Aaron Joel Santos

Documentary

An overture of documentary photographs from various assignments and personal projects across Southeast Asia. 

  • A farmer burns crop residue beneath Long Bien Bridge, a sprawling rusted decrepit and beautiful structure spanning the Red River in Hanoi, Vietnam.
  • In Yen Bai Province in northern Vietnam, a young man in a pith helmet watches a field burn.
  • Two children walk along an empty street in Pyongyang, the capital of North Korea.
  • Penitents flay themselves on the streets of Cutud during Holy Week in the Philippines.
  • A quiet moment between inmates in Klong Prem prison on the outskirts of Bangkok, Thailand.
  • An elderly blind woman sits vigil over a disabled child in northern Shan State, Myanmar.
  • Six-year-old Namfon lies in a Japanese Encephalitis-induced coma at a hospital in Vientiane, Laos, as her mother Teo leans over to comfort her.
  • A neon-lit portrait of Yaya, a transgender prostitute in Pattaya, Thailand.
  • Inmates exercise and run laps in a small cell block corridor in Klong Prem Prison in Bangkok, Thailand.
  • A young migrant worker walks past a new construction project in the southern suburbs of Hanoi. What were once abundant rice fields on the outskirts of the capital are now being paved over and converted to new urban and industrial areas.
  • Two mentally disabled men are kept behind bars at a facility in northern Shan State, Myanmar.
  • A man walks past signs calling for the annexation and freedom of Nagaland in northeastern India.
  • The names of 504 victims of the My Lai Massacre carved in marble at the museum in Quang Ngai, Vietnam. And a portrait of Pham Thanh Cong, the museum's director and a survivor of the massacre.
  • A portrait of Nguyen Thi Lien, who survived the My Lai Massacre during the American-Vietnam War, and a small ditch and stream where hundreds of bodies were systematically slaughtered by US troops on 16 March 1968.
  • A young child suffering from the lasting effects of the Agent Orange defoliant used to decimate jungles and fields during the American-Vietnam War, in the Friendship Village on the outskirts of Hanoi.
  • Luu Thi Thu and her four-year-old son, Van Dung Tuan Tu, at their house near the airport in Danang, Vietnam. Young Tu's physical and mental disabilities are thought to be caused by his father's exposure to Agent Orange dioxins at the Danang airport, where he works dredging near known contaminated sites.
  • A farmer and two nuns from the Sisters of Charity in northern Shan State, Myanmar.
  • Farmer Nguyen Van Duoc works his fields beneath Long Bien Bridge in Hanoi, Vietnam. He earns roughly US$60 a month to support his wife and four children and he bears a tattoo that roughly translates as: {quote}I'm poor. I hate it{quote}.
  • A survivor of the American-Vietnam War in central Vietnam, where some of the conflict's most brutal and long-lasting battles took place. Many people, such as this survivor, spent years living in underground caves to avoid systematic bombings by US aircrafts.
  • Farmers and activists gather fish from a communal pond in a strange little agrarian utopia hidden within and in conflict with a large palm oil plantation in southern Thailand.
  • Portraits of two workers on a palm oil plantation in Surat Thani in southern Thailand.
  • An inmate at Klong Prem prison in Bangkok, Thailand. The inmate is part of a program that pits prisoners against foreign Muay Thai fighters for a chance of reduced sentencing or early release.
  • A portrait of Neung, a middle-aged transgendered woman in Phrae, Thailand.
  • A portrait of Tran Thi Hue, Vietnam's first Miss HIV pageant winner in 2010.
  • A procession of actors during the theatrical street play that is Holy Week in Pampagna, the Philippines.
  • Young children watch a procession of penitents atone for their sins during Holy Week in the Philippines.
  • A Burmese strongman visits a monastery in Mandalay and performs feats of strength and endurance for the crowd.
  • Six-year-old Namfon lies in a Japanese Encephalitis-induced coma at a hospital in Vientiane, Laos. Her mother and father spend time each day cleaning her and praying for her recovery.
  • A large bull is led to the stadium at the Buffalo Fighting Festival in Do Son, Vietnam.
  • A woman is treated in a rural hospital in northern Shan State in Myanmar.
  • Workers clean out a city sewer in the old town of Kolkata, India.
  • Lo Van Tan, an amputee in Son La province who lost his leg in an accident at a brick factory.
  • Inmates train in the Klong Prem prison courtyard in Bangkok, Thailand.
  • Burmese laborers load stones onto a large barge awaiting transport to construction sites downriver from Mandalay.
  • Burmese laborers load stones onto a large barge awaiting transport to construction sites downriver from Mandalay.
  • Two men transport firewood along a mountainside in Ha Giang Province in northern Vietnam.
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