If you were to visit a hand car wash service, you’d likely see bodies working together in a seamless chain; spray, soap, rinse, wipe, repeat, as soap suds hit the ground. Although it’s a familiar sight for many of us, the New York-based Peruvian photographer Diego Bendezu believes that not enough of us know or understand the journey of some of its workers.

As such, his latest body of work Dear Prima is inspired by the “resilience and work ethic of young Venezuelan migrants in San Martin de Porres [a northern district in the country’s capital Lima]”, Diego says, as he seeks to showcase their determination, courage and brotherhood. “I want to give them a voice, challenge stereotypes and foster empathy”. And so, what initially started as small conversations with the men on trips to the car wash with his father, has blossomed into a vast and emotionally revealing project for the photographer and those captured by his lens.

The quality and depth of Dear Lima isn’t merely up to Diego’s talent and skill. It’s also in the way he can describe the very specific details he learned about the men while photographing them. “I learned that one of the men’s mothers only earns the minimum wage back in Venezuela and another couldn’t afford to go back,” he tells us. In a trio of photos of one of the men, Diego captures his lived experience through his tattoos, his cap placed on a bollard and his hands at work holding a blue hose. The blue of his cap and the blue of the hose almost have a synergy, highlighting the car wash as their portal to a new life. “They are the heroes of their own story. All of them are the first to leave their home country and are here to provide a better life for their families back home”.