Hope: A Photo Essay

I was somewhere in Tuscany when I received an email from Melissa reminding me that I had a photo essay due for the yearly print edition of CEKU. The magazine goes into print that weekend. After a mini panic attack, I managed to calm myself down and started compiling ideas. After all I do tend to work better under pressure. It's nice having the beautiful landscapes of Europe to work with. Thanks to Melissa for helping out with the text and putting up with me! haha you can't rush genius

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Strange, isn’t it, how hope is both so frail and so powerful? It can be so easily crushed with our own hands and cynicism. But at the same time, it can also drive us to achieve our goals and dreams, however impossible they may seem. In the following photographs, I tried to illustrate different interpretations of hope – of its importance, of the other qualities it brings out, of its strength and weakness.

On my first year abroad, I found myself homesick, as all students feel at some point. I grew to realize how much Malaysia really meant to me as my homeland. In spite of its shortcomings, I continue to have hope for the country I call home, in the same way I believe all my fellow Malaysians do.

Hope against all odds. 

“Hope is patience with the lamp lit.” - Tertullian

“Man can live about forty days without food, about three days without water, about eight minutes without air, but only for one second without hope.”    – Hal Lindsey

 “I find hope in the darkest of days, and focus in the brightest.” – Dalai Lama