New faces

Sandar Thang, 27, is a refugee from Myanmar, the Southeast Asian country the U.S. State Department refers to as Burma. When she posed for this portrait, she, her husband and her infant son had been in their new home of Columbia, Mo., for one month.

They moved to Columbia about the same time I did. I met them randomly on the street, and she graciously posed for this photo. I brought copies of this and images I made of her husband and infant to their home several weeks later. They introduced me to more refugees from Burma/Myanmar. There are more than 60 in mid-Missouri.


Josh Vest, 22, tries to keep his fingers warm by cupping them around a cardboard cylinder of coffee. “It’s hard to keep a job while you’re traveling,” he explained, posing for this portrait. He and his traveling companion, Samantha Eveland, were in Columbia, Mo., on their way to his home state of Texas.

Making these portraits was part of my first assignment in the photojouranlism graduate program at the University of Missouri-Columbia. Taking my camera to the streets helped me break through a membrane of doubt. Thank you, David Rees.