AIDS activists try to spread the word

By Novan Iman Santosa

KARAWANG, West Java (JP): Like many AIDS volunteers around the globe, Abdurrachman Saibun, 25, is busy at the end of the year preparing to commemorate World AIDS Day, which falls on Dec. 1.

Last Sunday, the senior high school graduate led 35 other volunteers from Yayasan Pelita Ilmu (YPI),(a non-governmental organization focusing on AIDS), to provide an information service and campaign on the lethal disease in several villages in Karawang regency. The regency is located some 70 kilometers to the west of Jakarta.

For years, the area has been widely known for its promiscuous women and the permissive sexual activities in the villages. The fame of its women, for example, in swaying and rhythmically moving their body during dancing, has even been described in the expression Goyang Karawang (Karawang Sway).

It is said that husbands in some of these villages gratefully welcome any male strangers into their houses and permit them to make love to their wives. It is also said that many women who have been left alone by husbands working outside Karawang also open their doors to strangers, of course with the permission of their faraway husbands.

The sexual permissiveness is not all about money. Visiting males are said to be able to acquire free services, depending on their style of approach.

It is no wonder that many volunteers are concerned about the potential massive spread of HIV/AIDS in the area. People who live here mostly work on farms or in factories.

Abdurrachman said that at first it was difficult for the residents to understand his HIV/AIDS awareness campaign.

"I faced a big challenge from the residents because they didn't have a good understanding about HIV/AIDS," he said. "The residents simply thought that the disease could only happen to city people and the rich."

Abdurrachman has regularly visited the Karawang villages to spread HIV/AIDS awareness since 1996, but only after three years of hard work, has he finally been accepted by the locals.

He has even been christened by locals as the "AIDS man".

"They thought (at first) I was just a kind of technician, or a plumber," said Abdurrachman, who is of Betawi origin.

Trucks

To mark World AIDS Day, he and his friends drove last Sunday on three small open small trucks to the area. They distributed brochures and pamphlets on HIV/AIDS throughout their 20-kilometer journey from their YPI post at the nearby Pagadungan village of Tempuran subdistrict to the other villages.

Throughout the trip, members of the group explained matters related to the disease via megaphones from the cars.

"It's a way to attract the attention of the villagers," said Abdurrachman, who coordinates the team.

The volunteers also stopped at many busy shopping centers in Karawang city, distributing brochures about the HIV/AIDS campaign.

"The villagers usually spend their Sundays at such places, or just relax at home," Abdurrachman explained. "Moreover, there's no entertainment spots in their villages."

He and his friends believe that their street HIV/AIDS campaign on that Sunday was the first such campaign ever held in the West Java province.

Abdurrachman said the first HIV/AIDS case that alerted him and his foundation to focus their campaign in Karawang was the 1996 story of a local pregnant mother who was affected by the deadly HIV/AIDS.

He said the terrified woman was refused permission by her neighbors to deliver her baby in the area.

"The neighbors thought the baby would be a monstrous one, so they didn't allow her to deliver her baby in the village," he recalled.

The villagers also held a belief that stepping on any land belonging to the woman, such as her farm and paddy fields, would transfer her disease to them, said the volunteer, who has been with YPI since 1996.

After several difficult stages, the YPI volunteers were finally able to prove to locals that it was safe to have social relations with people living with HIV/AIDS.

"We carried the baby and showed the villagers that the baby was as normal as other babies."

He said the only way to present such a campaign was to show villagers the facts.

The other difficulty in imparting the messages are the different sex businesses in the Karawang villages.

Abdurrachman cited one example at a red-light district, about one kilometer south of Karawang city.

"There you can find houses used for prostitution on both sides of the street."

The volunteers had visited the place to alert the workers to the HIV/AIDS awareness campaign, Abdurrachman said.

"We approached and treated them in a very humane way. But we still find it difficult to convey our messages effectively, because the girls only stayed there for three weeks before being rotated by their pimps to other red-light places.

"They are often moved to Bekasi and Indramayu (in West Java), or to Tanjung Priok in North Jakarta every three weeks."

Rotation

He said that usually the YPI volunteers needed to spend at least one full month to convey their message to sex workers.

To anticipate the rotation, Abdurrachamn and his colleagues have designed a program to carry out their campaign in one week.

Abdurrachman outlined another sexual practice which posed risks to sexual health: what is known locally as an "Open House".

"It is a sex service usually provided by divorced widows or deserted housewives, not necessarily for money, sometimes just for sexual pleasure.

"Why would they do it for money? They already have everything," he said, drawing attention to their houses, motorcycles and rice fields.

"Some of the women are deserted by their husbands, who become migrant workers or leave for another woman," he said.

He said the types of "Open House" varied. One of them is called the "Love Restaurant" which offers extra services for customers that consume food or drinks on the premises.

"A bottle of soft drink can be as high as Rp 30,000 (US$4), from its usual Rp 2,000 price," Abdurrachman said, "because there is a lady accompanying you with her hands stroking your body or waving (paper) fans to chase the heat from your body".

"Further service is available on a guest's request," he added.

"All these practices make it difficult to stop the spread of HIV/AIDS, but we will continue our activities in HIV/AIDS counseling and education," Abdurrachman said.