Philadelphia to Ethiopia

TruthAIDS has a community partnership in Philadelphia with the Prevention of AIDS through Live Movement and Sound (PALMS) project. PALMS uses actors to teach about HIV prevention via role plays of very sticky life situations to at-risk youth. I accompany them on all their interventions and help out with answering questions from the youth regarding HIV. I also help out with testing and counseling after the interventions if needed and am working on strategies to help scale-up their efforts.

The intervention consists of 3 consecutive mornings of education with single-gender groups. The last round took place last week. The second day ends in a keep-it-real session which is similar to a TruthAIDS exercise called a TruthCircle. The session was extra real. Abuse, addiction, and difficult discussions with mothers and daughters were the themes of discussion. One of the participants didn’t say a word throughout the three days. She was extra quiet, I thought she had tuned us out and didn’t really care.

Fast forward, one week later. I receive a call today. “Miss… I don’t know if you remember me but I am one of the girls from the E3 center.” It was her, the quiet girl. “I’ve been thinking about you a lot and how much you care.” I listened. “Well you kinda look different and I only know one other person who looks like you and it’s my manager at the job. Anyhow, I got to talking about all the things you said about how stuff here and where you was born is actually worse. My manager be sayin the same thing and she really wants to meet you. I figure you guys are from the same part of town and all and she really cares too…” Well how did you get my number I asked? “I called the E3 center and asked the directors who had the number of the doctor who was around talking to us. I am at the job now and I just wanted to put my manager on the phone so you could connect.” I chuckled realizing she had not tuned me out at all. She was just listening really hard and making her own connections because she cared.

Turns out her manager was Ethiopian too and worked in human services organizations in Philadelphia. We talked about servicing unmet needs and laughed at the odd ways connections get made. I gave her my website info and told her she had a sweet employee. And just like that, the TruthAIDS family grows. Thanks quiet girl.