Meet Alysha Baldwin.
“I was born in Scarborough Grace Hospital and I grew up mostly in the middle of nowhere Ontario. I moved around a lot as a kid and lived on dead end dirt roads. Peterborough was a trip to the big city. I went to high school in Fenlon Falls. When we graduated from high school, we all would move to the big city of Peterborough… and look at us in the big city. My boyfriend, at the time, decided to come to university here and I decided to go to school at Algonquin for Travel and Tourism. I landed a job at Whispers and that’s a key component to me staying here.
“It feels like home in Ottawa. For me, because I’m a country kid, Kitchissippi is the heart and soul of this city. It reminds me of a small town, and it’s not a big city. Every place I go in to, I recognize people because I’ve been in there before. I do all my grocery shopping here. I do all of my Christmas shopping here. People come in to Whispers and ask me where they should go for this and that and I always have a suggestion nearby. If you walk into a bar here, you’re going to know someone at the bar. I love the small, family-owned businesses. This is my space. This is my strip of Ottawa. I can’t do downtown. You can breathe here.” Collected by Ellen Bond
Humans of Kitchissippi is a special street photography project designed to introduce readers to some of the people who live, work, and play in Kitchissippi. Each instalment of HOK contains three elements: a photo, a name, and a quote from the subject that reveals a little bit about who they are. View our collection of humans right here.