Hey guys,
Can't believe I've neglected my blog for such a long time! The only thing I can say in my defense is the following -- WORLD CUP. Rachel and I managed to make it down to South Africa for a couple of weeks in June and I had the time of my life. I got tickets to 5 games and managed to see two very different, but very cool GRS sites in Johannesburg and Port Elizabeth. I'm not gonna give you guys a full update of the past couple of months quite yet but I thought I would share some examples of all the cool media coverage that GRS has been receiving recently. Hope you guys enjoy them!
USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/soccer/worldcup/2010-06-14-grassroot-soccer-aids_N.htm
Cristiano Ronaldo backing GRS
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pvDancaZ5GE
Vanity Fair in Port Elizabeth
http://www.vanityfair.com/online/fairplay/2010/07/the-world-cup-and-grassroot-soccer-fighting-hiv-and-aids-in-africa.html
MSNBC giving props to Ethan Zohn, one of the founding fathers of GRS
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/38151178/ns/us_news-giving/
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
Monday, May 17, 2010
May 15 VCT
As I was watching the finals of last Saturday’s VCT event something struck me. In the span of just over four hours I had gone through the full cycle of human emotions.
At first I was panicked because so many things were missing and the event was about to start. Then I was disappointed because we had started so late and I thought this would affect the overall number of people that we could test. After this I started to feel happy and inspired as I watched all of our superstar GRS coaches and all of the amazing volunteers put so much energy and effort into salvaging our event. A short time later I was amazed at how much we had accomplished in such a short span of time with so many obstacles in front of us. Considering the circumstances last Saturday’s VCT event was as big a team effort as I’ve experienced in my life, and I’m truly speechless when I think about how thankful I am for everyone that participated. The kids, the GRS coaches, the Tingathe volunteers, the teachers…
For a while I really thought that the whole thing was going to be a disaster. If I’m being honest, there was probably a good 15 minutes when I thought we should all just pack up and call it a day before anything else went wrong.
Rachel and I arrived at the local primary school that would be hosting our event (Kalambo) at around 7 am and we immediately started setting up. The only problem was that nobody else showed up until around 9:30, a good thirty minutes after the scheduled start time. There was only so much we could do by ourselves so after a while it became clear that we would pretty much have to wait for all of the other pieces – the PA system, the kids, the village chiefs, the school teachers, our counselors and testers, the testing kits etc etc. The longer we took to get started the later into the day our tournament would go, and this is never a good thing when you consider how cranky and hangry people get if they stay too late past lunchtime without receiving any food.
Just to give you a good idea of how badly things were going at the start I’ll try to capture the first 15 minutes of the tournament. The tournament was supposed to start at 9:30 with four schools playing soccer games and the other four going through their counseling and testing sessions. Instead the games didn’t start until 10:30 and within the first thirty seconds of our first game a young girl passed out from overheating and exhaustion. At the same time the other four schools couldn’t go through their counseling or testing sessions because we were still waiting on the test kits to arrive. Additionally the PA system still wasn’t working because of some electrical problems. Normally we set up the PA system as early as possible to attract people and in theory get more community members tested. But on Saturday we weren’t able to get the PA system going until around 11:30. As you can imagine, things were not going as planned.
Ultimately, through a combination of hard work and teamwork, we were able to pull through all of these obstacles and host a successful event. In the end we managed to test 175 people, which is really an impressive number when you consider all of the obstacles and the fact that the particular area that we were working at was much harder to mobilize for testing. I think when this is all over and I’m back home thinking about Malawi and all the work we did here, I’m going to be particularly proud of last Saturday’s event. So many people did so many wonderful things to make the event a successful one and that’s why I’ll never forget it. People could have easily given up and blamed a lack of materials for the failure of the event. But instead the GRS and Baylor team rallied together and didn’t let the event fail. And because of that 175 people know their status and hundreds more have learned all about the behavior change needed to overcome HIV/AIDS.
Friday, May 14, 2010
Awesome graduation and tomorrow's VCT
GRS graduations have to be my favorite part of this internship. Today I went to the first graduation of the second school semester and while I sat there watching over thirty kids graduate I couldn’t help but have the goofiest smile on my face. I couldn’t really put my finger on why I love these things so much but I think it has something to do with all the joy and happiness that these kids exude when they accept their GRS certificates. They’re all so pumped to graduate and as soon as they receive their certificate all they want to do is show it off in front of their friends and family. All of the kids are extremely proud (and they should be), it’s really cool to see.
Most of the time the GRS Malawi team rolls pretty deep to these graduations. But this time I had to attend the graduation by myself because Rachel and our program manager were busy getting ready for this Saturday’s VCT event in Area 25. I didn’t think too much of the fact that I was flying solo at first, but as soon as the ceremony got rolling and I looked at the program I understood what being the sole GRS representative meant. I should have put two and two together earlier but for some reason I didn’t. Normally our program manager gives a 10 to 15 minute speech where he congratulates the GRS participants and thanks the school for letting us work with them. With Brian busy with VCT stuff, I realized that I was going to have to perform his duties and speak on behalf of the GRS team. After panicking a bit at first I only settled down when I started convincing myself that they wouldn’t want me to speak. “I don’t speak Chichewa…no one told me I had to speak…they wouldn’t want to hear what I have to say…”
Fortunately all of those useless ramblings in my head turned out to be completely false and the whole school did indeed want me to speak. The person who spoke before me was the regional Primary school advisor to the government and I’m not kidding when he finished his 15 minute speech with the following:
“Thank you so much for your time. The last thing I want you to know is how proud and happy we are for all of you. We hope that you will all continue to use the knowledge that GRS has imparted on you. I don’t have much else to say and I don’t want to take up more of your time because I know you’re all here to here what Eren, our GRS representative has to say. I know he will want to speak for a long time so let me introduce him now…”
As soon as he finished with that last sentence my panick levels started to go back up to code red. Did he just say that he didn’t have much to say?? He just spoke for 15 minutes! Did he just say that he knows that I have a lot to say…Oh no!
I wish you could have seen me stumble up to the center of the room, struggle with my Chichewa greetings, and attempt to make a managerial speech for the kids. In th end I think I held my own, I just focused on the kids and told them that they were all part of the GRS family now. My speech couldn’t have lasted more than five minutes but I gave it everything I had and in the end I think the kids enjoyed it. If nothing else, I’m sure they enjoyed seeing a silly Muzungu (white person) make a fool of himself!
Alright, well I thought I would just share that story with you because I thought it was fairly amusing. I’ll also share a highlight from the day before I sign off:
After the ceremony was finished and the kids starting dispersing to their various crowds I saw one kid, a GRS participant with a brand new certificate with his name on it, turn to his friends and push the certificate in their faces. He was so proud and happy and you could tell that all of his friends were incredibly jealous. I’m hoping that every single one of those kids signs up for GRS intervention next semester and something tells me that they will. I can’t tell you how cool it is to see kids get so excited about an extra curricular activity, especially one about HIV/AIDS.
Wednesday, April 21, 2010
Teen Club
I know I’ve been absolutely terrible about keeping in touch recently but I have a good excuse – work has been insane lately! In addition to organizing two more VCT tournaments next month (first on May 8th and second on May 29th) we’ve been trying to revamp Teen Club and oversee all of the interventions that our coaches have been running in the schools.
Rachel and I have hardly been in the office recently between school visits, meetings with professional Malawian soccer stars and other work related trips. Just this morning we met with two Malawi national team stars and both of them signed up to join our team at the May 8 VCT. I can only imagine how excited the kids are going to be when they see these national superstars coaching their teams!
Apart from all of the work that goes into organizing VCT tournaments, I’ve been spending a lot of time with the Teen Club program at Baylor Hospital. I’m not sure if any of you remember so I’ll briefly describe it again – Teen Club is basically a program that takes place on the 3rd Saturday of every month. The day starts at 8:00 am and it runs until 2:30 pm. During the day, we’ll give the kids enough ARV treatment to last them two months but we also are trying to think of activities to keep them engaged in the day even after they get their medication. My job has been to try and think of fun activities for the kids to do when they’re at Baylor. We’re trying to create a system where half of the activities are fun and the other half involve important key messages about stuff like adherence, stigma and relationships. That way the kids who come will have a lot of fun, but can also take a lot of important information away from the day.
I recently sat down and talked to a couple of the guardians who bring their HIV+ kids to Teen Club and talked to them about what they liked about Teen Club. I’m not sure what I was expecting them to say but their answers absolutely blew me away and made the room awfully dusty. The guardians were basically saying that they loved Teen Club because it was the one place where their kids could be kids. They kept saying that everywhere else their kids were scared to be themselves because of the potential repercussions but at Baylor they could stop worrying and just hang out with kids who understand them.
After being here for nine months and working at Teen Club every month you definitely get a sense for how much the kids enjoy coming to Teen Club. They get all dressed up and jump around when they see their friends for the first time in four weeks. Its pretty amazing to see how excited they get and to see how much they enjoy Teen Club, and the whole thing makes you wonder just how bad things are for them outside of the Baylor grounds. As much as I love Teen Club, sometimes I wish that there was an HIV+ friendly environment that was open every day.
All right, well that’s it for me today. I’m going to do my best to update this blog more regularly. In the meantime I hope everyone is doing well and I really hope that winter is finally starting to go away!
Monday, March 29, 2010
Massive VCT event in Kawale
Man oh man, this is definitely one of those times when I wished that I had updated this guy a couple of weeks ago. So many amazing things have happened since the last time I wrote an entry and I definitely have no idea where to begin. I’ve been thinking about the best way to attack all of the events that have unfolded recently and I’ve decided to do my best to write about each interesting episode in several installments over the next week or so.
I think the first thing that I want to discuss is the half-day VCT event that we hosted this past Saturday (March 20th) in the Kawale district of Lilongwe. The event itself was absolutely positively the most successful testing tournament that Rachel and I organized since we arrived in Lilongwe. We spent a lot of time planning this event, almost double the amount of time we spent planning all of the other VCT events combined because for some crazy reason we decided to invite four different secondary schools instead of one or two. Our thinking was that if we invited four separate schools, we would sensitize four completely different areas to the joys of a VCT event. We also figured that if we invited four different schools, we would have community members from four different districts in attendance. In the end, this wacky thinking proved to be pretty accurate because in the end we managed to test 483 people in less than 5 hours! Our previous high for a half-day VCT event was 330 people so we were really happy with the final results. The most striking thing about this event was that we managed to test 483 people while still managing to stick to our strict budget of around 300 dollars.
Testing 483 people while only spending 300 bucks is insane and almost completely unheard of in the world of HIV testing in this area. To put things into perspective for you I’ll compare our event to the massive testing event that GRS co-hosted with a couple of months ago. At this event 615 people were tested, which was a record for testing turnout in the history of HIV testing in Malawi, but at the same time this incredibly high budget came with a price tag of over 800 dollars. In addition, the huge turnout was almost definitely a result of the big celebrities in attendance, celebrities like Mafunyeta who is undoubtedly one of the biggest musicians in Southern Africa right now. At our event, we spent 500 bucks less, didn’t have any major celebrities, and did it in 5 hours instead of 10. Pretty mind blowing when you think about it.
Normally I include VCT related posts with the best thing that happened during the day and the worst thing as well. This time I’m going to finish with a story that almost fits into both categories:
At the beginning of the day I met this kid that I had worked with at our previous VCT event in Kawale. When I saw him I talked to him for a little while, asked him how things were going, and then asked him if he was going to test. He kept saying that he didn’t want to test because he was scared. This is a pretty standard response to the question of testing so I didn’t let it stop me and kept persisting and told him that he should test because I’m sure everything would turn out well. After a couple of hours of seeing him around and constantly asking him, he finally got tested. Minutes after he got tested, and before he had gotten his result, he came running up to me saying that he had gotten tested and that everything was ok. He was so excited and pumped that he started telling everyone. Unfortunately, a couple of minutes later I learned from one of our counselors that he had actually tested positive but that they hadn’t told him yet because they couldn’t find him. As soon as I heard the news this huge wave of sadness came over me. I felt like the whole situation was my fault and couldn’t help but feel responsible for all the sadness that he would feel when he learned his positive result. The whole situation rocked my world and I couldn’t stop thinking about it all night.
After thinking about it for so long and talking to a couple of people I realized that it was actually a good thing because now he knew his status and could get treatment and ultimately have a much better shot at living a long, healthy life. Needless to say the whole event made the HIV/AIDS issue even more real for me but I think my final conclusion is that we did a good thing by helping him learn his status. The bottom line is that he has HIV/AIDS, and that he needs to do something to address the virus if he wants to be happier in the long run.
All right, that’s enough from me for today. I’m going to write something about Teen Club in my next entry in a couple of days so stay tuned! Hope everyone is healthy and happy.
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
Malaria and the after life
So it turns out malaria is a serious illness. I found this out first hand last week. For the longest time I thought it was nothing more than a more severe version of the flu or something along those lines. In my six months in Senegal, and in my first seven months here in Malawi, I’d been bitten millions of times by mosquitoes but nothing ever come of it until last week. And then all of a sudden everything caught up to me and my luck vanished into thin air. Malaria hit me harder than a punch from Manny Pacquiao and for a little while everything was looking a little grim – but I’m back now and everything is ok. I guess the good news is that I can’t get it again, so now I can let those little bloodsuckers eat me as much as they want without worrying.
I got back to work late last week and was thrown back into it right away. We had a two-day training for our peer health evaluators to help them in their Teen Club duties. A lot of them had been complaining about a couple of things so we decided to put together a training session to help them feel more comfortable and well equipped for Teen Club.
This week Rachel and I have been planning our first half-day VCT since after Christmas break. The tournament is going to be this Saturday and for the first time ever we’re inviting four different schools to participate – that way community members from four separate districts will come and support their schools (and hopefully get tested too!). As you can probably guess, the more schools we invite the more work we have to do to make sure everything is ready for the tournament. Rachel and I have basically been going from one school to the other to make sure that everything is in place for Saturday. We’ve talked to countless teachers, and embarrassed ourselves in front of four separate school assemblies (where there are between 500 and 800 people normally watching).
Before we started doing these school assemblies to sensitize all of the students before our VCT event, one of our master coaches, Godfrey, encouraged Rachel and I to use our "Malawian" names when introducing ourselves to the students. This may not sound like much but I cannot tell you the reaction of the kids when we pretend that we have Malawian names. All of the kids freak out and start screaming and jumping out of their seats -- "there is no way you can have that name"! Keep in mind these reactions are all in good fun, they just love the idea that we would have Malawian names because it’s completely unheard of for them. The way I see it now is that Rachel and I are complete comic entertainment for all students and teachers in Malawi. We’re there to lighten the mood and make everyone laugh, which is pretty awesome if you ask me.
The next couple of days are going to be pretty hectic and busy, but in a good way. Rachel and I are going to be running around like crazy people making sure everything is in place for the VCT and every afternoon from here until Saturday we’re going to be running practices with the kids to help get them excited for the big tournament. Without us they wouldn’t be able to practice because they don’t have soccer balls or anyone else around to organize them.
On top of all that my parents are coming to visit this Friday! I’m really excited because they’re going to witness one of our tournaments first hand. I haven’t told them the plans yet because I wanted to surprise them, but I’m pretty confident that they’re going to be completely overwhelmed. One second they’re walking off a 3 day flight that completely rocks your internal clock, and the next second they’re walking around a field with about 1000 crazy Malawians kids running and screaming. Should be pretty funny and entertaining, can’t wait!
Monday, February 22, 2010
Buckingham Browne and Nichols Spreading the Halloween love in Malawi
A couple of months ago Buckingham Browne and Nichols (BB&N) where my Mom is in the midst of her 22nd year as the Lower School French teacher, got in touch with me about an idea they had. The school administrators proposed the idea of sending me some candy so that I could give it to some needy kids in Malawi. My Mom had been sharing my news and updates from Malawi intermittently throughout the year so many of her colleagues knew what I was up to. And went I went home for Christmas in December I actually gave a talk to about one hundred 6th graders that covered some of my work for Grassroot Soccer in Malawi. So when I heard about BB&N’s desire to help me out in Malawi I instantly signed up to do my part. The kids and teachers that I spent time talking to in January were all fantastic people, and they all shared an interest in learning about Africa so I thought this would be a great fit.
I started having these discussions with my Mom around the end of October, as kids in Cambridge, MA were making there costume preparations for Halloween. Right after we had agreed to do something together, the kids gathered as much candy as they could fit in a big package and sent it off to my address in Malawi. I received the BB&N package around mid-January (ha! 10 weeks for a package! That’s how long it takes in the states as well, right?). As soon as I opened up the package I was really humbled by all the goodies and treats that the American kids had sent to Malawi. In addition to a collection of some of the finest candies that America has to offer, the kids wrote some really sweet cards for the Malawian kids. After talking to some of the GRS peer health evaluators out here, who all work at some local Malawian school, I decided that the best fit for these treats was a local orphanage called OCSR.
A few days after I had decided to give the treats to OCSR I went to donate the goodies with Rachel and the GRS coach who works there, Aaron, by my side. When we arrived at the orphanage there was a whole assembly of seats arranged and all of the kids were waiting impatiently for us. Before we gave them the candy they presented us with a group song and a dance to honor us as special guests. After that we ran a quick GRS activity with them, pressure limbo, a game that highlights the increased risks associated with being a sexually active teenager. Once this activity was finished it came time for me to explain to the kids what Halloween was and then present the goodies to them. Needless to say the kids had almost no idea what I was talking about when it came to Halloween (Costumes? Free candy? White people are nuts!). But when it came time for me to pass the candy around all of the kid’s faces lit up and all of them started smiling uncontrollably. The whole experience for me was really rewarding and I’m doing everything I can to repay BB&N for their kindness and generosity (hint hint, there may be a return package from the Malawian kids coming your way soon!).
Hands down the best highlight of the whole day came at the very end of the meeting when Rachel and I were just about to leave. As we got up to go to the door the kids broke out into a song. The song itself was great and catchy but it became even more powerful when our coach, Aaron, started to translate the words for me. I’ll spare you a word for word account of the song but the chorus of the song basically meant “Thank you for remembering us”. This may not seem like much but it meant an incredible amount to me because I started to think of all the people who have forgotten these unfortunate kids throughout their tough lives. At that moment I learned two things about these kids:
1. 1. How much our visit meant to them and how touched they were by the donations from BB&N.
2. 2. That Halloween was their new favorite holiday!
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
Last Graduation!
Just writing to let you guys know that this morning we had our 8th and final graduation for the second cycle of 2010. The graduation was intended for about 25 kids but almost 500 showed up to watch us dance and make a fool out of ourselves. I was actually the blunt of most jokes after I got up to introduce myself. Before I explain what happened, I want to mention that both Rachel and I have been trying to hard to improve our Chichewa in an effort to communicate more effectively with the kids. So I got up first, all excited about the prospect of introducing myself in Chichewa and said “Muli bwanji, dzina lako ndi Eren”. After I said this all of the kids started laughing, at this point I wasn’t too nervous because I thought all of the kids were just laughing at my dumb (azungu = white person) butchery of their language. They always laugh at me anytime I try to speak Chichewa or try to dance so this wasn’t anything new to me. Unfortunately though, it seems that the kids had more reason to laugh at me than I had realized. Turns out I should have said “Muli bwanji, dzina LAKO ndi Eren”. I guess my first attempt meant “Good afternoon, your name is Eren” instead of “Good afternoon, my name is Eren”. I guess you can’t say I’m not trying…
Anyways, after I got past the embarrassment I managed to take a lot away from our last graduation ceremony. This ceremony took place in Chinsapo, the newest and furthest GRS site in Lilongwe. The fact that Chinsapo was brand new to the GRS program in Malawi, and that it is far away from all of the other sites means that there is a lot of work to be done if we want to make the brand Grassroot Soccer well known in the community. For the most part GRS is fairly well known in and around Lilongwe, but the more you go out of town you find fewer people who have heard of our NGO. So today was a great opportunity to get the word out on what we do and what we’re all about. And I think we did that pretty well (except for my language blunder, which everyone laughed off anyway). The really great news is that the event took place in front of so many people, because now there are 500 more people in the area who know what GRS is and 500 more people who know how important it is to get tested.
Before I sign off I want to share two really cool stories from last Saturday’s graduation in Kawale. The graduation itself was a huge success as we were able to graduate about 150 kids and there were a number of celebrated guests in attendance.
Story #1 – One of our most major guests, the head chief of the Kawale district, attended our event and seemed tired all afternoon. Granted he was a fairly old man, maybe 80 years old or more, but I was still slightly worried that he wasn’t engaged or something. After the event the GRS Malawi team went to go talk to him to thank him for coming and it was during this interaction that he said one of the most touching things I’ve heard since I’ve been here. After we were done saying thank you and all that jazz, the chief turned to us and said “Before I came here I was hungry” (at this point all of us were a bit worried because maybe he was upset that we kept him in a room for four hours but neglected to feed him) but then he continued with “now, I am full”. I guess this is a popular saying in Malawi and basically what it means is that his heart and soul are full of happiness. Turns out the chief was absolutely thrilled by the event and as he left he promised us that he would help us in any way possible in the future – a really great promise when you consider how much power this man has in the community.
Story #2 – One of my favorite traditions in GRS is the coach’s story. This is something that each GRS participant and coach is encouraged to create and master during his/her time with GRS. The story is supposed to be very personal, and it is supposed to explain why he/she decided to join the fight against HIV/AIDS. At the Kawale graduation, one of the children got up to share his coach’s story. At first all of us were a bit skeptical because the kid about the share his story was normally a bit of a goof. But as he got up in front of everyone in attendance something in his demeanor changed – as he readied himself for the story you could see that he was digging deep to reflect on a very challenging time in his life. The story was an incredibly sad one, about how his older brother died of HIV/AIDS. I won’t go into too much detail about the story because its actually quite long (if you want to hear the whole thing email me), but all you have to know is that the story involves an absolutely tragic and unnecessary death -- one that might have been avoided if this kid’s older brother got the chance to learn the GRS curriculum. After he was finished wit the story, he stared out at the audience with tears in his eyes. Everyone who had heard his story couldn’t help but share the tears, and as he went to sit down numerous people went up to him and either hugged him or thanked him for sharing. The kid ended his story by explaining that his brother’s death forced him to join GRS. As I write this blog post half a week later, I still can’t shake the image of this kid getting up to share this powerful story.
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
ARV treatment in Malawi
When I first got to Malawi I had no idea what ARVs were. To be honest, I’m not ever sure if I’d ever heard the name. But the more time I spend here, and more specifically the more time I spend working at Baylor’s pediatric HIV hospital, the more I realize how important these drugs are for patients suffering from HIV/AIDS. ARV meds can be the difference between an HIV/AIDS patient living until he’s 80 years old, and an HIV/AIDS patient dying at a very early age because of the disease. Patients who put themselves through regular ARV treatment come across as healthy and happy people. People who don’t have access to this type of treatment can suffer through a slow and painful death.
The whole reason I bring this up is to highlight a piece of news that I just read in the Malawian newspaper this morning. The article informed me that there are currently 250,000 people on regular ARV treatment in Malawi. This may sound like a good number, but when you go digging into the details you’ll realize that this means that only 25% of people living with HIV/AIDS in Malawi are receiving the care they need to survive. You see, the population of Malawi is just over 14 million. And many of the most recent estimates about HIV/AIDS in Malawi suggest that the national prevalence rate is somewhere between 12 and 14 percent. This means that even at a very conservative guess, there are over one million people living with HIV/AIDS in Malawi today. (A more adventurous guess would put that total much closer to two million, around 1.7 if you want to be exact). But regardless of what the total number is, this much is clear – there is a significant number of Malawians infected with HIV/AIDS who are not receiving access to ARV medication. When you consider that in some countries like Botswana and Namibia the ARV coverage rate is between 70 and 80 percent, you can see that a in a country in Malawi where only 25% of people are covered, there is still a lot of work to do.
Friday, February 5, 2010
I don't care about your name! I just want to see you dance
In a lot of ways this past week has been the culmination of my first six months in Malawi. Every single one of our sites – Area 36, Area 25, and Kawale – has recently finished their 10-week GRS HIV education curriculum and as a result we’ve been spending the past couple of days graduating all of the newest members of the GRS family. All of our coaches and all of the kids graduating have put in a ton of work and effort to get to graduation day, and I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to convey the happiness and joy that fills the room when these kids accept their certificates. Most of the graduation classes put together a poem or a song about GRS to help celebrate the day. I’ve been blown away with the amount of talent and effort that goes into each one of these works of art. I’ve been taking a lot of pictures, and actually a lot of videos too, but as always I won’t be able to post them onto my site because of the terrible Internet here in Malawi. I have a hard enough time posting these blog updates!
1) Dancing – I can’t even count the amount of times that I’ve been forced to dance in front of hundreds and hundreds of people during my graduation ceremony tour. It seems that Malawians are more concerned with seeing an individual’s dancing ability than anything else. At one graduation ceremony yesterday one of the teachers in charge of the program literally said the following to me after I was done introducing myself: “I don’t care about your name! I want to see you dance!”. After he finished saying those fateful words all of the kids in attendance, close to 1,000 in total, started clapping their hands frantically in eager anticipation of my moves. Needless to say I didn’t disappoint (that is one video I might intentionally be hiding). The whole dancing thing may seem a little weird at first but when you think about it, it’s pretty awesome. It just shows you how much people around here enjoy life, no matter the circumstances. They could be starving, dying of some disease, in total poverty, but if there is a beat they will dance and enjoy life for as long as they can. I was trying to think about what would happen in the States if one of the teachers started clapping and waiting for everyone to dance and I immediately recognized the fact that almost every single American kid would just sit in his seat and be weirded out by what was happening. In Malawi, the kids are ready to dance and have fun whenever and that makes things a lot more fun for me.
2) Commitment to GRS – One of the most astounding things I’ve been trying to wrap my head around recently is the level of commitment that these kids show to the fight against HIV/AIDS. As I was sitting through a graduation ceremony yesterday I started asking myself – “Why are these kids even here? Why would they devote so much extra curricular time to our program when there is no tangible benefit to be gained?”. In all honesty I was having hard time finding answers to these questions. I mean, we were putting these kids through an intensive 10-week HIV education program, where they devote hours and hours of time outside of school and giving them no tangible reward. I was imaging myself at that age and thinking about what I would have done back in the day, and I’m pretty sure I would have avoided any sort of serious extra curricular work at all costs.
But then it hit me – these kids don’t need any monetary or tangible rewards for this education because all they really care about is the knowledge itself. This is a disease that affects almost every single Malawian (I guarantee that everyone in the graduation room knew at least one person touched by HIV/AIDS). These kids just want revenge. They want to learn about what has been attacking them and their communities so that they can one-day defeat it. To sit back and watch the level of commitment that these kids had within themselves gave me a new sense of inspiration and passion for my work. Their dedication proves just how serious the problem of HIV/AIDS is in the region, and it proves that we need to do everything in our power to beat it once and for all.
In other news, starting to get very excited for the Super Bowl. Sunday night will be a very very late night but its hands down one of my favorite events of the year so I’m going to find a TV and get my popcorn ready.
Prediction – Colts 31, Saints 23
Friday, January 22, 2010
Witchcraft in Malawi
So I’m going break my own cardinal rule and discuss something unrelated to GRS and HIV/AIDS work on my blog. Normally I wouldn’t want to waste your time with anything other than updates on my work for GRS but something really spooky and interesting has peaked my interest recently.
In the past couple of weeks, there has been a lot of talk about witchcraft all over Malawi and in some other African countries. The more I started hearing these stories the more spooked out I became. Pretty much every hundred yards you go in Malawi you see a signpost for the local witchdoctor (basically it’s a skull and bones flag that extends from the witchdoctors hut into the sky). In these huts, witchdoctors are rumored to do all sorts of black magic. They cast spells, they create bizarre potions, they cut people to get blood, and they do all sorts of wacked out stuff. Many of the spells are designed to cure sickly loved ones, or even to get some crush to fall in love with you, but there are also some more sinister ones as well. Some neighbors have been accused of getting the local witch doctor to injure or kill another neighbor to settle some dispute over land or money. As I’m writing all of this stuff, I can imagine most westerners who are reading to digest this info with a mixture of disbelief and humor. I’m sure most people are asking themselves – “How can people actually believe this stuff works?”
Well to answer that question, almost every single Malawian that I have talked to about witchcraft genuinely believes in it. In fact, not only do they believe in it, they swear by it and would most probably die to defend it. At first I thought like I imagine most westerners would think on the subject, I kind of just laughed it off and didn’t take it seriously at all. But the more I thought about it and the more I discussed it with locals, the more I appreciated what it means to local Malawians. Witchcraft is an integral part of Malawian culture and as such it should be respected and taken seriously. That being said, while I was reading the local papers this morning I read a very interesting article about witchcraft.
The story is more or less as follows: two older Malawian women were allegedly teaching some little girl the ins and outs of witchcraft, some woman in the community was murdered, the little girl accused the two women of casting a murderous spell on the victim and as a result the police took the women into custody. As I write this, the two older women are sitting in a jail cell facing a maximum sentence of 10 years imprisonment with hard labor. Apparently, the Malawian courts recognize the accusation even though there is no evidence to support it (I guess evidence is hard to come by in the world of magic and witchcraft). I make a point not to try to judge things too much when I’m in a foreign culture, for the most part I understand that Americans have traits and habits that the rest of the world mocks and we, as Americans, make fun of many foreign cultures for being “different”. All that being said, I couldn’t help but be reminded of the Salem witchcraft trials when I was reading this article. I mean, it is one thing to recognize and respect the Malawian predilection for witchcraft, but it is another thing all together to think that it’s ok to put someone in jail for 10 years without any inkling of evidence.
Finally, I know I said that this post was completely unrelated to my work for HIV/AIDS. But you probably won't be suprised that the world of black magic/witch craft isn't too far away from the world of HIV/AIDS in a lot of cases. Many local people believe that if someone is diagnosed with the disease it is because someone else has cast a spell on them. Too many people, and especially children, think that HIV/AIDS is the work of black magic and not of bad choices (unprotected sex etc). I can't tell you how many times I've discussed the role of witchcraft when discussing HIV/AIDS with children here. I do my best to tell them that there are real and tangible ways of avoiding HIV/AIDS but a lot of children don't believe me. While many children may agree that leading a healthy life style can be one way of avoiding HIV/AIDS, according to them there is nothing you can do to avoid the disease if a witch doctor has you in her cross hairs.
Finally, I know I said that this post was completely unrelated to my work for HIV/AIDS. But you probably won't be suprised that the world of black magic/witch craft isn't too far away from the world of HIV/AIDS in a lot of cases. Many local people believe that if someone is diagnosed with the disease it is because someone else has cast a spell on them. Too many people, and especially children, think that HIV/AIDS is the work of black magic and not of bad choices (unprotected sex etc). I can't tell you how many times I've discussed the role of witchcraft when discussing HIV/AIDS with children here. I do my best to tell them that there are real and tangible ways of avoiding HIV/AIDS but a lot of children don't believe me. While many children may agree that leading a healthy life style can be one way of avoiding HIV/AIDS, according to them there is nothing you can do to avoid the disease if a witch doctor has you in her cross hairs.
All right, well I just thought this stuff was pretty cool so I thought I might share it with you. Hope everyone is doing well wherever you are! Miss all of you!
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Home Sweet Home
Back in Malawi!
Sorry for the delay in between posts. Since my last post on November 27th, I’ve traveled through Zambia, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Namibia and South Africa and also spent a bit of time at home with my family and friends. The traveling may sound like all fun and games and admittedly I had an unreasonable amount of fun. But getting to know different cultures and meeting people from different African nations was truly a fantastic experience. Africa is such a huge and diverse continent and each new country that I visit seems to amaze me in new and exciting ways. Unfortunately Africa is all too often thought of as one country or one culture, which is so crazy because each country is so extremely different from its neighbor. There are so many different languages, religions, traditions, customs etc, it almost feels like you’re going to a completely new continent every time you go to a new country in Africa.
While I was at home I was able to regroup and reenergize myself for the next couple of months in Malawi. I absolutely love it here and I couldn’t imagine doing anything else, but that being said sometimes it is very difficult to go through a typical day here. The work we do is so amazing and rewarding in so many ways and there are some days that I feel so good about everything that is going on, but there are also some days where I just feel completely mentally and emotionally destroyed. Some days you go to work and see the kids living with HIV and you get inspired by their ability to overcome whatever obstacles come their way. Other days you just can’t get over the tragic circumstances that these kids are thrown into from birth. The job and all of the emotional baggage that comes with it is an emotional rollercoaster so having a couple of weeks off at home was really great for me.
I thought it was going to be really tough to go into the office on Monday morning after 40 hours in a plane/in an airport but I was actually really happy and excited to get to Baylor. I missed all of our coaches and everyone here a lot while I was away so it was good to see everyone. I bought all 20 of our coaches Red Sox t-shirts to reward them for all of their hard work and also to spread the good word of the Boston Red Sox.
This week Rachel and I are checking up on all of our coaches and supervising them in their class interventions. The first intervention cycle of 2010 (a 10 week HIV education course that runs through the GRS HIV/AIDS curriculum) started two weeks ago so our coaches have been working hard to maximize the impact that they are making. We’ve starting the planning for the graduation ceremonies that will take place after the 10-week intervention cycle is completed. These graduations are designed to reward the kids for their hard work and commitment to GRS so I’m excited to do everything possible to make these kids happy.
Beyond that, Rachel and I are also continuing to plan half-day VCT events all over Lilongwe. We’re doing our best to expose GRS to new regions and new schools and we’re also trying to incorporate some major Malawian celebrities to attend our events and help us attract large crowds. The Malawi national football team just made a pretty impressive showing for themselves in the African Cup of Nations (basically the African version of the World Cup) and so we’re trying to get some of the national team players to help us spread the GRS curriculum. I’ll keep you updated on any progress that we make.
Hope you guys have a safe, healthy and happy 2010 full of fun adventures! Feel free to shoot me an email if you want to say hey – erenkmunir@gmail.com
Thursday, November 26, 2009
Some food for thought on Thanksgiving Day
Hey everyone,
I hope Thanksgiving Day finds everyone well and that you all manage to spend a little time with the people you love. I sure wish that I could have the three F's in my life right about now -- family, friends and football. But I'm happy to settle for some nsima, which is what I eat every day, and my new Grassroot Soccer family.
I just wanted to write a quick entry to share some of the latest research in the world of HIV/AIDS. All the information is coming from the Kaiser Family Foundation, one of the leading researchers of HIV/AIDS and other global health problems in the world. KFF is an American non-profit that does a lot of good work all over the world and I love reading all of their most recent updates.
Here are two links to the latest stats and figures for the global HIV epidemic. The first link is a general stat sheet that covers HIV all over the world while the second link focuses exclusively on Africa's relationship with the HIV/AIDS virus.
1. World
http://www.kff.org/hivaids/upload/3030-14.pdf
2. Africa
http://www.kff.org/hivaids/upload/7391-08.pdf
In case you don't have time to look through the two links I'll share some of the facts that I find the most interesting.
A) 67% of people living with HIV/AIDS live in Africa (that's 22.4 million people). 70% of new HIV/AIDS infections take place in Africa, and 70% of all HIV/AIDS related deaths occur in Africa. There are mind blowing percentages when you consider that there are currently 33.4 million people living with HIV/AIDS and Africa only accounts for 12% of the world's population.
B) The Adult HIV/AIDS prevelance rate in Sub-Saharan Africa is 5.2%.
Sorry to give you guys such a sombre Thanksgiving post but I think it's important to think about things that this while your giving thanks for whatever your giving thanks for.
Before I sign off, I will finish with a really important quote from the KFF:
"The latest country estimates from UNAIDS and WHO indicate that in most sub-Saharan African countries, HIV/AIDS prevalence has stabilized, although often at high levels. In addition, some countries have even begun to experience declines. Finally, there is evidence of reduced risk behavior in some parts of the region. Most countries in sub-Saharan
Africa have developed national responses to HIV/AIDS through National AIDS Commissions, legislation, programs, and services"
There is hope after all!
Happy Thanksgiving!
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
315 people tested at our 3rd and final testing event!
Sorry for the delay in between posts, November has been a busy month for GRS in Malawi. Things are finally starting to settle down now that you lucky people in the States are getting ready to chow down on some Turkey.
Rachel and I hosted our third and final half-day VCT testing tournament this past Saturday in the Kawale district of Lilongwe and the event was a huge success. The final numbers on the day were as follows – 315 people tested, 9 people were found to be reactive and of those 9 only 2 of them were over the age of 18. I have a couple of notes about the day as a whole:
· The number 315 is absolutely phenomenal. In our previous two events we managed to test 120 people and 220 people respectively so to beat our previous high by almost 100 is a great achievement. The fact that we’re improving on our numbers by right around 100 people from one event to the other is making the GRS Malawi team recognize the limitless potential of these half-day events. With continued improvement we’re hoping that one day we can try to test 500 or even 1000 people at these half-day events.
· The final budget for the day ended up being around 270 dollars. With the help of Baylor Hospital here in Lilongwe we’ve managed to cut pretty much every single unnecessary expense so that we can focus our money on things that will make us more efficient. The fact that we’re testing over one person per dollar that we’re spending is a pretty cool stat; especially when you consider that the standard budgets for testing events in Southern Africa can go as high as two or three thousand bucks while testing right around the same number as us.
· The thing that amazed me most about the event was how smooth and hassle free it was. At the previous two events we had major problems that came out of nowhere at the last second, for example in Area 25 one of the teams didn’t show up and in Area 36 four of the teams showed up two hours late. We had a few unexpected hiccups at Kawale but for the most part we dealt with them quickly and didn’t let them disturb our rhythm at all. We avoided one major catastrophe when Mother Nature decided to be kind and hold off on the rain until the end of our event. At one point it started to drizzle a little bit and I totally froze. I knew that if it started pouring everything would have been ruined – the kids would have run home, the PA system guys would have packed up shop and the counselors would have gone home as well. I can’t even begin to imagine how terrible it would have been if it had started raining. For one thing, we probably wouldn’t have tested 50 people and all of the 270 bucks that we spent would have gone to waste.
· One of the toughest parts of the day was when this 18-year-old kid came up to me and told me that he had just tested positive for HIV/AIDS. I tried to support him as much as possible and raise his spirits but the worst part was that he didn’t believe the outcome of the test. He kept saying that he didn’t believe the doctors but when I asked him why he couldn’t come up with one good reason not to believe them. I tried my hardest to tell him that he had to visit the Baylor clinic in the next week to follow up the positive result and consult with one of the clinicians at the hospital but he seemed very hesitant and almost hostile. After a while we managed to calm him down and we booked him in for an appointment this week but for a little while that was kind of a scary moment. I think his reaction to the positive result was a product of two things: 1) I think he was scared and part of the HIV/AIDS culture here is to run away from things that scare you. 2) I also think that this was a classic case of HIV/AIDS stigma. The kid didn’t want to believe that the positive test was real because he didn’t want to accept that HIV/AIDS was a real problem. Either way, as long as he goes to his appointment and sticks to his ARV’s he’ll be ok but we definitely need to keep an eye on him.
· I don’t want to finish on such a somber note so just before I conclude my post I’m going to talk about one of the coolest things about the Kawale event -- the presence of the local community Chiefs. In Kawale, and actually in a lot of Malawian communities, the Chiefs are the most influential people in the area. We extended invitations to all 12 Chiefs in the Kawale area and we were all extremely surprised to see all 12 of them show up on the day of the event. These Chiefs were undoubtedly one of the main reasons we managed to boost our number to 315. Their presence inspired kids, mothers, fathers, and absolutely everyone around to come out to our event and test. The best part of the whole Chief experience is that some of them actually agreed to test. We were by no means expecting them to agree to test and we were ok with that, we thought their participation would be enough of a help to our event. In fact, some of them almost declined our invitations because they were worried that we would force them to test. But in the end, after they saw what we were doing for the kids and how fun everything was some of them actually agreed to go into the testing room. The fact that they not only showed up to the event but actually participated in the testing aspect was a huge help to GRS in Malawi and a testament to their wisdom as Chiefs. Hopefully we can continue to build a working relationship with them because their power is unparalleled in Malawian culture.
All in all the day was a huge success and I’m really happy because it means that I can start my 3-week journey home on a high note. Starting on Friday Rachel and I are planning a nice long trip from Lilongwe to Cape Town through Zambia, Zimbabwe, Botswana and Namibia. We’re planning a couple of fun activities along the way – some of these fun activities include bungee jumping from Victoria Falls, sand dune surfing in Namibia, visiting a sweet safari park in Botswana and white water rafting down the Zambezi. I’ll be sure to let you know how it goes if I survive and I’ll take as many pictures as possible.
Happy Thanksgiving to all of you wherever you are in the world!
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
Great coverage of GRS Malawi in the Press
Hey Guys,
Just wanted to write a quick update with two important things.
1) In the last week, all of the major Malawian media organizations have been sending requests to interview Grassroot Soccer about the record breaking number of HIV tests at the two events that we hosted in Area 36 and Area 25 last week. The two biggest newspapers in the country have covered the events and all sorts of important people have been congratulating us on our huge numbers. Apparently the 615 people that we tested last Sunday is a record number of tests in one day in the history of HIV/AIDS in Malawi -- pretty awesome news.
One of my jobs in the past week was to write an article/press release to detail the success of our events. The Grassroot Soccer website posted it on the main website today, so I'll include the link if you want to check it out (if I were you I would check it out, not to read the article but to look at the picture from the event). Here is the link to the article on the GRS site:
http://www.grassrootsoccer.org/2009/11/03/arecordnumberofhivtestsinmalawi/
And if you don't want to look at the link, I'll copy and paste the article from the site here:
GRS Malawi saw unprecedented success during the weekend of October 23-25, 2009, through two community HIV testing events in Lilongwe. On the 23rd of October, through a half-day Voluntary Counseling and Testing (VCT) tournament combining soccer, GRS activities, and HIV testing, GRS Malawi tested 215 people. Two days later, the GRS team, in partnership with the Baylor College of Medicine/Abbott Fund Centre of Excellence, tested another 610 people during an impressive community sensitization event with over 4,000 people in attendance. Testing a total of 825 Malawians in one weekend, GRS Malawi is making great strides to fight the pervasive stigma and fear that deter people from learning their status. David Jones, Vice President of the Baylor International Pediatric AIDS Initiative, stated, “there has not been a larger single HIV sensitization event organized in the country ever, or more people tested at a public event in one day.”
The following is a first hand account of the weekend written by Eren Munir, a Grassroot Soccer intern in Malawi:
After weeks of preparations, the weekend set to begin at noon on Friday, October 23rd, with a half-day VCT, and end at 4 pm on Sunday, October 25th, with a community-wide sensitization event, was finally here. Charged with the ambitious task of completing two separate testing events in two distinctly different areas of Lilongwe, Malawi in just 52 hours, we were unsure what a realistic goal for the events would be, but decided that testing 300 people, between the two, was reasonable.
Having tested 115 people at a similar half-day VCT tournament three weeks earlier, we hoped to test 100 people during Friday’s tournament. By incorporating soccer and HIV education into a positive environment around testing, however, we were able to provide counseling and testing services for 215 people, surpassing our goal while spending only $235 for the entire event! The cost-effectiveness of our model, which capitalizes on the power of soccer to encourage people to test, is inspiring. With one success behind us, we prepared for Sunday’s sensitization event, unsure of what to expect from an event we had never run before.
The sensitization event was even less predictable, and with church attendance a common Sunday activity in Lilongwe, we wondered if we would be able to draw a significant crowd. On our side, however, was the presence of Mafunyeta, one of Malawi’s most popular musicians. Early in the afternoon, with over a thousand people in the audience, we anticipated testing 200 people. But as the golden Malawian sun beat relentlessly on our backs, and the day wore on, suddenly, people began streaming in by the hundreds. Soon, the crowd had tripled, and over 4000 people gathered for the music, performances, and HIV education presented by GRS and Baylor’s Tingathe and PMTCT Outreach Programs. The sea of people before us was a powerful sight and at the end of the day, the news that 610 people had tested during the event was overwhelming. Bringing the total number of people tested to almost three times our initial predictions, the GRS team felt proud of and inspired by the community’s collective action in the face of an epidemic that claims the lives of more than 60,000 Malawians every year.
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
800 people in 3 days
I learned one very important lesson over the past couple of weeks: update my blog more frequently! I’m not even going to pretend like I’m up to the task of reporting each event that has unfolded since the last time I checked in, but I’m here to tell you that I’m going to do my best. I figured for the sake of space and time, it would be far easier to break the past three weeks into a series of highlights and lowlights (hopefully more highlights than lowlights).
Highlights
· Number 1 definitely has to be about the immensely successful VCT event that we held in the Area 36 district of Lilongwe this past Friday, the 23rd of October. This event was essentially planned the same exact way as the Area 25 event that we hosted about a month ago. We had 8 teams of about 15 kids aged between 16-18. Each one of these kids got the opportunity to play in our soccer tournament, engage in GRS HIV education activities, and learn their status by testing for HIV/AIDS. This event was a huge success because we managed to test around 220 kids, close to 100 more than our event in Area 25. Seeing an increase of 100 people tested was very gratifying for Rachel and I, especially when you consider the amount of obstacles that we had to overcome to ensure that the event was a success (I can spend a whole blog entry talking about obstacles themselves but I fear they may bore you).
· One side note about the event we had in Area 36 – the whole thing cost only 235 dollars! That means we essentially spent one dollar per person that we tested – this is amazing when you consider all of the different costs involved. We have to rent a loud PA system to attract people, we have to pay our coaches/peer evaluators, we have to feed them and the children and we have to provide water, testing supplies and stuff for the football fields. I feel weird saying this, but if you donate one dollar to GRS you can help one person find out their status within the context of a Malawian VCT. That feels pretty good to say when you consider how much money it could potentially cost elsewhere!
· Coming in at a close second is the sensitization event that GRS hosted in Area 25 this past Sunday afternoon. The basic idea behind a sensitization event is to make sure that people in and around Lilongwe learn about GRS and the kind of work we do. These events make our work a lot easier in the long run because people are way more willing to work with us if they know who we are and what we do. Sensitization events are so important in the world of HIV/AIDS in Africa because it such a taboo topic, so it is good to get all of the facts out there in order for people to realize that all of the stigma is a waste of time. Sensitization events are particularly important in Malawi because GRS was established here in 2006 so very few people know who we are and what we do. Most sensitization events here are small scale, maybe in a small church or some small room with a handful of people. But GRS and Baylor Hospital decided to absolutely blow this event up by inviting some of the biggest performers in Malawi. There were three musicians who are household names in Malawi, as well as a group of acrobats and actors. Almost all of these performers decided to test, and this in turn encouraged OVER 600 people to test! As you can probably imagine 600 is an insane number for one of these events, so we were all very happy with the work that we did. The performers acting as role models in the testing department definitely helped, but I think the massive number also proves how important HIV/AIDS work is here.
· My closing highlight definitely has to be the number 820. This is the total number of people tested from the two events that we had this weekend.
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I don’t want to spend too much time discussing downers, because it is impossible to ever be too down on yourself when you are in this beautiful and amazing continent – but I will discuss one or two things that got me thinking over the weekend.
Downers
By far the biggest downer was interacting with the people who just found out that they were HIV+. When you test over 800 people in a country where the national average for HIV+ people hovers around 14%, you should expect to meet people who discover their positive status – but this doesn’t make it any easier. I have to admit that I had a hard time talking to the first couple of reactants that I talked to. I mean, what can you possibly say to them to make the situation better? And who am I to talk to them? I would just kind of freeze up and go silent when I should have been trying to make them feel better. Thinking back on it now I feel terrible because I should have done a better job but I think my silence was due to my inexperience. After spending time at a couple of events now, I wouldn’t say that I feel comfortable interacting with people who test positive for HIV right in front of me, but I would definitely say that I feel comfortable enough to not be silent. In my limited experience, I have learnt that it is ok to reassure people moments after they learn about their positive status. At first I thought it wasn’t my place to try to reassure them, I was afraid that it would come across as patronizing. But after thinking about it I realized that these are the people who most desperately need to hear a friendly and reassuring voice.
The only thing that you need to tell them is the following: everything is going to be ok. Just because you tested positive doesn’t mean that your life is over. You can still live a healthy, happy and long life IF you adhere to the ARV medication and make smart decisions about your lifestyle from here on out.
All right, I think I’m done for today. Please let me know if you want to here any more about these events or anything else. I have a bunch of pictures and videos that I cannot upload in this country because the Internet connection is so slow and unstable – but maybe I can get them to you when I come back to the states in December.
We are hosting our last VCT event of the quarter in two weeks, on Friday November 6th in the Kawale district of Lilongwe. We have set an extremely optimistic goal of testing 400 people at this event, and I cannot wait to tackle this challenge.
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
1st VCT event in Malawi
It’s the day after. I’m sitting here in my unfurnished room in our new house (our 4th home in the last 2 months actually), and all I can think about is yesterday’s VCT event in the Area 25 district of Lilongwe. Voluntary Counseling and Testing events are an integral part of the Grassroot Soccer program because they are one of the most effective ways of combining soccer with HIV counseling/testing. The average VCT event is an all day affair and yesterday our schedule for the kids ran from 12:00 noon until 5:30 in the early evening. Rachel and I were responsible for creating the schedule and basically ensuring that everything ran smoothly throughout the day. As you can probably imagine, events like these are easily derailed so being responsible for everything is easier said than done.
The whole point of the VCT event is to get as many kids tested as possible. Obviously there are a lot of roadblocks to this goal -- many kids don’t want to test because they are scared of their potential result, many parents don’t want their kids to test because they or their partner have HIV/AIDS and they know that their child does too so they don’t want them to find out, or because the majority just don’t want to because it’s easier not to test. This is where the soccer comes in. When we set up the tournament and start communicating our program with the school, we make it very clear that the only way kids are going to be able to participate in the tournament is if they agree to test as well. So for instance, all 96 kids who participated in our tournament yesterday received counseling for HIV/AIDS and then tested. In my opinion, VCT events are the best way to prove the incredible power that soccer has in the world of HIV/AIDS. 90% of these kids would never have tested if we just showed up there with a bunch of doctors and offered free tests. But by promising soccer as an incentive, we were able to attract a huge number of kids to our counseling/testing services.
In an effort to hype up this event as much as possible, Rachel and I decided to build a relationship with one of the professional soccer teams in Malawi – CIVO United. They are one of the perennial powerhouses in the Malawian Premier League so everyone in the country supports them and all of the kids love their players. Only in Africa would you be able to just go to the stadium of an elite professional sports team during one of their practices and organize a meeting with the players and coaches within minutes of walking into the grounds. Can you imagine just walking into Fenway Park and organizing a meeting with Terry Francona, David Ortiz, Dustin Pedroia and Jason Bay? Yeah, I didn’t think so. But that’s essentially what we did with CIVO United, and from the first second we started talking to the guys they were all 100% behind our message and our agenda. Rachel and I were both wholeheartedly amazed and touched by the players and their willingness to help us for free. After the meeting we got the names of the players who wanted to participate in our event in Area 25 and we started planning ways in which they would be able to assist us as much as possible. When the meeting ended, we were expecting only one or two guys maximum to come up and offer their services so you can imagine our shock when basically the whole team said that they wanted to join us.
Unfortunately it would have been difficult to effectively incorporate all 25 of the CIVO players, so we decided to take three and we promised that everyone of them would have the opportunity to volunteer for us at a future event. After everything was said and done, we had the luxury of picking the team captain and three of the best players on the team. And after thinking about it for a while, Rachel and I decided that they would be most effectively incorporated in the event as one of the coaches for the teams during the tournament. So out of the 8 teams, 4 four of them were being coached by widely known and admired soccer celebrities. You can imagine how excited all of these kids were.
From previous experience in using African soccer starts to help the testing aspect, GRS had become accustomed to the fact that these players would not want to test. Maybe they would strongly encourage the kids to test, but there was no way that they would test. In the grand scheme of things, it is very difficult to get men to test for HIV/AIDS and it is even more difficult to get young, established men to test. Rachel and I had resigned ourselves to the fact that the CIVO guys probably wouldn’t test. But when they got to the event all they could talk about was how much they wanted to test, and how much they wanted to tell their kids that they were testing so that the kids knew that that their role models were testing. I would have a hard time telling you how much of an impact this had on the kids, and how much of a difference in made in our testing numbers for the day. All I can say is that we were expecting to test around 60 kids when everything was said and done, but at the end of the day we had over 100 kids tested – a huge difference in the world of VCT events. Hands down one of my favorite moments from the day was when one of the CIVO players got tested and came running to find me to show me the prick on his finger to prove that he had been tested. He was so excited that he had been tested, you could tell that it was something that he was unsure about at first, but so excited about when he was finished. Moments later he called his wife to tell him that he had tested and that he knew his status. Just a really cool moment.
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Street Skillz at Teen Club
This blog entry is coming on the heels of a wonderfully relaxing long weekend in Lilongwe. Pretty much everyone in Malawi had the day off on Monday to celebrate the end of Ramadan – so I was able to relax a little bit after a fantastic Teen Club session on Saturday. It was only the second Teen Club I’ve ever attended but I already felt a lot more comfortable during the event. I actually felt like I was helping the kids this time, which is a huge turnaround from the last time when everything going on was a little dizzying. For all of you guys who don’t remember what Teen Club is, its basically a once a month event where Baylor Hospital in Malawi hosts about 100 HIV+ kids. The purpose of the event is to check up on each one of these kids on a regular basis to ensure that they are adhering to their ARV medication and that everything else is going well. But ultimately Teen Club is also an opportunity for HIV+ kids to meet other HIV+ kids and make new friends.
· A goal scored by a girl counts as double.
· Everyone on the pitch has to score after every goal, even if it means cheering for your opponent.
· Each team has to come up with a special team name and cheer. The team should perform this cheer before the game, after the game and after every goal.
· Players on the field are responsible for calling their own fouls.
Each one of the rules is designed to encourage the kids to be responsible, communicative, honest, and fair. The rules are also designed to involve girls as much as possible. GRS is actively trying to increase female participation in soccer and other sports. One of the most striking statistics that I’ve heard since I’ve been here is this one: FIFA estimates that less than 1% of the world’s 260 million soccer players are female. And all the Research has shown that female participation in sport improves school performance, reduces rates of unwanted pregnancies & STI and delays sexual debut. So involving girls in soccer and other sports is just one more way to help in the fight against HIV/AIDS.
All in all the day was a huge success. The main reason we decided to pilot “Street Skillz” in Teen Club is because we were having a hard time finding an engaging activity for the older kids in the program. In the past, Teen Club in Malawi has had a lot of problems with problematic/disinterested 17 year olds who end up distracting the younger kids. So we thought that by using “Street Skillz” we would simultaneously engage the older kids and also create a less distracting environment for the younger kids who come. The idea ended up working out really well because the older kids felt special and privileged when they were allowed to play soccer, these feelings made them more willing to engage in the activities and have fun. During the planning process, a lot of people were worried that playing soccer with a group of HIV+ kids would be too risky and dangerous considering the health of each child. I don’t need to tell you how fragile each kid on ARVs is, and obviously one bad fall etc. would be potentially disastrous to them. Fortunately no one got injured and everyone came out of the day happy and healthy.
All of the pictures are amazing because in each one you can see how incredibly happy the kids are to be outside playing soccer. You can tell in each kid’s face that they feel normal and that they love the feeling. It’s really touching to think about because when you see these kids you know that they probably don’t have the chance to feel/act like normal kids very often. For a wide variety of reasons like stigma and discrimination most of these kids never have the opportunity to go outside and play soccer with the other kids in their village. So it felt really good providing these kids with the right environment to play and have fun. Hopefully I’ll get the pictures up soon, that way you can see first hand how happy the kids look. They’re all hugging after every goal, high fiving each other, dancing and smiling after every goal – it was truly an awesome thing to see. The more I think about it, the more I realize how important Teen Club is to these kids. Obviously Teen Club is important to them because it is where they get there month’s supplies of ARVs and where they get seen by doctors. But beyond that it is also important because it provides kids with a real chance to feel normal and be with kids who are similar to them. After I saw these kids leaving the soccer pitch on Saturday afternoon, I couldn’t help shaking the feeling that as soon as they left the field they were going to be thrown into this world where they were back to being “different” and “social outcasts”. As depressing as this feeling was, it also encouraged me to work extra and do my part to ensure that each session is as fun and fulfilling as possible. If these kids only get one chance and month to be normal, we better make sure that each session is as awesome as possible.
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