Photos

This one's for Cathe - the rest of the story!

A young Iraqi girl provides us with a beautiful smile in stark contrast to her pot belly, dirty clothes and disheveled hair.

She and her mother are just two of the considerable number of poor people that line the streets of Baghdad, needing a hand-out. Her mother always sits and has the little girl persistently follow the people that pass by until she is either given some money or is shooed away. The mother, unfortunately, has taught the girl to claim being "sick", which simply isn't the case.

Besides giving the girl some dinars or a dollar when I see her, I am also trying to teach her that she is also capable of earning. I save up the little prayer books that I buy from my other little friends across the river and then give them to her and try to make her understand that when she holds out her hand, she can have something to offer instead of just taking. I think she understands more than her mother. At least I hope so...