United States
During the ten and a half years that Americans have been fighting in Afghanistan, as tens of thousands of troops have rotated in and out of the combat zone, only one soldier has ever been captured by the Taliban. His name is Bowe Bergdahl, and since June 30, 2009, he has been America’s last living Prisoner of War.
Bowe Bergdahl grew up on a dirt road that winds through a narrow river valley a few miles outside of town of Hailey, Idaho. The town of about 8,000 guards the highway to the ski resorts of Sun Valley where billionaires and movie stars spend their ski vacations. Bowe’s mother, Jani, home schooled him and his older sister, and Bowe spent years studying martial arts and fencing, becoming particularly accomplished at the epée. After a period of wandering, Bowe joined the Army at age 22, and soon after completing his training shipped out for Afghanistan. “He saw Afghanistan as a humanitarian mission,” Bowe’s father Bob says. “It was the highest ground for an American soldier.”
Source: TIME
Nevada, USA
Unfearing Hand Prints
Dejenee Shiflet
United States
Jajuan Kelley of Atlanta wears a Skittles wrapper over his mouth during a rally in memory of Trayvon Martin, the unarmed 17-year-old who was killed by a Florida neighborhood watch captain while returning from a convenience store with a bag of Skittles and an iced tea.
David Goldman/AP
Source: TIME
United States
Friends Jasmine, 6, and Amy, 8, outside a migrant worker motel in downtown Fresno, California. Amy’s mother makes about $8 an hour on a nearby farm.
Joakim Eskildsen/Time
Source: TIME
California, United States
“I appreciate a lot of things now in my life and I think that’s what I didn’t do before. I took things for granted and now it’s like I have to literally sit down and appreciate because now it’s like I honestly feel like, man, I just wasted 39 years of my life and the cold part is I knew it. But I still chose to do what I did.” - Raymond Slayton
Leaving the Life: Portraits of Former Gang Members, Adam Amengual
Source: TIME
United States
An attendee in the crowd holds a sign as former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum, a candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, speaks at a campaign event with the Punta Gorda Tea Party in Punta Gorda, Florida.
Eric Thayer/New York Times
Source: TIME
United States
Spc. John Lundy, right, and Spc. Matthew Sturgill, obscured, leap into the arms of Pfc. Devin Horton, Dec. 23, at Camp Atterbury in Edinburgh, Ind., as 109 members of the 1st Battalion, 149th Infantry, Army National Guard, prepare to board a bus home for the holidays. The unit was one of the last to leave Iraq.
Andrew Laker/The Republic via AP
Source: MSNBC
United States
Tea party supporter William Temple, of Brunswick, Ga., sits in the Des Moines, Iowa, airport on Jan. 4 as he awaits a flight home after the Iowa caucuses.
Evan Vucci/AP
Source: MSNBC
Washington DC, USA
“Hi, my name is Lorenzo and I live on Girard St. in North America. I am five-years-old, and I loooove gardening. I like to plant plants so that other people can have plants. Did you know that plants need water? It’s true, they get real thirsty just like people.
I love to cook big, giant steaks and popcorn. We don’t grow any steaks or popcorn at the garden yet.
“I am a great waterer and I just got an award for watering the plants so good. I want to make sure that they have what they need, so they can grow up big and tall. When the plants grow, we can have more to eat, and share our plants with all the people who come to the garden.
“If you come here, you can see all of the plants that I done watered, like the eggplant and the grapes. I like to cook that stuff, but I love to cook big, giant steaks and popcorn. We don’t grow any steaks or popcorn at the garden yet.”
I asked Lorenzo to share a recipe from the garden.
Lorenzo’s anchovies, eggplant, and sweet leaves popcorn
- ”Get some anchovies, you know them fishy things from a can”
- “Pick some sweet leaves from the garden, like mint or other sweet stuff”
- ”Take an eggplant from the garden when it is purple and cook it up”
- ”Pop some popcorn”
- ”Mix everything together in a big bowl until you make it taste real good. It is the best, and everyone is going to like my recipe.”
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From The People’s District
Source: peoplesdistrict.com
United States
Learning a new computer program was both frustrating and fun for first-grader Kylea Devoy in Robyn Wells’ New Harmony School class in New Harmony, Ind., on Oct. 27.
Denny Simmons / The Evansville Courier & Press via AP
Source: MSNBC
Illinois, USA
Chicago marathon. This adorable little girl was cheering on her “dadda.” She was actually past the area that the cheerers were supposed to be, but no one stopped her.
Allison Hilger
Source: samilice
Washington DC, United States
“My adopted parents brought me to D.C. when I was two years old from Baltimore. My adopted father was a cement finisher and my adopted mother cleaned houses for a living. We lived a nice life up in NE until I realized that I was adopted when I was about 12. When I learned that, I dropped out of school and ran away from home to find my birth parents. I needed to know who they were and understand why they abandoned me. I took off to Baltimore knowing only my grandfather’s name.
“In Baltimore, I was alone and hungry and stole some food from a store. When the cops caught me and asked me where I lived, I gave them my grandfather’s name. They took me to his house and that was the first time I met him. I didn’t know what I was going to find when I met him. I had all of these grand ideas that my parents were rich and would take me back into their loving family.
I’ll be 60 in November, but I feel like I am getting younger as time moves forward. The music keeps me young.
“My family was not rich, but my grandfather was very warm towards me and he introduced me to my aunt and eventually to my Mom. Turns out that my Mom had seven kids after me and kept them all. I was so angry that of all of the kids, she decided to give me away. My real mother was happy to see me, but never offered to take me back and never did anything for me, so I was back on my own at 12. I have no hard feelings towards her. She is who she is and I need to accept that. As for my father, I didn’t meet him until I was 47. He found me.
“As I was abandoned by one family and ran away from another, I was pretty much by myself since the age of 12. After running around Baltimore for a bit, I came to D.C. and joined a motorcycle gang and lived in a runaway house. I then ended up leaving D.C. and drifting around for a long time. I spent a good part of that time drinking and drugging and dealing with my own issues. That was the size of it for a long time. The thing is that everywhere I went, I took me with me. I could never escape who I was and the things that I had been through. Eventually, I understood that living like that was not normal and I needed to change. I finished school and went to college to be a social worker. I wanted to help people who were down and out, especially those struggling with addiction. I went into alcohol counseling and worked in the same recovery house that I went through when I had my problem with alcohol.
“While there were dark periods, one of the things that always helped me in my life was music. Ever since I was very small, I knew that I wanted to play music. My foster parents did not allow me to play. When I was nine, I entered into a song writing contest in Nashville and won. When I approached my parents with that, they did not let me accept the prize and told me to stay away from the music business. I ended up giving the song away and it went on to make a lot of money for someone else. That’s why when I was 12 and living alone, I taught myself how to play guitar on 18th and Riggs. I taught myself right handed and then I turned my guitar over and played left handed. After that, I had the same dream every day for about 15 years that I was on the stage playing music. The stages and lighting would change, but I was always performing. I thought that was a sign that music and I were made for each other.
“Since I have been back in D.C., I have been playing music all over. I have played in clubs and on the street and have even had a recording contract. There are ups and down, but I know that I am meant to play music here. I’ll be 60 in November, but I feel like I am getting younger as time moves forward. The music keeps me young.”
Bill is in the band, Bill C and the B’s. Hear some of their music here.
Source: peoplesdistrict.com
San Francisco, California, USA
“She goes by ‘Zombie’, but there’s still a spark. With her crew she’s the one people notice. When they notice.
But mostly, they don’t see that she’s sad. And maybe not so comfortable being pretty. Or herself. And that she doesn’t quite feel alive when she’s still.
Or maybe that’s just a girl she reminds me of.
But her guy’s been watching and figures she’s talked too much. So she takes the bottle.” - Tom Stone
Source: flickr.com
New York, USA
These photos are from an ongoing project where people draw a self portrait (how they see themselves, how they want to appear, or literally how they look), and then are photographed with the drawing as a comparison.
M. Herrington
Source: meh9585.cias.rit.edu
United States
Jasmine (‘Jazzy’), four, lives in a big house in Kentucky, USA, with her parents and three brothers. Her house is in the countryside, surrounded by farmland. Her bedroom is full of crowns and sashes that she has won in beauty pageants. She has entered more than 100 competitions. Her spare time is taken up with rehearsal. She practises her stage routines every day with a trainer. Jazzy would like to be a rock star when she grows up.
From Where Children Sleep
Source: amusingplanet.com
