BY JOHN HAMILTON

The first citizen of Malawi I ever met was a 9-week-old baby named Moses. It was my first full day in Malawi, Africa, and the doctor I was visiting, Perry Jansen, was opening his small clinic on a Sunday morning because Moses was not doing well.

Farmers had found Moses in a sugarcane field, abandoned by his mother, who had AIDS. On that Sunday morning, Moses was thin and weak, and everything he did — even blinking his eyes — appeared to happen in slow motion. Treating Moses would be a challenge. He might have malaria, which is treatable, or still be trying to recover from malnutrition. Expensive tests to confirm Moses’ HIV status were not available.

I went to Malawi in December to visit friends who are working to help Africans affected by HIV and AIDS. I returned with a heavy heart. In the capital city of Lilongwe, 25% of the population is thought to be infected.

The impact of HIV/AIDS erodes all aspects of society: Teachers die faster than new ones can be trained; the impact on agriculture fuels the possibility of famine; AIDS-related orphans drain the resources of extended families. Uninfected children have little chance of normal lives as they cannot afford an education or must care for sick parents or siblings at home.

Yet in the midst of all this, it was encouraging to witness the positive work being done.
During the week I spent at the ABC Clinic, I met HIV/AIDS patients, spent time with orphans, saw a food-distribution program in a nearby village, joined volunteers as they went to the homes of individuals too sick to go to the hospital and sat in on a local club of young men who meet weekly to encourage each other toward staying HIV negative.

My interest in HIV/AIDS has roots in the death of my own partner four years ago. As I cared for Bruce during the last two years of his life, I saw how AIDS ravaged his body. Watching Bruce decline, I knew that this was not the way it is supposed to be.

Everywhere in Malawi you are confronted with the same fact. Just last month, the U.N. Secretary-General’s Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa described the world’s inadequate response as “mass murder by complacency.” Those are strong words, but for individuals convinced to emerge from our complacency, even our first weak steps can have positive impact.

It is tempting to find only despair when confronted with what has been described as the cruelest disease the world has ever seen.

But the trials of the people of Malawi are already bringing forth astonishing examples of courage and fortitude: individuals who find the resources to do what’s necessary, whether working in a clinic or providing relief to remote villages.

In Malawi, I saw that mankind’s best qualities can be found in hopeless situations, amongst those who are trying, in large or small ways, to make the world the way it is supposed to be.

Hamilton is assistant dean of the School of the Arts and Architecture.