hidden features

Svetlana Zelenskaya (b. 1985) is a photographer based in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. She started her career in 2012 as a photojournalist and then a photo editor at local media outlet Kloop.kg. From that time she covered major social and political events such as series of protests against the biggest gold mining company “Kumtor” in 2012 and the second parliamentary elections after the ousting of Kyrgyz president Kurmanbek Bakiyev in 2010. She had a project about non-dominant religions in the country and contributed to series of photo stories about ethnic diversity in Kyrgyzstan.

POWER OF LOVE

More than 1500 children enter orphanages every year in Kyrgyzstan. Just 30 of them are adopted. The most common causes why kids are in orphanages – poverty and death of parents.

Nadezhda Kolosova, 65, is a mother for 15 children. She adopted ten of them after moving from Orenburg to Frunze (former name of Bishkek) in 70s. Nadezhda took care of her new sons and daughters in spite of their diseases and the crisis after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

When one of her children has needed surgery, she went to work as a chief engineer on the North of Russia to raise money. In three months she earned enough to pay not only for surgery, but to cover family needs for the next year.

In the Russian language name of Nadezhda means “hope”. She gives it fully to her children. Now her sons and daughters are adults — they have finished universities and work as doctors, musicians, cooks or machinists. Some has their own families and children.

Giving love once, it has flourished and returned to her more.