Little travellers fight big problems

U of M students help fight AIDS in Africa

EVAN JOHNSON, STAFF

“People know that there’s this thing called AIDS in Africa, but I don’t think most people have any idea of the extent of the impact it has on families and on communities and on individuals,” said Ilan Schwartz, a 25-year-old University of Manitoba medical student and creator of the Little Travellers HIV/AIDS Initiative, a unique fundraising project that has, since its inception in 2005, raised over $100,000 for HIV/AIDS relief in South Africa.

Little Travellers got its start after Schwartz returned to Canada from a stint volunteering at Hillcrest AIDS Centre Trust, a non-profit, non-governmental relief centre located in the KwaZulu-Natal province of South Africa, a region with a particularly high prevalence of HIV infection—about 40 per cent in the province and an estimated 60 per cent in the area around Hillcrest.

One of the excellent programs undertaken by Hillcrest is their income generation craft project, in which women affected by HIV/AIDS earn an income by constructing various craftwork items, including a variety of small, adorable beaded dolls (Little Travellers), several of which Schwartz brought with him upon returning to Canada. He started to get offers from people wanting to buy the dolls and agreed to sell them on the condition that the money go to Hillcrest. Then, realizing that he had stumbled across an excellent fundraising opportunity, he decided to take action.

With a group of his generous Bannatyne campus classmates, Schwartz started a group called Simunye—Zulu for “we are united”—and was able to get the initiative started.

“Our first shipment was 1,000 dolls and everyone thought we were crazy, that we’d never sell 1,000 dolls,” he said. “It turned out that those 1,000 dolls were sold out in about three days.” The dolls sell for five dollars each.

Now, Little Travellers has sold over 21,000 dolls, and the project has nearly 100 beaders earning a living creating them. Because 100 per cent of the money raised through the sale of the dolls goes to those affected by HIV/AIDS in South Africa — approximately half of the money goes to the crafters, while the rest goes to other Hillcrest aid programs — the initiative relies on the support of various sponsors, including U of M student organizations like UMSU, to keep the operation running.

This past summer, Schwartz returned to Hillcrest along with fellow U of M medical student and Little Travellers organizer-volunteer Kristine Christoph, and the two spent time talking with many of the Hillcrest beaders. Though they had both volunteered there before, Christoph stressed the impact of getting a chance to speak with the Hillcrest women specifically about the impact of Little Travellers.

“One women told us that everything in her house she has been able to purchase with the money she’s received from making Little Travellers,” she said. “It was definitely such a joy to hear about the pride that people have in knowing that when they go to bed at night they’re sleeping in a bed that they purchased with their own money.”

With this pride comes a sense of empowerment that has significant importance in a country where the social stigma attached to HIV/AIDS infection can be extremely destructive to families and individuals, particularly women. Schwartz stressed in particular “the link between financial dependence and the inability to negotiate safe sex and to make one’s own reproductive choices,” and referred to an HIV-infected woman he spoke with who was able to use her newfound financial independence to convince her stubbornly resistant husband to get tested for HIV and subsequently receive treatment.

Recently, Schwartz had a chance to meet with Stephen Lewis, erstwhile UN special envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa, and took the opportunity to ask for Lewis’s endorsement of Little Travellers. Initially, Lewis was resistant because of the large number of groups and organizations that seek his approval, but in the end he provided an emphatic, ringing endorsement, calling Little Travellers “totally inspired” before adding, “I endorse it every stitch of the way.”

Visit www.littletravellers.net for more information. Those interested in volunteering with Little Travellers are encouraged to attend a meeting at 226 Oxford St. on Sunday, Oct. 23 at 7:30 p.m.. Little Travellers can be purchased at the University of Manitoba BookStore, as well as at other locations around the city.