| Thembi | |
| TimeCode | Audio |
| 00:02:08 | My name is Desmond Tutu. No country in the world has been harder hit by the aids epidemic than South Africa. More than 5 million South Africans are living with HIV the virus that causes aids. |
| 00:24:19 | Thembi Ngubane is one of them. She lives in the township of Khayelitsha just outside of Cape Town. A sprawling sea of houses and shacks made of wood, planks, tarpaper and sheets of tin. This is Thembi’s story. |
| 00:45:13 | Title - 'Thembi' |
| 00:51:01 | Hi, my name is Thembi Ngubane, I stay here in site B , Khayelitsha Makhaza and this is my neighbourhood…. and this is my neighbour. I am 21 years old this year and I was diagnosed HIV positive 4 years ago. |
| 01:17:19 | Ok now welcome to my house, this is where I stay. And this is my boyfriend Melikhaya, we have been together since 2003, since I have tested we have been together. And this is my Onwabo, “hello”. |
| 01:43:12 | Look how she smiles, hello look at her…. come , come my baby. She is comfortable look how she shows her two tiny teeth. My girl, my girl – look how she smiles. |
| 02:02:07 | Testing, testing, one two. Test test test. Hi this is Thembi, it is time for my prayer. Every morning when I wake up I will run off to my drawer, take out the mirror and look at my self. I say “Hello HIV you trespasser, you are in my body, you have to obey the rules, you have to respect me and if you don’t hurt me I wont you. You mind your business and I’ll mind mine. Then I will give you your ticket when your time comes." |
| 02:45:07 | Singing |
| 02:49:06 | We end this hour on a sad note, we learned today of the death of a remarkable young woman, her name was Thembi Ngubane and you first heard her on this programme 3 years ago. Ngubane lived in one of South Africa’s largest shantytowns and one of many things that made her special was that she was open about the fact that she had aids. |
| 03:14:12 | Singing |
| 03:27:10 | Thembi was born in Gugulethu in 1984 at NY 12, just right down the street. |
| 03:29:24 | Name super - Mbambeleli Mtshakazi Thembi's father |
| 03:39:17 | They told me at the hospital I have got twins, I was very scared, I couldn’t sleep until such day when I went to the hospital only to find out that it was just a tiny girl. |
| 03:42:05 | Name super - Nozizwe Ngubane Thembi's mother |
| 00:03:08 | I used to drive Fiat, was my cars. She used to say to me “Dada, when I am old I am going to buy for you another Fiat. I still remember that now when the time, the day we go to bury her I remember oh this kid promised me that dad a one day I will buy for you another Fiat. |
| 04:13:10 | My father was staying at his own house in Barcelona and we were staying with the grandfather. It was us, the grandchildren and my grandfather only, and he was strict. |
| 04:13:10 | Name super - Thembakazi Thembi's sister |
| 04:25:20 | I was also scared of the grandfather because the grandfather used to chase me with a whip when I went to visit Thembi’s father there. |
| 04:37:20 | In Gugulrethu we were like a family that is under a person that he is the one that “I am the person of this house and nobody is going to live their rules, this is my rules. |
| 04:39:08 | Name super - Thembella Thembi's sister |
| 04:50:01 | She did grow there until she was 14 years, when she was 14 years she did came back to me, she doesn’t want to stay there. |
| 04:52:09 | Name super - Princess 'Nana' Thembi's grandmother |
| 05:01:18 | In Khayelitsha we like play outside man because nana she is always busy and most of the time nana she was working our grandmother so when we were in Khayelitsha we were always alone. It’s me and Thembi and our small sisters like Nokuzola and our small brother Thulani and Nosiswe so she is the oldest one. More time me and her like she cooks and she does other things. |
| 05:03:16 | Name super - JJ 'Al Capone' Thembi's brother |
| 05:20:15 | Our grandmother she is at work so we get more time to play or be with friends. |
| 05:23:14 | In Khayelitsha there was that freedom, that’s why she wanted to stay in khayelitsha because she knows that she is going to get away with a lot of things. Like here she wont get away with anything. |
| 05:49:00 | My friend she was involved with Thembi’s friend you know? So in that time my friend invited me to go and see her girlfriend. When I went there I saw Thembi, but Thembi, she already knew me in that time. We just fell in love, just like that just because I was a cute guy. All the ladies wanted me you know. |
| 05:50:00 | Name super - Melikhaya Thembi's boyfriend |
| 06:15:11 | I met him in 2002 in February and we met at the hair salon. I was working as a hairdresser and he was still in school and since he was kind of not too much of a talking guy so I spoke for myself. That was the most embarrassing moment now when I think back. |
| 06:33:22 | In that time we were loving each other and Thembi she was so beautiful. |
| 06:46:06 | In kasi you must have a good beautiful lady so they guys they wouldn’t know you, you are a king, ingwenya, they said so. You are the lion, you know. |
| 06:56:04 | This is Melikhaya, my boyfriend. Say hi -‘Hi’ I was telling them how cute you look. Melikhaya is obsessed with music. Come Melikhaya, lets dance. |
| 07:13:09 | Singing and dancing. |
| 07:22:23 | Our relationship became stronger and stronger and you know we became closer but not knowing that we were facing these challenges, we were having sex and enjoying ourselves and doing all the kind of reckless stuff that youngsters do. |
| 07:38:02 | Singing. |
| 07:44:10 | Well I was 16, yeah I was doing grade 12 and you know I was healthy, pretty, you know I was hot, I can say that, I was very very very very hot! 2002, when I think about that year that’s where at first I used to think that year almost really ruined my life. |
| 08:14:17 | I am going to tell you how I was infected, I had this boyfriend and then we broke up, a year later I heard that he had died. When I went to his house his family was gathered there. ‘I said what happened, was he shot or was he stabbed.’ ‘No he was sick.’ That’s when I started to get very worried. |
| 08:37:02 | I went to the clinic, they bring all the equipment in front of me and just prick me on my finger. They said when your blood looks like this it means you have the virus. You are HIV positive. |
| 08:51:21 | She called me, ‘Melihkaya where are you?’ I said, “I’m at my house, you know me man. And she said can you please meet me between Jo Slovo and Khayelitsha stadium? I said I am coming baby and I asked her what’s wrong?’ And she said I must just come. I met her there and she wasn’t wearing any shoes, she was carrying her shoes like she was running. Maybe she was running I don’t know. |
| 09:29:00 | She told me that she had to tell me something and I said what? Whats going on with you? |
| 09:37:03 | From the love life centre I came straight and I met him by the school. I met him there and I told him that I had just come from love life and they said I am HIV positive, just like that. I just told her that it’s ok, just like that and then she went back and I just hug her. And I said ‘Hey baby it’s ok’. In my mind I was thinking about how long I am going to live. |
| 10:06:23 | I went through hell you know. I disclosed to him and he came home and he didn’t know what HIV was what AIDS was. He just told his mother and now everything was like a mess. In that time I was so crazy and then scared. Sometimes I would just look at myself and say “baby, I’m getting thin’’ but it’s just my body. |
| 10:28:04 | They locked me in this room, they called everyone to come and everyone was like shouting at me all those things were happening and that made me stronger and then I said ‘’O.K.’’. |
| If this is the way that an HIV person has to live then I am not going to take this route any more. I am going to fight for my battles and I am going to fight for my life, I am not ashamed. Everyone can just get HIV without knowing. | |
| 10:48:23 | We separated for I think a week or two and I just go back to Thembi and said I can understand now, I can go with you to the support group, let me be supportive to you because nothing is going to change, I am also going to get tested. |
| 11:21:05 | Radio - Manto Tshabalala-Msimang says President Thabo Mbeki’s government will make sure that traditional healers will be recognised as professional doctors. |
| 11:30:18 | Screen text - 5.5 million people are living with HIV in South Africa |
| 11:40:02 | We used to go to marches trying to persuade and pressurise our government to buy anti retro drugs for patients because people were dying. We said, “if you can afford to buy medication for high blood pressure, diabetes and epilepsy. This is also another chronic illness”. |
| 11:40:05 | Name super - Nompumelelo Mantangana Manager Site B AIDS clinic Khayelitsha |
| 11:48:17 | Screen text - 2.5 million people have died from AIDS |
| 11:52:24 | Screen text - 30% of pregnant women are HIV+ |
| 12:01:09 | For many, the prospect of a longer life may seem more like a punishment than a gift . |
| Name super - Thabo Mbeki President | |
| Screen text - 500 000people are still not getting ARV's | |
| I am sure you are aware of studies that show that ARV’S and African potato don’t interact well. | |
| 12:15:24 | We have got a constitution at home, if people chose to use traditional medicine and that’s why we are doing research to make sure that it is safe. Why not give them their choices? |
| Name super - Manto Tshabalala-Msimang Health Minister | |
| Screen text - 300 000 people have died as a result of the Government not distributing ARV's | |
| 12:26:07 | ’FIRE MANTO NOW. FIRE MANTO NOW’’! |
| 12:33:11 | Remember Anti Retro Virals do not cure HIV and AIDS, I hope it is clear by now. |
| 12:35:10 | Screen text - 400 000 South Africans will die within the next year of AIDS |
| 12:42:24 | You know those are really the darkest days of South Africa under the leadership of Manto Tshabalala. She came to Khayelitsha but she was coming for all the wrong reasons. She was coming to talk about the vegetables, the garlic, the potatoes. |
| 13:05:00 | She was just brainwashing the people because those things don’t help. If the garlic and the African potato can help, there are a lot of African potatoes in South Africa, then everyone who got AIDS would be cured already because we have got a lot of African potatoes. |
| 13:26:04 | I met Thembi in 2004 and I was in Khayelitsha interviewing a bunch of young people who were affected by AIDS in some way and was thinking about doing a documentary but I remember thinking at the time that I wasn’t sure that I wanted to do this big project about AIDS. Until I met Thembi and Melikhaya and I was interviewing her and asking her a bunch of questions and she told me about her HIV prayer which is when she would look in the mirror and talk to her HIV virus and give it commands and orders. |
| Screen text - Joe Richman Radio Diaries Producer | |
| 13:51:04 | I remember thinking at the time it was kind of powerful and a poetic way to deal with her disease. And it was then that I realised that I wasn’t going to do a documentary about AIDS, I was going to do a story about Thembi. And I went back to her about a week later and I said “Would you carry around a tape recorder and document a year in your life? A way to tell the story of AIDS through the eyes of one young person who is actually going through it. And she said yes.” |
| 14:21:03 | Hi guys it’s Thembi again. Today I am going to take a walk with you around my neighbourhood. As you can see a lot of people are living in shacks and people feel like the government is not doing anything because a lot of people don’t have houses. There are a lot of us here in Khayalitsha that are sick but the people don’t disclose people do talk, do point, people do whisper. And sometimes if they hear that someone is HIV positive, they burn your house down. So that you can’t stay there anymore. |
| 14:45:01 | So here in Khayelitsha, especially when you talk about HIV, you talk about a big thing because they know that everyone here is at risk of contracting it but still there is a lot of discrimination and stigma going around. |
| 15:02:00 | I have never ever in my life kept like a written diary or a tape recorder anything like that, so for me it was like someone that really listens and does not talk back, not even judges you. The tape recorder, it was always there when I needed it, I could cry and say anything and the tape recorder will never take whatever I said and gossip about me or laugh at me. So I felt like there was someone very special and I felt very comfortable talking to the tape recorder. |
| 15:29:07 | I met Thembi for the first time in consultation actually in Ubuntu clinic a bit further down the road and she had a low CD4 count and she was not on the ARV’S and I remember she was walking with this little microphone because she was taping herself. |
| 15:34:01 | Name super - Dr Gilles van Cutsem Medecins Sans Frontieres |
| 15:46:11 | Hi. |
| Hello. | |
| How are you? | |
| I’m fine thank you, how are you? | |
| I’m feeling great. | |
| I’ve known that I am HIV positive for 2 years, I am considered stage 4. When you are on stage 4 you are not HIV positive anymore, they say you have got AIDS. | |
| CD4 is an indication of how good your immune system still is. | |
| Yes I know. | |
| You know it is going down all the time? | |
| Yes. | |
| And when it is below 200 it is dangerous for you. | |
| Yes I know, I was very surprised to know that my CD4 count was below 200 and at the same time I have never been sick. | |
| You are very much at risk of getting sick, it’s a bit like swimming in a lake where you have crocodiles and if you stay swimming along time at some point you are going to get bitten. | |
| OK, I understand. | |
| Are you sure? | |
| Yes I am sure. | |
| 16:48:24 | We had a serious chat “You are such a bright, educated girl and you have a low CD4 count, why are you not on the ARV’s yet?” |
| And she said yes I know now I really have to go on the ARV’s | |
| and I think a few weeks later she was started on the ARV’s. | |
| 17:15:01 | These are my ARV pills and I am going to take them for them for the rest of my life. |
| This is Effervescent and this is 3TC | |
| So I am taking these pills everyday at nine o’clock, I must take them at the same time. | |
| But in the morning I take only 2, I take D40 and I take 3TC and at night I take Effervescent and I take 3TC and I take D40. | |
| It is very difficult like to take pills everyday but when you know it’s something that you have to do if you want to live you just get used to it. | |
| At first it was hard for me to swallow the pills , I would just swallow them and swallow water the I would vomit . | |
| But then my boyfriend told me that I must not drink pills like that if I am going to drink them for the rest of my life, I must learn to drink the pills and accept that I must put the pill here, then swallow the water. | |
| 18:03:22 | I made a choice, ok I don’t think this thing will kill me if I could just talk to it, I don’t know, maybe some magic will happen. |
| I woke up in the morning and I just stood in the mirror convinced I was really powerful and I talked to HIV and I talked to it very well and I greeted it and I told it not to do anything bad to me today, it must keep me well. If it doesn’t do anything I won’t do anything to it, but one day it will get out and I am really good at drawing pretty stuff so I drew this really ugly picture of a monster but he is smiling, he is happy. So I draw it and I said to Melikhaya, ‘You know what I think HIV looks like?” and he said ‘What?” and I said “it looks like this!’ | |
| 18:49:01 | At first it was not even easy to go to a tavern, I would go to a tavern just to enjoy myself, just to sit there, and maybe I am alone I am not with Melikhaya and you can see people are whispering and talking and saying don’t even speak to her, she has AIDS you know? She came here to spread AIDS and people thought at first I was going to spread it and if people saw me standing with people and chatting they thought that maybe I was spreading it just because I always look nice, I always dress up. Just because I have HIV, I don’t have to be dirty so I always keep myself up and I am always confident and I am always in the spotlight and many people thought that maybe I was spreading it. And they were all telling rumours that, do you know that she has AIDS, not only did she give her boyfriend AIDS now she wants to give the whole community AIDS. |
| 18:49:01 | At first it was not even easy to go to a tavern, I would go to a tavern just to enjoy myself, just to sit there, and maybe I am alone I am not with Melikhaya and you can see people are whispering and talking and saying don’t even speak to her, she has AIDS you know? She came here to spread AIDS and people thought at first I was going to spread it and if people saw me standing with people and chatting they thought that maybe I was spreading it just because I always look nice, I always dress up. Just because I have HIV, I don’t have to be dirty so I always keep myself up and I am always confident and I am always in the spotlight and many people thought that maybe I was spreading it. And they were all telling rumours that, do you know that she has AIDS, not only did she give her boyfriend AIDS now she wants to give the whole community AIDS. |
| 19:40:09 | Singing ‘Melikhaya and Onwabo you are my sweethearts, Melikhaya and Onwabo you are my sweethearts’…. |
| 19:46:21 | In that time, I was a boy in that time. I didn’t even go to the bush to be a man you know. They said “Hey man, if you don’t do a child to Thembi you are going to lose her.” They say ya, you must do a child with Thembi and I said hey I think about this thing. These guys tell me the truth. I must make a child with her so that I can keep her, a child is not a ring. Singing ‘I love you with life, I love you with death, you are my sweethearts, I love you with life, I love you with death, you are my sweethearts’ |
| 20:23:02 | I talked to Melikhaya and he said “Ya mum I am listening to you, I wont make Thembi pregnant.” Ok Melikhaya, carry on it’s your life my child but you must be careful because you can see me I am suffering. Your father doesn’t work, it is only me working to support you. |
| Name super - Gertrude Pumela Melikhaya's Mother | |
| 20:57:00 | It was in 2003 she fell pregnant and maybe I was so lucky she fell pregnant and then Onwabo was born I was so glad to have this lovely daughter you know. To me it was a blessing. |
| 21:19:14 | Singing ‘We won’t perish because of AIDS’. |
| My daughter Onwabo is a big influence in my life because I feel that I am living for her because when I look at her I just have a reason to live, she is the joy of my life. | |
| I know what people might be thinking but Onwabo is fine. They gave me a drug called AZT when I was in labour, she has been tested and she is HIV negative. | |
| 21:51:09 | I am a light sleeper, I sleep late at night and it is hard for me to wake up. When the baby is crying, she doesn’t want to wake up some times. Sometimes when the baby is crying and wants the nappy to be changed I just cry and say “ahh, why did you pee, why did you pee.” now look . I must wake up, I must wake up. I don’t want to wake up, I just want my sleep, MY BEAUTY SLEEP. I think I deserve it. At least, not 8 hours of sleep, I think I deserve 20 hours of sleep. |
| 22:36:01 | I am just imagining what this world will be like without me. I am not scared of dying but I am scared of not being here. Leaving my baby behind. Melikhaya, do you ever wish that maybe you had never met me? No. The thing is that I love you. You know that. Yes, but I am the one who has infected you. I don’t want to blame you. You didn’t go on top of the mountain and say you want to have AIDS and I don’t want you to blame yourself. Just be strong. Ok, what scares me most is that I think we are not going to die at the same time . I know that you think if you die first I am going to have another girlfriend! No, nothing like that! Give me a kiss for that. |
| 23:41:02 | When we are in a taxi, coming from town and people are talking about HIV, Thembi just told them that we are an HIV positive couple and we have a child who is HIV negative. So what can I say, ‘Thembi was a hero!’ |
| 24:03:08 | I want people to see that my life has not been cut up because I have HIV. I can still have a baby that will be HIV negative and my baby will still grow up and be healthy like any other normal child. People should not see HIV as a stop to their life or as an obstacle that they can never move, it is just a rock that you have to pick up and put it aside and just walk on. |
| 24:19:16 | When Thembi got really sick in 2005 I think 2 things happened. One, she got on ARV’s which saved her life and two I think it was at that point she decided she didn’t want to hide any more and in fact she wanted her story to be heard by as many people as possible and I think that was the time when we all hatched the idea of doing a tour of the United States and South Africa . |
| 24:47:15 | Ya Ya. Now we are going to America, and it is our first time to fly and our first time to go over seas you know. Singing – ‘But everyone has a story, telling it with glory, touching the hearts of everybody, she was a hero, and she didn’t die by the knife, and I don’t blame her, that’s how life is.’ |
| 24:56:18 | I am here in New York and it’s been 2 days since I arrived and I am very happy. Singing – ‘My friend who lives positive with this virus, this demon’. I came with my boyfriend Melikhaya, we are from Khayelitsha. Say hi. Hi! It is really a miracle because I never thought that I would stay in a hotel and this is the bed and it is very huge, as you can see I am used to very small beds. A very big mirror. And we also have a TV, everything is nice. We also have a kitchen so it is just like a house. This is the bathroom and it is nice to take a bath because it is so big, I feel like a star. Singing – ‘Thembi Ngubane fighting for her right to live with AIDS, this will infection will do nothing to me!’ |
| 25:49:19 | It was my first flight, my first time out of South Africa. Singing – ‘As time went by she had to go by places, talking this, talking that, talking about her status, to everyone that she knows that is close, she said her goodbyes, she was nice, she was wise, every time Melikhaya is at her side he says hold on baby together we will fight, you are my best friend girl no matter what, I know at the end it is going to be alright’’ |
| 26:16:17 | So now I am waiting but I really don’t feel like going out, I think have got a little fever. |
| 26:21:10 | Ah, whats up Thembi, its R Kelly and I just wanted to say hello to you, I’m chilling in my home town Chicago. That’s far away but at the same time it is close because I got you right here in my heart baby and I just wanted to say that I am thinking about you I am praying for you and I want you to know that I love you. |
| 26:39:15 | Today is my first day in D.C. Hi guys, guess what? I am in Boston and I am visiting this studio. It is 9pm so I have to take my pills as usual. Singing – ‘She was a mother and a youth, a leader and a truth, she was living proof, for the whole neigbourhood, from Khayelitsha to Gugulethu, to the whole world she was known to be good, that is truth, no-one is perfect, even if they are obedient, but we see how good a person is through their actions’ |
| 27:14:22 | Abstinence discussions don’t work where you come from? No, because most of the teenagers where I live have already experienced sex because we don’t have anything to do that is fun. Sex is free, sex is fun and you can’t get arrested from having it. An important point! |
| 27:39:16 | Now I am going back to South Africa. It has been nice chatting with you guys and sharing everything with you. I just hope you will miss me because I will miss you. |
| 28:13:20 | “Kidus is in Johannesburg and I am in Cape Town, yes!” When we came back from America, everyone wanted to work with Thembi you know. Thembi this side, Thembi that side! So she didn’t have the time to relax and think sometimes. |
| 28:41:07 | I did the documentary for only the U.S. and there was a point when it came to my mind that I cannot do this for other countries. Why shouldn’t I come home and do it here also in South Africa? By that time I hadn’t decided whether I was going to show my true identity, my name and my true pictures. I wanted it all faded, just the story. But when I grew to love it I find that it wass so important for me to start here and also be here in South Africa. |
| 29:07:23 | From the beginning,HIV has come with a stigma because of the way it was introduced through sex so I think that stigma is always going to be there, It is going to be hard to break that stigma because if you want to beak that stigma then we should start talking about sex. If sex is a taboo in our homes then we wont break the AIDS stigma. |
| 29:25:20 | Screen text - South African Tour |
| 29:47:05 | Singing – ‘Who told you, who told you that AIDS is deadly, we don’t care what fortune tellers may say |
| 29:45:10 | I went back home and tried convincing him to go get tested, because it is best you know your status otherwise you just get sick and die. |
| 29:33:02 | Screen text - Thembi travelled 3655 kilometers visitng cities and villages across the land |
| 28:59:01 | I cannot say that a condom doesn’t make sense, they do make sense but when it comes to us teenagers, we are very ignorant. Every condom can come and then the rumours will come like if you use a condom then she is unfaithful, I don’t want to use a condom, it’s too small for me, I love you so much, you are the only one for me. |
| Screen text - Thousands of South Aricans saw her on TV and heard her on the radio | |
| 30:16:14 | If you have decided that now you want to have sex, you must know the consequences you are going to face after having sex. The most important part is to accept my status and find ways of living with it. |
| 30:27:19 | One thing with HIV and AIDS , I live around it, my family, most of them have it. But what I see in them is mostly anger. |
| 30:39:07 | This should be treated like any other disease, like flu or anything, we should stop lying. Please let’s come out in the open and talk openly about this thing. |
| 30:47:16 | I have disclosed to my daughter who is 17 years old now and it was very difficult for me but now we are just talking about everything. We are just talking openly about dying, about what is going to happen. |
| 31:02:01 | It is a situation where you are really depressed, I know having HIV is like death and no cure and there is really no cure and all these things that happen when you are HIV positive. When you are HIV positive and I am not scared to say this but you don’t live a normal life. You mustn’t take it as a curse, you must take it as a challenge because for I see it as something that I have to overcome. |
| 31:05:23 | Screen text - Thembi told her story to school children all over South Africa |
| 31:28:16 | If it was me standing in front of lots of people like that I would be standing there crying. She was just strong and told us about HIV. She even laughed about it, she made it as normal as possible. Ya, she was free. She was a teenager like us, she was doing things like us, she was at school, she was having sex, she had boyfriends, but nobody takes a minute and say “Ok, come I go test and see if I have got HIV and AIDS” and then she gave us that moment to think about all of the things I am doing, what are the consequences of it? |
| 31:46:11 | I believe that if someone like me, like Thembi had come to my school and talked to me, of course I would have reconsidered but no one came to my school and said they were HIV positive, and I did this and that. The only people that came to my school had pictures of half dead bodies and they told me that this person has HIV ADIS and if you have sex without a condom or many people, you will look like this and then you die. That was the message. |
| 32:28:17 | Thembi felt pretty comfortable going to schools, talking to high school students. She was always kind of scared of going and talking to politicians, she called them the big people. And so when we were invited to go and talk to parliament it was really exciting and it was really scary but one thing about Thembi is that once she got behind a microphone and started talking, she wasn’t nervous anymore, she just spoke her mind |
| 32:57:23 | She was not going to hold back. On the one hand they say you must eat the right foods, on the other hand it says take ARV’s, or do people understand that it is not an either or. You take your ARV’s and you look after your health in every other way. Do people understand that message? |
| 33:31:15 | All the billboards are out there, all the advertisement, everything is on TV, everything is on radio (PROTECT YOURSELF USE A CONDOM, STAY AWAY FROM HIV – SAVE YOUR LIFE- save this – save that, but it is all going through here and through there to the teenagers. No one is listening. The messages are being broadcast. But it was different when I stood up there as a human being and I am just like them, I am not a celebrity, I eat what they eat, I do what they do, but I stood up there and did something different, I said ‘’I HAVE AIDS’’. Which no one does? |
| 34:05:22 | When the Zuma thing came out, it really affected me because by that time I was in Chicago and people from the magazine came up to me and said ‘’you are from South Africa, have you heard?” And I had a comment but people were scared and they said ‘’Are you going to comment against the president?” I feel like it is my right to say what I feel like saying. I just said to the paper that “He is very dumb and he is talking bullshit!” |
| 34:27:01 | Screen text - 2010 am year after Thembi died . . . |
| 34:49:07 | There was one day when she came and she was like so thin and I said “Thembi you must stop drinking because you are getting too thin.” I tried to talk to her to tell her not to drink so hard but she said that she was not drinking too hard, I am just having fun and I like to let her have fun because she was my big sister. |
| 35:40:14 | In the township when you go to a tavern you will all hear stories, stories, stories about which girl you were going out with. It’s up to you what you do with your life. Yeah you know what, in township we don’t take things seriously, when you are a youngster. When you talk about HIV, its like you are talking about a fever, you will get treatment and then you will be fine. No one else will know that you are HIV positive unless I told you the truth. So actually it is like we don’t care, we take things very easily. |
| Name super - Thembi's friends | |
| 36:20:12 | We are here talking about Thembi, the last time we were sitting here there were 5 of us and now there is only 4 left. |
| 36:23:10 | My name is Patricia, I live in Khayelitsha, C section and I am a waitress at the commodore hotel. My name is Ayanda I live in C-section and I am unemployed. My name is Thembi I also live in C-section and I am also unemployed. My name is Babalwa I live in C section and I am unemployed. My name is Nolusindiso, I also live in Khayelitsha and I am employed. |
| 36:23:10 | Screen text - 2009 a year before Thembi's death . . . |
| 36:49:14 | Even in the townships there is racism among us, if they see you are dating a white guy you are a whore, you are a gold digger, you are with that guy for the money. You are a gold digger. Why? Because he is white I am a gold digger? You must date someone of your own race, a black person. You have got a right to date any one but you must a black person who looks like you. |
| Why? Because he is white I am a gold digger? | |
| You must date someone of your own race, a black person. You have got a right to date any one but you must a black person who looks like you. | |
| 37:02:02 | Why should I date a black guy, like you? Because we are the same and our love would be perfect. You can’t love a white person. Why? No! When you are dating a black person you are living your culture. You are going against your culture. Listen everything is changing. |
| 37:35:18 | We live in a country of diversity, everything is mix and match. Even you, you don’t know that your child wont be a Xhosa. Maybe you will go and make a baby with some coloured girl then you have this child with you don’t know who but she will still be your child. I will even date a foreigner it does not matter as long as I get love, as long as I am in love with that person. |
| 38:16:10 | I am giving you, I am giving you, I am giving you my penis. I am also giving you my vagina. No no man. It is 50/50 because you give me your penis, I give you my vagina. |
| 38:29:19 | If you tell a guy no you must use a condom he says, “ Have you ever eaten a banana with the peel? “ In biology they say if you have an erection then the blood doesn’t flow to your brain, it all goes down to your penis the blood doesn’t flow right here in the brain, so you are not thinking at that time. |
| 39:00:00 | We were partying a lot, also my mother used to tell us that we must stop drinking now. |
| 39:07:23 | There are difficulties to take your treatment when you are drunk because you won’t know the time and even though you know the time and you took your medication maybe you will overdose it or you will take different treatments, the ones that you are not supposed to take at that time. |
| Name Super - Vathiswa Kamkam Thembi's AIDS counsellor | |
| 39:30:12 | There is a time on a monthly basis when we retrieve defaulters. When I saw Thembi’s name in the defaulter list I was shocked so I went to retrieve her file and I phoned her and asked her ‘Where are you and why are you not coming to the clinic?’ She said to me that she was out of town and she would come in to see me and explain, we always give them the benefit if the doubt at the end of the day but when time passes and she is not coming back, you start to think “ What’s happening now”? |
| 40:01:04 | Sometimes I am very scared like when I feel sick, I know I am going to be better but it is something that is there, I can’t run away from it. So sometimes I am really afraid and when I call home and I tell them I am coughing, everyone freaks out. |
| 40:22:17 | I really had this impression of this girl who has been raised in the townships and then very suddenly becomes world famous is taken out. |
| 40:33:17 | We have got so many celebrities or activists who know exactly what is happening, who are defaulting. Then you don’t know what else to say to him or her because they understand all the tricks, they understand how the disease works, they understand the medication but at the end of the day I really think that it is pressure on them, they are overwhelmed by the fame. |
| 41:01:21 | Sometimes organisations don’t take enough care of their activists, they put them in front as an example and as a figure to go and educate others and they give a bit of support here and there but there is no-one providing real stability. |
| 41:21:22 | To say that Thembi was caught up in the celebrity of touring around the world, and of becoming a role model and all of that and she became kind of a victim of that it is condescending to Thembi, It implies that she was a passive participant in all of this, and if you know Thembi, you know that she wasn’t. She was strong willed and powerful and she knew what she wanted. |
| 41:50:10 | When I grew up I had that feeling that I would be famous or something but I just think I deserved it, because I worked for it. |
| 42:09:17 | I don’t want to lie, I knew she had stopped taking her medicine but for a reason. Sometimes Thembi was away and when she came back the people working in Khayelitsha clinic, they knew Thembi , that she was a star or something, but when you go there they are going to shout at you and say you quit and you think you are a star. They are going to shout at her, that is why, she was scared to go to the clinic. |
| 42:49:01 | She deserved to be shouted at, maybe not in a wrong way but in a rightful way so that she can take her medication again and again. And for a person having information like her, it was so unacceptable not to take the medication. |
| 43:11:18 | The pills I asked her why she doesn’t take them then she started to raise her voice and I said ok. Ok. She just told me that I am not the one taking the pills, she is the one taking the pills, I am not the one. She just said to me ‘No you don’t understand the situation with the pills, I have to take these pills the rest of my life so you don’t understand.’ So I just say its fine, I understand. |
| 43:54:12 | Thembi, but you are not what you are telling the world, you are telling the world this and your actions are something completely different from what you are telling the world, and how can the people out there believe in you because Thembi is a typical example of a person that will make the community say “Look, they are dying, the ARV’s are not working. |
| 44:23:09 | When I saw her I suspected she had TB and I sent her to hospital because she was very sick and to further investigate TB. The problem I think is that she was put on TB treatment at that time but because she had multi drug resistant TB that was not diagnosed yet, the TB drugs did not work, after having failing the TB treatment for while they must have tested for drug resistant TB and apparently it was difficult to find, so they took some time to find that it was drug resistant TB and then it was too late. |
| 45:02:11 | I kept on looking at how people stigmatise other people and how other people that are not strong, keep on falling down, and I didn’t want to be a victim, I didn’t want to be one of those people that are going to be stigmatised and go and just give up and just die and think that it is the end. I wanted to pursue my life and my dreams, I wanted to be here just like everyone else. |
| 45:27:03 | I had the thinking of when I find out that I am HIV I would kill myself but after she came I thought about it and I told myself that even if I am HIV I will plan my life and live a better life, a different life from what I was living before. |
| 45:57:07 | Singing - When the sun shines we shine together, told you I’ll be here forever and I am always going to be your friend, baby I am going to stick it out to the end. Now that it so raining more than ever, told you that we would hold each other. You can stand under my umbrella umbrella eh eh eh |
| 46:32:17 | Singing – ‘As a believer of life, only one has a story, telling it with glory, touching the hearts of everybody. This infection will do nothing to me that is what she told herself, she was positive indeed. Every time Melikaya is on her side. He says hold on baby, together we will fight. She was a mother and a youth, a leader and a truth. She was a living proof for the whole neighbourhood, from Khayelitsha to Gugulethu and the whole world she was know to be good, that is truth. Built her own family even though she was HIV deserving an award she was world VIP!' |
| 47:09:09 | Singing |
| 47:09:09 | Credits: |
| Director - Jo Menell | |
| Producer - Richard Mills | |
| Research - Thembella Dick | |
| Camera and Film Editor - Richard Mills | |
| Sound recordist - Ndumisano Sibindlana | |
| Animation - Jisoo Kim | |
| Final mix - Warrick Sony, Milestone Studio | |
| Vocal artists - Nomfusi & Waqa | |
| Graphics - Craig Keown | |
| Colourist - Kim Krause | |
| Special thanks - Joe Richman Tony Tabatznik | |
| Thanks - Anayansi, Carolyn Carew, Dr. Gilles van Cutsem, CNN, DAT, Angus Gibson, Gertrude, Guy Hubbard, JJ, Mbambeleli, Melikhaya, Nozizwe, NPR, Radio Diaries, Princess 'Nana', Sarah Crowe, Siyayingoba HIV/AIDS Archive, Thembakazi, UNICEF, ZAPIRO |