The boy is about five or six years old. He sits with his back against a giant red water tank, one hand on the spigot, the other on the post of the rusted metal platform that holds the tank up off the ground. His hair and eyes are dark, and though his hands still possess the dimpled pudginess of childhood, his face has aged in a way that has nothing to do with years. He looks directly at the camera with an expression that seems perplexed and mildly irritated, as if asking whomever is behind the camera “what are you taking my picture for?”Article continues after advertisement
There are three other children also in the picture. A girl, bent over at the waist, holds a dented tin bucket beneath the spigot the boy has opened. In her other hand is a plastic jug which she will fill once the bucket has reached capacity. Her thick, dark hair is tied back in a ponytail, and, like the boy, she is looking at the camera, though her gaze seems more of a tossed glance than a challenging stare; she is busy, mid-task. She is perhaps seven years old.
The last two children in the photograph are younger, both girls. One sits on the metal platform on the far side of the water tank, peering shyly around the red plastic at the camera. Her grey sweatpants are rolled to her knees, and her feet dangle above the ground. The other girl seems not to notice the camera; she is turned away, colorful leggings rolled up as she stamps in the run-off that has pooled on the dirt ground around the tank.
