The lost sailors

My Photo scholarship 2011 entry

Spain | Tuesday, November 8, 2011 | 5 photos

I am a journalist because I have a strong interest in getting to know and sharing other peoples feelings, their wishes. And, that way, I can discover their particular story and help them with my narration. That is the reason why I consider photography to be a privileged language to tell a story, as it is close to been a universal language. Besides, through image those feelings and those wishes of the protagonist are filtered.

That one is the idea I have tried to reflect with the photo feature about the sailors in Iballa. A crew that has been living for the last two years in their boat, in the port of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Spain. They do not leave the boat even if their boss does not pay them, as they have nowhere else to go. They are people forgotten by their boss, the authorities, and in a bigger picture, by society. But they keep their dignity, as it can be seen in the pictures, through their daily routine. Mor, from Ghana, shaves his head every day; Issa, Mauritanian, reads in order to learn Spanish. Captain Pedro plays chess even if his rival also left the ship.

With these arguments I consider I would make the most of the experience National Geographic offers. In addition, I am looking forward to specialize in trip journalism. But I wish I could write articles about my travels that are destined to discover people that live in different cultures. And that includes how they relate with nature; how their landscape and the fauna determine the live of communities in that environment.