In-depth: Love in the time of HIV/AIDS
Photo: Glenna Gordon/IRIN
Wakesho's events provide entertainment and allow HIV-positive people to socialise
The party at a popular restaurant in Nairobi, the Kenyan capital, looks ordinary, but the people attending it - all of whom are HIV-positive - are enjoying a rare opportunity to socialise without feeling like an outsider.
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The story of Samuel and Stella Malunga* is one of love and forgiveness in a time of HIV and AIDS. They met and fell in love while studying law at a university in neighbouring South Africa. Samuel graduated two years before Stella and returned to Zimbabwe but kept their relationship going until she was able to join him in 2000.
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Tips for managing domestic arguments and ensuring a happy sex life are just some of the bits of wisdom passed on at Tanzanian bridal showers. Known as "kitchen parties", no subject is taboo as the guests prepare brides-to-be for life as a wife.
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When Clémentine Banzoat, 41, a mother of two, learnt she was HIV positive nine years ago, she not only lost her partner, the father of her second child, but also her job. After several failed relationships with HIV-negative men, she decided to look for an HIV-positive partner to form a family.
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Last year, Camille Liu's* future was looking good. He had met a woman - "a perfect match" – while working in Mozambique as an electrician. They fell in love, decided to move to his home country, Mauritius, get married and have children.
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That teenagers, and even pre-teens, become sexually active is usually kept under the blanket, especially in conservative societies, but when these young people are HIV positive the issue becomes even harder to acknowledge, and has been largely ignored.
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"Multiple, concurrent partnerships" has become the latest catchphrase in the HIV/AIDS lexicon. It refers to the practice of having more than one sexual partner at the same time, which experts say is a key driver of Southern Africa's devastating HIV/AIDS epidemic.
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To avoid the pain of being rejected, many HIV-positive Kenyans are choosing to exclusively date other infected people. But does this make things any easier?
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Fatuma and Hamidu Kamugisha met 12 years ago as hotel employees in Tanzania's Victoria Lake-side town of Mwanza and sparks flew. The couple hooked up, married and then returned to Hamidu’s native Uganda where they had four children.
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The dating scene is often compared to a jungle: rough, tough and a little bewildering. But when you're HIV-positive and looking for love, the map's even harder to decipher, the journey fraught with esteem-threatening decisions and nagging uncertainty.
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