Life - Aids, and the impending doom of Death:
I was sitting
in
an African Clinic in Kampala, Uganda. I was battling with another round
of malaria and not feeling too well. My blood had just been drawn with a
fresh needle (something one has to be particular about in Africa since often
they will reuse needles which will be washed in a bleach solution, but I
wanted a place where they used new ones).
The scene was a simple one, a room with some lab equipment, two benches to sit on while one waited for the results and two lab technicians who were probably working for a mere fraction of what they could make in the West.
Next to me was a young woman about 18 or 19 years old, accompanied by two men who seemed to be relatives. She also had her blood drawn and being spun around in a centrifuge as she was awaiting the results whether she was HIV positive or not. The three were whispering amongst themselves, the young woman was extremely nervous. I could sense her fears of the results that were to come in a few minutes. I closed my eyes for a moment and uttered a silent prayer on her behalf. I began to sense her inner pain and agony. Her fright, her fear of the impending doom and my heart went out to her in compassion.
The centrifuge kept spinning, unaware of the impact the result of this test was to have upon a young woman next to me. The Lab Technician came up to me with a slide and announced "You have malaria, and a pretty severe case." My thought was, thank you for announcing it and being so caring about it, but then this was not a plush Doctors office somewhere in the USA. I had just paid $5.00 for the visit and $6.00 for the malaria test, so what did I expect, a person familiar with Emily Post and her ways of etiquette when announcing that someone had an illness. My body knew what she was saying already and it was no real news, but a mere confirmation to me.
I remained seated on my bench since I wanted to hear the results of the young woman's test. It was not long before the same lab technician came to her with a bowl from the centrifuge and said without any emotions "You are HIV positive." No counseling, no quiet reassurance, no compassion, just another verdict of impending death for an Ugandan woman. It would not make the next issue of "The Monitor," or "The New Vision." No, she was simply another statistic for the UN studies of AIDS in Sub-Saharan Africa. She was another number, a part of the 30% of Ugandans infected with the dreaded disease. The plague of Africa had struck once again a life at the edge of its prime, not to empower it to live but to snuff it out.
She was crying as she got up to walk out. I followed behind them and felt what she was feeling. I felt her ache, her hopelessness, her despair, her loss, and her impending doom. I stopped them and looked her into her eyes. Her name was a Florence and she lived in a nearby slum. She was a maid for a well to do Ugandan. Her boss had insisted that they make love or otherwise she would lose her job. The two men with her were brothers and they too were crying, something a bit unusual for African men.
I reached out and took her hands. There were no words, there was touch, eyes meeting and she knew I cared. She looked at me and asked, "Why do you care Muzungu (white man)?
She did not understand that looking at her, I felt she could be my daughter.
She did not understand that there was a
connectedness between people who understood pain and that in this moment
I could feel what she felt. There was no need for words; the touch of a
hand and the hug that followed was enough.
I saw Florence several times after that. I saw her as her condition worsened and she became progressively ill. I also saw the changes in her, changes that were outward and inward. There was the outward deterioration and in a sense an inner renewal. There were still tears but there also was a deep realization that death was another door for Florence out of this present condition into one where no longer there was suffering, hunger, pain that was both in her and around her. That is what gave her the strength to both live and die.
I went with her brothers to pick out the wooden casket along Entebbe
Road from one of the many casket makers located there. The funeral was the
same day. She was buried where she had been born up country in the back
of the house of her birth. Today she is a simple statistic amongst the thousand
that are dying of AIDS in Uganda, but to me she has a face, a smile, a laughter,
tears running down her face, she is not a number to me but Florence.
A determined Woman
Anne Owiti
was one of the most persistent women I had ever met. She kept badgering
me to support her project in one of the worst slums in Nairobi, Kenya. There
this British trained nurse ran a facility that cared for 200 AIDS orphans
in a school and at the same time she placed the orphan
s
in homes surrounding the school. There was the Clinic itself, which gave
out everything from pills to condoms and watching over it all was Anne,
administrator, nurse, director, cook and on Sundays she preached to whoever
would come to listen to this Luo woman.
She had a way of making me laugh as I drove down to her project through the muddy, red churning clay after a heavy rain. I was thinking as to how we would ever get out of here since I did not have a four wheel drive vehicle that day.
The facility was a ramshackle collection of clay and mud buildings put together with whatever was available. As I walked around the site I was struck by the contrast of a lush golf course right adjacent to this slum. Only in Africa was my thought, the contrast was somewhat overwhelming.
Inside there was no electricity and it took me awhile to get adjusted to the dim light. The waiting room was a sight to behold and too bad I did not get a picture that does it justice. There were boxes and boxes of donated condoms stacked against the wall. A cross hung over them, a table with a Bible on it and a wooden carved model of the male organ which was used to demonstrate how to use condoms to those coming into the clinic. There were posters about AIDS and its dangers and in themiddle of them was one that simply said, "Jesus is Lord." I could not help but smile, as I had never seen something like this in my life. The images were a bit overwhelming; humorous on the one hand but also a message about the reality of life in this slum. Anne was making a difference in whatever way she could use donations from American Churches, the local Indian Society, UNICEF and the European Ladies Club.
As I walked out I noticed a small refrigerator which made me chuckle since there was no electricity and I asked who had donated it. Anne smiled and said that it had been given by the European Ladies Club after they had visited there. Hmm, is all I could say, but then she assured me someday someone will give us a generator, in the meantime she was going to take it home to use it for cooling sodas at her house.
Another sad story from Uganda as reported in the Monitor Newspaper
Monitor 25th May 1999 News-line
Barmaid tells her HIV status, men weep
By Kee Jay
A year ago a fairly good
looking woman started working as a barmaid at a waragi/ malwa joint at a
place north of Kampala, and ever since several men have romped about with
her.
As soon as
she came, one Joe, a skilled skirt chaser in the 'hood, assumed rights over
her. Behind his back, however, the woman was schmoozing with many other
guys.
Things seemed to be proceeding just fine when, the other Sunday, she let
out a chilling secret.
After a drink one-two-many in the bar, she quarreled with Joe, and soon
began pouring out her heart.
"Let me today inform all of you here that I am HIV positive and I have killed
a few men," she proclaimed.
The near-dozen men inside the bar didn't at first take the kyana seriously
thinking it was one of her usually crude jokes.
Not this time. She reached for her handbag and extracted her HIV status
card and gave it to the nearest fellow and it went round the room.
Tears quickly began to flow. One Tom threatened to chop the woman to pieces
but was restrained by other patrons.
Another reported the matter to the area Local Commissioner chairman but
was chased away.
Uganda's First Lady: AIDS a Moral Problem (from a news report)
Uganda, one of the nations hardest hit by AIDS, is advocating abstinence above any other prevention measure. The epidemic in Uganda now affects 30 percent of the country's child bearing population. The nation's First Lady, Janet Museveni, recently talked about the AIDS epidemic to reporters in Washington:
"AIDS is a loud and urgent symptom of a malady which has pervaded the whole human condition, but especially Africa. It is a physical manifestation - like environmental degradation, violence, and corruption in high office - of a deep-seated disorder in the spirit of man ... People have used sex in all sorts of ways that it was not meant for. It has taken AIDS for us to know what we've been doing with our bodies and to learn that we're really responsible for our lives."
"Teaching people to use condoms is, at best, only a short-term solution. What works is a change of behavior for us in Africa. Marriage is being used in all sorts of incorrect ways, and our children are watching us. We have to set an example for the young by instilling the virtues of self-control, faithfulness and honesty in relationships. The young represent our chance to survive. We must not fail them."
"We never really talk about our ethics, our morals, but I feel very strongly that this is the only answer. Ours is a spiritually illiterate generation. The Whole problem is tied in with the breakdown of morals in the world. AIDS is not the problem of Africa alone. It's a human problem, and we have to treat it as such." (One must consider her remarks in the light of 25% of the country infected with the AIDS virus at that time)
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Last updated: 06 July 2010
Aids-The African Plague
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