Two or three years ago I was sitting on a step outside a tiny corner store near a highway in India to a pitstop meal of chips and a soda. A ragged, shoeless, dirty, teary-eyed little boy came up to me holding two balloons. He didn’t speak English and I don’t speak Hindi so we traded unfamiliar words for a minute or two. From what I could gather he was trying to sell me the balloons, or he had just found the balloons…in either case he was holding onto them tightly.
He made a motion for my potato chips so I gave him the bag I had just opened. He ate very slowly and stared at me blankly while I shot his photo. After finishing, he motioned for my Coke. I opened the bottle and gave it to him…he drank, slowly again. He then sat on the step next to me for a few minutes, jabbering on again in his quite voice, holding onto the balloons with both his little hands.
(photo: Fidel Amos)
Then he left…
Fidel Everywhere 