The aftermath of the war

War, this evil act does many things to people. War creates hatred between the two enemies or more if more nations are involved in the battle, this hatred can go on for a long period of time. It may also never be reconciled. War can also cause both governments to be overthrown, shortages; it could destroy the economy, and hurt innocent people.

Photograph by Sebastiao Salgado

War is so terrible and its consequences are so unpredictable. Although the Vietnam War ended, many consequences still happen every day especially the impact of war on children. In this photograph, these children are having health examinations in order to be officially approved to migrate to the U.S. A new life is waiting for them. Although they have to leave their beloved country and there will be many difficulties in a strange environment, they are luckier than many children who were affected by the war. They still have their family, have someone to love and depend on.

Photograph by Tu Nguyen

This photograph was taken by my friend when we visited an orphanage for homeless children. Each child has his pitiful and pathetic story. Some children lost their families in the war. Some children were abandoned because their parents don’t have abilities to take care of them. Some children were sent to the orphanage because of their disabilities. Many children's disabilities were caused by parental exposures to Agent Orange – toxic chemicals America used in the war. The war has changed the destinies of those children and generations to come. My country is trying everyday to catch up with the world. We- new generations are still suffering from the pain of loss, the pain of separation but our generation knows that we have to consider the Vietnam War as a valuable lesson.

Works Cited

Lattin Zachary. "Aftermath." Vietnam then and now. n.d. Web. 19 Mar. 2010.

Salgado, Sebastiao. Migrations: Humanity in Transition. New York, Aperture. 2000. Print. 72.

          -Pamphlet. NP. Migrations: Humanity in Transition. New York, Aperture. 2000. 427. Print.
    
         

Tears

Photograph by Sebastiao Salgado

Life gives you thousands reasons to cry: you are sad, you feel extremely depressed, you cry tears of joy and and even sometimes you cry for no reasons, etc. Looking at this photograph, you may wonder why they are crying. Are they waiting for something and finally unable to do it? Are they happy because they meet their families after a long time?

I still haven’t figured out the answer. Let me tell you something about the photograph, then you can find out the reason of tears by yourself. This photograph was capture at the International Airport of Ho Chi Minh city in Vietnam. At the end of 1970s, Orderly Departure Program was established to help Vietnamese people migrate to other countries. It was estimated that there were 547,565 people leaving Vietnam between 1980 and 1994. Most went to the U.S. with up to 392,780 people. As several family left for new countries, these women cried when they said goodbye to their families. Maybe they were tears of anxiety for those going to have a new life with many difficulties waiting. Maybe they were tears of regret because these women were left behind. Maybe they were tears of separation.

When people say about Vietnam, many may think of the Vietnam War and the unstable situations after the war ended. However, Vietnam is changing at breakneck speed. The potential bottled up by the war and the restrictions that followed as the painful process of reunification and reconciliation proceeded, is now being unleashed. The current GDP per capita remains around US$2800, and the unemployment rate, which reached a devastating 25% in 1995, had dropped to 5.75% by 2005. In the aspect of politic, Vietnam is a single party state which is lead by the communist party. Vietnam’s current government structure is actually very similar to a democratic form of government. However, the economy is open to all types of economic factors; therefore, it looks like a market controlled (capitalist) economy. This is the same as China's government and economic control.

Works Cited

Salgado, Sebastiao. Migrations: Humanity in Transition. New York, Aperture. 2000. Print. 73.

-Pamphlet. NP. Migrations: Humanity in Transition. New York, Aperture. 2000. 427. Print.

"Vietnam today." Let's go. n.d. Web. 11 Mar. 2010

The Meaning of War?

Photograph by Sebastiao Salgado

If war is against humanity, why are wars still happening? If war brings sorrow, why does human fight each other? I ask myself these questions so many times; however, still leave them unanswered. Maybe it is because of the dark sides of human will and feeling. Maybe people have unlimited wants. Since our greed is boundless, we battle to satisfy our need for food, shelter, oil, etc.

In Angola , the war has been going on for more than three decades. The warring parties fund their armies by trading natural resources, in particular diamonds and oil, for weapons and ammunition. But recently, the world's biggest diamond cartel, De Beers, announced it had placed an embargo on the purchase of Angolan diamonds. As long as the diamond trade continues, so will the war. It is not African countries buying the diamonds and it is not African countries selling the arms. Nations far from the scene still play a role in many African conflicts, either by purchasing mineral resources or supplying weapons and ammunition to the warring parties. It leaves physical exhaustion of the people as the only brake on continued war.

The victims of Angola's war are its citizens -- more than 600,000 dead and 3 million refugees due to conflict between two primary Angolan factions, the communist MPLA and the anti-communist UNITA. The cities are crowed with displaced people. This photograph depicts the real situation that Angola’s citizens go through. The eyes of two children in the photo haunt my mind. The sorrow in their eyes, the bewildered look on their faces…. they are wondering what is happening. These children have no chance to choose their lives. They lose their families, have no clothes to wear and even have no adequate shelter. I wonder where their fresh and cheerful smiles are. How long have these children lost the happiness of life?

Works Cited

Salgado, Sebastiao. Migrations: Humanity in Transition. New York, Aperture. 2000. Print. 224

-Pamphlet. NP. Migrations: Humanity in Transition. New York, Aperture. 2000. 427. Print.

"Angolan Civil War." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 2010. Web 08 Mar. 2010. Web. 04 Mar. 2010

Everyday can be a struggle

Have you ever wonder how refugees can live through bad conditions when many of basic needs are far from being met? They lack of everything: food, clean water, sanitation, shelter, etc. To deal with poor living conditions, they earn their livelihood by doing dangerous and illegal work.


This photograph shows a group of children who were playing around the coal burning fires. For almost a century now coal mines have been burning in the state of Bihar, India. As the fires spread at a rate of fix to six meters a month, thousands of people live with the ground beneath them burning every day. Refugees collect the coal and pre-burn it in order to improve its quality. This coal will be sold at local markets for about a dollar a basket. However, the consequence of burning coal is far more dangerous. As a result, those refuges live under the polluted atmosphere containing carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxide and fine coal dust which strongly affect their health. Their lives and jobs become part of the carbon culture.

Those children in the photo also suffer from the poisonous air. They have no choice because selling illegal coal is the only way to survive. They have no future because the terrible conditions destroy the chance to gain the skills they will need in their future lives. Everyday can be a struggle just to survive.

Works Cited

Salgado, Sebastiao. Photograph. "Migrations: Humanity in Transition [Leaving the Land for the Cities]". Legends Online. PDN and Kodak Professionals, n.d. Web. 25 Feb 2010.

Shaikh Azizur Rahman. "India's illegal coal mines turn into death pits."  25 Nov. 2006. Web. 25 Feb 2010

Left to Tell- Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust

 Immaculee's book “Left to Tell" is an inspirational story about the other side of the world where genocides, wars and battles still happen every day. Her experiences during the awful slaughter remind us to be aware of what is happening to our world these days and recognize that we are so blessed. While we exaggerate small issues in our lives, there are others in this world that undergoes tragic circumstances. Immaculee is an example of fortitude, courage and determination to overcome life’s challenges.


During this ordeal she discovers not only an amazing depth of faith in God but also the true meaning of forgiveness. I wept as reading Imaculee’s message when she eventually meets the killer of her family: “Forgiveness is all I have to offer.” Her profound message is so meaningful to me, which conveys the triumph of the forgiving soul over the feeling of hatred and revenge. If a person like Immaculee who suffers lots of pains and bitterness can forgive her enemies, why don't we forgive our friends, our acquaintances for making harmless mistakes?

Her moving descriptions of how she is able to build such a strong faith in God and her true feeling of how she learns to forgive during such a hard time make her story more powerful and engaging. This book gave me an opportunity to look back at myself, get in touch with my spiritual side in a more personal way and learn to forgive past offenses. Everyone who is seeking forgiveness, trying to forgive someone or struggling to go through hardships should read this wonderful book. It’s a way to purify your souls.

Keep the faith

 Photograph by Sebastiao Salgado

After 30 years fighting between North and South, finally the Vietnam War ended. Many people who didn't follow Communism decided to flee Vietnam. "Boat people" were born. It is described that hundreds of people sat next to each other like fish in a can. They suffered the storm, the robbery, the rape repeatedly. They lost family members, relatives. 

On Vietnamese boat people web page, many tragic stories from refugees were collected. A refugee told her own story: "Hours later, another boat appeared. When it got close to us, five men jumped on our boat and started searching again. They also took some clothes we were wearing. Then they told everybody look away, undressed two teenage girls and took turn raping them for hours. I was so terrified, held my son tightly in my arms and totally shook!  We heard the girls cry for help, but we were helpless! What a shame!!!  Later on, they left." I was so terrified by her story. As a Vietnamese person, I truly feel the pain as well as the emotion of those refugees.

This photograph was taken on the beach Of Vung Tau in 1995. Those people in the photo hold the faith of seeking happiness, the strength to overcome their fate. They had to survive, maintaining their lives to tell the world their tragedy and what hardship boat people endured. There were no more tears on their face, no more complaints. When the pain is too big, you will feel nothing at all.

Works Cited 

" A true story". Boat people. June. 1999. Web. 17 Feb. 2010

Salgado, Sebastiao. Photograph. Migrations: Humanity in Transition. Aperture. New York, 2000. 60-61.

 

Just a little bit of hope

 

Photograph by Sebastiao Salgado

There are many kinds of migration. Mostly, we talk about migration over national boundaries, which mean someone moves to a different country. Another type is internal migration which refers to change of residence within national boundaries. This process takes place in developing countries such as Vietnam, China, etc. Internal migration is becoming big issues for the developing countries.

Millions of migrant workers who had left their farm for factory work are now facing the possibility of making an urban-to-rural migration. Although this process is a good signal of a new stage of development, Cu Chi Loi- a researcher in migration situation in Vietnam argued that: "However, confront with a huge flow of rural-to-urban migrants and poor urban planning migration is seen as a negative process."(115)

I like this photograph because it just look so artistic. Some people are standng near the windows under the dim light. They are waiting for the bright light outside their obscure lives. The shadows of night surround their undefined futures. They just need a little light to keep their faiths. Just a little bit of hope...

Works Cited

Cu Chi, Loi. "Rural to Urban Migrationin Vietnam". n.d. Web.10 Feb 2010

Salgado, Sebastiao. Photograph. "Migrations: Humanity in Transition [Leaving the Land for the Cities]". Legends Online. PDN and Kodak Professionals, n.d. Web. 10 Feb 2010.

Where to go

 

Photograph by Sebastiao Salgado

There are thousands of Salgado's photos that I can choose to talk about. However, I tend to pick the photo which reminisces about my country.

This photograph was taken in Burundi in 1995. The Rwandan Genocide was the 1994 mass killing of hundreds of thousands of Rwanda's Tutsis and Hutu political moderates by the Hutu dominated government under the Hutu Power ideology.However, the 1994 genocide was targeted mainly at Rwanda's minority Tutsis population. The perpetrators came from the majority Hutu. In the western media the killings were widely portrayed as tribal hostilities.Between April and July 1994, at least 500,000 Tutsi were killed when a Hutu extremist-led government launched a plan to murder the country's entire Tutsi minority and any others who opposed the government's policies. Tutsi rebels won control, which sent a million Hutus, fearful of revenge, into Zaire and Tanzania. In Burundi, the Tutsis yielded power after a Hutu won the country's first democratic election in 1993.The fighting created large numbers of refugees; over the next two years 250,000 Burundians, mostly Hutu, escaped to safety in neighboring Zaire (Congo) and Tanzania, countries burdened by 2 million Rwandan Hutu who fled Rwanda after the genocide of Tutsi civilians in the spring of 1994.

Photograph by Hugh Van Es

                                             

                                                                  

                                                  

The similarity between my country- Vietnam and Rwandan was the evacuation. Surely if war came it would be better for families to stick together and not go breaking up their homes. That's why they decided to moved to safety places where they can live together. This photograph was taken in Da Nang- a city in the middle of Vietnam in 1969. There were all women and children in this photo. I can see their frightened eyes; I can feel their worrying feeling. They didn't know how to escape from the fierce fighting. Hugh Van Es explained those women and children was waiting to be evacuated. They were so hopeless that they just sit there and waited for the help. Human nature is to struggle to survive. However, there is also the love existing in each person. Those women can run away and leave their children behind; but they didn't do that. Although the war threatened their lives, the most powerful emotion still existed. And the love never fails to stir my soul.

Works Cited

Meisler, Stanley. "Rwandan and Burundi". The Atlantic Monthly, n.d. Web. 3 Feb 2010.

Salgado, Sebastiao. Photograph. “Migrations: Humanity in Transition [The Human Family Around the World]”. Legends Online. PDN and Kodak Professionals, n.d. Web. 3 Feb 2010.

---. "Migrations: The Story of Humanity on the Move". Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Havard, n.d. Web.  3 Feb,  2010.

Van Es, Hugh. Photograph. "Van Es Hugh, Photojournalist who covered Vitenam, dies at 67". The New York Times, 15 May 2009. Web. 3 Feb 2010. 

My hometown- Vietnam

Let me tell you my story. My country was split into communist North Vietnam and non-communist South Vietnam. On April 30th, 1975, we successfully unified Vietnam under a communist government and the United States (with the aid of the South Vietnamese) failed to prevent the spread of communism.

After that day, many South Vietnamese people fled out of Vietnam because they didn't believe in the new government. Moreover, they  were afraid that their lives couldn't be safe. They mainly fled to the United States, and it is referred to as one of the largest war refugee migrations in history. However, because of the large distance from Vietnam to the US, refugees went to neighboring areas and then continued their journeys. As a matter of fact, hundreds of the refugees may have died of unexpected accidents such as: pirates, diseases, etc.

In the first photo, you can see a destroyed boat on Galang Island, Indonesia in 1995. Salgado captured a dark, truthful picture which evokes the miserable feeling for the refugees. According to Southeast Asia Resource Action Center, although "no one knows exactly how many thousands of people took to boats", it is estimated that "as many as half of them perished at sea." This estimation frightens me. The pain of loss as well as the pain of separation must still haunt the refugees' minds which causes disagreeable attitudes toward the communist government.  I don't blame them on their attitudes, rather I disagree with wars. What is the meaning of the Vietnam War when the U.S. received nothing from the invasion? In contrast, the U.S. suffered  lots of damage financially as well as casualities. We, the Vietnamese people, are still suffering from highly destructive impact of the war. The mental wounds of war are greater than anything.

One of my relatives, Tri, belonged to an anti-communism family. His family was rich because they worked for American employers. When the Vietnam War ended, his family escaped from Vietnam by going on the "boat people". Unfortunately, Tri was unable to go out of Vietnam because he was left behind and couldn't find his family. Tri told me he was extremely frightened and heartbroken when he lost his family at the age of 18. He wondered what he should do since he had no house, no money, no future. I cannot imagine the horrible feeling he experienced at that age. He still hasn't received any news from his family. Although the war has been over nearly 30 years, the consequences have not completely closed. The pain, anger and hatred still smolders somewhere.

Although the truths about the war are disturbing, it awakens the consciousness of young generations who know what to do with their lives and their societies.

Works Cited

Salgado, Sebastian. Photograph. Migration: Humanity in Transition. Aperture. New York, 2000.

The History Place. 1999. Web. 27 Jan, 2010.

http://www.historyplace.com/unitedstates/vietnam/index-1945.html

"Vietnamese Refugees". Southeast Asian Resouces Action Center. Web. 27 Jan, 2010

http://www.searac.org/vietref.html

Open some doors for them

Are you busy with homework, housework and lots of other stuff? Please spend a little time sharing the pains of thousands may lose their houses unpredictably, or who suffer from family separations.  For migration to take place, there must be some factor that pushes people out or that pulls them to a new environment. If those people lived in a stable environment, they would not think about moving. People leave their native lands for a variety of reasons: religious or racial persecution, lack of political freedom, economic deprivation and disasters.
This photograph can reveal nothing unless you consider the viewpoints of the illegal immigrants. I can imagine their eyes looking through the steel bar, wondering how they can get into the promised lands. They are not sure about their futures. I can feel their greatest disappointments when they touch the steel bar. It is too hard to go through. So much emotion overwhelms. Salgado knows how to create a touching photograph. This photo was taken in a skew angle which makes me feel the endless length of the steel bar. It also means that the immigrants are hopeless to finish their purposes. So why don't we open some doors for them? It's not the door to go into the United States, but instead it's the door to lighten their lives.

Salgado's purpose of taking photographs is to raise our awareness about social problems. Recently, the most shocking issue is the earthquake in Haiti. We live in the world of high-speed technologies which provide us lots of information, news, analysis about the current situaton of Haiti. However, we don't live to enjoy those technologies. We don't just watch and hear about those terrible news without doing anything relating to that disaster. I feel really painful. When they assess damage in Haiti: "Tens of thousands of people lost their homes, 9 million people may need emergency aid", I wonder what I can do to help them. However, everything won't change if I don't put my effort into helping. Feel their pains and do something....

Works Cited
Haiti devastated by earthquake." U.S.News". January 13, 2010. Web. January 20, 2010
Salgado, Sebastião. Photograph. Migrations: Humanity in Transition. Aperture: New York, 2000. 28.

I come from Vietnam- a country suffered from many wars, especially The Vietnam War, also known as the Second Indochina War. When I grew up, my country's economy began recovering and growing rapidly. However, I still heard some stories about Vietnam in the war from the elders. They told about refugees, starvation, poverty and even how people tried to migrate to the USA. I don't see the immigration situation as a big problem but Salgado's photograph has changed my mind. Through the images of the Third World, Salgado raised my awareness about my responsibility.
Sebastian Salgado was born in Aimorés, state of Minas Gerais, Brazil. At first, his job was an economist, then Salgado began his career in Paris as a professional photographer in 1973. What makes Salgado's photographs become unique is the exposition on the other side of the world. He doesn't taking photographs from the beautiful life as people usually do but rather focuses on "the dark side of humanity". Salgado travels throughout the world for his photographic projects which have been featured in numerous international periodicals as well as books, including Other Americas (1986), Sahel: l’homme en détresse (1986), Workers (1993), Terra (1997), Migrations (2000), and The Children (2000).
Every week, I will spend time writing comments about his photographs in order to let people know how the other side of the world actually look like. Hopefully, I can awake somebody to the sense of duty.

Works Cited

Salgado, Sebastiao. Photograph. Migrations: Humanity in Transition. Aperture. New York, 2000. 78
"Sebastiao Salgado, Africa". Taschen. Web. 14 Jan. 2010.

Who I am???

This picture was taken by my relative. I haven't met her for a long time so we don't know each other well. When she came over my house, she was really interested in taking photos of the view around my house. What made me surprise was her ability to catching some great moments of the nature. Although I know there are many great things around my house, I have never realized that I live in such a beautiful world which is surrounded by lively insects, colorful trees.
She showed me many wonderful photos but I am deeply attracted to this photo because I see myself in it. At first, the picture reminded me of a triangle love, haha. Of course, I'm not in that situation. I hate choosing so I try to keep away from problems as much as possible. However, the photo made me wonder where I'd like to stand in my family and in the society : in the middle, on the right or on the left. I kept thinking of that and I came to the decision of standing in the middle. It's not because I like catching the notice of people or the fame. The reason I want to stand in the middle is because I like being loved by everybody. It's so grateful to feel the love, especially from people that I love. More than that, I also want to share the love to everybody and make them feel happy. And shouldn’t all people enjoy the same treasure of the world filled with inspiration and understanding?