JustBeUrself

You, me & AIDS..

India lost another match and dad & I were watching insipid news shows showering brick-bats on Greg chapel & bouquets on ganguly dada. Dad was lecturing about the usual “Be responsible” & “Grow up” stuff & I was changing channels more fast then Paris Hilton changing her partners & by chance we landed on MTV. My fingers just froze. A lady in her twenties was recounting her ordeal after she was diagnosed HIV positive, In fact she was blamed by her in-laws for bringing the curse on their son & was thrown out of their house, and she was stigmatized & victimized for no fault of hers. It’s very much clear that her ‘faithful’ husband had got her in this mess; still the lady stays with her husband and had to abort her child due to the circumstances forced upon her.

My own dilemmas cropped up & I was kind off feeling at unease seeing the discussion that followed, “was this thing ok to talk about”, “how it actually spreads”, all my fears & doubts came to fore and I knew answers were far from coming. I tried to strike a conversation with dad but seriously could not muster up the courage to really get to the point, doctors & volunteers from a NGO were trying their level best to clear up the haze surrounding AIDS & HIV. I comprehend that unsafe sex is the major reason but seriously even being a 3/4^th engineer my knowledge regarding aids is peppered with irrational fears & rumors, like hiv +ve people pricking needles to take revenge, hiv virus being passed during food preparation & even shaking hands with hiv +ve people being dangerous cloud my mind. I know these are based on unfounded fears, but you don’t need to be an expert to not to be influenced by guys talking all this gibberish. Me & my friends way short on awareness on this issue. This issue remains a taboo in our homes, educational institutes, hang-out places, everywhere. We refuse to simply talk about it. I remember during a late night hostel gupshup session Sam tried broaching this subject & the standard reply was “WE know everything dude, It can’t happen to us” & we moved onto other topics..

But it can happen to me, to you or your best friend, hiv virus doesn’t see the label of your jeans or perfume you are carrying, unsafe sex, improper blood transfusion, sharing needles all can cause aids & seriously You know when you are at risk.

I jotted down the number of the helpline & plan to call them 8 am tomorrow morning to clear up my doubts because I don’t want to carry the baggage of irrationality and I guess I am going to literally force my friends to listen about it.

Life is precious & we can’t afford to lose our loved ones just because of lack of information, ignorance is not bliss in this scenario. We are responsible for good health of our loved ones and our deeds, aren’t we. So my real-life friends you will be listening a lot about aids & hiv from my mouth over a next few days.

posted by Ginni @ 9:19 PM