Reflections on Africa

Again, I'm, at long last, trying to fill in some of the spaces from last year's travels - especially before the next round starts this summer and then fall. One of the things that I wondered about before arriving in Africa was how open a subject HIV/AIDS would be. Obviously, it's difficult to get completely accurate figures on these things, but it's estimated that just under 7% of the adult population in Kenya is has HIV/AIDS. It's a terrible figure, although certainly much smaller than what you would see in Swaziland (almost 39%), Botswana (just over 37%) or South Africa (just over 21%). I visited two universities in Kenya, Kenyatta and Moi, and they didn't shy away from addressing the issue. One of the first signs you see when entering Kenyatta University - and one of the biggest on campus - deals with HIV/AIDS. When I visited Moi University in Eldoret in northern Kenya there were actually free condom dispensers in the hallways (and one wonders how much of a firestorm it would cause in American universities just to put up pay dispensers).