World AIDS Day

In case you missed it, December 1st was World AIDS Day. Every year Botswana has both a national World AIDS Day on December 1st and then regional commemorations on December 10th.
This year I went to our region's World AIDS Day in a tiny village in the middle of the Tuli Block with three other Peace Corps volunteers. The Tuli Block is a wonderful game reserve full of elephants, giraffes, and countless other animals. I'm sure you can imagine how excited we were that our regional World AIDS Day was going to be there.
The village was beautiful and we couldn't resist going for a hike after we had set up our tents next to the clinic. Unfortunately, we didn't get to see any elephants, but there were monkeys and baboons and some antelope running around. The view of the sunset was breathtaking.

A baboon skull along the path

The next morning we got up early to attend the commemoration events. There were many speeches, a candlelight vigil, drama group skits, a lovely choir, and a poet. One day I will have strong enough internet to share some videos of Batswana singing and dancing, but until then this unsatisfying little photo will have to do:

The Poet

We set up  some posters explaining what Peace Corps does and shared information about HIV/AIDS in Botswana while passing out red ribbons. 

After the ceremony, the attendees stopped by our booth and we quizzed them on their knowledge of HIV.

In honour of World AIDS Day, here's information about a potential, new "super condom" that could have a major impact in the fight against HIV: 

"According to scientists from the Texas A&M University Health Science Center, the new contraceptive will be lined with a hydrogel-based product (hydrogel being a water-based gel, generally used in healing cuts), which kills the HIV-virus in the event of a condom breakage.The condom will also feature an antioxidant to enhance sexual pleasure. "People say they don’t want to use condoms because it doesn’t have the same sexual pleasure," Mahua Choudhery, head researcher on the project, told the BBC.
"The anti-oxidant [in the condom] will enhance neurotransmitters which will work with nerve endings, giving greater sexual pleasure.
"If the HIV virus gets into the product, the condom will block it, prevent it replicating, and prevent entry [from the body]."

If this condom is effective and becomes widely available (and cheap) in the coming years, it could completely change public health initiatives and the struggle against HIV. The most common reason people opt out of using condoms is because they don't like the way it feels. If this condom actually increases sexual pleasure, people would be interested in using them for more than protecting their health or preventing pregnancy. Behaviour change is probably one of the hardest aspects of public health, so if you could change a product instead trying to change the way people feel about a product, HIV prevention would have a huge victory.

If you're interested in learning more about HIV/AIDS, I strongly recommend the book The Wisdom of Whores: Bureaucrats, Brothels, and the Business of AIDS by Elizabeth Pisani. Unfortunately the book doesn't delve too much into the HIV situation in Sub-Saharan Africa, but it's still a fascinating and engaging read. Pisani writes with brutal and oftentimes hilarious honesty.

And finally, here is  video the Peace Corps made of an interview with former President Festus Mogae of Botswana. I had the opportunity to hear President Mogae speak at our All-Volunteer conference this year and he was incredibly inspiring. 

PCVs with the former president

Here's the link to the article I referenced in this post: http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/health-news/new-supercondom-will-fight-hiv-and-increase-sexual-pleasure-scientists-claim-a6778746.html 

16 Days of Activism Against Gender Based Violence

Every year from November 25th to December 10th, there is a global campaign to bring attention to gender based violence called 16 Days of Activism. People are encouraged to hold events, rallies, or trainings to break the silence around gender based violence.
A study carried out in Botswana in 2012 found that 35.2% of women surveyed had experienced physical intimate partner violence, and 14.6% had experienced sexual intimate partner violence. Gender based violence is definitely an issue in Botswana, but reporting levels are still extremely low. During a 12 month period, only 1.2% of Batswana women reported cases to the police. Silence is overwhelming and many reported cases tend to be withdrawn before they even make it to court.
Though I do feel very passionately about these issues, I was hesitant at first to plan activities for 16 days in my village. When I asked friends about it, they would tell me that gender based violence just isn't something that's talked about publicly. But I still received support and interest from people when I shared my ideas and explained what the campaign was about, so I decided to organise a few events.
Unfortunately, the public debate I wanted to host has been put on hold (indefinitely), but two events did work out.
The first event was a kgotla meeting to introduce 16 Days of Activism and share some information about gender based violence. A kgotla is like a community hall. It is the centre of every community and it is where tribal administration is carried out. Disputes are settled here, information is shared, and groups are organised. Fortunately, our kgosi (chief) was extremely supportive of the whole campaign. He attended the event and shared some words with the community. I invited the police chief from the village next to ours to share some statistics about the low reporting rates in our area. Our social worker then spoke and explained what the four types of gender based violence are and how they affect communities. We also had representatives from the school and the village development committee present.

Our social worker, the Kgosi, and the police station representative

I was a nervous wreck for this event because I decided to make a short speech (entirely in Setswana!) to explain why I was holding this kgotla meeting and what I hoped these conversations could achieve. I am nowhere near fluent enough to be able to write a speech in Setswana, but a friend of mine graciously helped me translate what I wanted to say. Apparently the speech was a hit! It is probably one of my proudest moments from my service so far. I'm a pretty soft-spoken person and am not a fan of public speaking, but when I was up there speaking, I could feel the crowd responding to my words and  encouraging me to go on. Days after the event, people were still coming up to me and congratulating me for that speech.
After all the formalities and the speeches, I had prepared a pledge board for people to sign if they wanted to take part in 16 Days of Activism and join the fight against gender based violence. Everyone who signed received a purple ribbon to wear for the duration of the campaign.

Signing the pledge board

The second event I organised was a gender sensitivity mini-workshop using a wonderful tool called "In Her Shoes". “In Her Shoes” is an interactive training exercise designed to allow men and women the opportunity to walk in the shoes of women experiencing violence. The objectives of the training were:

•       To increase awareness of and empathy for the difficulties women who experience violence face when seeking support.
•      To encourage participants to actively think about what they can do in their personal and professional lives to help prevent violence against women.
•       To begin a rights-based discussion of common perceptions about violence against women.

The tool kit contains the stories of different women and their experiences with gender based violence. Except instead of just reading the story, partners are given choices as they go through the story and have to decide what they would do if they were in that situation (with the options provided, which realistically, can be limited). This way, every participant puts themselves in the shoes of a woman who is experiencing violence. 

I sent out letters to each of the major stakeholders in our community and asked that they send one or two volunteers to this workshop. We had representatives from tribal administration, the parent teacher association, the clinic, the primary school, the police, the village development committee, and two community representatives. Sadly, the volunteer who was supposed to help me facilitate the workshop did not show up… such is life. But we rolled with the punches and some of the participants were great support (especially with translating from time to time). This training was by far one of the most interesting and rewarding activities I have done during my service. After each group had gone through the stories of two different women, we all sat down to discuss these stories. Everyone shared their thoughts about different gender issues, society as a whole, and the relationships between men and women. Finally, we talked about what we could do in our community. 

A little splash of extra honesty to round this post out: As much as I enjoyed these two events, I don't know how much more I will try to do gender related events. If people approach me and are interested in having more workshops or starting a support group, I will definitely jump at every opportunity. But I also know that I really had to push to make these events happen, and a lot of the time it was a struggle. I want to do the things that people in my community really want and focus on the areas where I have the most dedicated and enthusiastic partners. Maybe I'm wrong, maybe in a few months I'll try something new or find a new approach. All I know is that by December I was feeling pretty worn out. So I'm taking a break. Because it's Christmas and New Years and now is the time to breathe a little and reflect on everything that has happened this year. I hope you're all doing the same!

Merry Christmas from Botswana!

It's incredibly hot these days, but we do our best to get into the spirit. 

I'm taking the last of 2015 to reflect and prepare for 2016 (it's bound to be a big year!)

I don't have a real Christmas tree, but I think what we make is even better.