2010 - Love to be there

About 40% of adult deaths that occurred in the age group 15-49 years in 2000 were due to HIV/AIDS. About 20% of all adult deaths are due to AIDS. When combined with the excess deaths in childhood, AIDS accounts for 25% of all deaths in the year 2000 and has become the single biggest cause of death in South Africa. And if nothing is done to treat AIDS, the number of AIDS deaths is expected to grow further to more than double the number of deaths due to all other causes, resulting in 5 to 7 million cumulative AIDS deaths in South Africa by 2010.

There's this media campaign for AIDS awareness in South Africa called Love Life. I always thought their approach to the topic was a bit off-colour, rather promoting promiscuity than steering the youth away from it. The main slogan for the campaign (see title) was to inspire the youth to stay alive till 2010- it being the year of soccer world cup, SA's first attempt at proper public transport, and, well it's just such a smooth number. Even though I found the message slightly morbid the slogan stuck, and wherever my road leads me, in 2010, I'd love to be on home grounds.

With SA recently passing a bill legalising gay marriages (see http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15714036/ ) and religious fanatics kicking up a storm over this, I've been wondering where the line is between human rights and overseeing immorality. Just to clarify myself - the passing of the bill is shaap-shaap in my books. A liberal decision, but it is almost 2005, y'all. SA is a pioneering, leading country in so many ways, and in just as many, it's stuck in the corrupt political mud.

The line gets thinner with the following:
A mail from my mother, a teacher, told of the following developments in SA's education.
The government wants to implement maternity leave for school children, because so many pupils are out of school with pregnancies. The even want to bring creches to school, so that the children and their children can be close together. The kids keep having kids because the government gives grants to underaged mothers (the more kids your have, the more money you get, without lifting more than your knees). And so continues a destructive cycle.
The path to hell being paved with good intentions and all that.

That was my daily dose of cynicism.

On a happier note - I had whale for school lunch. Itadakimashita!