Homeless

It's strange measuring the homeless factor in Mozambique since most people live in tin-roofed shacks without running water or electricity. Since I've starting shooting on the Marginal, I've encountered a number of homeless people. I've befriended some mostly out of familiarity although I was unsuccessful in getting permission to photograph them. There are two camps that I've tried to get into: one is in a drainage structure on the beach that has a changing group or individuals who live there. My attempts are always rejected. At one point one obviously unstable man tried to lure me in there, but a man that I had befriended told me not to go (which I wasn't about to anyway), and ended up arguing in my defense with the man. This same man was also a help when some men on the beach were harassing me while I was photographing (not them). However, he never let me photograph him and sort of disappeared; I haven't seen him for months.

I have photographed some individuals including a man who lives in a hole in the ground. Sadly, they have obvious mental problems. The man in the hole will sometimes talk to me but will rarely say much at all but has permitted me to photograph him. There is a man who wanders the city dressed in rags (seen sleeping balled up near an underpass) who I've tried to talk to but is completely incoherent and in his own world talking to himself and eating found objects off the sidewalk at times. another man is Asian and usually wanders the beach. I've also tried talking to him, but he says nothing at all.

As I noted in another post about paying subjects, I gave bread to the "hole man." Today, after seeing him a few days ago with a bandaged foot, I gave him some sanitary wipes that I had in my car to clean it off; he had cut himself stepping on glass. I photographed him but afterward sat and talked to him, or at least tried to, and asked if he needed anything. He just kept messing with his foot, so I went and got the wipes. He says he doesn't have a name and doesn't need anything, so just leave him alone rather than pester him about spending a day following him around as was my original intention.

I've always been very cautious about photographing homeless and dislike when people just photograph them for the hell of it. I don't like doing it for its own sake, these feelings sort of increased after spending so much time doing my homeless project in Florida and befriending many of them. In this case, my rationale is that they are part of the life on the Marginal and a contrast to spectacular sunsets, traditional fishermen, and hotels and restaurants.

The Marginal and the Man in the Hole

I shot a man that I've wanted to photograph for a long time. He lives in a hole in the sidewalk at the end of the Marginal, and I had been trying to talk to him. He unfortunately doesn't say much at all, but he was alright with me photographing him. In the past I had asked him if he was okay especially the first time I saw him, I thought he was sick or worse. This goes to the payment question, because when I was talking to him, he said he was hungry and I went and got him some bread.

Later, I photographed a guy climbing a coconut tree. He was pretty nice, but asked for money and I told him I couldn't pay him. He was alright with that and we just chatted for a while after that. Would it have been unethical if I would have given him some change? He risks a lot climbing trees to sell coconuts. The two situations are examples of dilemmas I run into daily. With the homeless guy, I don't know if giving him bread is breaking my own rules. After finishing the homeless project that I mentioned in my last post and its publication, the reporter and I began volunteering to feed the homeless once a week with a community advocacy group. Our editors knew about it and when stories came up about the group, we did not work on them.