(Photo: Students attending our Health and HIV/AIDS class.)
"Why are Tanzanians dead because of HIV/AIDS? Why are Americans not dead because of HIV/AIDS? Why?"
The questions left by students in the question box last week were nothing if not frank.
HIV awareness campaigns are not new to the gritty urban settlements of Africa. What is less common in these communities is an environment of freedom where every question can be asked. But can this subject of HIV/AIDS, taboo even after years of education, really be dealt with candidly?
Enter: a little team of folks from Trinity Presbyterian, Santa Ana, California, and a little team of Wild Hope staff here in Tanzania.
Now, give them five days with forty high school aged young people and let the learning begin!
To our great delight, the team from Trinity stepped up to the challenge with grace and boldness. The forty Tanzanian students who attended Wild Hope's Leadership Academy module, Health and HIV, were truly blessed.
Every evening, the questions/comments box was filled with slips of paper--
"What can I do when I know I have HIV/AIDS?"
"Most of the bosses they want sex with girls to give the job and the girls say yes because they don't have job, nothing to eat, so they agree."
"I know 20 people who have died from HIV."
Preparations each evening were sobering, yet God was faithful to grant wisdom and insight. By the end of the week, the comments reflected the thankfulness students felt for what they had learned and the environment in which they had been led.
Seasoned teachers from a local school affirmed that the permission to speak openly was a big step forward for all of them. The students already know, first hand, what HIV/AIDS is. Yet for many of them, this was the clearest information they had received on cause and prevention, not to mention the myriad of related issues that surround the disease.
This is the beauty of bridging cultures-- we can take each other to new places and be changed for the better as we journey together.
Our visitors from California might not be able to quantify exactly how their experience with forty kids in a severely challenged neighborhood within Arusha changed their lives. They'll just know that it truly did. The young Tanzanians who attended won't forget what they heard in honesty and freedom regarding topics of grave importance. From practical health tips to matters of hope and faith, they've been impacted and inspired.
And we are the lucky ones! What a joy it is to bring our friends from opposite corners of the globe together. What a pleasure it is for us to play matchmaker :-)
(Photo: Ashley Sparks of Trinity with one of the students.)
