#69 Children of the Rice

Ok I have to admit, that was a corny title... but wait... hear me out...

It was harvest-time and we were in a rice field just outside the town of Bontoc in the Mountain province. Bontoc itself was busier and more congested than we expected, considering it is the remotest place we've previously never even heard of (see for yourself, it's on the horizon of this week's postcard.) But here in the fields, where families each have a small plot of riceland, every square meter is dedicated to planting rice. The two children in the postcard belong to a family of five. And because their plot is beside the Chico river, they manage two harvests a year, enough rice to last them for a full 12 months. In most other places, a single annual harvest is all that can be had. Those families plant their second crop in the lowlands, or find other ways to earn the balance of their annual rice bill.

You see then... these are literally people of the rice... and thus their children. Their rice field is their life-line. It feeds them, defines their days, and determines their family's relative prosperity or lack thereof. One day, these two children-of-the-rice will till this land. Join my prayer that the promise of a better future, that which we all seek for ourselves, include them as well. Enjoy.

(Pixel-peepers: The sparsely cloudy sky produced mostly harsh light so even dried rice stalks became reflective. I used a polarizer to remove the reflections and to saturate the warm earthen colors. It helps to keep an eye on fast-moving clouds, shooting only when the sun peeked through, to maximize color saturation. Shot on tripod, 1/3rd stop under-exposed, 2.8/28mm set at f/8.)

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