Select students visit Malawi to fight global HIV/AIDS crisis

When members of Student Leaders in International Medicine went to Malawi, they were surprised… When members of Student Leaders in International Medicine went to Malawi, they were surprised that the local vendors knew so much about American politics. ‘They knew everything about our politics,’ said Miranda Velikoff, who went to Malawi this year. ‘They knew an African-American was running.’ Pitt student Alicia Rosenbloom chimed in, ‘Everything was, ‘How’s Obama, How’s Obama?’ They knew a lot more about it than I did.’ Each spring the Student Leaders in International Medicine sends volunteers to Lilongwe, Malawi, where they work with native Malawian groups in an effort to fight the HIV/AIDS crisis in Africa. Last year’s group consisted of students Velikoff, Rosenbloom, Sesi Aliu and Elizabeth Van Loon. They were chosen from within SLIM during the fall semester and went to Malawi shortly after school let out, from May to June. Now that the group has seen the condition of Malawi, ‘We’ll keep that in mind when voting,’ said Vekilof. Aliu agreed, saying, ‘It changes the way you think about policy. Whether it be the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank or the U.S. government, it all affects Malawians. The world is the way it is because people make certain decisions.’ The group used money from a 5K/10K fundraising race it holds every spring. But it only paid the way for a designated group leader, someone who was there the year before and would serve as a guide. The rest of the group paid for travel expenses and airfare on their own. The students, Van Loon said, returned from their trip feeling ‘frustrated.” ‘Money is being poured in [to organizations], and we saw the real hard truth that it doesn’t always get where it’s supposed to, and they’re not as effective as people say they are,’ said Aliu. So SLIM took matters into its own hands. The group works with native Malawian community-based organizations to help each of the five major villages set up sustainable projects that will better the community and thereby better the health conditions, Van Loon said. ‘SLIM narrowly focused on medicine when it first got started,’ explained Aliu. ‘As we did more research, we realized the world isn’t just different spheres of health and economics, but it’s all connected.’ The group managed to connect the five CBOs ‘mdash; Mwana Wa Nzako, Mchenga, Paradiso, Luzi and Tilerane ‘mdash; on its first trip. Now the five villages have monthly meetings to discuss problems in the area. In Malawi the group members alternated their time between researching on health, economic and human rights issues and taking trips out to the five villages and getting to know the people in them. They held a general meeting with the community about every three days, said Aliu. About 100 to 200 people would show up to listen to a panel composed of Student Leaders, different community leaders and directors. The leaders talked about problems in the community ‘more for our benefit, since the community already knew these things,’ and the Student Leaders asked questions, said Aliu. After the public meetings SLIM held private meetings with the community leaders to discuss project planning. ‘The communities needed things like access to clean water,’ said Rosenbloom. The major goal of SLIM’s trip then was to plan project goals for each community designed to help them attract business or to improve the sanitary conditions. They found that Mwana Wa Nzako needs a paraffin pump so the people can sell fuel, Mchenga needs a borehole for clean drinking water, Paradiso could use a pick-up truck for easier transfer of AIDS patients, Luzi needs a bakery to manage feeding all of the orphans from family with AIDS it takes in, and Tilerane needs a pig farm for feeding it orphans as well. When SLIM wasn’t in meetings, the group was out in the community. ‘One of the cornerstones of the project was to get involved at the community level,’ said Aliu. The group stayed with a CBO director’s grandmother. They called her ‘Gogodas,’ which means ‘grandmother’ in Malawian. They met her relatives and helped her cook. They laughed, recalling the time that they helped her make ‘nsima,’ a corn porridge. Cooking on a wood stove was harder than it looked. ‘To stir the pot takes a lot of strength,’ said Aliu. ‘She was better at it than me.’ The group befriended local vendors, often taking them out to lunch.’ SLIM said its goals had not yet been met. It needs more fundraising to help fund the project proposals written up during the 2008 trip, which is why the group is going back next year, from May to June. Student Leaders will choose the next group from within its organization by the end of the fall semester.