Inspirational Youth

In a community where HIV/ AIDS is hugely prevalent and continues to increase, in certain townships it is a topic covered routinely at schools and at community groups. In regards to spreading information, increasing knowledge is one of the most affective ways to heighten awareness and emphasise the importance of ARV medication, whilst encouraging people to take their medication. 

But if you don’t go to school, or attend a community group, how do you learn about the virus that has gripped the 34% of your community? 

This week at the sports outreach, we revised HIV/AIDs. We have covered HIV numerous times before, and this week we wanted to uncover what the children knew. We planned ahead and thought that it may be difficult to get the children to engage, so gave gifts out as an incentive and encouragement; football books for the boys and bracelets for the girls,worked wonders. 

We kicked off the week in Hillside, a fairly spiritually dark area of town. There was a better turn out of boys than girls, although that lead to some unfortunate behaviors and disrespect. However the girls played hard as we had a game of netball, finishing the session with the HIV lesson. All of the girls participated well, all taking at once and over the top of one another. They knew a lot about HIV, how it is contracted, what it is, what it does and how to prevent it; what they didn’t know we were able to recap by the end of the session.

Thinking we had made a good start to the week, and feeling quiet proud of our efforts, we drove to Siteview, where one of our sports mentors had taken a football session by him self. Our jaws dropped as we saw the respect the children had for him. All the children  were sitting around in a circle and putting their hands up to answer questions. They moved to the front of the group to address their peers and share their knowledge. 

No one spoke out of turn, no one grabbed for a gifts, and no one pushed and shoved others. 

They had total respect, it was inspiring to watch. A credit. Full of integrity and leadership qualities, Michael is a prime example of what Grabouw needs. An influential role model and someone for the younger generations to aspire to. 

Each township is different ....... and that brings different struggles. The following day at Iraq squatter camp, where ramshackled shelters are made from anything and everything, where water is sparse, and electricity non-existent and where a 8 unit toilet block serves a multitude of people, we where faced with the reality that few of the children attend school. We encouraged then to share what they knew, much of which was limited and was full of misconceptions about the illness. We tried to break down stigmatised barriers and the misconceptions these children had about HIV, and they sat and eagerly listened, while one of the older girls translated into Afrikaans.