#IWMFfellows

[iwmfontheground]

I met these warm and inspiring women in a neighbourhood on the outskirts of Juba. All four are working as health clinic trainees – they see it not just as a career, but as a form of health-activism. They told me about their efforts in finding ways, however small and local, to make a dent in tackling soaring rates of child pregnancies, sexual abuses, domestic violence and other problems within their communities. #GirlPower.

#IWMFfellows #[South Sudan] 

[yeinegro]

Thanks @hysperbole for the interviews. ・・・ “I came here to fight for women’s rights. As a gay man that I am I support women’s fight because we have a similar struggle.” Yeifri Ramirez is part of a crew of bikers/activists that advocate for a range of causes. It’s a group of 40 people, all connected in a Whatsapp group. They didn’t all know each other (Yeifri only knew one person when he started) but now he’s friends with everyone, getting together to “enjoy the city.” When I asked him what came first in terms of priorities, biking or politics, he looked at me like I was a bit dim and said “Bikes and politics come together.” Yeifri said it’s hard to be gay in the Dominican Republic, he is open about his sexuality but knows many people who stay in the closet. “Human rights in general to start is the same. Gender identity and women (sic) suffer discrimination because they are women and we do because of our preference.” His sign calls for a penal code that respects women’s rights, and the one on the handle is in support of younger women who are forced to be with older men. One of his comrades had a sign that said “The patriarchy rises SUV’s, we ride bikes.” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . #dominicanrepublic #santodomingo #march #protest #activist #gender #humanrights #womensrights #gayrights #bikes #politics #iwmf #iwmffellows #carribean #thisiswhatafeministlookslike (en Zona colonial)

[lubumbashilynsey-blog]

Burgermeisterin Jenna Maloba spends her Saturday mornings officiating weddings in Lubumbashi’s Kenya neighborhood. And each time, she gives a gift of a live chicken, which is usually greatly appreciated. Except this time, when the chicken displayed its shock all over this poor young woma’s dress. But she dusted herself off, regained the somewhat grim composure of brides here, and carried on the procession. - Lynsey Chutel

[kzreporting-blog]

Many people cross the border between Rwanda and Congo multiple times a day. Some live in one country and work or go to school in another. The infrastructure between the two neighbors is stark. #goma #drc #rwanda #border #africa #iwmffellows #travel #discover #reporting #onlocation #everydayafrica (at Goma, Congo)

[everydaylatinamerica]

Durante marzo, @theIWMF -International Women's Media Foundation- hará un takeover de la cuenta de @everydaylatinamerica con fotografías producidas por sus miembros y becarias! --- This is @theiwmf fellow @anacvallejo. I am a freelance photographer and this is a photo from a long-term project called 'Entre Nubes' that focuses on the daily life of members of an illegal squat on the outskirts of Bogota, Colombia. Kids play as the sun sets in San German. ---- #Colombia #LatinAmerica #photography #journalism #women #photojournalists #IWMFFellows #potd #journalists #photos http://ift.tt/2HMG4La

[instapicsil3]

All about the green 🌿 #IWMF #IWMFfellows #GreatLakesReportingFellowship http://ift.tt/2iugvUY

[neuffer]

It was so strange to see this woman, Reeyot Alemu, onstage accepting an award at the IWMF Courage Awards in New York City last week. Reeyot won an IWMF courage award in 2012. But at the time, she couldn't travel to the United States to accept it. She had been imprisoned by the Ethiopian government in 2011, and would not be released until 2015. I've spent the last three years working as a freelance journalist in Ethiopia, so for most of that time, I had no opportunity to speak with Reeyot. I knew her only as one of several journalists in the country who were languishing behind bars. Media workers have it tough in Ethiopia, Africa's second most populous country. The security and intelligence agencies have little tolerance for journalists, and the government has used a sweeping anti-terrorism law -- enacted in 2009 and much-criticized by human rights advocates -- to target and silence its critics. I wrote about Reeyot for the Committee to Protect Journalists (you can read that story here: https://cpj.org/2015/04/attacks-on-the-press-conflating-terrorism-and-journalism-in-ethiopia.php ) while she was still in prison. And shortly after her release, I called her to get her thoughts on President Obama's July 2015 visit to Ethiopia. During his visit, the U.S. president had largely shied away from criticizing Ethiopia's human rights record. Reeyot told me that Ethiopian officials "just want to pretend in front of Obama and the international community that they are democratic and trying to improve human rights conditions." (We published that comment here: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/28/world/africa/obama-calls-ethiopian-government-democratically-elected.html ) I, too, have found it difficult to do my job in Ethiopia. I was detained multiple times and, in one instance, jailed overnight. But Reeyot, like so many other Ethiopian journalists, has suffered far worse. In total, she spent just over four years behind bars. Reeyot left for the United States soon after her 2015 release. So although we spoke on the phone, I never got the chance to meet her... until last week. And these Courage Awards are quite the event. Its purpose is not only to bring media bigwigs together and honor the work of brave female journalists from around the world -- this year's awardees were Stella Paul, Mabel Caceres, Janine di Giovanni, and Diane Rehm -- but also to raise money for the IWMF's Emergency Fund, which helps female journalists in dire straits. It was great to meet all of these women, but particularly interesting to see Reeyot herself, free after all these years, and taking the stage in New York City.

[ullmanphoto]

So long, Morogoro. #IWMFfellows #Tanzania #travel #onassignment #landrights @everydayafrica @theiwmf #africa

[iwmfontheground]

This is not my first time to get fake-kidnapped as I already did hostile environment training last year. It's still a shock, being reminded that this is one of the perils of the job. What do you really do in this kind of situation? On both scenarios that I've been in, I always try to remove the blindfold. I wanted to see, commit things in memory as I distract myself from the cramps. I remind myself that this is just drill and wait for someone to shout the safe word "Obama!".

-Kimberly dela Cruz

[iwmfontheground]

Rwanda’s soil is rich, so indeed the land is green. I have never worked on a story on agriculture or climate change before so visiting farms between the Kigali swamps and the Eastern province really gave me an intimate portrait of how integral the earth is connected to survival. From coffee to banana plantations, the land is responsible for the nation’s economic growth, empowering communities and feeding its people. 

It is the one reason why in a place like this, climate change holds immense significance for both security and subsistence. It has been an interesting journey putting faces to the effects of consistent torrential rainfall and drought, understanding that the human consequences go beyond trendy buzzwords.

One thing I love about being a journalist are the many opportunities it offers for learning, and working on these stories has been one to savour.

Love always

Wana

xoxo

[iwmfontheground]

Meet the Fellows Kimberly de la Cruz 

Kimberly de la Cruz, a freelance photojournalist based in Manila, has been immersed in covering the horrors of drug war the drug war in the Philippines for the past two years. Now, she’s traveling to El Salvador, where she looks forward to telling new stories and exploring her creativity behind her camera.

“I’ve always reported in Manila and coming to El Salvador I think could be fresh, and I could break a lot of barriers that are existing in my base in Manila,” Kimberly said. “I’ve always been curious about doing a lot of stories outside of the Philippines.”

She said she sees photos as an experience, and she aims to offer viewers an honest portrayal of the people and places she photographs.

“I’ve always wanted to explore photos that could actually make people feel or actually transport them to the scene that I photographed,” she said. “Photos are revelatory in a way. It’s a visual experience, but at the same time it stays with you — how the photograph makes you feel, makes you think.”

Kimberly fell in love with photojournalism from the first time she started taking photos for a local media outlet. But covering her country’s human rights crisis since President Rodrigo Duterte launched the “war on drugs” in 2016 has also made Kimberly feel like an active citizen on the right side of history in the Philippines.

“What I like about journalism now is the battle between good journalism and fake news because when you’re actually informing people, shaping public opinion, educating people about what is happening,” she said.

“As a journalist you are always biased to the truth so whatever is the truth you report it, and if people don’t like it, they will call you unfair,” she continued, highlighting negative reactions to her and her colleagues’ drug war coverage, such as trolling. “What’s unfair is when you are killed just because you were on some kill list.”

– Heather Gies 

[iwmfontheground]

A New Tribe

As I reflect on the past two weeks spent traveling and working with fellows from around the world, I realize how much this experience has made me grow – both personally and professionally. As journalists, the majority of our time is spent alone: planning projects, reporting in often difficult environments, editing at home or in coffee shops. We get used to the silence around us and keep moving forward, always eager to make our next story better than the last. We convince ourselves that we can do this alone, that there is no time to ask for help. Up until now, I lived anchored in the belief that if I couldn’t figure it out on my own, it probably meant that I was doing it wrong.

On the very first day of the reporting trip, this dangerous misconception crumbled to the ground. I was in complete awe of the talent and kindness that surrounded me. As an introvert that finds comfort in solitude, I never thought that having a group of experienced, caring women around me – a tribe, as we like to call it – would make such a huge difference in my life. We all come from different backgrounds, have been shaped by different life experiences, cover different topics in our reporting and yet, we all share a common truth: we wholeheartedly immerse ourselves in the hardships of others, hoping, through our work, to leave people’s lives better than we found them.  

Constantly exposed to humanity’s suffering and injustices, our work can easily take a heavy toll on our own lives, unless self-care becomes an absolute priority in our routines. The meaningful friendships created on this trip have become essential elements of my own well-being. I now know that challenges do not necessarily need to be faced alone; there are peers out there who want to listen and offer advice. I’ve learned to take myself less seriously, deeply rooted in the knowing that my work comes from the heart and that laughing endlessly to fellows’ stories is healthy for the mind. Most importantly, however, the experience of finding my tribe while reporting in a country filled with both life-threatening chaos and inextricable beauty, brought to me the greatest gift of all: meeting kind-hearted women journalists who genuinely want to see you succeed at work and at life, and who are prepared to give their all to help you get to where you want to be.

by Cristina Baussan

[iwmfontheground]

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No somos paramédicos ni rescatistas, pero nuestro trabajo como periodistas en zonas de riesgo nos obliga a aprender nociones básicas de atención a heridos. Saber qué hacer en los primeros momentos después de un siniestro puede salvar nuestra vida y la de otros.

- Celia Guerrero

[iwmfontheground]

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San Pedro Sula at nightfall.

Sometimes our work affects us in surprising ways.

On our second day of reporting in the field, we had followed another team on a lead about three murdered transgender women whose bodies were still in the morgue months after they had been killed. Honduras has the highest relative rates of murders of trans people in the world. Myself and my reporting partner Cristina were working with the LGBT community in San Pedro Sula and we wanted to learn more about women from the community.

That Thursday, our second day in Honduras, eight of us including fellows, IWMF staff, and local journalists were standing outside the morgue waiting to see if we would be allowed in, when a family of three showed up. Two young children and a woman who I assumed was their mother. She was crying. All of a sudden it all hit me. How could it be that two groups of people could show up to the same place and leave with such intensely different experiences? We were there to gather information; hard information to hear, absolutely. But this family’s life had presumably just been changed forever. They soon went into the morgue and we stayed out. I wanted to run away, to pretend I hadn’t seen her face. And then I thought, who am I to be sad? Nothing bad happened to me. But I couldn’t get her face out of my head.

Shortly after, a man drove a truck with another body in the back into the morgue. I don’t know who it was, I don’t know if it was that person’s family who we had seen minutes earlier. Perhaps it was another case, maybe the family of that person had no idea they had lost someone yet. Perhaps they were just having a normal Thursday afternoon.

Fifteen minutes later and we were being motioned into the morgue. The first stop was the ballistics unit, the floor of which was covered with guns wrapped in plastic bags. Guns that had been used in crimes, evidence of so many other crying mothers, fathers, partners, children, friends. After a brief tour we spoke with two of the doctors at the morgue for about 90 minutes, and I was trying so hard not to cry that I admit I missed much of the interview.

When I think now about being there, I think about what was on the walls. Outside the ballistics unit was a 2015 calendar that read “Good luck”.

About an hour later, we went back to our hotel and some of us went back out for a night patrol.  I spent most of the night intermittently thinking about the crying woman, and being frustrated for “not being a good enough journalist” because I had opted out of photographing and filming the night patrol, thinking that I might not be able to handle more death that day.

What an immense privilege that is, to be able to choose to step away from a situation that feels harmful to us. So many people do not get that privilege.

The best thing about the IWMF fellowships is the, well, fellowship. Every single fellow checked in with me, as I had been visibly upset after the morgue. We had some profound conversations about knowing our limits and expressing our emotions, and how that as journalists it is important to follow our instincts, whether they are about stories, safety, finding the good light, or knowing when you need to take a break. For me, I needed to take a step back and take in what I had learned that day, so that I could be ready to make the best work possible the next day. But it was important to be there, though, to understand some of the context of San Pedro Sula. And I continued to learn throughout my time there that despite this backdrop of violence that we so often hear about, there are so many more stories of resilience, persistence, and strength.

by Anna Clare Spelman