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June 30, 2006
La Deuxieme Partie
I have made a lot of progress on my project during the past few days. I’m really excited because I am working with an amazing Malian woman named Ramatoullaye who is the director of HIV Education at the Point G Hospital in Bamako. Ramatoullaye actually has HIV, and sadly, her husband and all three of her children died of AIDS. Working with her is so inspiring because despite the fact that she has faced so many hardships, she is actively working to combat HIV in Mali and making a real difference in people’s lives. She has a very commanding presence. On Wednesday, she helped two other GAIA students, Erica and Ally, present their project from last year at the clinic. Last year, Erica and Ally filmed a discussion group for women they held at the clinic, and then used the footage to make a documentary about HIV attitudes in Mali. Many of the women who watched the film on Wednesday were the ones who participated in the group last year, and it was really unsettling to see that many of them believe that people will give you AIDS if they don’t like you by putting it in your food or coughing on you. Hopefully, the peer education program will do a lot to dispel these myths.
My project has a new aspect as well. Besides providing peer education training at the clinic, Ramatoullaye and I will also be taking in patients to get HIV and other medical tests done at the Fondation de Charles Merieux in Bamako. This is especially important because last year, GAIA tested over 1000 pregnant women for HIV. While only a small percentage of these women were found to be HIV-positive, the clinic at Sikoro did not administer the medical tests (CD4 count, viral load, liver function, etc.) necessary to determine the proper treatment regimen, and consequently, many women were not treated properly, if at all. This is really a shame because HIV treatment is actually provided for free by the Malian government (I find it funny that one of the ten poorest countries in the world provides free HIV treatment to its citizens and the US still doesn't provide all of its citizens with quality health care). Ramatoullaye (the Malian woman helping me with the project) and I are going to bring the HIV-positive patients to the Fondation Merieux five people at a time so that they can get their tests done and start treatment. It is our hope that since Ramatoullaye is HIV-positive, the patients will not be afraid to go in for testing and realize that treatment is both available and helpful.
I am excited because I had my first Bambera lesson this week. Our entire house is taking them from this really amazing professor named Dudu that comes to our house. Just to give you an idea of the exchange rate in Mali, I am paying TWO DOLLARS (1000 CFA) for every hour lesson - and considering there are only 5 people in my lesson group, that is pretty amazing. We have only learned "hello" and "how are you?" and things like that thus far, but he is coming again tomorrow, so I am hoping to be able to at least be able to hold a basic conversation by the time I leave.
Just a quick cultural sidenote – our latest pastime is dodging marriage proposals. The other night, all of the GAIA volunteers and doctors had dinner at a Chinese restaurant (in Mali... strange, right?) and everyone seemed pretty shocked that none of us are married (who knew I’d be over the hill at 20?). It’s unusual for here though because in Mali, people get married as young as 13 or 14, and polygamy is also common... men have up to four wives! All of the marriage talk wouldn’t be so weird if people weren’t actually ASKING us if we wanted to marry them, and by this I mean that 55-year-old men stop us when we are walking and say things like, “I’ve been watching you for the past few days and have decided that you should be my wife.” To which we respond, “I have a boyfriend,” or “My husband lives in Iceland,” or “My father would have to approve of you before we can get married and he has a chronic fear of airplanes.” Our responses grow more interesting by the day, it will be interesting to see what we come up with by the end of the summer…
Posted by Madeline DiLorenzo at June 30, 2006 07:46 PM
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