Shendi - The Spring

A strong wind whips sand over the flat plain dried out by the strong African sun. Some scraggy trees dot the landscape giving shelter to some skinny hungry sheep, who suffered from their thick fur. The heat was oppressive.

"To think about the future, what a luxury! " an old man with a stick in his hand explained. Many springs dried out in the last years and the remaining have to feed more people and livestock, what is often not possible. The donkey gets the stick of the old man on his back and starts to pull the rope to bring water onto the surface, where it gets filled by men in big - and children in small - containers. Hard work for every drop at more than 45 degrees. The sand turns the eyes of the herders red, while the sky and everything else orange. The donkeys suffer like anybody else.

The recent draughts brought intense fighting to parts of Sudan - fighting over water. Not for the future of the children, but for surviving today. The future here is the next moment, the next morning and not more.