SOFIA AND THE MISFORTUNE OF THE HIV/AIDS

‘READ ME’ - MOTIVE

The topic of this literature textbook classed this text in a different category from the usual norm of playwriting. This is due to its sensitive subject matter and its targeted readers in both Europe and the developing world, who needed more information to fully understand the play and benefit from its educational contents.

The need to understand the basic knowledge about HIV/AIDS cannot be over emphasize in our world today. HIV/AIDS knowledge is power. So please, encourage yourself to read on.

Who can tell me the origin of HIV/AIDS?

Not I, said the engineer. Not I, said the farmer. Not I,

said the English, French, German, Chinese and Japanese

Teacher. I will try, said the Biologist:

It is what people do in their passionate moments in their secluded domains, said the engineer. Drug users and drunkards doing the wrong things in their passionate moments, said the teacher and the farmer.

HIV/AIDS originated from the African monkeys, said the medical researcher. Since he is the most credible in this field, the World communities upheld his assertion and views.  Right or wrong, the discussion is no longer based on the origin of the disease: the world communities’ concentration now is based on the search for an effective and reasonably priced medicine, and cure of the pandemic disease.

Of all the identified diseases in the world, HIV/AIDS is the most obscure, and the most difficult to understand by the common man.  I share with the Scientists’ position, as they wrestle with their emotions, and sympathies for the victims. The bigotry accusations avoidance must have influenced the final research conclusion to include the African monkey as the original carrier.

The scientists would have saved us all the hassles of trying to find out the origin of AIDS, if they would have simply coined a statement stating that some German, Russian, British or United States scientists had developed a potent virus, injected all the Prisoners of War (POW), and released them into society.

That would have been a probable cause for food for thought for the common man, including curious children who wanted to know more about the dreaded disease.

I first visited a former school colleague of mine who had contracted the AIDS Virus in 1989. I met Joe, as he would like to be called, at the California State University, Hayward, California. We studied and socialized together throughout our school days. After graduation we went our separate ways. He got a job at a Credit Card processing Bank in San Mateo, while I secured a job at Bank of America in the same city.

Joe’s parents informed me of his terminal health condition in early 1989. My first visit to the hospice after I saw him changed my position about the dreaded disease from intolerant to tolerant, compassionate, with a commitment to help the cause. What kind of help?  I had no idea.

I could not sleep for days on end, as I was preoccupied with the question of how I could be useful in fighting the AIDS epidemic. That was when I started looking for reading materials, but at that time, apart from a dictionary meaning, there were very few or no writings on the AIDS subject, which only emerge on the scene in the early 1980’s. The more I thought about the issue, the more I believed I should do something that would make a difference, because too many innocent people were dying of the epidemic.

The present generation is living in a world at risk. Most importantly, the world should build upon our younger generation’s understanding of this deadly disease, so that they can be ambassadors of HIV/AIDS education to their respective families and friends. Technology and the new age scientific accomplishments have made young adults and teenagers less and less interested in reading to obtain pertinent information in the 21st century, and for years to come.  This unprecedented short-span attention in reading by our children is certainly a cause for concern. They can spend time on end in front of the television with equal intensity of attention without fatigue. This concerns and other factors spurred me to write this play for theatrical and audiovisual production. I do believe that bringing this controversial topic of the century and centuries yet to come to the classrooms and theaters will assist the younger generation to make

well-informed life decisions.

With the conviction that I have something to contribute, I penned research strategies. I began my research at the San Francisco General Hospital, in San Francisco, California. This was the AIDS Service Center in the West Coast in the mid 1980’s.

I also worked with the “University of Hard-knocks” (street experience) at the San Francisco Polk Street strip, Oakland’s San Pablo street, and Broadway Street. There I had two scuffles with my interviewees, and I lost two cameras at the hands of roughnecks. 

My most terrifying moment came on May 25th 1996; I was sleeping in my room at 6534 El Capitan Circle, in Stockton, California, when I heard the most frightening sound of my life outside my room door.