After nearly five years in Darfur and thousands of photographs, it is frankly difficult to summarize all my feelings, now that I’m leaving. As this is not the place for intimate confessions, I’ll just say a bittersweet goodbye.
It’s true that Darfur gave me one of the most fantastic professional experiences I’ve ever had and hopefully some of my images have aroused awareness. But it’s frustrating to have witnessed five years of an immovable conflict, which is burying a big community into oblivion. This region of extraordinary personalities and proud characters, innate survival and transparent honesty, is suffering an indifference that hurts.
It has been five years of intense emotions and authentic stories that have made me aware of being alive. But during all this time, more than two million people have remained into camps for displaced, there have been constant shelling and looting and the main actors in the conflict have not come to peace even an inch. Just the same as I saw the first day I arrived.
Goodbye, Darfur. Thanks for what you’ve given me and sorry for not having given much in return.