This photo, taken on a clogged and crowded street in a town called L'Estere, is one of my favorites. These men have rigged up a bicycle-type system with a circular stone, which they use to sharpen knives (you can see one in the right hand of the man at the top of the frame). When they talk about the high rates of unemployment in Haiti, they're usually referring to traditional work and jobs--they're not accounting for the countless men and women (and, sadly, children) who are out hustling (in the best sense of that word) by selling goods and services (like knife sharpening) to cobble together a surviving wage. While years of corruption and outside interference has created a state of dependence in much of Haiti, people like this remind me that entrepreneurship and ingenuity can arise and thrive in even the most impoverished places in the world. And that gives me hope.
