GALLERY
  • PROJECTS
    • KITCHEN STORIES FROM THE BALKANS
    • OF TIME AND MEMORY
    • DESTINATION ETERNITY
    • LITTLE MAGI'S SWEET HOME
    • MODERN TIMES, GARBAGE TIMES
    • GOLDEN HOPES
    • THE MAN-MADE LANDSCAPE
    • ON THE OTHER END
    • FRAGMENTS OF MEMORY
    • MEET 66
  • PLACES
    • HIMBA REALITY
    • NAMIBIA LANDSCAPES
    • BELIZE
    • CUBA IN B&W
    • CUBA IN COLOR
    • CUBA IN POLADROID
    • INDIA FOR BEGINNERS
    • OSLO
    • ON THE ROAD IN ALBANIA
  • PORTRAITS
    • PEOPLE
    • EMPLOYEEES
  • HOME
  • GALLERY
  • BIOGRAPHY
  • CONTACT THE PHOTOGRAPHER
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    This is a story of a four years old girl and her family branded as Gypsies and fully rejected by the Bulgarian society. According to unofficial studies the average Bulgarian believes that crime is genetically determined to gypsies and neither education nor integration would change that fact. Maggie lives together with her single mother and 5 brothers and sisters in a long abandoned ruin in the central part of the Bulgarian city of Ruse. Conditions in her home are abysmal and go far beyond poverty line. Neither water nor sanitary facilities are available in their living quarters. This, despite the fact that Bulgaria has been a member of the European Union since 2007. Every now and then (since it is an act of charity and depends on the person who is keeping watch) her mother can secure same fresh water from a nearby nursing home. When she first became pregnant at the age of 16, under circumstances she prefers not to talk about, Nadka, Maggies mum, was forced out of the orphanage where she grew up into the ruins and there she is 18 years later. Ever since she was a child Nadka has dreamed of her very own big family. Shes had little luck with the men in her life but she adores her children and tries her best to secure a better future for them. The social benefits she and her children receive from the state amount to approx. 125 in a country where prices are almost equal to the European average. At the same time representatives of the Bulgarian social services say that If she does not improve her family's lifestyle shortly, they will take her children away and put them into an orphanage and thus close the vicious circle.
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