We began the day at three in the morning in a small fishing boat on the Nile River. We spend the early morning hours with a mother, her three children, and her sister who live on a small fishing boat that is four meters long by one and a half. Their life is simple, and follows the slow rhythm of the Nile’s water. The children do not go to school and the entire family is illiterate. A day in their life begins at three in the morning to catch fish that they sell at the market. They cook, sleep, and live on their small fishing boat. They do not have gas, electricity or water.
Our second location was a cemetery. Not a normal cemetery, but the City of Dead, adorned by Islamic architecture, where it is estimated that more than five million Egyptians live. It is a four-mile long city where poor people live and work amongst the dead. Cemetery guards have the daily duty to prepare bodies for burial, following the funeral rites. Some City of the Dead residents live in tombs, that that have been retrofitted into homes where the dead are placed in the ground covered by a stone.
Stories that give voice to the voiceless surviving. A world of difference.
