Kwejuna food distribution

Yesterday we had our quarterly food distribution for HIV infected women, the second of my time here, and it was a wonderful day. It was amazing to see almost 250 women show up, since there remains a lot of stigma associated with HIV, and these women are among the most marginalized people in this society. It’s even more remarkable that there is so much laughter and so many smiles among the women, even when they’re waiting in line at the community center for hours as we record their information. It seems to me that there is a real sense of community and camaraderie among the women, as they can sympathize with each others' sufferings (physical, social, and emotional) in a way that no one outside of that group really can.

I was in charge of weighing all the women and their children and measuring their height, and my day started off on the wrong foot. As I was weighing the baby of the very first women through the line – the very first – he peed all over me. This was no little trickle, this kid was hydrated. Not the way to start what was already going to be a long day. Jennifer said that I was now baptized. Luckily, that was the only time that happened all day, although throughout the day a puddle grew ever larger underneath the scale we use for the babies.

The other funniest part of the day was when two women, one after the other in line, set their cards on the table, and one of them also had a child health card. I had a rather simple method for keeping track of whose card was whose, but I got pretty seriously confused when I looked at these ones – both women were named Mbambu Grace. Both had daughters named Thungu Gloria, born a month apart. One card listed a husband named Muhindo, so I asked which woman was married to Muhindo – both claimed to be married to a Muhindo. At various points, we were certain that we had it figured out – each time a different way. After about 5 minutes of confusion, questions, women yelling and laughing, we figured it out based on where they lived – or rather, I handed them each a card with what I thought was the correct information, and I’ll never know if I actually go it right. But in a place with no social security numbers, where names can change from year to year (and some people struggle to remember the names of their children), and where birthdays are often not recorded, that’s just the way that record keeping goes.

It was special to see so many women, who are living with a fatal disease, just enjoying being together, and to have the chance to give them some food, some care, a smile, some encouragement. My attempts to speak Lubwisi provided a lot of comic relief to the women who attended (perhaps my most valuable contribution). It was wonderful to find a child’s negative HIV test results and give the good news to the mother, and it was heartbreaking to see the positive results. On some of the cards I saw the names of children whom I knew from the health center or nutrition work, only to see that they had recently died. There was a mixture of heartbreak and happiness that is hard to describe or understand.