Aunties all over the world ....

Now that I'm back safely ensconced in Cape Town ... I have to admit I have this wee tiny sense of achievement ... I had never ever thought I could or would go gaily gallivanting across the centre of africa .... much less almost getting down and dirty with gorillas, UN peacekeepers etc etc ... its a long long way from growing in Brummie-land ....

But as much as I loved my trip - I have to say journeying solo wasn't all happy days .... and I now have a new-found respect for all my foreign-correspondent/journalist friends, NGO workers etc etc who travel a lot by themselves ..... even little things are hasslesome - like having to take all your stuff into small airport toilet cubicles because no one will look after them for you .... and I found I had to resort to eating all meals with a book in my hand avoiding eye contact ... partly to amuse myself (my own company not being the most thrilling) .... and partly to dissuade anyone from talking to me (other people's company being even less desirable) .... and partly to avoid looking as though i'm touting for business (being mistaken even once as a prostitute was enough for me ....) ....

Which brings me to the odd thing about being female and travelling alone in Rwanda .... I had geuinely thought that I would need to be constantly on my guard against marauding males looking to besmirch my virtue ...... I even chose my driver Amin - partly because I knew that the Muslims hadn't participated in the genocide too much (and i didn't fancy being in the wilds with someone with a recent history of raping and pillaging) .... but really because I knew that he was newly married .... and hence hoped he was less likely to get funny ideas in his head .... it turned out that I clearly had thought Too Much of myself ....

Aside from his frequent references to the fact that his religion allowed him a second wife and how much he liked intelligent women .... Amin was a doll .... and a complete gentleman (i think) .... although to be honest even if he had made any improper suggestions - i would never have known since whereas I had meticulously researched his marital and criminal-tendency history - I had totally forgotten to check his English fluency .... and later found out he only spoke Kinyarwanda and some rather limited French ....

But in reality rather than my being propositioned or pursued - once anyone found out that I could speak French ... it was much more common for me to be asked firstly why Indians don't marry black people (what does one say to that ... best just to shrug blankly and change the subject ....) .... and secondly to be roundly and blatantly scolded - and no one seemed shy in doing that ....

"You're here by yourself?" they asked me - women, men, kids, grannies, colleagues and so on ...
"Yes - for the AIDS conference and then I decided I wanted to see your beautiful country" - thinking foolishly that this would endear me to them ...
"And you live in South Africa by yourself too? No family?"
"Well I have lots of good friends there .... "

By this stage - having had a lifetime around Indian aunties ... I knew exactly where this conversation was heading .... and I was starting to look around desperately for an exit ... and yet they still pressed on ...

"So - no husband? Hmmmm - and you travel all around? Also by yourself?"
"Yes - well its my work you see .... I work with health and development ...."
"This work of yours - it does you no good ...."
"Oh? I'm really trying to do some good ...."
"Yes but you are a woman .... and a women should have a husband and children. A woman should not do such work. Why are you wasting your time?"
"Well - you know - people are dying ... and no one else will help them .... there's so much I need to do in the world .... and I don't want to be tied down yet ...." .... I tailed off .... all the while wondering why I sounded so pathetic ....
"You don't want to get married? Are you ok? You like men? No problems?" ... they groped for a way to make sense of me ...
"No no - I'm fine .... I just want to do other things first ....... so much to do you know ..." Men and women alike shook their heads reprovingly ...
"Aren't people dying in your own country too? We are very grateful for people like you coming to help us of course ... but what are you solving?"
"Well - you know ... AIDS is killing millions .... I want to help people ... blah blah blah ..." - I knew it was a losing battle ....
"If you really want to help people .... better you make your mother happy and settle down ...."
"Er - have you been speaking to my mother?" .... Peals of laughter all around and lots of nodding ...

Bloody hell - my mum has her spies in Rwanda too? Perhaps I should just get her to come here so I can stay ....

Travels in the Danger Zone ....

After the whole gorilla experience .... I was pretty much giddy as a school girl and ready for any adventure that came my way ..... so my driver Amin and I decided to set off westwards to Gisenyi on the banks of Lake Kivu .... one of the "exploding" lakes ... (ie gassy and volcanic) ... but apparently quite the resort town of Rwanda

The journey across the Rwandan countryside was stunning .... green forest-covered hills giving way to lush heavy more tropical and exotic surroundings .... and i really started to feel i was travelling into real and proper deepest darkest (at least Central) Africa ....

We drove through village after village ... all amazingly with electricity lines ... but apparently no water ... and so sadly an all too common sight along the way were little kids (anything from 3 years old) ferrying bright yellow jerrycans of precious water .... even more worryingly - I saw them dipping their containers into muddy puddles and holes after the rains ... trying to cut down on the hassles of water-portering .... however my driver was phlegmatic - That's the life of an African child he said .... but i couldn't help gasping every time we saw some child struggling with bundles on their heads and insisted on shouting out of the window - Go to school! .... Amin stolidly refused to give any of them a lift .... and made several comments in terse french to the effect of bloody bleeding heart limousine liberals...


We finally got to Lake Kivu later that afternoon .... and it was stunning ... a beautiful beach with warm blue water .... and after 7 days of extreme grubbiness - I'd decided to splash out and stay at a very smart hotel (I'd been dreaming about a hot shower all week) .... I gulped down the welcome cocktail as the list of things to do was read out to me ... A massage? Perhaps some shopping? Jacuzzi? Swimming Pool? What was a girl to do?

No no I said brightly .... I want to cross the border into Congo and see Goma .... Amin looked incredulous ....

All along the route to Gisenyi - I had been remembering the Gourevitch book and its account of how both genuine Hutu refugees and genocidaires alike fled in 1994 along the same roads that we had taken all the way into Goma ... and the ensuing appalling chaos and mess of the refugee camps which had essentially sheltered and protected some of the worst criminals of the genocide .... I'd noticed that had been much more of an army presence in the area - known to still harbour some Hutu Power ideology .... and we'd passed a few remnants of the refugee camps - which looked still pretty miserable (although now it wasn't clear whether the residents were fleeing the wars in Congo or leftovers from the genocide) ....

Plus there was the small matter of the active volcano in Goma ... that had iced the post-genocide disaster cake by erupting in 2002 destroying much of the city ... not to mention the years of civil wars and conflict post-Mobutu ..... it seemed to me like a perfect day trip .....

Amin was reluctant to take the car over the border and so we walked through the barriers .... but nothing prepared me for the difference 5 minutes can make .... Almost immediately as we crossed into Congo - it just felt more dangerous .... my sense of unease was not made much better by the fact that there were no taxis by the border .... just dodgy looking men on motorbikes lavisciously offering me a lift - to nowhere very nice ....

I dispatched Amin on one of the bikes to fetch a taxi from the town centre whilst i waited for him at the border post ... there were people around so it seemed reasonable ... and I relaxed when I saw a couple of UN armoured cars trundling up (perhaps that should have been a cue to worry?!) ...... so I sidled along next to the UN troops .... to find out they were from the Punjab!

As I stood there - several of the Punjabi troops were being propositioned by a few Congolese ladies of the night/day .... just picture an African Full Metal Jacket with Sardarji soldiers ... (Meesta, meesta - me love you long time ...... Arre yaar - vaat we get for 10 rupees ... and so on ...).

However it became evident that the soldiers were actually more bewildered by or interested in what an solo Indian female was doing randomly at the border .... the jiggling Congolese girls were getting nowhere with them despite their best efforts .... and so their pimp started to get huffy and strode over to me - his gun very prominently displayed in his belt .... "This is my patch bitch - who you working for and how much?" he demanded .... I decided the only way to deal with this was to go on the offensive ... and so drew myself up, fixed him with an icy stare and delivered in my poshest BBC accent the line I've always wanted to say - "No sex please - I'm British" .... but predictably it was sadly lost on the pimp and the punjabis ....

Thankfully before I got myself into any more trouble - Amin arrived with the taxi ... and we set off to the volcano .... driving through Goma town - packed with throngs of people on the streets hawking anything and everything from umbrellas to squawking chickens with barely an inch of roadside to spare .... but perpetually shrouded in volcanic dust with half of it drowned in solidified lava ..... the darkness just added to the feeling that, despite the continual presence of UN troops, Goma is a city where danger lurks just around the corner .... markedly different from the safety and relative calm of Rwanda ....


We got to the Nyarigongo volcano (background in the pic above) and started climbing .... but quite frankly - the black dried lava looked pretty much the same after half an hour as it did after one hour - and it didn't look as though it would be any different until quite a long way up .... the dust was thickening and the sun was starting to set .... which made me even more nervous .... Goma at night wasn't where i wanted to stay and party ....

We scurried back to the border - where predictably the taxi driver tried to fleece us for some exorbitant price ..... but I was prepared for this - I'd just finished reading the memoirs of a South African journalist Jacques Pauw and the memoirs of Blaine Harden - ex Washington Post and one of the first uber-Africa correspondents .... both of which were littered with stories of the lack of Congolese scruples, the constant bribery and endemic cheating ... and I was ready for the challenge .... I bargained like a demon and thinking I'd done myself and my mum proud - I flounced back across the border... only to find that i'd massively overpaid for both my passport stamp/visa and for the taxi .... I guess I'm not that much of an old Africa hand yet ...

Gorillas in the Mist ..... Or Close Encounters of an Ape Kind

So clearly I've been harping on about Rwandan culture and history for far too long ... since all I seem to be getting at the moment are emails saying "Yeah - but what about the gorillas?"

Amin (my driver-guide .... on whom more later) and I set off in our ancient Land Cruiser (top speed 40km/h) to the north-western region of Rwanda - the Virunga volcanic highlands on the border with Uganda and the DRC, and home to one of the last remaining populations of mountain gorillas.

Few factoids: The mountain gorilla (Gorilla beringei beringei) was "discovered" in 1902 - but is now found only in two areas of Africa - the Bwindi Impenetrable Forest of Uganda (where in fact my mate Paul is working with the Batwa pygmies) and the Virunga Highlands. As of the 2002 - there were only approximately 700 gorillas left between the two regions .... their numbers depleted due to disease, poaching, habitat loss and war(some rebels in Congo killing them and even eating them) .... making them one of the most endangered species in the world. Apparently 98% genetically identical to humans - they are unable to survive in captivity and attempts to release rescued gorillas back into the wild haven't been very successful. Just for the Yanks .... male silverbacks (they get all silvery when they reach full adulthood) can weigh 50-100lbs more than the average american football player - but are 10 times stronger.

I've dreamt forever and ever of seeing gorillas .... and have been making fantasy plans for a trip ever since I arrived in SA .... so when I heard about the PEPFAR conference in Kigali - I shamelessly abandoned all friendships/fantasy travel companions and knew I had to get something accepted just so I could come here (apologies Peter) .... luckily I managed to get a gorilla permit at short notice .... and everything seemed to be going swimmingly .....

However when I arrived at the volcanoes (the ones in Rwanda are dormant ... unlike the ones in Congo - of which more later) .... i realised that fantasy planning doesn't actually prepare you for any reality.... ....Having spent the night in a very musty cold mountain lodge (i am assuming to toughen wannabe trekkers up) .... i met with my trekking group at the Parc de Volcans headquarters .... and my heart sank ... they were all blokes - experienced climbers, fit and looked very prepared .... my only prep had been to buy some Merrell sneakers and I'd already eaten the one power bar I'd brought when hungry in Kigali .... and then - I was handed a machete bigger than my arm .... i was clearly In Over My Head ....

And so we entered the forest - it was dense, dark and like something out of the Lost World ... you almost expected dinosaurs to come crashing out .... and it was definitely filled with beasties, creepy-crawlies and nasties ..... we thrashed out with machetes at the overgrowth and scrambled up for what seemed like hours .... I was starting to think that perhaps armchair adventure was more my style ....

Finally - the tracker stopped and made us leave our gear in a pile ... and gave us the ground rules .... don't ever point at the gorillas (they think you're going to throw something at them and attack in anticipation), don't sneeze at them (v prone to human disease) ... and if one charges (ie beats its chest a la King Kong) - then sit down in submission and never ever run ..... S.H.I.T.

We edged up further and heard some grunting .... and then all of a sudden there they were .... a family of about 10 gorillas - two blackbacks (immature males), three females and a bunch of babies .... just messing around, hanging off trees, goofing about ... we were all speechless .... these things are HUGE .... massive massive hairy beasts with human-like hands and feet with expressions to match .... it was breathtaking .....

And then to our total delight - one of the blackback males naughtily pulled one of the females to the ground and treated us to some gorilla-porn .... (especially naughty because only the boss-silverback is supposed to mate with the females of the group ... so this trollop-female was living very dangerously ...) .... although she didn't seem to enjoy the whole experience - he just hauled her around from side to side whilst she lay back and thought of the jungle ...

After the deed was done - Mr Seducer sat back seemingly content munching leaves and chewing bamboo in post-coital bliss .... when suddenly in a flash he made a grab for the only female of our group - ME! He managed to get hold of my shoulder grunting away as I flailed helplessly (my own King Kong moment!) ... but thankfully the nice ranger jumped in between and wrestled him away .... snarling the cheeky gorilla turned away ... but then flipped around and landed a HUGE wallop on the bloke standing next to me .... flooring him ... before scampering away laughing ....

I won't deny that I was petrified and looking around for the escape cord .... i was especially terrified of what the poor ranger would have to tell my mum .... So sorry Mrs Rao - but Bhargavi became a Gorilla concubine .... I can imagine my mum would just be glad I had settled down finally ....

Anyhow heart pounding and hands all trembly .... we continued onwards and upwards to see the Big Boss himself .... The Silverback .... and we found him sitting Buddha-like .... watching over his extended family .... if i'd thought the others were huge ... this one was Gargantuan with big furry muscles - and all herbivore too .... if he been the one grabbing me - i'd have probably been smashed to bits ..... my mum was right - you do grow tall if you eat your veggies .... and hairy apparently ...

He just sat meditating for while - not bothered at all by all our camera clicking or gawping .... before clearly hunger got the better of him and he set off at great pace through the forest ..... howling for his crew to join him ....

We tracked him for over an hour .... clumsily thrashing through the trees as he delicately picked his way - amazingly graceful for something so massive .....

And then we came upon Wife Number 1 - replete with baby-gorilla on her back .... together they all foraged for the best leaves and shoots .... with the Big Man grunting paternally - the Alpha Male ....











It all seemed to come to an end far far too soon .... we'd been trekking for almost four hours yet it felt like seconds ... None of us couldn't bear to leave them .... and at the end it was almost as though he knew .... he turned let out a yelp and beat his chest goodbye ..... We couldn't have been more than ecstatic .....



So my machete and i were reluctantly parted .... i'll admit to being a little emotional by the end (i mean - to be touched by a gorilla ... of course i'm still a little paranoid i've caught some ape-disease ... wasn't man-ape contact how HIV started?!) .... and i still can't quite believe how magical it was ... i do feel as though i've had a glimpse into some sort of primaeval world - one that is slipping away fast ......and i'll make no excuses for being horribly schmaltzy - i've fulfilled a dream ....

Genocide ....Jamais Encore

Its the only reason most of us have ever heard of Rwanda - The genocide. So much so that the pre-conference blurb that we all received had to make it clear to us "It is considered impolite to ask Rwandans whether they are Hutu or Tutsi, and how they participated in the Genocide. We are trying to build a society of Rwandans."

But it is impossible not to wonder when you are here ... thanks to Hotel Rwanda we all know what Hutus and Tutsis are supposed to look like .... and so we all peer at people .... is that nose thin or flatter? She's tall and thin - must be Tutsi ... I wonder if she has any family left? I wonder how she survived .... Hmmm he looks rather squat and definitely darker .... I wonder how many he killed or raped .... and how he deals with that today?

I visited the Genocide memorial in Kigali - a beautifully presented history of pre-genocide Rwanda chronicling how the seeds of tribalism and hatred were sown through colonialism (divide-and-rule wasn't just a British tool) ... and supported by the Belgians, French and the Catholic church ... and how "Hutu Power" came to be. It then unfolds the horror of the Genocide itself in detail, and exposes the egregious inaction of the international community, UN General Dallaire's difficult situation, Kofi Annan's incalculably arrogant and costly mistake in ignoring Dallaire's pleas, the reticence of the US government to engage and especially the complicity of the French through Operation Turquoise aiding Hutu Power. Inexorably - the exhibition moves on to the situation that ensued in the refugee camps on the then-Zairean border, the rush of aid agencies who naively prolonged the conflict and the effect on creating Congo. Finally the memorial ends with a painful reminder of the lives of children lost and the potential wasted .... I had tears streaming down my face .... By the time I got to the new additional exhibition on genocides past and present around the world - despite the international cry of "Never Again" after the Holocaust .... I was pretty much inconsolable.

What is so hard for we foreigners to understand is how the Rwandans all still continue to live together especially in such seeming peace .... how do Tutsis cope when they see Hutus that they know committed heinous atrocities and how are Hutus able to forget the catastrophe that they generated and carry on with normal life .... It is incredible that just 13 years on - President Paul Kagame has somehow managed to create a society which functions (albeit with a heavy police presence) and that people appear (at least to an outsider) to genuinely seem to believe that they must put all differences and history behind them, abandon old tribalism and work together ....

One of the more shameful aspects of the aftermath of the conflict (if you believe Gourevitch) is that the international community refused to let the leaders of the Genocide be tried under Rwandan law .... giving the excuse that Rwanda practised the death penalty and so the countries where the Hutu Power instigators had fled to (UK, France, Canada, US, etc etc) could not in conscience extradite them back to Rwanda ..... and so the UN set up the International Criminal Court in Arusha. Gourevitch claims that in large part this was to bury the mistakes made by the UN and other nations and even their complicities in the conflict, and unfortunatelt the ICC has only managed to prosecute a fraction of those implicated and errors made in arresting and bringing such leaders to justice (especially from France) have been more than embarrassing ... even more embarrassing is the way in which this is still being sadly ignored ....

Rwanda responded to such a snub by altering its own rules on the death penalty and setting up its own system of trials based on local tradition - the Gaccaca courts. These have taken place across the country and have allowed normal people to confront their tormentors and give explanations .... a bit like the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa but even more focussed on the average village person - these courts have allowed those who committed serious crimes and genocide planning to be imprisoned yet also "pardons" those who were swept up in the madnesss of those 100 days .... its somehow worked (at least superficially) .... and its allowed the rebuilding of an entire nation and society to start ....


In some spirit of self-flagellation - the next day ... I decided to visit the genocide memorial at Nyamata about 25km outside Kigali. This was a Catholic church where thousands of Tutsi's sought refuge from the Hutu killers - who were their neighbours and friends in the same village .... the priest locked them inside, brought in the Hutu Interhamwe and then fled to Europe. Over 2500 people were murdered inside the church over the course of a couple of days ... the women were gang-raped and people who weren't killed first had their achilles tendons cut to stop them running away .... some were killed with machetes or clubs ... others with grenades and guns ....

Its a simple and small church .... brick built with a dozen roughly hewn pews .... and then you notice the church roof is spattered with bullet holes and blood .....

(The purple ribbons show that the 100 days of remembrance are being observed (from April to July) to mark the period of the actual genocide)



A side room is piled high with clothes and belongings of the victims .... you notice hairbands and torn Nike T-shirts .... spiderman pants .... and lovely batik prints ....

The front pulpit is covered with the same cloth that adorned it during the massacre ... its covered in blood .... and on top rests a pile of rosaries recovered from the carnage ....

Outside lies a neat row of mass graves .... twenty to a coffin ... those are for the lucky that have been identified or were found at least semi-whole .....

And then you walk on to perhaps the most horrific sight that I have ever seen .... underground lie the bony remnants of hundreds, thousands of others that were systematically chopped to bits and dismembered .... there are neverending racks and racks of bones ... almost immediately my Doctor-response kicked in and i started to identify the bones - femur, femur, tibia, radius - rather than take in the sight before me .... but then i reached to the skulls ... and I couldn't medicalise any more .... there are some that are smashed .... some whole ... and worst of all the tiny ones of the children massacred ....

It was to me the most powerful reminder yet of our failings as a international community and that we really must never ever allow ourselves to stand by and let such inhumanity take hold ever again .... jamais encore ....

A Slight Change to Plans

Hmmmm .... it seems that Kenya Airways is a little rattled by the recent plane crash ... one of their planes isn't feeling so well and so they've had to cancel flights out of Kigali .... you can imagine the chaos this has caused here .... all the Yanks are stamping feet and yelling about how important they are and how they have to get back (whilst muttering about third world etc etc) .... the various African women are all anxious as they've left kids at home and their fathers being good African men have barely coped with the four days let alone any more .... and there are few rooms in Kigali to put people up in ....

So for once my general habit of conflict avoidance has proved positive .... I agreed to leave on Saturday instead of Thursday .... and waived an offer of some grotty room in Kigali .... I'm going to take my chances and travel round the country a bit as well as doing the long-planned gorilla trekking .... i've found a driver (a young married muslim guy - so should be safe i hope) .... and am now doing some frantic reading about places to see ....

Worst Cultural Offenders of the past 60 years ...

A complete aside here ... but I'm just surfing the web as I wait for my gorilla trekking guide to come and pick me up (african time clearly ... already two hours late) and I came across this piece in the Guardian ... The Worst Cultural Offenders of the past 60 Years ....

With typical guardianista snobbery - the author has listed amongst others:-
Andy Warhol
Bono
The Jerry Springer show
and Sex in the City ....

Have to say - my top 10 would include at least:-

Big Brother
Las Vegas
Boy bands
Fox TV
E! TV
Dolly Parton/Celine Deon and all those other terrible female singers of the gay pantheon
The Telly Tubbies
Techno ....

Hmmm .... in fact I'm now hard pushed to think of positive cultural influences .... perhaps Oscar Wilde was right ....

The PEPFAR Conference

Where to start when describing this conference?

Firstly its been a ground breaking meeting since for the very first time the US-funded PEPFAR conference has invited in other agencies such as the WHO, UNAIDS, GFATM etc ....... given USAID's terrible reputation for engaging only in bilateral programmes and never contributing to basket-funded projects - this has represented a huge step forward ... its also meant that we've been graced by experts from all these different groups moving the emphasis away from toeing the PEPFAR line (abstinence good/condoms bad etc) .... and so the conference has been reinvigorated from mere forum where the various PEPFAR organisations show off their results and are suspicious of sharing"secrets of success" .... into a meeting where issues are being properly debated, difficulties and challenges openly aired and strategies that work highlighted ....

Secondly its also been amazing to be at such a diverse gathering - although it is a little ridiculous to be a British Indian representing Africa interacting with a Ugandan representing the US government and a Yank speaking for India .... but its great to see such a mix .... and i have revelled in meeting people from Cote d'Ivoire or Nepal or Djiboutie ..... it does however make me feel a little pity for poor white people with no decent national costume to bring colour to such an event ....

Thirdly its also been a conference where Africans have been given their place and time alongside american or european "experts" to present their experiences .... all too often we hear western academics lecture to us - setting standards and dispensing lofty advice ..... so its seems this forum has finally spawned true "south-south" cooperation as we share thoughts on the problems we face .... and debate how we should implement guidelines as best for own own contexts .... and i have been humbled by the courage, motivation and innovation shown by colleagues battling the epidemic with limited funds in areas bereft of all infrastructure .....


Fourthly - the conference was opened by Paul Kagame, the Rwandan head of state (and ex-RPF leader whose military tactical brilliance is credited with having ended the genocide) and was attended by the whole of the Rwandan parliament emphasising the political will behind efforts to control HIV in country where it was spread primarily as a result of the rape and torture carried our during the genocide. Last summer in Toronto - the Canadian Prime Minister refused to attend the International AIDS Conference (the gays aren't in line with his christian beliefs) ... and in South Africa - not only does our President not believe HIV causes AIDS and our Health Minister the laughing stock of the world but she also snubs all HIV conferences in the country and bans her staff from attending .... So it was really heartening to see that there are leaders on this continent who are prepared to confront this challenge ... the prevalence rate here in Rwanda is around 3% - just imagine if the South African government had shown this leadership when we had such low rates ....

Finally the main issues discussed have also been different to previous conferences i've attended .... the activists shouting for access to treatment and rights for health workers/prostitutes/one-armed lesbians etc are thankfully absent .... western buzzwords such as pre-exposure prophylaxis (essentially the morning-before weekend wonder pill for people that want to go out and have unprotected sex) and hot-of-the-press new drugs have rightly been disregarded as irrelevant to us .... instead the topics have ranged from how to responsibly implement male circumcision across our countries and cultures and how to improve our prevention of mother to child transmission (a real tragedy: a simple method exists yet is somehow shockingly poorly implemented) .... to the value of opt out (ie mandatory) HIV testing and how to integrate malaria and TB into HIV programmes or how to reach orphans and vulnerable children ....

I won't bore you with a litany of facts and figures ...... it suffices to say that we seem to be losing the battle with the current lip service that is being paid to properly funding and supporting the efforts so desperately needed .... over 25 million people have died from HIV since the early 80s and conservatively over 20 million currently live with HIV today .... that means that at present over 45 million people have died or have been condemned to die (and thats not counting the 3 million infected each year) .... 45 million people ...... that's more than 7 times the number of people that died in the Holocaust .... the majority of whom live in Africa ...

And so its appropriate that this conference has taken place in Rwanda - where 13 years ago - whilst it burned like hell on earth - the world turned its back and navel gazed in embarrassment ... after which Bill Clinton and Tony Blair amongst others pledged that we would never let it happen again .... Today however we see the same apathy and disinterest and i'm-sorry-but-what-can-i-do face making - and its not just AIDS .... tragedies have unfolded in Iraq, Afghanistan and Darfur ....

Kevin de Cock from the WHO gave a rousing plenary address yesterday urging western donor nations to honestly commit funds and honour promises made ... but also impressed upon us the importance of all of our roles and contributions to these efforts .... and he floored the whole audience by ending with a quote Martin Luther King:

History will have to record that the greatest tragedy of this period of social transition was not the strident clamor of the bad people, but the appalling silence of the good people .....

The Land of 1000 Smiles

Now i know i'm prone to fall in love with places (oddly - the direct opposite to the way i usually feel about people) and i know that i am somewhat prone to hyperbole (!!) .... and that the places i've ever not been effusive about are probably countable on just one hand (really just Portugal and Botswana .... and i guess also the US for which love-hate doesn't begin to describe my conflicting emotions about) ..... however i am happy to admit that i've fallen deeply in love with Rwanda ....

Flying from Nairobi (which included the ubiquitous unscheduled stop - this time in Bujumbura) ...
[An aside: Bujumbura! Those of you who i went to school with - do you remember doing all those cake sales and school fetes to raise money for Burundi - well congrats girls - i think it worked .... the place looks pretty good]
........ you pass over endless dry plains and beigey-grey landscape ... and then all of a sudden you're met by this deep green jewel-like land all misty and romantic. My school-girl imagination immediately kicked in - this was a Place for High Adventure .....

But right from landing in Kigali - the smiles started ...... the immigration officer was positively ebullient (in SA this is a role whose job description it seems to stipulate extreme grumpiness and sheer refusal to be helpful in any way) ....... the baggage handlers couldn't have been more efficient or eager to assist ..... in short the hospitality and grace of the Rwandan people has been incredible .... obviously some of this will have been enforced through the knowledge that this is the first major conference in the country and there is certainly a high level of state "control" here .... but truly the courtesy and care shown to me by every person i've met here has been unlike anywhere else i've ever been .....

Now the initial glow did subside somewhat when i was told on arrival that my nice cushy hotel room for the conference had mysteriously been double-booked (i'm blaming the yankee organisers and not the lovely Rwandese) ... and so i was allocated to stay at a private home about 15-20 mins drive away .... gulp i thought - .... as we drove out of the city ..... past a mosque (who knew there were rwandan muslims?!) and further into the suburbs .... what am i going to tell my mum if anything happens to me?

But its worked out fine .... in fact its been really good to escape the constant networking of the conference in the evenings and come back to a place where i'm forced to practice my GCSE (high school) french ... eat real rwandese food (grilled goat is so good!) and hang out drinking local beer in the neighbourhood .... and even far away from the tourist hotels and police presence - i am amazed at how warmly i've been welcomed and how safe i feel here .... the people are so thoughtful and nice that in fact i find myself smiling more too and even being friendly to complete strangers ..... what on earth will i do when i get back to SA?!

In praise of .... Nairobi Airport

So first stop on my Big Adventure seems tame enough ... Nairobi airport ... a place that i've rushed in and out of many times but never really stayed in for any amount of time .... and any airport at 530 in the morning is likely to be pretty rubbish - right?

Wrong - Nairobi airport rocks ....

The shops are hilarious ... there are about 75 of them ... all selling exactly the same thing namely afro-trash beads, kikoys (shawls) and carvings interspersed with bad wine and decent liquor ... eveything despite being the same has different prices but similar baleful sales assistants (which makes for comedy in itself) .... the internet cafes are snail-slow .... and the food options are limited to grease and lard ....

But its all redeemed (also in part by Java House - possibly the best coffee place in the whole of Africa) .... by the colour and the pageant ... you arrive in Nairobi airport and realise that the whole of Africa is passing through here ....

Johannesburg airport is a model of German efficiency and French design - all marble, glass and chic shops .... and you could easily mistake it for any airport in Europe ... the only black people there are of two extremes - either suited and booted/stockinged and stilletoed young black execs .... or the cleaners, security guards and general minions .... there's no in between ...

In Nairobi - the world is awash with bright colours, national dress and LOUD gabbling (no one in Africa seems to speak quietly) .... and even more so today because most of Africa seemed to be transiting through on their way to the conference in Kigali ...... it's chaotic, infuriating and totally utterly African ... and I love it ... ....

I wish i could have taken a picture of the lady in front of me in the rush for the plane (obviously no one queues here and seat numbers are deemed mere suggestions) .... she had on a parrot green Nigerian outfit .... an huge matching turban on her head ... and top of the turban she balanced a Louis Vuitton tote bag .... if that isn't modern Africa - I don't know what is ....

The Land of 1000 Hills ....

I am off tonight for yet another HIV conference .... but this time its in Rwanda .... the land of 1000 Hills .... and i am so nervous but dead excited ....

Now i grant you the background reading i've done hasn't been exactly inspiring .... genocide, rape and civil war (We wish to inform you ....)

But also there are some high points .... the country has dealt astonishingly well with the aftermath of its terrible recent history .... Rwanda is embracing new technologies and its applications to health and poverty reduction .... and is so committed to protecting its environment that all plastic bags are confiscated on entry ....

And of course there are the Gorillas .... silverback mountain gorillas .... can't survive in captivity .... highly endangered ... oddly don't drink water just somehow inhale it from the atmosphere .... huge great hairy beasts .... and i have rather bravely booked myself on a hike (!!!) up the volcanoes to try to see some .... so fingers crossed for me and them ....

"My take-home won't take me home"

We're in the midst of a crisis here in SA.

Nurses, teachers and other public sector workers are on strike across the country demanding a 12% payrise instead of the 6% they've been offered ....


And it is shocking - these workers are pitiably paid .... they make barely enough to cover basic needs ... and despite inflation now running at 6.5% - these public sector workers haven't had a decent rise in years ... which is especially galling when we're constantly being told how well the country is doing .... and when President Mbeki scores a 57% increase ....

However the reality is that for the past week - no children have been able to go to public school .... books, desks and facilities have been burned and kids have been threatened if they venture anywhere near a classroom .... exams have been postponed indefinitely and troops keep guard on school playgrounds ...

Even worse - although doctors have not participated in the strike .... our nurses sadly don't seem to be quite so sensitive to their essential staff status .... and have deserted hospitals and clinics in their droves .... even more horribly - they have barricaded hospitals, prevented patients entering and the army has had to be deployed for emergency medical assistance ....

I was doing my monthly stint at Edendale hospital last week ... and the junior doctors were being told to discharge all the patients they could because the hospital was planning on shutting down the next day (anyone left would have to be transferred to a private hospital) ....

As I left the hospital .... picketing nurses occupied the 5th and 7th floors of the building toi-toi-ing (a sort of scary demonstration singing/dancing effort - think old anti-apartheid riots) .... and when i finally battled the crowds and got outside ... cars were being smashed, tires burned and the police were firing rubber bullets .... it was my first proper strike - and I was terrified ....

This is the scene that now greets patients when they try to seek medical attention .....

The papers report that hospital authorities admit patients are dying due to lack of access to healthcare .... dying outside hospitals of heart attacks or asthma attacks because they can't physically get inside ....

The worst story of today was a woman who lost her baby because there was no one to assist the obstetrician with an emergency a caesarian section .... or a report yesterday of eight schoolgirls who were arrested after they got into a fight with striking teachers .... the girls were protesting against the strike: they wanted to be taught.

Now I am all in favour of workers rights ..... but I had always believed that the whole point of a strike is that it's a peaceful way to show strength and hence win demands. For me - it's the ultimate weapon that workers can wield in a collective bargaining situation ....

However here - there seems no end in sight to the violence as more unions are threatening to join the strike in sympathy. This from a teacher's union head: "We are at war now and in war there are no strict rules. You shoot to kill."

Birthday Presents for me ....

Just as the blog was getting a little afro-serious ... a brief social aside ...

I had a birthday last week ... and will post more on the festivities soon .... but i got this as one of my presents from my lovely new yorker mate Lisa .... rather worryingly my other presents were yummy delicious wine and a truly beautiful bottle of oban ...

We wish to inform you ....

Seeing as how Yat is now doing book reviews and spreading his literary wealth .... I thought it would probably be acceptable to give a quick mention to a truly astonishing book that i have just finished ...

On April 6, 1994, Rwanda's then Hutu dictator, Juvénal Habyarimana, was assassinated whilst returning to Kigali.

It has still never been actually proved who killed him - but what is clear is that a clique of military men were readily on hand to put into action a plan they had been hatching of "Hutu Power" .... an extremist ideology called as its ultimate goal for the extermination of every Tutsi in Rwanda.

For those of you who haven't yet seen Hotel Rwanda .... within hours of Habyarimana's death, many Hutus (including militias such as the infamous Interhamwe, policemen, ordinary citizens, even clergy) began indiscriminately murdering their Tutsi neighbors.

Over the next 100 days, between 800,000 and 1 million Tutsis and Hutu oppositionists were killed, most by machete, rape and unspeakable torture ..... while the international community stood idly by .... and, in some cases, acted in a manner that allowed the Hutu génocidaires to conduct their bloody work with even more ferocity and expediency. Once that had finished (not by international forces but by Tutsi forces fighting back) .... the ugly saga then continued through refugee camps, trials and more western obfucscating .... culminating in the creation of the new Democratic Republic of Congo and yet more bloody conflicts that still simmer on ...

What were we doing in 1994? What was the top story over that period? The collapse of apartheid perhaps .... or the end of the Balkans war maybe? No .... we and the world's media were all glued to the trial of OJ Simpson ....

The author Philip Gourevitch (who writes for the New Yorker) investigates the events before, during and after the genocide .... and is scathing in his debunking of myths and pathetic excuses .... the book leaves you inconsolable as every institution you want to believe in today is shown to have participated in the mess or purposefully turned a blind eye .....

However he saves his harshest criticisms for the UN (especially the then head for the Rwandan mission - a certain Kofi Annan) .... for the French - who quite shamelessly supported Hutu Power with arms and diplomatic clout throughout the genocide (apparently Mitterand's son was an arms dealer who certainly did very well out of the whole episode) ..... and the Clinton administration (particularly Madeleine Albright, then the U.S. ambassador to the U.N.) who adopted a catastrophic post-Somalia hands-off policy toward Africa ..... and seemed to engage in a bizarre semantic ducking-and-diving around the word "genocide." (remind you of any current event?!)

If any of you have ever been to the Holocaust memorial in Washington DC or anywhere around the world ... there is one stock phrase .... "Never again" ....

What tripe.

Again and again is perhaps more like it. In Darfur, we are witnessing a genocide again .... and again we are witnessing ourselves witnessing it whilst doing little to stop it. Just as Rwanda made a bleak mockery of the lessons of Bosnia and the Balkans - Darfur is making a bleak mockery of the lessons of Rwanda.

I'm quite ashamed to admit that I have read this book so late ... it should be essential reading for anyone working in Africa ... and frankly for anyone at all interested in our world today .... it is the sort of book that makes you despair for better things and makes you contemplate your wrists with your razor .... but it also perhaps one of the most powerful and truthful books that i have ever read ... and I urge you all to do the same ....

'Tis the season of the AIDS conference .... and meeting heroes ....

AIDS conferences are as much theatre as they are anything to do with real science or furthering the cause of people living with HIV .... my first experience was last year at the International AIDS conference in Toronto - a veritable circus for activist organisations, fringe groups and people who frankly just like to protest .... as well as a media love-fest for celebs, politicians and philanthropists. For every serious NGO, pharma company and scientist - there were groups such as grandmothers against AIDS, transvestites, transexuals, multisexuals and a whole bed-zone for sex workers of every shape, hue and flavour ....

The big conference this year is in Sydney in July, but there is also the PEPFAR shebang in Kigali in mid-June (on which more later since I'm actually going to that one) but to kick the season off this week is the South African AIDS conference in Durban - probably the most important national level conference in Africa ....

And with good reason .... South Africa has the largest number of HIV cases in the world .... and has both stories to be proud of as well as to wish swept under the carpet .... we've all heard the tales of Thabo Mbeki refusing to believe in HIV and stating that he doesn't even know anyone with AIDS, as well as our mad-as-a-hatter health minister Mantu Tshabalala Msimang who trashes ARVs and promotes garlic, lemons and the african potato ...

However - SA was also the host country for the 2000 International AIDS Conference (Durban) where for the first time the idea of ARV treatment for all was truly advocated for .... demanding decreases in the cost of treatment ... arguing on the basis of human rights that the developing world could not be ignored or used merely as a lab for drug testing without experiencing the benefits of such advances .....

SA is also the country which hosted the PEPFAR conference last year(Durban again) where the impact of this US funding body was properly debated and where we argued that rather than the US government being able to claim that the American people had out 1 million patients on treatment ... instead such funds should be used to actually strengthen health services and enable countries to put their own people on ARVs in a way that would be sustainable beyond George Bush ....

And its the home country for the TAC (Treatment Action Campaign) arguably the organisation who have done the most globally to spearhead the campaign to bring treatment to the developing world, to bring down the cost of drugs, to advocate for the rights of people living with HIV and to force a blinkered South African government to confront that they were allowing what some compare to a genocide to exist within the country ....

So we are all looking forward to this year's conference knowing that things are slowly beginning to change here (thanks in great part to the TAC amongst others) .... and proud that whatever we debate here will have massive impact on other national conferences in Africa and will form the basis for the big international conferences coming up ...

However when i walked onto my flight to Durban this morning ... i was gobsmacked to see that i was sitting next to THE Zackie Achmat (in economy no less!) - the founder of the TAC, one of Time magazine's Heroes and a Nobel Peace prize nominee .... sadly i was too travel sick to talk lots to him (i know most people grow out of it when they're 12 - but what can i do?!) .... and was frankly too shy to chit-chat with a man who is really one of my living heroes .... all i could do was thank him repeatedly for everything that he's done ... and ask him shamelessly for the cheesy photo below ....

Peace and Love to all Mankind ....

The Global Peace Index was published this week ... apparently the brainchild of an Aussie entrepreneur/philanthropist and conducted by the Economist's Intelligence Unit ... with the support of the Dalai Lama, Archbishop Desmond Tutu and the former US president Jimmy Carter.

It ranked countries on 24 different indicators assessing a coutry's level of violence and danger .... but takes into consideration street violence, numbers of prisoners and organised crime as well as general warmongering, military spending and intercontinental meddling ....

Unsurprisingly the Scandinavians did rather well .... Norway comes top of the table with its peace-loving neighbours Denmark, Sweden and Finland all in the top seven (what is it with the scandinavians coming top of eveything?) ..... New Zealand is second (surely too far away from anywhere and too full of sheep to cause anyone any problems?) ... the Irish were fourth (amazingly given recent history) .... one place above Japan (having an elvis-impersonator head of state clearly makes for more love less war) ...

Equally predictable the bottom 5 .....
121 Iraq
120 Sudan
119 Israel (interestingly Palestine isnt on the list)
118 Russia
117 Nigeria (there are some great nigerian blogs ranting against this!)

But the list also throws up some suprises .... the UK is ranked at 49 - way way below most other euro nations including the Baltic states ..... China comes in at 60 just below Libya and Cuba ... whereas the US barely makes the top 100 (96) just one spot better than Iran .... India and Pakistan fare dismally at 109 and 115 respectively .... and Somalia not really being a country doesn't even feature on the list ...

The Dalai Lama is quoted as saying "Compiling and maintaining an index of which countries are the most peaceful and publishing the results will undoubtedly make the factors and qualities that contribute to that status better known and will encourage people to foster them in their own countries,".

We can but hope.