The short story of a wardrobe malfunction while reporting:

Climbing up the embankment of a dirty-water canal, I took one step too big and heard a loud rrrriiiiiiip as the crotch of my pants gave way. I had been photographing the canal for a story I was working on during the IWMF African Great Lakes reporting trip in Kinshasa, DRC.

My heart fell to the ground, as I looked down and realized that I was quite, ahem, exposed.

To add to my predicament, I wasn’t finished shooting. I covered the giant hole in my pants with my left hand, and carried on taking photos with the right for a few more minutes.

The grandmother of the person my colleagues and I had been interviewing just moments before was there to save my day. I sent up a prayer of thanks when Grandma Anna welcomed me back into the house and gave me a large piece of fabric to tie around my waist. I handed her my pants, and five minutes later she was finished fixing them.

Small kindnesses like this carry me through the stress and sweat of the job.

Holly Pickett, DRC Reporting Fellow