I uploaded more photos!

Mikadi Beach
Originally uploaded by .aef..

This photo is from Mikadi Beach. We went a few weekends ago, it was wonderful, and there are more pictures on my flickr website.

Today is Friday and I could not b more excited. It was just a long week. In other news, I might do a small survey/study at UDSM about perceptions of HIV/AIDS. This idea grew out of a discussion in one of my classes today. We were talking about the social and cultural aspects that contribute to the widespread rate of HIV/AIDS infections in sub-saharan Africa. One point that got brought up by the presenter was that women need to be educated about HIV/AIDS and condoms. Later in his presentation, he stated that in many Tanzanian cultures married women do not have control over the frequency of sexual contact in their marriage, use of protection, or other aspects of sexual contact between husband and wife. As he continued, he kept hinting that it is the woman's fault if she gets infected with HIV/AIDS. So I think it would be interesting to do a study of what Tanzanian men and Tanzanian women think, who is responsible for protection, who's fault it is that HIV/AIDS gets transmitted, and just general knowledge of the virus.

On another topic, I am getting so frustrated with Tanzanian men who play the cultural relativity card to defend patriarchal and oppressive aspects of Tanzanian life. For example, in my seminar that I discussed above. One of the LCCT students brought up the point that it is not just women who need to be educated about condom use and HIV/AIDS. Men also need to be educated. You can educate the women all you want, but if women are not allowed to control when and how they engage in intercourse, then all the education will not help them. They will still get infected with HIV/AIDS because they can't control whether or not a condom is used. I would argue that men need to be educated just as much, if not more than women about HIV/AIDS and condom use. But whenever it is suggested that women actually become more empowered to make decisions about their body, the men always respond with "in my culture, it's just like this. We can't change it, it's our culture." Another example, yesterday in my criminology lecture when the lecturer implied that all prostitutes are drug addicts, and that that is the reason women become prostitutes, to earn money for their drug addictions. When I brought up the point that that wasn't true, many women become prostitutes because they have no other option and that is the only way they can survive, some kid in class said something along the lines of "in my culture that isn't true because women choose to become prostitutes only if they are naturally criminal. In my culture being a prostitute is illegal and only criminals become prostitutes." I was so angry with him. There have been other instances of men just saying "it's my culture" when the topic of gender inequality comes up, and it has just made me angry.

I understand that this is not my culture. I understand that there are many things about Tanzanian culture that I do not understand. But I do not think it is acceptable to oppress another human being and say "it's my culture, I can't change it." I have never ever heard a Tanzanian woman say that instances of sexism are just culture. I have only heard men say that when they are trying to explain away some inequality.

Anyways. I am going to go jeans shopping now. I fell and ripped the knee open on one of my two pairs of pants and because the non-ripped pair aren't as dressy, I would like to buy a nice pair of jeans to wear on days when I need to present especially. That and jeans are comfortable and remind me of home. And I didn't bring a pair.