“Cucumberers”

The “Way Out” program (in Hungarian: “Kiútprogram“) is a labour market program to develop the social economy, helping people in deep poverty in Hungary, run by an NGO. I was photographing people in the program in 2013 to show their everyday life during their work to visually show that there is an alternative to the public works program that was mainstreamed at that time. This reportage shows the physical part of the work, spanning phases from arranging the poles, through planting the cucumber seeds through watering, protecting from pests to picking and selling the cucumber. It is a humbling experience to see poor people, whom the state-run system can often provide with the simplest jobs only, manage a set of tasks well that entail risk, require endurance and diligence. A few portraits at the end are a tribute to all participants. (Another subset of these pictures were published in the index.hu, a then fairly social-minded internet news portal. In much worse quality, unfortunately.)