St. Thomas Church
From July 22-28 I had the opportunity to serve with my Church in Juneau, Alaska. During the trip we helped at a homeless shelter, tear up an old house that is being remodeled, and filled potholes among various other things. The scenery in Juneau was fantastic even though it rained for almost the entire trip. I got to test out the new GoPro and I was very impressed by the quality of the files that it produced.
For the past week, I have been on a service trip to the Dominican Republic with St. Thomas' Church. I was the designated photographer for the trip so I spent most of my time taking photos of our service and fun throughout the week. Other than a 24 hour stomach virus, it was a truly unforgettable week of fun and service with my fellow missioners. One photo in particular stands out to me as the most meaningful. We were mixing cement for the foundation of a concrete wall that a community was in the process of building when a man approached. He told me his story of how he got Dominican papers, something many people in the community of St. George lacked, effectively making them country less and unable to leave the confines of their village for fear of being arrested for not having papers. He saw the camera that was at my side and asked me to take his picture. Not only did he pose in one of the goofiest ways that I have ever seen, he was unbelievably excited when I showed the photo to him. I realized then that it was entirely possible that he had never had a photo taken of him at his request that he was able to see afterwards. His seemingly unending happiness made me realize how much of a difference that I can make in someone's life with a camera and I cannot wait to go back again to take more photos of the people there. Check out the Gallery for more!
For the last 5 years, I have been volunteering at my church for the first week of July and taking photos of the kids from Paul's Place in downtown Baltimore. For the first time (ever apparently), it rained during camp, forcing us to improvise and move our activities indoors. Taking photos of kids is always difficult and the lack of light certainly did not make anything easier but I was extremely satisfied with my results.
