Argentina: Patagonian Gaucho

 Sheep farmer, or gaucho, of Patagonia’s Chubut Province. Because of Patagonia’s tempestuous wind he could not wear the typical black hat of the Pampa’s gauchos to the north. Only headgear he could pull down to his ears.

     In 1984, reaching the crest of a hill while riding a horse across Patagonia between the coasts of Argentina and Chile, a sudden head-on blast made my horse pirouette 180 degrees as if it had been a mere flag.

     The tempestuous wind apart, the journey went like a charm. At the end of most 12-hour rides a lonely gaucho in charge of a sheep farm treated me to wine and a succulent barbecue. And my saddle, like his, was cushioned by a thick sheep skin.
     The wives of the lonely gauchos in charge of the sheep estancias lived in distant towns, forced there by the need of their families’ children to attend school.

Buried under their own wool, corralled sheep await the shears.

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Africa: The Long Wait For Customers

The first eight following photographs were shot in 1973 

Street vendors in Parakou, Benin.

The clothes vendors in this photograph were listening to the music of a small portable radio. A water peddler was walking down the road in search of his own sale.

A street vendor takes a nap while her colleague watches the store in Benin’s Cotonou.

Here, not far from the previous small business, is another one. Selling on the streets is the courageous alternative to doing nothing when unable to get employment.

And here, just across the street, as is evident in the previous shot, is a more sophisticated and alluring small business. The large words say:

     Do you want to be elegant like us? Then get shod here by Quo Vadis  
(the owners wrongly used the French word “galant” for “elegant”).

     The small yellow sign says: High Shoemaking Fashion. 

     An unfinished basket out front is waiting for last touches.

Expert barber waiting to give his next haircut in Porto Novo, Benin.

This poor kid in Niamey, Niger, may have skippd school to help his family put some food on the table.

Here, near Bertoua, Cameroon, monkeys for the pot, wearing white price tags, were being offered to passing motorists. Tails tied to heads helped buyers to conveniently carry their purchase home like a handbag.

Delicious organic tomatoes being sold in a small corner of the sprawling Kumasi market of Ghana in 1992.

Proud owner of a store specializing in the sale of kente cloth, hand woven in wooden looms in Bonwire, Ghana, and elsewhere among that country’s Ashanti.

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Benin 1969, Before Clothes Became Legally Required

 Working over her family’s oven, an Ewe girl of Grand’ Popo, Benin, crushes hot peppers over a flat stone to season her family's lunch.

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Benin: Riding To Prayer At End Of Ramadan

In the following 1969 photos taken in Kandi, Benin, Bariba horsemen are following drumming griots, or minstrels, to prayer. The occasion was the End of Ramadan, the month-long Moslem fast. A blinding rising sun was casting long shadows and coloring the light.

Waiting in the shade for crowds to gather and prayer to start.

The boy was taking rsponsibility for his father's horse.

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Benin: Elegant Young Girl

Girl of Natitingou, North Benin.

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Benin: Sunrise on Kandi Brings A Street To Life

In this 1969 photograph, a woman is pulling water from a communal well as sunrise brings the rest of the street to life under its warm light.

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Algeria: In Salah Oasis’s Giant Sand Dune

Unrelated Berber horseman and black woman moving along the foot of a giant sand dune in the Algerian oasis of In Salah.

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Algeria: Threatening Oasis Sand Dunes

This 1973 photo shows how high moving sand dunes had forced the inhabitants of parts of Algeria’s beautiful In Salah oasis to abandon their houses. In an effort to stabilize the dunes visible in the background, hedges had been planted into their sharp crests.

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Algeria’s Aurès Mountains: Shawiya Berber

Shawiya Berber farmer photographed in Algeria’s Aurès Mountains at Mchounèche.

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Algeria: Shawiya Berbers

While walking the narrow winding streets of Algeria’s M’chounèche, in the Aurès Mountains, I accidentally interrupted this small group of conversing Shawiya Berbers who had gathered in the shade to sip tea. They stopped to have a look at me, and I stopped to shoot a picture of them. They were as curious about me as I was about them. So an invitation followed, which I gladly accepted, to share their tea, which was still brewing inside the house over the embers of a small fire. Three small glasses of it, as is the custom. Moslem hospitality is legendary.

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