How African grandmothers are saving their continent

Facing fear together
As we continued to talk and build a rapport, Mary revealed her greatest fear: she's HIV-positive, and she's terrified that if she dies, her 19-year-old daughter will be left alone with five children to support. Up until this year, women over age 45 were never tested for HIV. So the grannies themselves are often HIV-positive but don't know it.

Although Mary is one of the “lucky” ones -- she has access to life-prolonging antiretroviral drugs due to a new program in the large centres in Kenya -- she worries about the future.

And that's where the Grandmothers' Gathering comes in. The initiative had brought together 100 grandmothers from 13 countries in sub-Saharan Africa and 200 Canadian grandmothers, who had contacted the SLF to see if they could help these women who are raising their orphaned grandchildren.

Overcoming differences
The three-day event was one of the most emotional and exciting times of my life. We grandmothers overcame language differences through age-old African traditions such as singing, music and dancing. We cheered and whistled when Stephen Lewis delivered his inspiring opening address, and when an African granny dressed in a bright yellow-and-green dress invited Stephen to dance, we all got into the spirit, clapping and laughing enthusiastically.

I was awed not just by the energy the African women brought to the Gathering but by their resilience and commitment. Many of them were from South Africa, and they had fought for justice and against apartheid while raising their children and earning a living. Now, in the face of one of the world's worst pandemics, these same women are holding the continent together.

Instead of having a well-deserved rest, they are actively parenting again, on their own and
with few resources -- often without even basics such as food to feed
their families.

Harsh realizations
Since the organizers understood that many of the participants live with food deprivation, they were careful not to have what we'd consider a conspicuous amount at the meetings. During breaks, there was coffee, juice, fruit, energy bars and yogurt, which I thought was appropriate since it is basic healthy food. But to the African women it was an abundant feast. To at least one woman from Uganda this abundance was overwhelming: while all this food was there for the taking, she was painfully aware that her children and grandchildren were home in Africa hungry, with only a rice patty to eat. I thought about how I love to cook with my grandsons, and how I take it as a given that my children and grandchildren will be well fed.

Certainly, I felt sad about the food, but I was in for another shock when we Canadian grandmothers heard about “widow cleansing.” This traditional practice forces a new widow to have sexual relations with either a designated village “cleanser” or with a relative of her late husband; purportedly it's to help the widow break with the past, but it's also an attempt to establish ownership of the deceased man's property -- including his wife.

One African woman recounted how the grandmother group in her village had banded together and refused to have sex with a cleanser who was HIV-positive. “We used to say we would die for our traditions,” she said. “And we all may truly die if we don't stop this one.” So they would no longer have to rely on the men in the village for support, they had borrowed funds from a development program to create a brick-making business.

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