Photographer based in Cairo, Egypt >> Shawn Baldwin

Zabaleen, Egypt

A young boy held a piglet at the home of a zabaleen. To Abraham Fahmi, a local Coptic priest, it comes down to a simple matter. "If you move the garbage, you will kill the entire neighborhood," he said. "This is their lives." May 2009.
   
Zabbaleen and pig farmer Morgan Girgis, 30-years-old, chases after a pig which will be brought to the slaughter house, inside a pig pen beside his home in a predominately Coptic Christian neighborhood in Manshiet Nasser in Cairo, Egypt. He was forced by the government to sell his pigs. May 2009.
   
A woman carried a child through a trash-filled street in Cairo. The organic waste the zabaleens collect is fed to pigs, but the government of Egypt is killing the pigs, a reaction to news that a swine influenza was spreading around the world. May 2009.
     
  
Young men sort trash in a street in a predominately Coptic Christian neighborhood of Manshiet Nasser in Cairo, Egypt. May 2009.
   
Men broke plastic containers into smaller pieces that will be recycled at a small factory. The zabaleen and their supporters argue that if the people of Cairo could be taught to separate organic and inorganic waste before throwing out their household trash, the problem could be solved. The pigs could be raised in farms outside of the city and the organic waste could be carted out there daily. May 2009.
  
Romani Kamal, right, 25-years-old, and Maged Samir, 17-years-old, inside a small factory that cuts up plastic bottles in a predominately Coptic Christian neighborhood in Manshiet Nasser in Cairo, Egypt. May 2009.
     
  
"We want them to live a better life, humanely treated; it's a very difficult life," said Sabir Abdel Aziz Galal, chief of the infectious disease department in the Ministry of Agriculture. The zabaleen are convinced the government wants to use the swine flu scare not to help improve their lives of Christians but to get pigs out of Egypt. Islam prohibits eating pork. May 2009.
   
Zabbaleen's show off their hands with tattoo's of Jesus Christ in a predominately Coptic Christian neighborhood in Manshiet Nasser in Cairo, Egypt. The Egyptian community of mainly Coptic Christians, known as Zabbaleen, are employed in the city of Cairo to collect and dispose of much of the city's waste. The organic waste is fed to pigs. May 2009.
   
Zabaleens stood in front of an enormous pile of plastic that will be recycled. They live in neighborhoods spilling over with trash. May 2009.
     
  
Zabbaleen Magdi Lamey sits on a stairwell beside the kitchen in his home in a predominately Coptic Christian neighborhood in Manshiet Nasser in Cairo, Egypt. May 2009.
  
Zabaleens tied garbage bags to a truck in a mainly Coptic Christian neighborhood in Cairo last week. Hundreds of thousands of people have made their lives and a community by collecting Cairo's trash and transforming it into a commodity. May 2009.
   
Young men sort trash in a street in a predominately Coptic Christian neighborhood of Manshiet Nasser in Cairo, Egypt. May 2009.
     
  
A man carries away a pig at the home of Zabbaleen and pig farmer Morgan Girgis, 30-years-old, in a predominately Coptic Christian neighborhood in Manshiet Nasser in Cairo, Egypt. May 2009.
   
Coptic Christian day laborer's who traveled from the countryside to work in this neighborhood sit on a street corner in a predominately Coptic Christian neighborhood in Manshiet Nasser in Cairo, Egypt. The Egyptian community of mainly Coptic Christians, known as Zabbaleen, are employed in the city of Cairo to collect and dispose of much of the city's waste. The organic waste is fed to pigs. May 2009.
   
A couple is married in a predominately Coptic Christian neighborhood in Manshiet Nasser in Cairo, Egypt. May 2009.