus children who come here were orphaned when their parents died of AIDS. The vast majority of them, approaching 90%, are infected with HIV as well. The children, who live with families in the community, come to the center every Saturday so that they can receive medications and a hearty meal at least once a week. Despite all of the hardships in their young lives, the children are still just that, and the smiles in this picture are indicative of their exuberant joy, an overriding hopefulness that I was lucky to capture.
Bubu cooking breadfruit, Marshallese style on Aerok, Ailinglaplap, RMI. Breadfruit was a staple dish for me and my host family. The traditional preparation here is in an old cut-up oil drum.
Honorable Mention: Lauren Goldman (Costa Rica)
Tamales being made the women on the indigenous Reservation of Rey Curre for the Festival of Devils (2009).
Honorable Mention: Jon Brandt (Ecuador)
A child at the market in Gualaceo and his dog hidden between the fruit.
Honorable Mention: Paul Morrill (Marshall Islands)
Winter 2008 WorldTeach Photo Contest
1st Place: Rachel Segretto (Marshall Islands)
Second graders Jita (left) and Daryl (right) participate in one of the most popular games on Majuro: "Who can stay upside-down the longest?" Please don't be confused by Daryl's upside-down thumb's up; one need only look at his smile to see that being upside down is flippin' fun.
One of my 8th graders from Namdrik Atoll, where I spent a year as part of the Marshall Islands 2006-2007 program.
3rd Place: Sarah Cortese (Ecuador)
In Las Tunas, Ecuador, the students play on the beach during recess.
Honorable Mention: Krista Langlois (Marshall Islands)
Winter, a grandfather from my village on Ebon Atoll, lived with a large family right next to my school. I often sat with them after classes and learned to cook (and eat!) Marshallese food and practice my Marshallese. Winter works his way through a pile of coconuts to make copra (dried coconuts), the island's only major export and their main source of cooking fuel.
Honorable Mention: BobbiLe Ba (Ecuador)
My three-year-old host brother Joselito, from Portoviejo, is very proud that he is the father of two baby chicks. He loves to have his photograph taken with them, and here, he is pictured with ¨el pollito blanco¨ and ¨el pollito negro,¨ as he calls them. Every morning I hear him saying ¨Don't worry, don't cry, your dad is here now!¨ It is the most precious thing!
I took this photograph in a neighborhood close to where I lived in the northern suburbs of Guayaquil. I did not know the people who lived in the house, but I passed by this window frame daily on my way to volunteer at a governmental job training school in the center of the city. It became part of my daily routine to admire the fake rose on the windowsill, framed against a curtain of embroidered flowers. The pairing of synthetic representations of nature encapsulated a common theme I found in the stories of urban Ecuadorians. They all had left the campo, the rural farm lands, to find work in the city. The fake flowers connected them to this past and illustrated the problems with modernity in the developing world.
