AIDS

The 15th International AIDS Conference has finally come to a close after a week of moving speeches, angry demonstrations, detailed scientific analyses, and the attendance of some 20,000 delegates, international celebrities (Ashley Judd, Richard Gere, CoCo Lee, Rupert Everett, Oprah Winfrey, Dionne Warwick, Princess Mabel of the Netherlands) and political figures (Kofi Annan, Nelson Mandela, Sonia Gandhi).  I was fortunate enough to obtain VIP tickets from my uncle, and was able to listen to Nelson Mandela and Sonia Gandhi speak on the last day of the conference.  Their speeches were very moving and incredibly rousing.  It's sad how political differences can sometimes get in the way of the more significant issues, making us lose sight of the individual people who have been affected by this horrible disease.  In his speech, Mandela mentioned a little something about AIDS patients swiftly being reduced to "mere statistics", and I found myself agreeing with him completely.  When I was in high school, I was lucky to have had the opportunity to visit AIDS hospices and talk and interact with various AIDS patients.  But as shameful as it sounds, before that, they'd been mere statistics in my eyes, too.

I went to an AIDS hospice for the first time in 10th grade as a part of my Catholic Studies class.  We were all a little apprehensive at first, as we didn't quite know what to expect.  A few parents were apprehensive too; it took a lot of convincing and persuading before many of them were finally willing to give their consent and sign the permission forms (No, your child won't contract HIV from interacting with the patients.  Yes, there will be some physical contact - holding of hands, massaging of legs, hugging - but your child won't be able to contract the disease.  Yes, should you not wish for your child to come into physical contact with the patients, your child can observe from afar.)  One of my upperclassmen, who'd already gone to the AIDS hospice the year before, told me that when the time had come for him to massage one of the patients' legs, he almost didn't know what to do.  Not that massaging requires the intellect of a rocket scientist, but because there literally was nothing there to massage - nothing except for loose flesh and brittle bone. 

But besides the issues of physical contact, we were rather nervous because we weren't quite so sure of how we were supposed to interact with the patients.  Should we be cheerfully optimistic?  Brutally realistic?  Or simply keep quiet in fear of offending them?  But when we finally arrived at the hospice, the people we met there immediately put all of our worries to rest.  They chatted with us, laughed with us, held our hands, and smiled so carelessly... as though they themselves were unaware of the skin hanging off of their bones or their sunken eyes and prodtruding cheekbones.  I don't care if this sounds cliche and slightly melodramatic, but it was as if they'd successfully managed to detach Spirit and Body into two separate entities; as if their spirits were free from their disease-ridden bodies.  And the spirits we met that day were such beautiful ones.

There was a girl who was only a few years older than the rest of us; still nothing more than a teenager.  Sounding like a "statistic" in the sad reality that is Thailand's modern-day AIDS story, she was originally from Chiang Rai, but had been sold by her parents into prostitution.  She said that she'd cried in isolation for weeks, putting on watery smiles and doing as her "pimp" told her to do the rest of the time, and hating every moment of it.  She had only been 14 at the time, and missed home desperately.  In fact, she still did miss her home, siblings, and most especially, parents.  How bittersweet it all seemed.  Here she was, a mere ghost of a thing, dying in a Catholic AIDS hospice hundreds of miles away from home, and still she missed the two people who had been the cause of her eventual demise.  Incredibly enough, she wasn't bitter about how things had turned out for her; she only hoped that her family - and especially, her younger siblings - had benefitted from her "sale".  The last thing she wanted was for her younger sister to be sold into prostitution and eventually meet a fate similar to hers.  After hearing her story and talking to her, I was left feeling extremely foolish.  I felt like all my concerns then - college admissions, SATs, high school crushes, exams, school dances - were all paltry and insignificant in comparison to what she was going through, lying there and struggling simply to draw the next breath until the time would come for her to finally draw her last.

We met other patients who had contracted HIV from drug use, unprotected sex, and in some cases, sex with one's own husband.  There was a lady who hadn't known that her husband was a frequent visitor of the city's many brothels, and so she had consequently contracted the disease from him.  There was another patient who, like so many other women in the world, had gotten the disease through prostitution.  Since her previous job required that she interact daily with foreign men, she was able to speak some English and was even able to chat with the students of the class who couldn't speak Thai.  What made the situtation even more heartbreaking was her infant daughter, who had also contracted the disease while in her mother's womb.  Even sadder than that, was the fact that the baby's mother died while we were there, choking internally on her own fluids as her baby girl cried in her mother's dying arms.  I was left wondering about the child's fate.  Of course she would eventually die, but what about before that?  I'd gone to an orphanage in Pattaya the year before in 9th grade, and remembered playing with a beautiful 5-year-old curly-haired luk-krung (eurasian) girl who no one wanted to adopt, because she had AIDS.

I apologize for the gloomy and somber entry, but the past week got me thinking and made me remember the AIDS hospice visits we used to make back in high school.  I'm grateful we made those visits, for it helped in giving the disease a human face in my eyes, and helped me to see beyond the statistical numbers we sometimes tend to passively overlook.  It also reminded me of how fortunate I am, and how easy it is to become ungrateful and negligent about the small, important things in life.  Family, friends, love - what more could one desire for a more fulfilling life?

~*~


Some AP and Reuter photos from the past week.

Elephants greet delegates to the 15th International AIDS Conference.



Activists and protesters converge from around the world and crowd Bangkok streets to raise awareness on AIDS-related issues, including drug prices, clean needle distribution, and condom use.



Lookie here, they can rhyme too.



Subtitles, for your viewing pleasure.
U.S. officials were shouted down at the various press conferences by European and Asian activists.  America was accused of not having a larger delegation presence at the conference, and while the United States is the most generous donor nation on AIDS, they were criticized for promoting "treatment and prevention plans that pander to conservative religious purposes and to the powerful American pharmaceutical lobby".



Kofi Annan and his wife greet HIV-infected children at a Bangkok hospital. He praised Thailand for its past successes in reining in AIDS, and warned that Asia is at a critical turning point in fighting the scourge.
"We need leaders everywhere to demonstrate that speaking up about AIDS is a point of pride, not a source of shame. There must be no more sticking heads in the sand, no more embarrassment, no more hiding behind the veil of apathy."


 
British actor Rupert Everett with a family affected by HIV.
"Prejudice keeps people in wealthy countries from paying attention to the worldwide AIDS epidemic. We are extremely racist."


 
Hollywood actor Richard Gere at the AIDS conference.
"I found myself in the last few days getting very teary about [the plight of all the infected youths], and in the middle of the night I started crying and it all came back to me."



Miss Universe 2004 Jennifer Hawkins of Australia greets an AIDS patient and monk at an AIDS hospice in Thailand.



Miss Universe 2004 Jennifer Hawkins at Bangkok's Wat Phra Kaew.
"Messages about safe sex have still not reached most of my generation. There are a lot of things that kill people today, but nothing rivals the stigma of AIDS."



Hong Kong pop star and YouthAIDS ambassador, CoCo Lee, and HIV-positive muppet, Kami (of South African Sesame Street fame), speak to reporters during a press conference.



Nelson Mandela and Sonia Gandhi shake hands after the closing of the 15th International AIDS conference.
Mandela: "I cannot rest until I am certain that the global response is sufficient to turn the tide of the epidemic.  History will surely judge us harshly if we do not respond with all the energy and resources that we can bring to bear in the fight against HIV/AIDS."

Gandhi: "I have seen people who have lost jobs and who have been ostracized, and the orphans not adopted because of stigma, and I have seen people fading away in front of their helpless families."


 
Ashley Judd and CoCo Lee join a religious rite for those who have died of AIDS-related illnesses at Wat Phrabat Namphu hospice in Lop Buri province.



Ashley Judd and CoCo Lee sit with a HIV patient at the AIDS hospice in Wat Phrabaht Nampu temple.

 CoCo Lee was reduced to tears after this visit, and I saw a clip of her on TV saying that "[she'll] never forget all the wonderful people [she] met" and that the whole experience has left her feeling "incredibly sad".



After having been splashed across all the local newspapers and evening news recaps, this image has become rather famous around town.   A picture can indeed speak a thousand words.  ~*~  Oh, and sorry for jumping on the Spiderman bandwagon, but after watching it over the weekend, it has to be said - Spiderman 2 kicks major Doc Oc ass.  I may posses an intense loathing for arachnids of all shapes and forms, but Tobey Maguire, I mean, Spidey, can save me from mad scientists anyday.

 

 

Currently Playing: Bohn Haw Koy by Sandra (Why are Thai songs always so sad?)

"ฉันร้องตะโกน ฉันคุกเข่า
พูดเรื่องเก่าเก่า เลื่อนลอย
และรอคอย ปลอบตัวเองว่าเธอต้องมา
ห้องมืดกว่าเก่า และว่างเปล่า
เหมือนฉันอยู่บนหอคอย
อ่อนแรงลงไปช้าๆ
อ่อนล้าเกิน จะหายใจอีก"
Currently Reading:  Shopaholic and Sister by Sophie Kinsella (The 4th installment of the Shopaholic series - I finally got it!  What can I say?  Every girl needs a little chick lit to spice up her bookshelf, you know.)