Help. HRLN’s role is to help people. The goal of their legal education and training is to promote not only awareness about HIV/AIDS but also to help people understand their legal rights and their positions as equal persons under the Constitution of India. The challenge we encountered this week, which was in hindsight to be expected is that we can only help people that our willing to let us help. Jen and I met with a woman this week who works for an organization called the World Care Council. She is helping to implement programs for those affected by Tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS and Malaria. Her organization is there to provide assistance and support. In our meeting with her we were searching for cases of maternal mortality and HIV/AIDS so that we can put together a public interest litigation claim, so that something can be done about this issue and about the policies that exude discrimination towards HIV positive persons, in particular soon to be mothers whose own life and the life of their child is at stake. This woman tells us the story of a soon to be mother that is being refused a Caesarian section by the hospital for her firstborn child. Her concerns are that she gives birth to a healthy baby. We took this case back to HRLN and they contacted the woman offering HRLN’s assistance and help to ensure that she and her baby are provided the treatment they require. While she initially insisted she would be grateful for help, hours pass and her mind sways. She decides she no longer wants the help of lawyers. We don’t know if she is fearful for her confidentiality, fearful of lawyers, fearful of her family, or all of these things. There is no way of knowing, there is only one thing that becomes abundantly clear from this, try as you can to help someone, you cannot help someone who does not want to be helped, whatever the reasons. It is not a novel realization, but it a challenging one.

The Space Between Us. I started reading a book this weekend that I would recommend for anyone traveling in India. It is called the Space Between Us by Thrity Umrigar. It was recommended to me by a friend from home as I had decided this summer to read fiction books based in countries I was traveling to (i.e. Israel and India). Somewhat ironically the book has more to do with my time in India than just being based in India as it discusses AIDS in the book. It highlights the unawareness of AIDS that really is rampant in India. While numbers would be unknown, based on statistics of the prevalence of HIV and what I have learned in my time here, HIV is largely unknown, especially in rural or below poverty line communities. The book speaks to some of this unknown state of what exactly is HIV and it reinforces some of HRLN’s education. While HRLN is a collective of lawyers and social activists and as such have to be careful about educating about the virus in medical terms, they do try to clear up some basic confusion that surrounds HIV. Such as that the virus cannot be spread through “hugs”, or “shaking hands”. Seeing this information for the first time being communicated to the community made me realize how much about HIV/AIDS is unknown in many areas of India. I think it is easy to take not only our education system, but also our access to information and our ease of speaking about difficult topics for granted in Canada. While it may be a difficult conversation still in Canada, I am assured that most of us have heard of HIV/AIDS and know what it is and of its methods of transmission. This education and information is sorely lacking in India, and thus, prevalence rates continue to rise. [Other book recommendations that I have yet to read but hope to this summer (again, for anyone traveling to India at any point in their lives): A Fine Balance by Rohinton Ministry; White Tiger by Aravind Adiga].