A bit sad but hopeful

Sorry, another HIV Post!

But today I went to a pretty amazing place. But let me start at the beginning.

So basically we have to submit a WFP annual report soon, a glossy pretty much saying how great we are (same as any other annual report). So we went out to Takeo province to interview a lady who was being assisted by WFP and a partner NGO , Partners in Compassion (but I will get to them). So this woman was married with a boy (very cute kid btw!) when her husband started falling ill. They sold all their land and possessions to try and treat him and they eventually found out he was HIV. He then killed himself. Then she started getting sick and it was really bad. Luckily her sister brought her to this NGO and with their help and WFP's food she is quite healthy and is on anti-retroviral drugs which help delay the onset of AIDS.

So after the interview, we went to the Partners in Compassion site (which is located behind a pagoda) and I requested a tour.

As we walked in there was a girl, probably about ten, whose mother was getting her blood tested (the mother had just found out she was positive and of her two other children one was positive and one wasnt). I felt quite uneasy watching the strip test (basically blood is applied to a strip which indicates the presence of HIV antibodies - it isnt 100% reliable but is a good low cost indicator so if a positive result shows, they will be retested at the hospital with other methods) and felt like I shouldn't be there but in Cambodia there there isn't really such a thing as privacy so there was a bunch of people watching. Within a few minutes the mother was told ''nieng mee-un'' , she has. She will be retested at the hospital but apparently its pretty likely that she will be the 25th kid with HIV being treated there.

The centre started as a hospice for AIDS sufferers by a Cambodian and American doctor but they increasingly found that as the parents died, there was a large amount of kids left behind, both positive and negative. So they turned into a children's community. I also gush because although it is Christian organisation it works in active partnership with the Buddhist pagoda next door and its logo has both the cross and the Buddhist flag. Better than some other NGOs in Cambodia :)

Particuraly moving was the crematorium which had a family room attached and in it was the photos of all the kids and parents that had died there. Most of the kids living there had pictures of their parents, siblings and friends on the wall and went and prayed there. It was pretty moving. As we were leaving we met two pretty tragic cases, one a 2 month old girl who was the result of a rape, and her mother had just died of TB and a kid who was an unwanted birth and sold by his mother to a couple who couldnt have kids. The mother was positive so the new parents had the kid tested which returned a positive result so they abandoned him at the centre. The re-test later showed that the test was wrong and he was not positive.

The good news is though is that these kids are well looked after, they are on ARVs, they eat well and are schooled well. With this kind of care they can expect to live normal lives for a long time.

Spent the w/e in the speu which was nice, went for some bike rides (including past the prison which has a ladder hanging over the wall - better lock those doors :) )

Bye