In the summer of 2000, Dr. John attended the International AIDS Conference in Durban, South Africa. A lovely city not well known to tourists, it had beautiful beaches, slums, fancy areas and segregated townships. Dr. John wrote:
"Durban will be forever be imbedded in my mind with wonderful memories of its youth who walked with me to warn their peers about HIV/AIDS. Lloyd (18) and Gugu (22) are friends who volunteered their time as part of the red-shirted conference crew. I spoke at their church youth meeting in the black township of Umlazi and they have become active PeerCorps workers. Nolan, an 18 year-old who assisted the Conference photographers, as did Aurelia, 15, invited me to speak in their respective schools and share the delights of Indian curry at Nolans parent's house. Michael (23) and Christopher (16) took me through their mixed-race township of Wentworth to meet youth after first speaking to their church's youth group the night before.
"Siblings Lee (17) and Stacey (13) invited me to meet their schoolmates after a poolside discussion with neighbors David, Damien and Steve in the upscale, white neighborhood of Westville. Faith, a 31 year-old single mother of one and newspaper reporter, escorted me to Banbanyi, a squatter camp north of Durban after doing a story about my global walk coming to South Africa. She has since set up her own effort to share news with other HIV positive mothers. Mohammed, a 15 year-old from Johannesburg was in town to help his granny at her small restaurant where Dr. John had lunch. He spoke of the need to inform his soccer buddies about HIV. There were the young Afrikaner sailors, Marc and Sakel, interested in learning the facts about the sexual transmission of HIV to tell their fellow seamen before boarding their training cruise to Capetown. And there were Pamela and Princess (both 17) who gave up their window-shopping at the Umlazi Center to hear about AIDS so they could tell their girlfriends. Ayanda (19) and Tambeso (19), security guards at the conference, took me to their Zulu township of Kwa-Mashu; while surfers Collin and Glendell brought me to their white working class neighborhood of Austerville. Msizi, 21 and underemployed, was my guide to the Zulu homelands in the countryside hundreds of kilometers north of Maritzburg and Greytown.
Near the end of my outreach in South Africa, I wanted to bring all of these great young people together as one PeerCorps team in their neighborhoods but that was still too much to do in South Africa with many issues from apartheid still remaining. But we all gathered together for a pizza and coke party at North Beach before I left. Thirty two youth came representing the spectrum of South African life. My last message to them, "HIV/AIDS is your battle now. Let the older people squabble over history but you concentrate on the future -- and that is your right to lead healthy lives free of AIDS. Your job is to spread the word as widely as possible."
Eighteen year olds Barry and Pierre, then the official youth mayor of Durban, did a lot to keep the group together and speaking at area schools. Pierre now seves on our Global Board.