Tutu Tester and condom quizzes

I think we would all agree that today was a monumental moment in our work with these kids. We started off with some really serious discussion topics, like "my teacher wants to have sex with me." I was working with an all girls group today and they were giving us all the right answers. They have led us to believe that they have minimal personal connections to most of the topics we go over, even the basic ones. Every now and again they'll say they know a friend that relates to the issue at hand, but I was beginning to believe that they weren't facing these types of situations yet. Until they wrote the letters...

Before lunch we had everyone write an anonymous letter to Auntie Stella about whatever they wanted advice on. We then read and discussed all the letters in our small groups. And to my semi-surprise these kids can relate after all, since a lot of the letters were about some really heavy stuff. The girls wrote about cheating boyfriends (surprising at 14-16 I think), pressure from their friends to have sex, their best friends sleeping with their boyfriends. There was some serious adult drama in these letters, and they were pretty tough for us to give advice on.

Then some of the guys' letters were even more serious. The most memorable was one which said that his girlfriend had told him last night that she was pregnant, was really angry about it and wanted to have him arrested, and wanted an abortion. What do you say to that?? So in summary it looks like we really are desperately needed here after all.

The girls also got to telling us a lot about some of the customs here relating to sex and marriage. Apparently in order to become men, ~18 yr old boys will go out and live in the bush in the eastern cape for a few months. During this time they build and live in a grass hut, walk around naked and painted white with only some form of wrap around their shoulders, and get circumcised. Yes, this really does happen. Also once girls get married they can only wear skirts. Maybe they'll ell me more later.

Finally, we wrapped up our work an hour early to take the kids down to the mobile clinic to get tested. It was entirely optional, but these kids don't really have anywhere better to go so a quite a lot of them walked all the way down there with us. It was called the Tutu Tester, a mobile clinic run by the Desmond Tutu Foundation and supported by USAID that travels around the area and I think stops in Hout Bay about once a month. They test for HIV, diabetes, TB, and body mass. On the walk down there all the kids were saying there is no way in hell they would get tested, even if we did with them. Most of them said they were too terrified (yes, they used the word 'terrified'). I tried to tell them it was easy while working to not push or persuade them. I am fully aware that they were not terrified by whatever the procedure would entail, but rather getting the results. HIV is very prevalent here, like the rest of Africa, but still stigmatized.

Thobane in the red, Azile in the gray
One of my girls, Azile, was open to getting tested from the beginning. She is awesome, always super involved in conversations and has a really good head on her shoulders. We were so proud of her for being brave even when none of her peers were. She even had to tell a nurse she was 16 instead of 14 in order to get tested. We all stepped right up and got measured and weighed for our BMI, then sat and waited to go into the mobile clinic for our HIV and diabetes tests. And of course all of the kids who so adamantly refused stuck around and watched us sit and wait.

The test and clinic was super simple. It was a simple finger prick for blood to use in an HIV test strip and blood glucose tester. A nurse asked a bunch of questions about sexual history, family history, current health etc, and I was given a clean bill of health. Then came kind of an unexpected turn: part of the test was to test whether I knew how to use a condom. Seriously. There was a wooden penis sitting on the table and the nurse handed me a condom and told me to put it on. I told the group about this at our meeting tonight, and no one else had to do it! (But no one else had my nurse) Seeing as how I will probably have to teach this in the very near future to a group of kids that have never seen a condom, it was a good confidence boost. And you know me, anything for a good picture; of course I asked the nurse if I could take a picture before I left to "show the kids what it's like."

As we started going in one by one and emerging proudly with our finger pricks, slowly the reluctant kids started stepping up to get in line. Thobane, who you could tell was genuinely terrified of getting tested just by the look on his face, eventually worked up the guts and agreed to do it. We tried to be as supportive as possible and Tess invited him in with her to watch as well as went with him while he got tested. We could not be more proud of him. His buddy Smash, who I wrote about earlier as the most outspoken kid in the group, was also adamant about never getting tested. He said he couldn't live with knowing he had HIV, and would rather just not know. He also walked down to the clinic with us, made fun of it for a little while and then left to go home. He came back about 15 minutes later and said to me "Natalie get this: when I got home, first thing my granny said was 'let's go down and get tested.' I told her no way, she can go by herself." I teased him for a while about leaving his grandma to go get tested alone, especially as he was hanging out with us AT the clinic. But after I emerged from my testing, he was sitting and waiting for his turn. Poor kid was so nervous, but once again I am so incredibly proud of him for being brave and making that choice. Once we were done some of us took a picture with our post-test bandaids, which is thus far one of my favorite photos for so many reasons.

Without a doubt today has been the most moving experience here. I am so proud of each and every one of them, and of our group for setting an incredible example. Maybe we are getting through to these kids after all.