When I travel I don’t take many pictures of the main tourist sights because so many people are taking pictures of the same scene and I
might as well get those pics off the internet. I also don’t see the need to pose and plonk myself in front of every tourist attraction. Instead, I prefer taking snapshots of scenes that are more temporal in nature and pictures that reflect more of the everyday life of the locals.

The shot above was snapped in Angkor Wat just as I was making my way out after watching the sunrise. I captured this moment of a woman rummaging through a garbage bin, opening styrofoam boxes filld with food that tourists had thrown out because they couldn’t finish it, and feeding her pet dog with the trash. I was touched that even though she was poor, she bothered to go to this extent to find food for her dog.

And as I was walking to the bus, just in front of the moat that surrounds Angkor Wat, I came across two children with two blue sacks going through another garbage bin, looking for stuff they could salvage. Poverty is still rampant in Cambodia and it’s sad that people, especially children, have to do this.

Clearly, what’s rubbish to someone could be treasure to another.