The members of Tianjin Hai He had 3 good reasons to celebrate the Mid Autumn Festival - their T-cells are good, their group is going strong and growing and they have a new office. The new office will allow the members of the support group them to meet regularly.
Tianjin Hai He extends its feepest gratitude to its generous donors.
The “Bird’s Nest” was not the only shiny new building which debuted for the Olympics. On the south of the city an equally impressive structure has just opened to the public, the very grand South Railway Station. The curves of the new structure are as interesting as those of the much talked of stadium and one feels as if one is in a very modern airport rather than anything as mundane as a the terminus of a rail system. In fact, this is one end of the new fast connection to Beijing’s port city, Tianjin which was unveiled without much fanfare in the days leading up to the Games Opening Ceremony. It may never become as iconic a building as its sporting cousin, but it is perhaps more significant in the long run.
It has become a commonplace for commentators to remark of the scale of the “new Beijing” and it is indeed impressive. My interest in the South Station, and the trains that depart from there is more personal. Fourteen years ago, my first train journey in China was to Tianjin from the main Beijing Station. I remember the taste of coal on the morning air, a ticket that was double the price paid by Chinese nationals and a two hour journey to Tianjin, alone in the rather faded splendour of the “soft seat coach”. In the years since, all of those images have been consigned to the history books. The coal briquettes, whose dust clung to my lungs, have been banished from the city. The special pricing for foreigners has been dropped, and now we must purchase our tickets from the automatic dispensers like the rest of humanity. The train, which would look well alongside anything the French can produce, whisked us to Tianjin in 30 minutes and even the expensive seats are all full.
Many of the changes have been gradual and almost imperceptible, but this latest “Great Leap Forward” is on a different scale. The old Beijing Station has been buffed up numerous times since my first encounter, but, despite the increasing amount of marble and the introduction of a greater variety of concessionary shops, it remains, at heart, a rather clunky leftover from early communist era architecture. It clientele too, remain equally proletarian. Women and men from all corners of China pass though its doors daily, carrying their dreams packed in fertiliser bags. Beijing acts as a magnet for the rural poor and, even without the Statue of Liberty, the main Station is their “Elis Island” entry point to the land of dreams. The South Station is a different world, all glass and steel, with gentle curves and a light airy sensibility. It is the Beijing Terminus of one of the fastest trains in the world, linking Beijing with its shy twin Tianjin. It is full of commuting urbanites, with narry a fertiliser bag in sight. Instead, all is self-confident, sophisticated bustle and unreservedly an urban experience; odd in a country in which most people are still farmers or from farming backgrounds.
The new Station remains a work in progress, only a few of the platforms are in use, the connection to the Beijing Subway has not yet open and some of the food concessions have not opened to the public. The incompleteness rather detracts from the full experience of the new communications hub. However, if the main Station was a monument to the aspirations of the New China in the latter half of last century, the South Station is a very eloquent suggestion of where China wants to go in the first half of this one. Thank God to live in interesting times!
You can read Part One HERE
Bricks came to know about Tianjin Hai He through Sr. Claire Zhai who used to be a volunteer worker for The Red Ribbon Foundation in Ditan Hospital in Beijing. I asked Sr. Claire what she thought about working with persons with HIV/AIDS. Simply put, her answer, which she gave in Chinese, was that it was not a job. Watching her, I noticed that’s how she behaved. She had this easy going and relaxed manner with the group. She didn’t impose either nor does she treats herself like some “visitor” or “guest”. She’s just there. Sr. Claire is a Catholic nun who has been involved with AIDS work for more than three years, first with Ditan as a volunteer worker and now through Jinde doing consultancy work with AIDS support groups like Tianjin Hai He. Not only did she introduce the group to Bricks but she also introduced the group to the local church where they regularly meet. Sr. Mary Yang, one of the sisters in the Tianjin Cathedral, know Sr. Claire and her work with PLAs. She got in touch with Sr. Claire and offered the group a meeting room in the cathedral which they could use for their regular meetings.
Not all the members of Tianjin Hai He are like Xiao Xuen, Da Hua and Li Hu. There are also the quiet ones, the ones who are still coming to terms with them being HIV+, like Mr. Liu. He only found out two months ago and I could still see that from his interaction with the group, he was a bit reserved and quiet and perhaps even a bit afraid. It was his first time to go to a public meeting with the other members through Da Hua and Li Hu’s persuasion. During the interview, he says that he was thankful for having found a support group that could actually understand his situation. He is somehow fortunate to have found Tianjin Hai He.
Not everyone living with HIV/AIDS is fortunate enough to find a support group like Tianjin Hai He. A joint study by the WHO, UNAIDS and the Chinese Health Ministry estimates that are 700,000 Chinese living with HIV/AIDS, which accounts to .05% of the population. Although education and awareness has fast been improving in the past decade especially with the top leaders in the government putting priority on the issue, this does not translate to the change in perception of HIV/AIDS among many Chinese. The stigma that comes with the disease is the more debilitating factor than the disease itself. One becomes faceless with HIV/AIDS. And “face” is important in Chinese culture. “Losing face” means to temporarily lose a certain sense of propriety and pride which the Chinese hold so dear. With HIV/AIDS, the “lost of face” goes to a whole new level, it becomes permanent. PLAs are “removed of the face”. They become faceless. They don’t exist. In many cases, coming out in the open is a social death sentence. Not all families are as accepting. Not all employers are as understanding. Not all hospitals are as accommodating. With HIV/AIDS, one becomes the unwanted guest in the family, a liability in the workplace and a mere statistic in the medical profession. .05% of the population does not exist because of AIDS and support groups like Tianjin Hai He become the sanctuary for men and women living with HIV/AIDS as many of them become all of the above.
With a regular venue, the sisters’ support and backing from the local CDC, Tianjin Hai He has evolved into a more organized, established and secure group. They have a hotline where members who are not yet ready to face other members can call for counseling and advice. They have a website/blog (managed by Xiao Xuen), an email address and a QQ messenger account for Internet and web gatherings. Recently, Li Hu attended a major training conference about cultivating AIDS support groups like Tianjin Hai He. I was impressed. What Fr. Loftus noticed was the business card that Li Hu handed out to everybody. It was nothing fancy, but it was a Tianjin Hai He business card. It meant that they were serious. It’s a good omen. The group plans to network with other AIDS support groups and they are being encouraged by the sisters and the local CDC to do so. It is very evident that knowledge about treatment and ways to prevent infection are not the only things that matter when someone has HIV/AIDS, it’s also connecting with other PLAs. From what I saw that day, the latter is more important than the former.
The disease and the social and emotional complications that comes along with it seem to have made a unique bond between these men. I looked at them during the meeting and I saw fear, yes, but not as much fear as I thought one would possess when one is faced with HIV and AIDS. As I looked at them I saw other emotions too. Like joy when Da Hua told the group that he has finally told his family that he is HIV+ and the family is dealing with it and slowly learning to understand it. I saw concern on their faces when one member, Yun Ming was telling the side effects of his new cocktail drugs. Each was willing to share their experience that might help him deal with it better. I also saw hope in their eyes. I also saw hope in their eyes when they were talking with us, especially with Sr. Claire. I saw the same hope when they thanked Sr. Mary who had offered them the room to use on a regular basis. It was the same hope that I saw when they were talking to CDC representative who regurarly come to their meetings. People like them give them hope that Chinese people can actually accept them without any sort of judgment and that they actually understand. Hope that translates to many things like living this reality they call AIDS and that happiness is possible. As Da Hua pointed out to us “The past doesn’t matter anymore. We must think of tomorrow.” Living with AIDS doesn’t have to mean the end. Life after AIDS is possible. I see it in the faces of these men.
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At first glance, Xiao Xuen, a twenty one year-old Tianjin native (China’s third largest city) is what you would call the quintessential modern urban Chinese youth. He is into the latest European male fashion, head to foot. His hairstyle is very Japanese. He is web savvy and maintains a blog of his own. And like the rest of China’s growing urbanized youth, Xiao Xuen is very sure of himself. You can tell this from his demeanor and even with the way he held his pen while I was interviewing him. However, there are two distinct qualities that make Xiao Xuen different from the rest from his peers – one is that he’s gay and the other is that he recently found out that he is HIV+. He is not alone in this. That day in Tianjin, where I was asked by Fr. Loftus, to come along to meet with an AIDS support group that will soon become a brick project for the Great Wall Appeal, I met 5 HIV+ gay men who were under 30. I must say that the experience upon these men and the people who support them was quite different from what I expected.
Xiao Xuen found out that he was HIV+ on the same day as the Wenchuan Earthquake. He went to a hospital in Tianjin complaining about a rash on his left leg, but didn’t expect that he was going to be diagnosed with HIV that day. True to his form, he did what any young Chinese urbanite would do in a time of personal crisis, he went online to look for any sort of solace in the thousands upon thousands of online forums that exist in the Chinese cyberspace. That’s how he found about Tianjin Hai He, an HIV/AIDS support group of gay PLAs in Tianjin that helps persons with HIV/AIDS like Xiao Xuen on how to deal and live with the disease.
Sitting around the conference the table with these 12 men and watching how they interact with each other, I began to realize that Tianjin Hai He is more of a community than a group. It is rather unique in a sense from other AIDS support groups because it was organized and founded by two of its members, Da Hua and Li Hu, who are both HIV+. It is a very young community itself, just 6 months old. Before 2008, Da Hua and Li Hu had sporadic one to one meetings in public parks with other gay men who were struggling to come to terms with being HIV+. Their discussions not only focused on education about the disease but also on support and counseling which many Chinese PLAs badly need. With more people asking for help, the need for a better and more secluded place for regular meetings became obvious. They looked for sponsorship from various NGOs. Bricks was one of the very few that responded.
Tianjin Hai He had very humble but inspiring beginnings. Da Hua and Li Hu were both products of Ditan Hospital’s Red Ribbon Foundation in Beijing. The Red Ribbon Foundation provides counseling and support to persons living with AIDS/HIV. Many of the people who seek solace from The Red Ribbon come from many parts of China. Da Hua, who is pushing 60, was inspired by the work of the sisters and health workers in The Red Ribbon Foundation. He is a frequent visitor of The Red Ribbon. He makes it a point to go to Beijing from Tianjin to get his medication at Ditan Hospital. Although he tells us that there are hospitals in Tianjin that actually cater to “people with his disease” (his words), he prefers going to Ditan Hospital where the Red Ribbon Foundation is located because there he doesn’t get the “looks”. “Ditan’s Red Ribbon Foundation has a more personal feel to it”, Da Hua says. “If I could only bring this kind of support that the Red Ribbon Foundation gives to us to Tianjin then it would not only be helping me but also a lot of people infected with AIDS in Tianjin.” That’s how Tianjin Hai He began. With Li Hu’s sense of management and leadership and Da Hua’s charismatic personality the two were able to persuade other PLAs in Tianjin to actually face and deal with the reality of the disease, not alone, but with a community.
To date, Tianjin Hai He has 22 members and is still growing. They have different age, social and economic backgrounds. In an ordinary situation, you would not find these men in one room discussing anything. In Tianjin Hai He, the overall feel of the group is quite relaxed, familiar and friendly. It seems to me that the disease is not the the only important topic in their gatherings. I even dare to think that it comes second or third. They talk about the education and ways of preventing infection, and the problems that they face in their families and workplace, yes. But I think the more vital thing that occurs in these meetings is that each of the members experience a sense of the mundane. They talk about the latest gossip and the television shows that they have been glued to lately. They make fun of each other’s mannerisms, clothing and speaking. They don’t come to these meetings to lament at the fact that they have HIV/AIDS. They come to these meetings to experience the mundane aspects of life together. They cherish the ordinary things, mundane things that many people, people like me, have taken for granted.
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