Hello my friends,

It´s a beautiful day in Guatemala!  This morning we were up early, and hiked over the avalanched road to visit the children of one of the villages… Men have  been working on the avalanched road, so today we only had to hike up a little hill, unlike the the days before, when we had to hike up to to what seemed the top of the mountain to cross over.   I won´t compain though, because although I´m carrying my heavy camera gear, there are grandmothers, and old men carrying bricks and HUGE loads on their backs and heads… hiking up the mountain without even breaking a sweat!  Yeah, they make me feel reallllly out of shape! ha ha.

This morning we were with village 1- these 24 families are currently living in an emergency shelter- an abandoned resturaunt  since their whole village was destroyed in the hurricane. These children are amazing, words just can´t explain the resiliance of the human spirit.  We show up, and the children came running with open arms and huge smiles!  The young girls I´m with have made amazing friends with the children, and it was so fun to photograph them and watch them the kids.  I gave the children cameras today and asked them to photograph the world around them- they were in HEAVEN with those cameras!!!  I´m so excited to see what they captured.

I feel so blessed to be here, doing this work…. it´s been overwhelming in so many ways,  but this has really been the most transformative trip of my life…can´t wait to show you some photos

Blessings to you my friends!

Melanie Soleil

Essence Photography