20 for 300

Today was the 4th day of the lifeskills training for HIV+ women - it's been very interesting. The women are really opening up and talking to each other. In a couple cases they've only known of their HIV status for a short time and the difference a few days makes has been remarkable. One woman brought her 6 year old son for the day - we helped entertain him. It was hard because he has a father, mother, and uncle all positive, and his mother is pregnant and of course we don't know if the infant will be infected or not. Yet it's great to see the positive attitude this woman has - she is a real fighter, all of the women are.

So speaking of fighters, since we've been basically cooped up in a hotel for 4 days, I decided to take all of the women and staff to see a movie - that's 20 people. Here that means thirty dollars, basically taking 3 people to a movie in California, so very worth it. It was at a mall right across the street from the hotel, we surprised the women by saying we were going on an excursion and then they were surprised to find out we were going to watch a movie! The only things showing were 300 and some Indonesian horror films - Indonesians love horror films, but since I'm still sleeping alone at the GC office for another week, we decided on 300. We had great fun watching the film all together; a nice change of pace and I was happy to offer folks a breather. Tomorrow I'm on the agenda to teach a module on HIV immunology, which will be intense since they are all HIV positive, so good to have some fun beforehand.