Disposable Words

Amtrak America

Austin — Thu, 09 Sep 2010 15:44:10 +0000

Ten angles on America’s rail infrastructure through the eyes of Amtrak passengers.

The geometry of patriotism. Near Union Station, Kansas City.

Preferential boarding. King Street Station, Seattle.

Early morning station call. Whitefish, Montana.

Angles to rail level. Union Station, Kansas City.

The baggage cart on platform 5.

Sunrise sightseers aboard the Empire Builder. Northern Idaho.

Carriage corridors.

Sunrise photographer.

A smoke break at Dallas Union Station as rains from Hurricane Hermine lash the platform.

Comings and goings at Seattle's King Street Station.

The Butte, MT Power Grid

Austin — Sat, 04 Sep 2010 05:48:14 +0000

Power and its presence in the hundred years’ past boomtown of Butte, Montana.

Uptown spires / heights may not be as advertised.

Splitting the Hillside "M" of Montana Tech.

Headframe gateway atop "the richest hill on Earth".

Tangled supply chain.

A gentleman's bet. The spiral staircase races the mountaintop to the sky.

Electricity arrived early to the Copper King Mansion, one of Butte's 6000+ listed buildings that together form the largest National Historic Landmark District in the United States.

Implements of power at the intersection of Main and Broadway.

Mercury / heavy metal.

End of the line.

Power Wash overlooking the Berkeley Pit, a one-time open pit copper mine that is now the site of the largest Superfund clean-up in the country.

Electricity descending / electricity submerged.

Quarryscape dominance.

Silhouettes and a Sunset Catch

Austin — Fri, 14 May 2010 05:26:46 +0000

Eight pairs.

Divination market, Durban.

Underclass.

Sunspray along a boulevard of herbal cure-alls and faith healers.

Shift's end.

Propulsion.

Fishing cliques.

Hillbrow Modern

Austin — Sat, 27 Mar 2010 18:13:55 +0000

Three images from an incomplete photo essay examining the modernist architecture of Johannesburg’s inner city.

Pressure-packed.

Skyscraper gaze.

Fire exit ribbon.

Portraits of a Rising Zimbabwe (5 of 5)

Austin — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 07:12:42 +0000

——

This is the part five of a five part assignment for IOM International Organization for Migration on the rebuilding of Zimbabwe after an unprecedented economic and civil collapse. Photos Copyright ©2009 Austin Andrews / International Organization for Migration (IOM) except where noted. Not to be reprinted or reproduced without permission.

——

Last August, Will van Engen (blog link) and I visited Zimbabwe on a photographic assignment for IOM International Organization for Migration, an intergovernmental organisation dedicated to promoting safe and humane migration in high-risk nations. Few countries recently have been in the headlines as much for migration issues as Zimbabwe, a failed state wracked by economic implosion where one third of the population now lives abroad, much of it illegally in neighbouring South Africa.

As a photography trip, it was ill-conceived: IOM organised an itinerary that compressed an entire country’s worth of far-flung project sites into one week of shooting. A Land Cruiser sent us tumbling down some of the worst roads in the world, chasing light and perpetually behind schedule. For every ten minutes spent travelling we’d be lucky to have a minute shooting. But as an experience it was one of the richest and most worthwhile trips of my life. I look back on the photographs below with rose-tinted fondness.

Wrapping up the series, part five takes us through some of IOM’s schemes in place to aid returning migrants with reassimilation.

A woman watches over goats donated by IOM to households of migrants returning to southern Zimbabwe from South Africa. A sustainable biogas is produced by harnessing the methane in the goats' waste, bringing power to far-flung regions that previously had none.

Animal husbandry.

Biodigester.

Residents of the Caledonia township south of Harare queue for attention from an IOM-sponsored mobile clinic. The twice-monthly clinic is the only access Caledonia's 2000 residents have to medical care.

Doctor visit.

Inspection.

Departing patient.

Meanwhile in the city, a patient gets treated at Harare's Parirenyatwa Hospital.

This doctor returned from the UK after a unity government was established in Zimbabwe to help participate in her country's economic recovery.

This welder returned to Zimbabwe through an IOM sponsorship for small business start-ups.

Statues in play.

Portraits of a Rising Zimbabwe (4 of 5)

Austin — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 08:39:15 +0000

——

This is part four of a five part assignment for IOM International Organization for Migration on the rebuilding of Zimbabwe after an unprecedented economic and civil collapse. Photos Copyright ©2009 Austin Andrews / International Organization for Migration (IOM) except where noted. Not to be reprinted or reproduced without permission.

——

Part four takes us to IOM’s two Safe Zone activity sites for children at risk for trafficking, one in Bulawayo and the other in Chiredzi.

At the Safe Zone in Chiredzi, a local volunteer runs through the rules of a tire track obstacle course.

Contender.

Winners' circle.

The Chiredzi Safe Zone, one of two IOM-sponsored youth activity centres in Zimbabwe.

Point / Shot

Counterpoint / Reverse Shot

Primed.

Blue on target.

Story of a football.

Mirrored sliver.

The Five Ring Circus: Maple Leaf Meltdown

Austin — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 07:58:17 +0000

Various angles on national pride during the last day of the XXI Winter Olympics.

Balcony patriotism.

Blue sky runs.

The outspoken fifth floor.

A message in red.

Maple leaf wrapper.

Siren / call to arms.

The lonely states.

The leaf breaks a smile.

Momentum.

Noise above the crowd.

Flag-swaddled.

View from the top.

Canted chaos.

Messiah.

Raise the flag.

Sound the bugle.

Impromptu street hockey games sprung up across downtown Vancouver through the Olympics.

Late night crowds at the epicentre of Robson and Granville streets.

The Five Ring Circus: Game Faces

Austin — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 20:23:56 +0000

Canada takes on the USA for Olympic Gold. Two kilometres from Canada Hockey Place at LiveCity Yaletown, 28 February 2010.

Full regalia.

Detail of a crowd.

Maple leaf array.

Canada celebrates a goal from Jonathan Toews 12:50 into the first period.

Canada takes a 2-0 lead with a second period goal from Corey Perry.

America comes back to narrow Canada's lead with a goal from Ryan Kesler.

America comes back to tie the game in the dying seconds, forcing overtime.

Tie game.

Crosby takes possession of the puck for Canada...

...shoots...

"Where were you when Canada won gold?"

Eruption.

Thrash.

Tears.

150,000 best friends.

Believe.

"Oh Canada..."

"...with glowing hearts..."

"...we stand on guard for thee..."

Portraits of a Rising Zimbabwe (3 of 5)

Austin — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 01:32:44 +0000

——

This is part three of a five part assignment for IOM International Organization for Migration on the rebuilding of Zimbabwe after an unprecedented economic and civil collapse. Photos Copyright ©2009 Austin Andrews / International Organization for Migration (IOM) except where noted. Not to be reprinted or reproduced without permission.

——

This past August, Will van Engen (blog link) and I visited Zimbabwe on a photographic assignment for IOM International Organization for Migration, an intergovernmental organisation dedicated to promoting safe and humane migration in high-risk nations. Few countries recently have been in the headlines as much for migration issues as Zimbabwe, a failed state wracked by economic implosion where one third of the population now lives abroad, much of it illegally in neighbouring South Africa.

Part three takes us to two separate project sites on opposite sides of the country with different focuses on the same issue: safe migration.

PROJECT ONE / AWARENESS

IOM volunteers suit up at a UN World Food Programme distribution gathering in rural Masvingo province, an area that has seen an alarming percentage of its population flee into neighbouring South Africa. Their mission is to promote safe migration, raise awareness of hazards and prepare would-be migrants for the difficult journey ahead.

Spirited.

Locals crowd around an IOM volunteer distributing information on safe migration.

"Are you thinking of migrating?"

IOM volunteers distribute and play a game of Safe Migration Snakes and Ladders.

Eager fingertips await information.

Tattered.

PROJECT TWO / MIGRANT PROCESSING

An IOM billboard demarcates the dusty border between Zimbabwe and Botswana outside the town of Plumtree. A hotspot for illegal crossings, IOM operates a migrant processing centre on the Zimbabwean side of the border.

A truckful of deported migrants rounded up in nearby Francistown, Botswana arrives back in Zimbabwe at the IOM processing centre. The centre sees an estimated 3000 failed migrants a month, not accounting for those who attempt the dangerous border crossing more than once.

First steps back on Zimbabwean soil for a few of the 3000 illegal Zimbabweans captured and deported monthly from Francistown, Botswana.

Zimbabweans walk toward an immigration office for processing after being deported from Botswana.

A Zimbabwean immigration official addresses a room of would-be migrants deported from Botswana for illegal immigration.

The immigration official addresses the group to ensure no Botswanan citizens were mistakenly rounded up.

Migrants await repatriation papers in a processing queue in the IOM compound.

A dance troupe entertains the repatriated migrants while they await transportation back to Harare and Bulawayo.

Portraits of a Rising Zimbabwe (2 of 5)

Austin — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 02:18:29 +0000

——

This is part two of a five part assignment for IOM International Organization for Migration on the rebuilding of Zimbabwe after an unprecedented economic and civil collapse. Photos Copyright ©2009 Austin Andrews / International Organization for Migration (IOM) except where noted. Not to be reprinted or reproduced without permission.

——

Part two in what I’ll admit is an only occasionally compelling series focuses on IOM’s livelihood and employment programs for families and returning migrants in rural Manicaland, near the Mozambican border.

A family crowds around as water gushes from a deep borehole pump in rural Manicaland.

Stalks of dead grass line a child's walk back to her family's small rondavel village.

A midday scene between terms at an IOM-built, government-run school in rural Manicaland. This compound was once part of a white-run commercial farm that fell into disrepair after President Robert Mugabe's forced land grabs put it in the hands of urban blacks with no previous experience in farming.

Attentive eyes know.

Lessons for Wednesday 26 August 2009.

An uncertain hand rises in the back of the class.

The women behind the scenes of a local bakery, one of the many employment schemes IOM runs for returning migrants in the rural Mutare area.

Bread's last daylight as dough.

Hot loaves, hand delivered.

Hot loaves, hand delivered II.

Replacing the now-defunct Zimbabwean dollar in April as the country's street currency, a single US dollar now buys what 10,000,000,000,000 (10 trillion) Zim dollars once did.

Another IOM initiative, this community garden provides growing space, seeds and water access for its 28 members. The residents of these sunbaked rural highlands otherwise has little access to fresh vegetables.

Children work away in their family plot.

Prudence.

The fingers and shadows of ownership.

Construction implements and evidence.

Portraits of a Rising Zimbabwe (1 of 5)

Austin — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 00:36:42 +0000

——

This is part one of a five part assignment for IOM International Organization for Migration on the rebuilding of Zimbabwe after an unprecedented economic and civil collapse. Photos Copyright ©2009 Austin Andrews / International Organization for Migration (IOM) except where noted. Not to be reprinted or reproduced without permission.

——

Part one focuses on IOM’s homebuilding programs in remote rural communities for returning migrants.

Boys look out from behind a gate in an IOM-built community outside Mutare, an MDC (Movement for Democratic Change) stronghold near the Mozambican border.

IOM vests supervise a project site near Chiredzi. Here, locals build their own homes from materials provided by IOM.

A woman sits in her living room under wall-mounted pages from the Qur'an. With electricity sporadic at best, the television sees little use.

Foot traffic outside a new IOM-constructed brick house situated in a community of traditional rondavels.

A father and son make their way through the home-specked flatlands off the grid in Zimbabwe's remote Eastern Highlands.

Chasing the day's last golden light, an IOM convoy makes its way through the bush toward a far-flung building project.

Construction gang on the left, residents-to-be on the right.

Earthly Hands / Materials of Habitation.

Rim tracks in the path to a new home.

A family pauses midway through moving furniture into their new IOM-constructed house.

Cut Scenes from Zimbabwe’s Dark Decade

Austin — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 12:14:05 +0000

This past August, Will van Engen and I visited Zimbabwe on a photographic assignment for IOM International Organization for Migration, an intergovernmental organisation dedicated to promoting safe and humane migration in high-risk nations. Few countries recently have been in the headlines as much for migration issues as Zimbabwe, a failed state wracked by economic implosion where one third of the population now lives abroad, much of it illegally in neighbouring South Africa.

The following are cut scenes from an upcoming photo series on the slow rebuilding of Zimbabwe after one of the darkest decades in recent African history.

With the cooling towers of the Bulawayo Power Station looming behind them, residents of Zimbabwe's second-largest city wander township streets.

Main street bustle in the town of Chiredzi. With goods back on shelves after a long period of uncertainty, shops have reclaimed their status as community hubs.

Families stream in and out of a rural general store in the hills surrounding the border town of Mutare in Zimbabwe's Eastern Highlands.

A cattle drive by morning light.

A long-haul busliner. Vehicles like this one are a common sight on the nation's roads, with most domestic routes plied by dilapidated buses that are more than a half century old.

T-shirt ballot.

Sunset split.

Suggested treatment at Harare's Parirenyatwa Hospital.

Reminders of 2008's controversial elections still haunt many of the streets of capital city Harare.

Roaming from driveway to driveway, two buskers stop to play a streetside tune in the affluent Avondale neighbourhood.

A group of suburban youth wander home after a Friday night hanging out at the Avondale shopping centre.

Once a popular diversion for middle-class Zimbabweans, the nation's cinemas have fallen into disrepair and neglect in recent years.

Round-the-clock electricity still eludes Harare, with power cuts stretching for six hours or longer on most days. Her computer down, a cashier tallies up orders by hand at a Nando's fast food restaurant in Avondale.

As good a sign as any of the nation's topsy-turvy currency, the runaway hyperinflation of the Zimbabwe dollar has given way to stability as the nation shifts to the US dollar.

Another indication of the stabilising economy, shops are reopening as hard currency trickles through the population.

Dark City Daylight

Austin — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 10:52:48 +0000

Johannesburg’s densely-populated Alexandra township has held many roles since its inception in 1904, from its early days as a freewheeling freehold kingdom where blacks could buy their own land to a centre of activism against encroaching apartheid policy in the 1940s and 1950s through to its position as South Africa’s “Beirut” under the nation’s State of Emergency of the 1980s. Today Alexandra is among South Africa’s highest profile townships and is a place where historical prejudices and modern day open-mindedness form an uneasy truce.

The following street portraits are from a day spent exploring the township.

: Foot traffic outside a decaying worker’s hostel. Re-envisioned during the height of apartheid as a “hostel city”, only three of the single-sex behemoths were ever built. Each house an estimated 10000 people and are all still in operation.

: Residents tend to early morning washing in an Alexandra squatter camp.

: Sunrise bottles clear and green.

: Township dwellers buy still-warm ‘fat cakes’ on their morning walk to the taxi rank.

: Police presence.

: The rooftops of a recently-electrified shanty block.

: A morning walk against rainbow flats.

: Rainbow washing against rainbow flats.

: Comings and goings. Only one toilet serves this thirty household “yard” of shacks.

: Alexandra resident George Mashile sorts through clothing in his one room shack.

: Hail.

: Fresh faces and fresher paint.

: Tuck shop commerce outside the women’s hostel.

: Standing water in the brick jungle.

: A child runs through one of the sweeping courtyards of the women’s hostel.

: A kettle boils as two girls do dishes in one of the hostel’s industrial-sized kitchens.

: Sunlit parallelogram.

: Laundry under the watchful eye of Jacob Zuma.

: Pedestrian routes along the Jukskei River.

: Burnt tones.

: Opposing faces on either side.

: Expectant taxis waiting at the taxi rank.

: Two boys follow a bottle cap as it flows down a roadside gutter creek.

: Two silhouettes and an obstacle.

: Kids watch a tyre fire from a ridge of dredged-up construction materials.

: A hand points to an abandoned and unfinished housing project in Alexandra’s Far East Bank extension.

: Island in a road in a frame.

Check out Will’s blog Steeltown Blues for another angle on the same day’s exploration.

A Protest Song for the Deaf

Austin — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 11:09:17 +0000

Over 10000 striking municipal workers took to the streets of central Johannesburg yesterday for a 15 block march to the city municipal offices to demand an above-inflation 15% pay increase. Over 150000 police, sanitation and transportation workers are striking nationwide.

Photographed mid-dance, a woman leads a procession ten thousand strong across the Nelson Mandela Bridge.

Layered onlookers on Jorissen Street.

A marshal contains protestors as police set up a perimeter.

Skyscraperside filmstrip.

Johannesburg metro police set up a riot guard as protestors arrive at the municipal building for an address by the mayor and union leaders.

Bullet strip at the ready.

Chants against nepotism.

Architecture/protest halves.

Impassioned.

Municipal workers are protesting across the country.

For another (better-researched) perspective on the same protest, check out Will’s blog Steeltown Blues.

A Township in Flames

Austin — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 10:45:06 +0000

Tensions between riot police and the citizens of the Siyathemba township in Mpumalanga province reached a fever pitch yesterday in a stand off that saw police fire tear gas and rubber bullets at violent protestors. The nation’s eyes descended on the the rural township after a spate of xenophobic attacks earlier in the week — the first since a wave of violence killed 63 in May 2008 — erupted from broken election promises and poor housing delivery.

An armoured police Nyala watches over a restless citizen congregation during an address by the mayor of neighbouring Balfour. Later that day the same crowd burned his house down.

Jeers from behind a mesh fence.

Peace, for now.

Watching through a hole in the fence.

Headspace

Fired-up township dwellers take to the streets after the disappointing address.

Protestors storm the streets in riot configuration.

Riot police move in to defuse the situation.

A man throws a stone at police from behind the safety of a private residence.

Protestors run from approaching police Nyalas.

Guns at the ready, police scour the township for protestors brazen enough to show themselves.

Armed with rocks, protestors flee from approaching riot police.

Photographers Alon Skuy and Thys Dullaart of The Times take cover from crossfire.

A man runs from an armoured police Nyala rounding the corner.

A policeman guides a Nyala around hastily-erected roadblocks.

Standing in the Nyala's path, a protestor holds a stone at the ready.

Photojournalists take shelter from crossfire behind a Times car.

Bush Flight

Austin — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 16:17:32 +0000

ZS-SZ-MJO cargo hold on a Cessna 210.

Fins and rotors, blues in rhyme.

Pilot Rob Snaddon does a final inspection of the 210 before a delayed takeoff.

A subdivision skeleton north of Witbank.

Manmade clouds at the site of a controlled burn east of Pretoria.

Panic button in the afternoon half light.

Rolling hills and drifting wildfires.

Dan looks out from the Cessna over the sunset landscape.

Approaching the Drakensberg escarpment north of Witrivier.

The town at the end of the world.

Rob banks sharply to the left as he approaches the dirt runway.

Twilight landing.

Sunset beckons night. Photo credit David Snaddon.

Emma, Dan and David on a game drive through Selati Reserve later that weekend.

Wide-bodied belly.

Beacons in Orange and Blue

Austin — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 19:07:32 +0000

A torched car burns on the N3 motorway north of Johannesburg Saturday night.

The Township as Spectacle

Austin — Sat, 06 Jun 2009 14:22:16 +0000

The South African township holds a curious appeal for many photographers, myself included. For all their talked-about poverty and crime statistics, townships are also home to a vibrancy and sense of community rarely found in the gated palaces of Johannesburg’s northern suburbs. People here pass their days in the public space; on streetside curbs, at friends’ stalls, forever milling and browsing. The hand-scrawled signs and labyrinthine incompleteness to the space lends photos instant production value. And for the outsider there’s never a shortage of places to explore.

Scroll down for selections from a morning spent in the Johannesburg East Rand townships of Katlehong and Thokoza.

Vanishing point / a morning commuter train to Vereeniging.

Minibus taxis prepare for the peak hour commute at the Thokoza taxi rank.

Transiting silhouettes at the taxi rank. Most of South Africa’s townships were originally built as labour pools for pass-carrying blacks who were employed in the cities but prohibited under Apartheid from living in them. In the absence of public transportation these cheap and reliable taxis became as much a fixture of township life as the sangorma faith healers and ubiquitous streetside vendors.

An informal spaza convenience shop peeks out from a landscape of shanty shacks.

Curious kids in a township crèche (pre-primary school).

A woman walks past graffiti’d reminders of the township wars of the early 1990s, when anti-Apartheid uprisings in Thokoza were violently suppressed by the state police force leaving thousands dead. The East Rand townships were also the epicentre of last year’s xenophobic attacks that saw 100 killed and over 100,000 displaced.

A streetside barber hangs his shavers up after a customer.

Shadow inconsistencies at a streetside salon.

Salon styles.

An enterprising spaza shopkeeper at his phone booth.

Holler.

Power pole kings over a hawker market.

An interested buyer at a streetside clothing stall.

Busy hands at a sidewalk butcher.

Shopping bag.

Business hours.

Pedestrian traffic at a busy Katlehong intersection.

Flames and heat shimmer in an RDP neighbourhood. These one room houses are a common sight in the modern township with over 1.1 million built by the incoming ANC government in the early years after 1994.

Homeowners out front of their RDP house.

Living quarters.

The view out over the centre compound of a single-sex workers’ hostels. Formerly reserved only for pass-carrying black labourers, the hostels of Thokoza were notorious cesspools of crime and abject squalor during the dark days of Apartheid. Although most are still overcrowded and gang-ridden, this particular hostel retains little of its edge today.

Orange vendor.

Orange transport.

Orange delicious.

Diagonal kids / slide queue.

Fatherhood.

Tombstone Factory (and Kitchen Tops!)

Detritus and overflow from a burst sewage line.

Rusting, out of commission taxis at the taxi rank.

Long distance bus rank.

Salon shadows.

Sweeper’s shadows.

Five in Black and White

Austin — Sun, 31 May 2009 09:35:59 +0000

Selected angles from an orphanage for HIV positive children outside Lenasia in southern Gauteng province.

Story of a wash basin.

Catch-hands.

Bubble barons.

Three faces, four eyes.

Laundry line.

A Black Hole in the Rainbow Nation

Austin — Fri, 22 May 2009 21:21:10 +0000

My photography project on the Zimbabwean refugee crisis, most of which appeared on this blog in March, has found new life as a thirty shot multimedia slideshow. Check it out and don’t forget to turn the pesky captions off.

The slideshow can also be viewed in high resolution on the Medecins Sans Frontieres site and on The Times‘ online multimedia portal.

Special thanks to Thato Mogotsi and Alon Skuy at The Times and Zethu Mlobeli at MSF for helping put it together!

Matchbox Hillside

Austin — Sat, 02 May 2009 10:15:48 +0000

Seven takes from the former asbestos mining town of Bulembu, Swaziland. The mine closed in 2001, leaving the town of 15000 to plod along without an industry. The remaining few eke out a living working in the nearby logging camps as the town hastily reshuffles itself as a remote getaway resort.

Colour codes.

Green on the move.

Reunion.

Homefront.

Invisible kid.

Rustred.

Wind/sun direction.

Sunset Plain

Austin — Fri, 01 May 2009 10:10:24 +0000

Homeless/Homes

Austin — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 08:42:15 +0000

With the rest of the country flocking last week to the polling stations in record numbers, hundreds of residents of the Alexandra township opted to boycott the election to make a stand for poor government-subsidised housing. Speaking out against the corruption and delays that has marred delivery of a new housing project in the Far East Bank of Alexandra, the protestors held chants and dances on a grassy knoll across the street from a line of police vehicles and media.

Jig jog.

Stand.

Township police.

Swat.

Guards keep watch inside the disputed –and very incomplete– housing project.

Incline.

For the full series, including several (rather mediocre) photos not published here, check out the multimedia slideshow on The Times’ website.

Stadium Spectacular

Austin — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 17:17:54 +0000

Crew and extras on the set of The Human Factor, an upcoming Clint Eastwood-directed rugby film starring Morgan Freeman and Matt Damon.

An endfield Tuesday.

An endfield Sunday as crowds arrive at Ellis Park for the African National Congress’ final rally before Wednesday’s general elections.

————————

The following article was written by my friend Sarah about our experience attending the rally. Keep scrolling for more photos.

Text © Sarah Godsell / BusinessDay

Photos © Austin Andrews / The Times

Zuma Dispels a Sceptic’s Notions

I am a young South African, 23, and while I am very excited about voting tomorrow, I’m confused and a little disillusioned about who to vote for.

In this state of mind I, almost by accident, attended the African National Congree (ANC) rally at Coca-Cola Park in Johannesburg on Sunday.

I’m not an ANC supporter (well, specifically not a Jacob Zuma supporter) and I was expecting to have a day of grinding my teeth through speeches. Instead, I had an overwhelmingly positive experience, which, while not converting my vote, left me feeling much calmer and more positive about the country and its leadership after these elections.

The experience started with my Canadian friend, a photographer who invited me to the rally, and I walking to the stadium together with throngs of singing people. The atmosphere was celebratory, and anticipatory. I got caught up in it very quickly, although we stuck out in two ways. We were the only ones not wearing ANC T-shirts, which made us more conspicuous than being the only two white people in the crowd.

On our way into the stadium, having now acquired ANC T-shirts, I was reminded about the diversity of ANC supporters – the pace of the civilised crush was slowed by older people walking with sticks and young children, their ANC shirts reaching to their knees and toes.

The reception I received from the people around me was overwhelmingly positive. The area of the stadium in which I was sitting was so full that people had crammed onto the stairs; a jigsaw puzzle of people with a common purpose. The middle-aged women I was sitting next to were friendly and concerned, and offered me half their seats. And there were many idiosyncrasies that surprised me, and which made me smile.

While, as far as I could see, we were the only white people in the stadium (apart from members of the media on the field), the only languages on the posters were English and Afrikaans. But the crowd’s response to the Afrikaans prayer was positive (even the prayers were diverse, with a prayer by an imam, a rabbi and Christian ministers). At the end of the Afrikaans prayer the woman sitting next to me said: “In die naam van God,” (In God’s name) and leaned over to me and said: “Ek probeer.” (I’m trying).

I went to the rally strongly opposed to Zuma, with my arguments against him neatly lined up in my head. It was only when he started speaking that I realised that I had never actually heard him speak (I’m not counting the choice 30-second extracts shown on the news), and I was pleasantly surprised.

He spoke of a country where every colour and every gender feels comfortable and is not discriminated against, and reassured people that even if the ANC gets a two-thirds majority, it would not change the constitution.

His speech was not life-changing for me, but it did challenge my preconceived negative notions of the person who is probably going to be our president. I am grateful for that. And while some of my friends pointed out that words are just words, what else can you have in a speech?

I was also impressed by the spectacular organisation. There were at least 100 000 people gathered in the two stadiums and the areas outside, but everything was completely relaxed and peaceful. I had watched as the organisers stopped letting people into Coca-Cola Park and started sending them to the Johannesburg Stadium next door. I expected people to get angry. I expected lines of policemen. But there was just one line of security personnel, firmly standing holding hands and directing people to other areas, and people obeyed them. It made me so happy to live here.

Leaving the stadium was also very relaxed, my friend and I both in our ANC T-shirts. We were a bit of an oddity in the crowd, and people kept testing us, saying amandla. At first I was shy about responding; I never know whether it’s my right or not. But seeing people’s responses when I did respond, I carried on. And why not? Power to the people, to these people, the everyday people. And my hope, my prayer, is that the people in power remember every single day whom they are here to represent. I had definitely forgotten what the ANC stood for.

All in all, it was an intensely positive experience. And an intensely democratic one. I felt comfortable and proud to be South African. Everybody says that we have lots of work to do, and it’s true. And we don’t know what kind of president Zuma will be.

I still don’t know who to vote for. But I do know we’re going to be okay. And my friend and I can have some fun shocking all our friends by going out in our ANC T-shirts!

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Mugs and brims.

Sea of arrivals.

Supporters crowd the entrances for a view of the festivities.

The view from the upper tier.

Cascading crowds/opposing diagonals.

Decked out in ANC yellow and green, a helicopter flies over the two stadiums to raucous cheer.

Obey the corner.

Thumb-eyed.

Flag-faced.

Misty-eyed supporters recite the national anthem Nkosi Sikelele.

Point.

Brim message.

Crowds react to the surprise appearance of former president Nelson Mandela.

Face times four.

Freedom Fence

Austin — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 10:49:53 +0000

No related posts.

A Concert at the Central Methodist Church

Austin — Sun, 05 Apr 2009 12:39:42 +0000

On Saturday night the doors of the Central Methodist Church, an informal refugee camp housing an estimated 5000 Zimbabwean refugees in downtown Johannesburg, opened for a few of the city’s brightest musical and spoken word acts.

Open mic.

Sleeping berth.

Sound engineer.

Clapalong.

Singalong.

Commotion.

The lines divide.

Emcee.

A choir exits stage right.

High note.

Bubble-in-wait.

Frenetic.

Ledge.

Bounce.

Perspective.

A captive crowd.

Attentive.

Cell phone glow.

Sun-Up Johannesburg

Austin — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 07:17:35 +0000

Fogscrapers on Jeppe Street.

The trains of Park Station.

Female/male halves.

City Butcher

Austin — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 08:57:04 +0000

A News Story From Beginning to End

Austin — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 06:47:02 +0000

My first instinct is to apologise for this post. As thrilling as it often is to chase a big story as it unfolds and explodes, it’s also rather difficult getting pretty frames (which I’m a sucker for) out of hard news shots (which I’m not). The result is a brand of photography different from what generally appears on this blog, and in my eyes a little less interesting. But still worthwhile, I hope, all the same.

Here, that big story was the minibus taxi riot that yesterday brought down Johannesburg to a near-standstill. Thousands of taxi drivers protested en masse against a proposed public transit network they fear will put them out of business, blockading highways and wreaking city-wide havoc to build momentum.

I can’t be bothered properly recapping the event myself so read on for an excerpt from The Times’ extensive coverage. The paper had seven photographers –myself included– covering the madness across the city. Full source article here.

Protesting drivers beat motorists, stone cars and pull passengers from buses

TAXI operators have threatened to bring the entire country to a halt with a strike lasting more than a week if their demands are not met.

Bus commuters were beaten and at least one bus driver was shot yesterday before angry, striking taxi drivers and their bosses handed a list of their demands to the ANC and the Gauteng department of transport.

[...]

Earlier, hundreds of taxis caused massive traffic jams, blocking busy intersections and driving at a snail’s pace on the M1 freeway. Armed with sticks and knobkerries, they beat motorists and pulled commuters off buses.

The police fired at them with rubber bullets. There were reports of looting in the CBD.

At the Grayston Drive offramp on the M1, taxi drivers pulled passengers out of a Greyhound bus, beating some with knobkerries. Others threw stones at passing cars. A section of the highway was closed to allow ambulances to attend to injured passengers as other taxi drivers threatened to smash cars with bricks.

An all-lanes roadblock of stationery minibus taxis chokes the M1 highway south to Johannesburg from Pretoria.

Copper chopper overhead.

An angry taxi driver tests the photographer’s bias. He passes, although not without bending a few truths along the way.

The M1 at Corlett Drive.

A story of hands.

A conspiracy of taxis.

The transiting convoy approaches the Johannesburg CBD.

Election posters line the buildings of Braamfontein on the way across the Nelson Mandela Bridge.

Parking lanes, Newtown.

Have a nice day.

Impassioned protestors march to Mary Fitzgerald Square in Newtown.

The shadows’ complaints.

Signs former boxes.

Megaphone messages as mounted police circle the scene.

The protest continues into the CBD with thousands of taxi drivers marching with escalating tempers to the ANC (African National Congress) headquarters.

Implements of the new and old South Africa.

Guns at the ready.

Taunts and chants.

Tactics.

Hands clap for a taxi dance.

Window in cardboard.

Riot/melee.

The skyward eye.

Backup.

Ever watchful.

Memo for peace.

Sanctuary in the Sunburned North

Austin — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 20:22:04 +0000

——

This is part four of a five part assignment for Médecins Sans Frontières on the migration of refugees from impoverished Zimbabwe into South Africa. Photos Copyright ©2009 Austin Andrews / Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF). Not to be reprinted or reproduced without permission.

——

As the world’s worst humanitarian crisis outside a conflict zone, the collapse of Zimbabwe has had profound consequences reaching far outside its borders. They’ve been better documented elsewhere so I’ll just skim their surfaces here.

Perhaps the most visible sign has been the mass exodus of people from the cities and towns, most of them escaping to weather the economic storm from the relative stability of neighbouring Botswana and South Africa. Some estimates put the current population of Zimbabwe below 8 million, down from a peak of 12.5 million at the turn of the millennium, with as many as 3.4 million recent emigrants residing in South Africa alone.

This is a visit to the border regions of Beitbridge in Zimbabwe and the nearby refugee camps in the South African town of Musina.

A razorwire fence frames a view of Beitbridge, a Zimbabwean bordertown of 20000 and last port of call for would-be refugees migrating to South Africa.

Guards at a South African border post near Musina.

The three-fence electrified border between Zimbabwe and South Africa retreats into the distance toward Botswana. The border patrol employs a full-time team of workers to patch up sections of the fence snipped during illegal crossings the night before.

Snipped razor wire tailings and a discarded Coke bottle.

The main obstacle to Zimbabweans preparing to cross the border, the crocodile-infested Limpopo River in Matabeleland South is also a stronghold of the Guma-Guma, a gang of rebel bandits who prey on migrants hiding in the scrubland.

Riverscape. A human form camouflaged by reeds prepares to cross the Limpopo (centre of the image to the right of the waterlogged tree; click to enlarge).

15km from the border back in South Africa, the showgrounds in Musina were until recently an informal camp for as many as 4000 homeless Zimbabwean refugees awaiting their asylum papers. The showgrounds were formally closed two weeks ago, although several hundred still sleep every night on its dirt pitch.

Showground girl.

The tap awaits.

Fresh drink.

Social circle between rope links.

Wire link drink.

Suds and shoes.

Queue for asylum papers at a mobile Home Affairs branch.

Washing station at the Uniting Reform Church, a transit shelter for orphans and unaccompanied minors.

Writing practise.

Key combinations.

Pew berths.

Towel-clad boys walk to the shelter shower.

Moving places.

Share plate.

Supply tent.

A sunset toilet installation inside the men’s shelter.

Rock dust in a sunset haze.

Several major NGOs operate out of Musina; in addition to MSF, organisations with a base here include Save the Children, the International Organization for Migration, Oxfam, the United Nations High Commission for Refugees, and, pictured here, one of several chapters of the Red Cross.

Sunset boys.

A car snout peeks out behind children at a refugee camp.

Twilight washing outside the women’s shelter.

Women’s shelter in a Catholic church.

A story of shadows. Dinnertime at the men’s camp.

A story of shadows II. Settling in for sleep at the men’s camp.

——

Part five, a return visit to the Central Methodist Church in downtown Johannesburg, will be posted here tomorrow.

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Queue Camp

Austin — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 09:34:58 +0000

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This is part three of an ongoing assignment for Médecins Sans Frontières on the migration of refugees from impoverished Zimbabwe into South Africa. Photos Copyright ©2009 Austin Andrews / Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF). Not to be reprinted or reproduced without permission.

——

Atop a slag heap in the West Johannesburg neighbourhood of Crown Mines, hundreds of Zimbabwean asylum seekers wait for their turn the see the immigration officials at the Department of Home Affairs. An informal shantytown has sprung up near the entrance to Home Affairs, only here what pass for shanties consist of just a blanket and cardboard mattress. The refugees sleep in queues; some have been there for ten days or more. Roughly twenty people from each queue are seen per day, leaving the rest to slowly advance place-by-place over the days.

Tangle of bodies.

Silhouettes congregating.

Face in half light.

Festive, the front of the queue.

“Will Mr. Mugabe see this? Can you show him this?”

Queue placements.

Zip jacket.

Four women settle in for the long wait at the back of the queue.

Tyre fire.

Crisis Clinic

Austin — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 05:35:29 +0000

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This is part two of an ongoing assignment for Médecins Sans Frontières on the migration of refugees from impoverished Zimbabwe into South Africa. Photos Copyright ©2009 Austin Andrews / Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF). Not to be reprinted or reproduced without permission.

——

Since opening their Johannesburg operations in December 2007, MSF has operated a medical clinic at the Central Methodist Church, a downtown transit camp for over 5000 Zimbabwean refugees fleeing turmoil in their home country.

In its first three months of operations the clinic saw nearly 2895 cases and made 294 clinical referrals for HIV, TB, and other chronic diseases.

Story of a passerby.

The longbench queue.

Contagious or severe cases go to the isolation ward. Since opening the clinic has seen five cases of cholera, a disease that has infected over 87000 Zimbabweans in recent months and killed over 4000.

“You won’t feel it, barely.”

Post-test paperwork.

An MSF counsellor prepares a patient for the prick of an HIV blood test.

The nurse administers the blood test.

Awaiting results.

The test came back negative for HIV.

Triage nurse.

Doctor’s office.

Stomach cramps.

The scene out front of the Central Methodist Church.

——

Part three, a late-night visit to a refugee camp outside the Department of Home Affairs, will be posted here tomorrow.

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Palisade Perimeter

Austin — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 04:48:43 +0000

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This is an update to part one of an ongoing assignment for Médecins Sans Frontières on the migration of refugees from impoverished Zimbabwe into South Africa. Photos Copyright ©2009 Austin Andrews / Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF). Not to be reprinted or reproduced without permission.

——

Under pressure from nearby business owners the City of Johannesburg has begun to move in on the Central Methodist Church, a downtown transit camp for over 5000 Zimbabwean refugees. On Tuesday workers erected an iron fence around its entrances in an effort to restrict the movement of refugees after dark, a gesture that Bishop Paul Verryn has condemned.

The church and Medecins Sans Frontieres are currently fighting a lawsuit that seeks to move their operations elsewhere.

Skyscraping spokes.

Restive.

Symbols.

Church.

In Bishop Paul We Trust

Austin — Sun, 08 Mar 2009 10:47:22 +0000

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This is part one of a three part assignment for Médecins Sans Frontières on the migration of refugees from impoverished Zimbabwe into South Africa. Photos Copyright ©2009 Austin Andrews / Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF). Not to be reprinted or reproduced without permission.

——

Under the leadership of Bishop Paul Verryn, the Central Methodist Church in downtown Johannesburg has become a place of refuge for Zimbabweans seeking a new life in South Africa. Some 5000 line up here every evening for a place to stay safe from the xenophobic violence that has dogged Johannesburg’s townships, spilling out onto the pavement of neighbouring Small Street when all the floor space inside the church is gone.

Lately the situation has been worsening and the role of the church has become more important than ever. On Tuesday, the Home Affairs department of the South African government announced that it was closing the “showgrounds”, an informal refugee-processing facility at the border town of Musina four hours north. Transportation was arranged within days for the 5000 asylum seekers living on the small plot of scrubland, with most of them destined for Johannesburg, and most of them destined for Bishop Paul’s church.

This is the story of a Friday night in the Central Methodist Church.

——

Street food vendors socialise outside the church over suppertime. 5:45pm.

Mash and chicken bits.

Cross and crowds.

Latecomers to the weekly refugee meeting file into the Main Sanctuary Hall.

Refugee meeting in the House of God.

Bishop Paul Verryn opens the meeting with news of the eviction in Musina, and that buses carrying the first 1000 refugees are expected at the church later in the evening. More are due to arrive later in the week.

Seven rows.

A captive congregation.

As the Friday meeting wore on, text message reports began coming in with the news that Morgan Tsvrangirai, Zimbabwe’s elected leader and the only opposition voice against longtime dictator Robert Mugabe, was being rushed to hospital following a car crash that killed his wife. The Bishop led a heartfelt prayer for Mr. Tsvrangirai and the people of Zimbabwe.

Ceilingscape.

Comfort under the cross.

Meeting minutes.

Talk and thought.

Refugees sleep off to the sidelines.

With the meeting underway inside, droves of newcomers begin arriving to the front doors of the church.

Standing room only.

Latecomer.

Closing notes, 9:30pm.

Meeting adjourned, refugees flood the corridor outside the hall to stake out a space to sleep.

Names remembered.

Third floor sleepers.

Pew positions.

Vacancies.

A needle and thread.

Request.

Shirt slogans.

Feet in a row.

A church volunteer establishes ground rules in the boy’s dorm.

Contradicting eyelines.

Fingernail inspection.

Boys empty a closetful of blankets and bedding as they get ready for lights out.

Floor space.

Traffic in the stairwell as dishes are brought down to the washroom for rinsing.

Sleep queue outside elevators.

Covert conversation. 11:00pm.

——

Part two, a look inside an MSF medical clinic operating at the Central Methodist Church, will be posted here on Wednesday.

——

Rubber Bullets and Paper Houses

Austin — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 19:12:13 +0000

A Somali man breaks down crying after being evicted from the Klerksoord refugee camp north of Pretoria. Police and armed forces set fire to the camp, which opened last May in the wake of the xenophobic violence that swept across South Africa, early Monday morning, displacing 400 Somali nationals.

With the remains of their homes still smoking behind them, three refugees fill containers of drinking water to take back to their displaced families.

Former shacks.

Identity papers.

Elmy Waksame poses with the frayed photo of her family she brings with her wherever she goes. Elmy fled Somalia in 1995 to escape that country’s civil war, which claimed the lives of her children and roughly 300000 others, only to find herself the target of xenophobic violence and discrimination in post-apartheid South Africa.

Blessed?

Metro police stand guard along the entrance to the camp.

Kid convention.

Retrieving possessions.

Peering out from a tangle of hands.

Welts from rubber bullets trace a Somali man’s stomach.

Water bottles jockey for position at the camp’s only tap.

Displaced refugees play an impromptu game of football outside their burned-down camp.

Who’s Who on the Transvaal

Austin — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 00:06:58 +0000

Wildlife tracking at the Makaikai Nature Reserve in Limpopo Province.

Crocodile in a sunrise halo.

A herd of African elephants assert their sovereignty over a bush road.

Megan and Jean, a park ranger at Makaikai, survey a roadway turned into a lake by an afternoon flash flood.

Impalas in deadlock.

Peekaboo.

Rangers sight a lion resting in a thicket.

Criminal intent.

Impala on alert.

Air.

Grass intruder.

Gums.

Zebra grove.

Sonar.

A photo of a bug. Thrilling.

Zebra nuzzle.

A giraffe feeds at dusk.

Inner City Isolated

Austin — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 19:27:54 +0000

Fifteen sun-bleached stills from a morning in the inner city Johannesburg neighbourhoods of Newtown and Hillbrow.

Development.

Sundry scrap heap.

High noon/face of a city. A garbageman on Diagonal Street.

Negative space, imprisoned.

Head back/head front/hairstyles. A salon in Little Kinshasa.

Free kick.

The hulking Ponte City Apartments loom over a teenager playing basketball. A modernist Apartheid-era “vertical city”, Ponte now sits abandoned and infested with gang warfare. Plans to convert it into a 54-storey prison were recently scrapped in favour of redevelopment.

Leisure, backwards front.

Construction site social groups.

Supply chain.

Nobodied clothes atop the fire escape.

Handrail to the heavens.

V stride.

Indifferent angles.

Barbed window.

Steel City Scenic

Austin — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 04:08:49 +0000

Nine angles from an afternoon in Hamilton, Ontario, the flickering heart of Canada’s rust belt.

Bridge over beach, looking north.

Bridge over beach, looking south.

Smoke-wrapped pillars.

The ship at the end of the world.

“Don’t look into the light.”

Clarence, a seasonal welder from Port aux Basques, Newfoundland, readies his mask to relieve Tom.

Fossils consumption, regulation and burn-off.

Blizzard peekaboo.

Standing atop a range of tailing mounds, Will looks out over Hamilton’s industrial wastes.

Frog

Austin — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 21:34:07 +0000

So, I made another movie. I say that not with the usual euphemistic subtext of “I accidentally broke a vase” or “I wish I wish I hadn’t killed that fish”, but rather, quite simply, as a statement of fact: I made another movie and it’s pretty good.

It’s a short film document of a long conversation, in real time, from awkward reunion to difficult goodbye. It’s my first team-up with The Studio, a Vancouver collective who spend their days off from being the paragon of cool to double as damned decent producers. Chad Krowchuk (RV, Mentors) and Smallville’s Allison Mack fill the void on the fairer side of the lens.

You’ll see it later this year at festivals, or maybe on an airplane or something. Expect, for a short, a pretty wide release.

Blocking the final beat through with cinematographer Sasha Proctor (left) and Allison Mack. Photo credit Shawn Edstrom.

Location manager Ithon Harrison-Jones, co-producer Jeremy Regimbal, Sasha and myself ride the action bus before a shot. Photo credit Shawn Edstrom.

More blocking, this time out front of the action house, with Allison and Chad Krowchuk. Photo credit Shawn Edstrom.

Allison and I blocking a moment outside the house. Photo credit Shawn Edstrom.

Sasha pilots the impossibly heavy steadicam rig. Photo credit Shawn Edstrom.

Co-producer John Poliquin on his pink flip phone. You go, JP! Photo credit Shawn Edstrom.

More photos from the film and, eventually, some real information can be once-over’d at www.underthefrog.com

And with some luck, this blog will be getting a whole lot more interesting very soon. I’m in transit again, writing this time from Hamilton en route to southern Africa for reasons I’ll have to take a raincheck on. Listen close and follow carefully…

Twelve Hours in the Car (With Hot Chips and a Meat Pie for Lunch)