Obama comments on ‘Humans of New York’ photo

A recent photograph of an Iranian father and his young son, posted to the popular Facebook page “Humans of New York,” was extraordinary not in that it received over 4,000 comments but in that one of those comments was written by none other than US President Barack Obama.

The photo shows a man sitting next to his son, and the caption tells of how the father discovered that “he was raising a humanitarian” when the then 5-year-old boy gave away an entire bag of newly bought apricots to strangers.

Obama praised the young boy’s actions, calling the story “inspirational,” in a comment posted by the White House Facebook account.

“What an inspirational story. One of the most fulfilling things that can happen to you as a parent is to see the values you’ve worked to instill in your kids start to manifest themselves in their actions – and this one really resonated with me,” the comment read.

“I hope this young man never loses his desire to help others. And I’m going to continue doing whatever I can to make this world a place where he and every young person like him can live up to their full potential. (And if I ever get to meet him, I hope he’ll save me an apricot!),” he continued, signing with his initials, bo.

The comment received over 57,000 likes as of the publication of this article.

The photo was taken during the second trip to Iran in three years by photographer Brandon Stanton, who started “Humans of New York” in 2010.

The project has over 14 million followers on Facebook and features portraits of people along with short quotes. Initially Stanton limited the scope of the project to New York, but in 2012 he included photographs from a trip to Iran, and he has since visited many other countries, including Israel.

“Iran holds a special place in my heart because it was the first international trip that I ever made with HONY. But that was three years ago, and I’ve always looked back at the collection with a tinge of regret, because HONY was still quite new and the work was pretty uncooked. I was only just beginning to include quotes alongside the photographs,” Stanton wrote last month on his Facebook page in a post announcing the Iran visit.

“I always wished that I could return and do a better job telling the stories of ordinary Iranians, and I’m excited to have that opportunity.”

His photographs from Iran show the country’s human side by displaying the day-to-day lives of regular Iranians.

Following his 2012 trip, Stanton said that while he opposes many policies of the Iranian government, he encourages others to travel to Iran and get to know its people.

“Iran’s government is not its people. You can greatly enjoy a country, while at the same time disagreeing with it’s government. Travel is not advocacy of ideology or policy. Travel is travel, and it’s the single greatest contributor to understanding between cultures.”