Malene Sorensen is almost grown up, 19 years old, has moved away from home. Inside she remains a little girl.
If you know the fascination of what goes on inside the head of a little child that sits banging a spoon against a plastic bowl, you also know the fascination of how Malene sees the world. Her enthusiasm of small and big things make you wonder if she experiences the world as if new every moment. At the same time she knows it very well. She knows how to make the sign language signs for ice cream, candy and cakes and knows that with a little luck they will work. She knows that the colorful DVDs on the shelves next to her parents’ French window contain cartoons and other funny movies. She goes around looking through the windows of the institution Svanehuset for hours when she has been told that her parents will visit her that day. And she jumps up and down laughing when they finally arrive. She also knows that the dentist is dangerous, which makes it impossible to get her in the dentist’s chair if she hasn’t been given a sedative. If she needs to have cavities filled she is put under general anaesthesia.
Malene is mentally handicapped, she has epilepsy and she suffers from a mild degree of spastic paralysis. It is unclear why she is handicapped. Perhaps it is due to a birth injury or a chromosome disorder.
She grew up at home with her mother Jannie, her father Hans, her bigger brother Mogens and her bigger sister Maria. Now she lives in the institution Svanehuset in Copenhagen. She has her own room and a small, protected world that she knows well and feels at home in.

The Kyrgyz grandmothers struggle to make ends meet. The Kyrgyz Republic is the second poorest country in central Asia. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union the country has had severe financial troubles with many companies closing down, resulting in increased unemployment and poverty. Around 80 percent of Kyrgyzstan’s pensioners live below the poverty line, or twice as many as the average of the whole population, and as women on average live substantially longer than men in the country this is especially a problem for the elderly women. The pensions are very small, typically 30 to 60 euro. At the same time prices of basic goods like bread, potatoes, oil, fuel, and medicine are rising. One attempt to help in this problematic situation is GrannyAid, a program designed to help the elderly through self help groups. In these groups the pensioners meet to socialize and help each other and they get financial aid to start little businesses where they for example do different types of handicrafts that they sell on markets. GrannyAid is a joint initiative between DaneAge Association and DanChurchAid.

The 24 hour race at Le Mans is the most famous endurance race in the world. It is very rich in tradition. This year’s race is the 78th, and the first race was held in 1923.
The overall winner, as well as the winner in the fastest class LMP1, this year was the Audi car number 9 followed by the Audi 8 and the Audi 7, a complete show of force by the German cars. The French cars Peugeot had hoped to be able to repeat their win from last year, but all their cars abandoned the race before it was over.
The race was held from Saturday June 12th at 3 pm until Sunday June 13th at 3 pm. There was practice and qualifying sessions as well as warm-up in the days and hours up to the race.

Denmark is one of the richest countries in the World, and also one of the most economically equal countries. But this is changing fast. From 2001 until 2007 the number of poor people in Denmark grew by 50 percent, even though this was a time when the financial situation was very good. This is according to the OECD poverty line, as there is no official poverty line in Denmark. The three families in this picture story are just a few of the people living below the poverty line.
The Ohgrøn family lives in a worn down farmhouse in Ledøje, north west of Copenhagen. There are seven members of the family: the father Per, the mother Sussie and their five children Michelle, Dennis, Dan, Patrick and Daniel. Both parents receive social welfare benefits and the suffer from various illnesses that make it impossible for them to have a job.
Lawand, Narin and their four children are Syrian Kurds. They have escaped from Syria because Lawand, the father of the family, was imprisoned and tortured twice. He tells that there were days when he was hung by his legs for hours. Other days he was locked in a dark closet. He was whipped and beaten with fists. The family lives in two small rooms in the Red Cross Center Avnstrup. Including the little hallway, which is full of footwear in all sizes, the family has around 30 square meters room for sleeping, reading, watching TV and eating. The bathroom is down the corridor in the opposite direction of the communal kitchen. Every fortnight they receive a small allowance.
Connie receives social welfare benefits. She and her two children Christina and Oscar have 3.000 dkr. to pay for food, clothes, diapers, transport, and entertainment when the rent, other regular expenses and her many, expensive loans have been paid. Connie is no longer able to work because of various illnesses. She has asthma, a bad back, and she has suffered from depression and anxiety attacks.

The Buriganga River runs through Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh. It is virtually dead due to pollution primarily from numerous tanneries located in the Hazaribagh area of the city.

The water of the river has turned black. There is a foul smell of chemicals and sewage, and few animals are seen in or around the river, except for countless crows scavenging the riverbanks. Even so, poor people who do not have other options bathe and wash clothes in the river every day. The waste water from the tanneries runs directly into the river with almost no attempt to clean it. Thus 50,000 tons of waste water run into the river every day from industries in the Hazaribagh area, mainly the tanneries.

The leather from the tanneries is primarily exported to Japan and the Western World, either as hides or as finished leather products such as shoes, belts, or jackets. As long as the importing countries do not emphasize the need to produce the leather under environmentally sound conditions, it is unlikely that the river will once again be clean.

Daaras, or Koranic schools, are a widespread phenomenon in Senegal. The pupils of the schools are called Talibé. They are taught to read and write the Koran, and many of them go begging in the streets every day to collect money so that they can pay for the teaching. According to UNICEF, around 100,000 children in Senegal are forced to beg on a daily basis.
Often the children are orphans, or their parents don’t have the money to take care of them. So they are sent to a daara, often far away from their homes. The children live in the daara.
One of these many daaras is run by 36-year-old Bubacar Diao. The daara is located in the outskirts of Dakar, the capital of Senegal. There are around 100 children in the school.

Frank Skaarup is a Danish falconer. He breeds Peregrine falcons. The falcons are exclusively sold to buyers in foreign countries as Danish law does not permit sale of domestic species, including Peregrine falcons.
Frank Skaarup has been fascinated by birds of prey ever since he found a young kestrel when he was 11 years old.
Sometimes the falcon doesn’t return when Frank Skaarup calls it. It has occured that he has had to search for one of his falcons for days before its return.

In 2007 it was diagnosed that Vibe had a brain tumour. Because of the location of the tumour it was not possible to surgically remove it, so instead Vibe received 30 radiation treatments, four chemotherapy treatments, three high dosage chemotherapy treatments and a number of experimental chemotherapy treatments. In January 2009 Vibe lost the fight against the tumour. At the time of death she was seven years old.
Children get other types of cancer than adults. For example Leukaemia and brain tumours are common with children, while they almost never get lung or breast cancer. Every year there are around 40 new cases of brain tumours with children in Denmark.

Mohammad Hashem, 39 year old pizza baker and father from Burma, was attacked on December 5th 2008 without warning by a group of young Danish men. They stabbed him and his friend Jamal Uddin repeatedly. Mohammad was killed while Jamal survived. The brutal and meaningless killing happened on Kastruplundgade in Kastrup, Copenhagen.
It is suspected that the assault was racially motivated. Mohammad leaves his pregnant wife Farhana Islam and their son Isam Hashem Islam behind.

United MC consists of two sister clubs, one on Amager in Denmark, and one in Karlskoga in Sweden.
Every winter and every summer there is a party in the club in Sweden, and some of the guys from the club on Amager go there to party, hang out, and relax.