Yay! Pictures can be uploaded! But only when I'm at the Peace Corps office where there's faster internet speed...
My host family... aren't they beautiful? :) My grandmother with 17-year-old Dorophy, 14-year-old Chisomo, 9-year-old Marisela, and the baby niece.
This one is the newly named "Elaine" or "Ellen". hehe Ain't she a beaut? :)
The albino chicken I helped kill and eat. It was delicious. :P I'll try to post the video when I can... will probably have to do it from the U.S. via my brother.
This is my site... Providence Industrial Mission (PIM), the home of the revolutionary fighter, Chilembwe. I'm trying to figure out which village he's actually from. This is the PIM Church he built... The original one was destroyed but some of the remains lay maybe 100 meters away. I'll try to post a picture of my house next time... or should I say "half house"?Last picture for the day... It took me over an hour to upload these pictures and send my emails. Hopefully I'll have more time this week to upload more pictures.
He was my host nephew... Lumen... He's a cute lil' brat! :D
Anyway, o.k., I will finally talk about what I’ve been working on. For the last few months, I didn’t really know what I was gonna do. But now I have an action plan. For the next few months, I’ll be working on nutrition programs for children, increasing the distribution of immunization to Under-5 children and mothers, planning with OxFam (a UK aid agency) on health and environmental programs, establishing links between youth groups and PSI/Malawi (Population Services International). The youth group I’m working with (comprising of 18 villages from OxFam’s catchment area) are preparing a song, a drama, and a traditional dance for Chiradzulu’s opening ceremony for World AIDS Day (December 1). This year’s theme is leadership… I honestly believe that these youths are the leaders of our future, because they serve as role models to the kids and as comforters to their parents (or grandparents for those who’ve lost their parents to HIV/AIDS).
So, in light of World AIDS Day, I’d like to dedicate the rest of this post to HIV/AIDS. Sometimes, we get so caught up with our own lives that we forget the impact that HIV/AIDS can have on people. I start to lose sight of its reality when I get used to the people who travel up to 2 hours to come to my health center for ARVs twice a week.
But then I’m reminded by the skin thrashes… the swollen ankles… the weight loss… persistent coughs (usually TB)… just the overall weakening of the body and even their soul sometimes…
Nothing can sober you even more when you realize that among the people milling about waiting for the routine check-ups and ARVs are actually your own co-workers and people from your community.
And when I see the kids and the babies, I think that sometimes life’s just not fair. What if they don’t grow up to see their own children grow old? What if they die before their parents would? I can’t imagine the guilt the parents feel… Sometimes it might take just one act of infidelity to infect the whole family.
Here’s the reality: 14% of Malawians are HIV positive, but I think realistically, the rate is higher… maybe even closer to 30%. I say this because every single village I went to are dealing with deaths, loss of production, orphans, youth drop-outs to provide for their families, etc. My district probably has one of the highest HIV rates in all of Malawi (20-something% compared to Malawi’s overall 14% rate). During the National Testing and Counseling Week, my district rated the second highest of HIV positives, most likely due to the close proximity to town where girls can prostitute themselves, the high population of the villages that allows for infidelity, and I think it’s one of the poorest districts since people often commute to town to sell their crops leaving our area at a low development rate (also has a problem with the highest malnutrition rates). Many of the youths here face the pressure of preserving their “cultural traditions”, such as sharing the same blade for circumcision during initiation rites, polygamy, wife inheritance, “hyena” death cleansing (a widow is to “cleanse” of her grief by having sex with a man the night of her husband’s death), fisi (a woman is to “cleanse” herself by having sex after she gives birth), having sex with as many men or women to achieve “adulthood”, etc. So, you can see my work is cut out for me.
But I just gotta take one step at a time right? Sometimes I think it’s so hard to think that anything I do can make any kind of impact… but who am I to think that anything I do can make an impact? Come December 1, I’m going to remember why I’m here and what I’m here to do and most importantly… that none of it’s for me.
So, in light of World AIDS Day, I’d like to dedicate the rest of this post to HIV/AIDS. Sometimes, we get so caught up with our own lives that we forget the impact that HIV/AIDS can have on people. I start to lose sight of its reality when I get used to the people who travel up to 2 hours to come to my health center for ARVs twice a week.
But then I’m reminded by the skin thrashes… the swollen ankles… the weight loss… persistent coughs (usually TB)… just the overall weakening of the body and even their soul sometimes…
Nothing can sober you even more when you realize that among the people milling about waiting for the routine check-ups and ARVs are actually your own co-workers and people from your community.
And when I see the kids and the babies, I think that sometimes life’s just not fair. What if they don’t grow up to see their own children grow old? What if they die before their parents would? I can’t imagine the guilt the parents feel… Sometimes it might take just one act of infidelity to infect the whole family.
Here’s the reality: 14% of Malawians are HIV positive, but I think realistically, the rate is higher… maybe even closer to 30%. I say this because every single village I went to are dealing with deaths, loss of production, orphans, youth drop-outs to provide for their families, etc. My district probably has one of the highest HIV rates in all of Malawi (20-something% compared to Malawi’s overall 14% rate). During the National Testing and Counseling Week, my district rated the second highest of HIV positives, most likely due to the close proximity to town where girls can prostitute themselves, the high population of the villages that allows for infidelity, and I think it’s one of the poorest districts since people often commute to town to sell their crops leaving our area at a low development rate (also has a problem with the highest malnutrition rates). Many of the youths here face the pressure of preserving their “cultural traditions”, such as sharing the same blade for circumcision during initiation rites, polygamy, wife inheritance, “hyena” death cleansing (a widow is to “cleanse” of her grief by having sex with a man the night of her husband’s death), fisi (a woman is to “cleanse” herself by having sex after she gives birth), having sex with as many men or women to achieve “adulthood”, etc. So, you can see my work is cut out for me.
But I just gotta take one step at a time right? Sometimes I think it’s so hard to think that anything I do can make any kind of impact… but who am I to think that anything I do can make an impact? Come December 1, I’m going to remember why I’m here and what I’m here to do and most importantly… that none of it’s for me.
