Huuummus

Today’s theme is “How do you heal a society?” This question was asked by Christina Zarowsky, the director of the HIV/AIDS research center in the department of public health at UWC. We spoke to her today about public health, specifically sexual health, in South Africa and what UWC’s school of public health is doing to combat such issues in the community.
To go in chronological order, today consisted of a visit to UWC and the two tracks of my program (sexual health and social work) split up to attend different seminars, meetings and classes. The sexual health track went to a meeting during which women’s and gender studies master’s students defended their proposals for research. It was really cool to hear their ideas and everyone in the room was able to comment, critique, and ask questions, so some of us got involved in the discussion too. We only were able to hear two students before moving on to our next event of the day, but they were both extremely intriguing and I would be interested in hearing the actual research later! The first man spoke about an organization created by national soccer players to teach young learners about the importance of personal health, including sexual health and healthy relationships. They use soccer as a metaphor for healthy lifestyle choices. He is questioning young females’ role in the organization because of the sporty nature. The next woman spoke about women’s active role in the illegal drug trade. Most people assume that if women are involved that they are being used for trafficking and exploitation, but she is interviewing women who are ex-drug dealers who actually had power and made money. Anyway, both sound stellar and it was a new experience to be a part of their discussion!

 Moving on, next we sat in on a Women’s and Gender Studies class. She spoke about intersex and bodies, about our culture’s need to police the gender binary and the intersectionality of black women’s bodies. She pointed out that current beauty standards are hugely constructed by our culture and our need to objectify women’s bodies. I learned a lot, but much of what she discussed we had already done with Heather in her class and during out orientation for this trip.
Next we went and visited Christina at the office of HIV/AIDS research in the school of public health. Basically, she was intimidating because she is so tight. She was really inspirational too because this woman has done a whole lot; like 4 degrees post-graduate, doctorate from Harvard, worked for McGill and is now helping save the world in South Africa. Needless to say, she had a lot to bring to the table and she understands the challenges of a job like this. I wouldn’t want her job because I am sure it’s crazy overwhelming, but someone needs to do it. Also, it was really exciting because even though they don’t have conclusive data, things like HIV transmission, have decreased in the past years, and since many of the programs have been implemented just in the last 10-15 years this is great news! Apartheid really messed up this county, and it’s rather discouraging that so much of this progress would be even more if 50 or so years weren’t driven in the wrong direction. Because, like I have mentioned before, not only does this country suffer from years of ill informed public health knowledge, each race has been ‘trained’ to think separately than other races. This trip has been truly eye opening and so so so informative. I don’t even know how else to say it. It’s all coming to an end tomorrow, (except for the next week, when some of us are still here. We plan on trying to figure out if we can visit UWC again) I’m sad it’s ending, but very grateful for the opportunity to come here and experience this.
Also, we met up the the UWC HIV/AIDS peer educators again! Gah they are so fun! We are going to a braai with them tomorrow, the most famous braai in town! And we interviewed them for a video we have to make for credit for our class.  Really, all day has been just super and I am really happy we were able to bounce around and experience all these facets of UWC.

A couple days ago, a bunch of us went to this greek restaurant right in the shopping center next to our hotel, which happens to have the BEST hummus ever. In the world. Also, perfect mojitos, and our waiter Evans, was pretty super too. So we also went back tonight to partake in that again tonight.

Cheers!