The man holds a tiny orange pill in his outstretched palm, preparing to ingest the highly addictive drug yet again. A 14-year-old girl, pretty and shy, works day in and day out as a prostitute. A Burmese man escapes into Thailand hoping for a job, but ends up penniless and abandoned in this new land.

These are the stories senior Andrew Prinsen brought back from his summer conducting interviews and taking photographs in Burma and Thailand. His yet-unpublished collection represents a humanitarian impulse to push beyond facades and find complex stories of injustice and suffering.

While plenty of Americans can turn a blind eye to these individuals--perhaps preferring Thailand's scenic coastlines or more touristy locales--Prinsen insistently seeks them out.

"I want to tell stories in a way that will affect people, and effect change," said the Newburgh, Ind., native. "My interest is not as much in journalism as in helping people around the world."

To tell those stories the way he wanted to tell them, Prinsen decided photography alone wasn't enough. He made a concentrated effort to learn to write in an effective way, too, to become a wordsmith.

Now he hopes to attract a publisher for his project, which includes a journal of his perceptions and reflections as well as dozens of photos. Here's an excerpt from his journal:

We are headed toward a cemetery on the outskirts of town because I'm told that this is where many of the town's drug addicts hang out. Or rather, we're going to a hill overlooking the cemetery, because Jayad tells me we can't get too close, much less go inside. He says that the men there - the addicts - will do anything for money to feed their habits. He says that they wouldn't hesitate to kill me for 100 baht (US $2.50).

Prinsen originally ventured into Burma intending to work with Global Refuge International, a Christian nonprofit that helps refugees on the Thai-Burma border. He stayed in a boy's orphanage, which helped to introduce him to the culture, but soon he realized that the organization didn't have much work for him.

Furthermore, he wanted to explore the land and its people on his own. After renting a motorcycle and securing the help of an American photographer and a translator, he took off on a mission to document the stories that compelled him.

"I don't speak any Thai or Burmese, and I researched only minimally before I left," said Prinsen. "One of my favorite authors is A. A. Gill, who says that he does as little research as he possibly can because going into it as a Western person can be beneficial. Everything is fresh when you get there."

What he discovered after arriving was that the severity of Burma's military rule as well as extreme poverty caused many citizens to flee to Thailand. He met refugees who resorted to abuse of the drug Yaba, an addictive mixture of methamphetamines and caffeine, just to make it through the day, and young women who were forced into prostitution at young ages.

These individuals on the outskirts of society called out to Prinsen, despite the fact that drug addicts, prostitutes, and refugees were difficult candidates for
photojournalism. He realized that it would take years before he could establish relationships to the point that they would allow him to photograph them, but was still
intrigued by their stories.

This realization parallels Prinsen's realizations as an undergraduate at IU as well. He came into the School of Journalism intending to study photography, but soon expanded his interests beyond the image. He is now focused on literary journalism, crafting first-person narratives that compel a reader to take action.

To that end, he has documented well his experiences in Burma and Thailand, writing essays that are deeply personal and affecting.

Five of them enter the room. They stand so close in front of me with their hands behind their backs that I can feel them. They're not touching me, but I can feel them. I had expected scantily clad seductresses, but instead my eyes fall on a scene that makes me feel like I've just stepped into a teenage girls' clothing store at a Midwest American shopping mall.

Prinsen is not sure where his next travels will take him, but he is confident of their purpose.

"I think that too often when we leave the School of Journalism we know how to get the scoop and the hard-hitting stories, but far too few people leave with the skills of how to make a change," he said. "After I graduate in May I want to bring to light the injustice that is all too prevalent in the world. I think the biggest thing I learned was that we do, as journalists, have the capacity to affect the way people think."


Though his summer work isn't published yet, you can view his other work at his Web site, www.andrewprinsen.com.