Elbonita McNally is a new mom, a nurse and a well-known Photographer in Halifax, focusing her lens on landscape photography, street and portrait. Before she was capturing precious moments, her stories and photographs earlier in life would be more tragic. At just 8-years-old McNally and her family were fleeing the Kosovo war from Lakrishte situated in the outskirts of the capital, Pristina. McNally and her family spent a month at the Stankovec refugee camp in Macedonia. While no one in the immediate family was injured during the war, McNally says she did lose a cousin who was fighting in the war.

Besides leaving a homeland in ruins, McNally remembers how Canadians made her feel during her arrival in Canada, “I remember when we arrived getting off that plane and everybody in a line waiting to greet us with a Teddy bear and flags. I couldn’t believe how nice and welcoming everybody was” McNally says the children quickly adjusted to their adopted homeland, quickly learning English and making new friends but she says the beginning was more challenging for the refugee parents as they embarked a new beginning from losing their homes, their careers and having to find a new support system in Canada and learn a new language. McNally says they were surrounded by other refugees from Kosovo from the start and a new community was built in Nova Scotia. Prior to the Kosovo refugees settling in the province during Canada’s emergency airlift in response to UNHCR in 1999, there were only a dozen of Albanian immigrants in the province.

McNally's family would face new traumas in Canada following a tragic accident; that would take her mother’s life, only few years after settling in Canada. McNally, being the oldest child has become a great role model for not only her siblings but her community. She graduated with a Master's Degree in Education from Memorial University in Newfoundland and developed a new passion in Photography, a passion that has taken her from Canada to India and to over 80 other countries worldwide, she has spent her twenties capturing images that show compelling stories including capturing the images of a refugee family from Syria in Newfoundland. McNally was volunteering helping Syrian refugees settle in Newfoundland where she received viral attention for her humanitarianism, McNally was awarded ‘Volunteer of the Year’ award in 2014, she is deeply committed to volunteerism, particularly in aiding other refugees in their settlement.