Here at New Hope, we aspire to enrich the kids lives with photography in many ways. So the kids take the cameras and enrich their lives with photos of themselves, their friends and their family through their photos.

How do they do it? Almost every kid, comes back after their turn using the camera with a picture of themselves. Whether its them taking a picture of themselves or someone taking a picture of them for them, they always have a photo of themselves amongst the ton of photos they shoot (some have taken over 100 in one hour! I used to think 24 photos on a roll of film was impossible to use up!).

Probably the most interesting example I’ve seen yet is little John looking pretty fly with some sun glasses and holding a picture of himself which his sister took when she used the camera just a few days ago. It doesn’t bother me that they take pictures of themselves all the time. I think it just shows how kids in Peru are the same as kids all around the world. There is something about using a digital camera as if it’s a mirror.  If you look at peoples Facebook and Myspace pictures you’ll notice that there are a lot of pictures taken by the person with their arm extending towards the camera lens with a serious expression, as if to say “Yeah, I look good”. However vain it seems, I want the kids to have photos of themselves and their friends for the future; to have memories and to look back and laugh. That’s pretty much been my goal for this trip, to provide the kids with memories of friends, family and yes, even themselves as they looked when they were younger. But at the same time, we’re planting seeds of photography and giving them something fun to do, and so far the kids are having a great time making memories.