Christmas through the Eyes of a Street Child

As part of our Christmas 2005 campaign, Casa Alianza Guatemala gave out 120 disposable cameras and asked the children to capture the spirit of Christmas through their eyes. The result was a wide range of images showing the children’s perception of what Christmas meant to them.

Some photos showed brightly-lit Christmas trees sitting inside cafes, taken from outside. Others showed toys on street markets, and the usual things that most children dream of at Christmas. There were also pictures of again nativity scenes, Christmas decorations and shop windows. In sharp contrast others showed pictures of parks and life on the street. A picture of an advertising hoarding shows a message of peace through a sleeping baby emphasising most of all what these abandoned children are missing - a loving home.

One particularly striking photograph shows a security guard gestruring to a child as he approaches to take his picture. When another boy decided to take a photo of a bar, the owner started to threaten his accompanying street educators because he thought they were using the child to investigate illegal activities such as the sexual exploitation of minors.

The initiative had two aims: to make Guatemalans aware of the hopes of children who live on the street and secondly, to promote a sense of responsibility among the children themselves. The campaign attracted a lot of local media attention who covered the story in detail. The best of the 1.950 photos were exhibited in the prestigious Casa del Aguila in January.