Mohammed Haidar Khaled, 9, is aware that he won’t be a child forever.
San Francisco’s Tenderloin neighborhood is Khaled’s home, where he was born and raised. But he knows that change is imminent.
Middle school is a school year away, which means he’ll go to school outside his neighborhood. And the Tenderloin has always been the center of his life.
“This represents [my] childhood,” Khaled said.
“I took these pictures to remember stuff and myself and how young I was, and when I took this and how creative I was, so I can come back to it [when I’m] older and I can see what photos I took, and I’m like, ‘Oh my god, that was me when I took it a long time ago.’”
But Khaled’s perception of his beloved neighborhood is different from what the headlines about the Tenderloin say.
Often, news about the Tenderloin focuses on harsher realities — homelessness and open-air drug markets in the neighborhood. However, the Tenderloin is also home to approximately 3,500 children, according to the 2022 Census report.*
The children of the Tenderloin’s perspective is one that is not often heard and less often seen.
With a disposable camera in hand, Khaled took his camera to school, parks, home and other parts of his neighborhood.
But Khaled wasn’t the only one.
In an effort to present the perspective of a community that doesn’t frequently get a spotlight, KQED collaborated with 826 Valencia, Tenderloin Center, a nonprofit embedded in the neighborhood that focuses on helping kids build up their writing skills.
With the help of two after-school programs partnered with 826 Valencia, a cohort of 28 students from grades two to fifth were invited to participate in a project that asked them to document their lives in the Tenderloin. Each was provided a disposable camera for a week in May.
“All the memories of my childhood. I was born here, the exact same spot. This is the best because there’s a lot of Muslim people over here. There’s a lot of people from my country,” Khaled said. “Allah, I’m happy to be born in this community.”
See a selection of the students’ photos below.
*Correction: This story was updated to more accurately reflect the number of youths living in the Tenderloin.
Cami Dominguez is currently a California Local News Fellow with the San Francisco Public Press.
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